You shall further instruct the Israelites to bring you clear oil…for kindling lamps regularly (27:20). Reflecting on this commandment about kindling lights, medieval commentators offered two possible interpretations of the phrase ner tamid (literally “light regularly” but understood to mean “eternal lamp”). Rashi suggested it meant “routinely kindled,” while Nachmanides understood it as “continually burning.” In general, the latter interpretation—the image of an eternal, rather than a regularly kindled, light—predominated. In the rabbinic imagination, the eternal lamp of the synagogue recalled the menorah of Temple times, since rabbinic tradition associated the ner tamid with the westernmost or central lamp of the menorah in the Temple (Sifra Emor 13.7). In a poem composed for the occasion of this Torah reading, the Byzantine Jewish liturgical poet Yannai drew a parallel between the synagogue’s eternal lamp and that of the “woman of valor,” whose “lamp never goes out at night” (Proverbs 31:18).
The Rabbis understood the eternal lamp as an important symbol with multiple meanings. First, they associated the light with Torah. For example, BT B’rachot 57a teaches: “If one sees olive oil in a dream, one may hope for the light of the Torah, as it is written, You shall further instruct…” This association derives from Proverbs 6:23, which states: The commandment is a lamp / And the Torah is a light. The song “Torah Orah (The Torah is a Light),” popular in many contemporary synagogues during the Torah services, reflects this symbolism.
The Rabbis frequently represented the eternal lamp as symbolic of the divine presence, or Shechinah. In BT M’nachot 87b, the Rabbis wonder why God would need a light; they then deduce that the eternal lamp commemorated the divine light that had led Israel through the wilderness. The reason the eternal lamp was the “western lamp” was because “the divine Presence will never depart from the Western Wall” (Midrash Sh’mot Rabbah 2.2). Over time, the ritual of the Temple lamp was transferred to the home. Thus, Mishnah Shabbat 2:1 offers instructions for kindling Shabbat lights, which 2:6 then characterizes as a specifically female commandment. Yannai read those Mishnaic passages back into Exodus, linking the priestly rules for maintaining the Tabernacle’s lights with women’s command of hadlakat nerot, kindling lamps.
The eternal lamp was also understood in post-biblical Judaism as foreshadowing the light of the messianic age. The lamps described in this parashah were popular in Byzantine and medieval synagogue art. These images, themselves multivalent, may have both memorialized the Temple destroyed in 70 C. E. and also anticipated a time when the Temple lamps would be rekindled. As the poet Yannai wrote of those days to come, “And our light will no longer be quenched / and our flames no longer extinguished / and You shall be our everlasting light.”
The medieval mystical compilation Zohar (2:99b) offers a spiritual understanding of the ner tamid when it states that “ner” is an acronym for n’shamah-ruach (“soul-spirit”). Together, soul and spirit represent a perfect union of masculine and feminine. Together, they can bring forth light; but separated, they are powerless and in the dark.
Make sacral vestments for your brother Aaron (28:2). The Rabbis taught that each item of the head priest’s ritual garb possessed symbolic value. The fringed tunic atoned for bloodshed; the robe, for slander; the breeches, for sexual impropriety; the headdress, for arrogance; the frontlet, for brazenness; the sash, for impure thoughts; the breastplate, for neglect of the civil laws; and the ephod, for idolatry (BT Z’vachim 88b; Vayikra Rabbah 10.6; Shir HaShirim Rabbah 4.8). According to BT Sotah 36b, it was Joseph’s desire to have his name engraved upon the ephod (along with the names of his brothers) that restrained him from succumbing to temptation with Potiphar’s wife (Genesis 39).
According to the Zohar, “All the priestly garments were emblematic of supernal mystery” (2:231a). This mystical reading focuses on the layered nature of the vestments, which indicate a balancing of dualities: left and right, soul and body, and male and female. The primordial human whom God created (Genesis 1)—this passage teaches—was a singular creature, both male and female, but the two halves were joined at the back, facing away from each other. God separated this single entity into two, and “thus they [the first woman and first man] were brought face to face, [and] love was multiplied in the world.” Unfortunately, this physical division also led to emotional estrangement, jealousy, and strife. The unity of the ephod and breastplate (which were worn together) recalled the original unity of the first woman and the first man and, by extension, of all humankind.
—Laura Lieber