M'bein Shnei Hakruvim: The Word of God from the Space Between

When Moses went into the Tent of Meeting to speak with God, he would hear the Voice addressing him from above the cover that was on top of the Ark of the Pact between the two cherubim; thus God spoke to him.

(17) You shall make a cover of pure gold, two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide. (18) Make two cherubim of gold—make them of hammered work—at the two ends of the cover. (19) Make one cherub at one end and the other cherub at the other end; of one piece with the cover shall you make the cherubim at its two ends. (20) The cherubim shall have their wings spread out above, shielding the cover with their wings. They shall confront each other, the faces of the cherubim being turned toward the cover.

(2) Then David and all the troops that were with him set out from Baalim of Judah to bring up from there the Ark of God to which the Name was attached, the name Eternal One of Hosts Enthroned on the Cherubim.

(21) Solomon overlaid the interior of the House with solid gold; and he inserted golden chains into the door of the Shrine. He overlaid [the Shrine] with gold, (22) so that the entire House was overlaid with gold; he even overlaid with gold the entire altar of the Shrine. And so the entire House was completed. (23) In the Shrine he made two cherubim of olive wood, each 10 cubits high. (24) [One] had a wing measuring 5 cubits and another wing measuring 5 cubits, so that the spread from wingtip to wingtip was 10 cubits; (25) and the wingspread of the other cherub was also 10 cubits. The two cherubim had the same measurements and proportions: (26) the height of the one cherub was 10 cubits, and so was that of the other cherub. (27) He placed the cherubim inside the inner chamber. Since the wings of the cherubim were extended, a wing of the one touched one wall and a wing of the other touched the other wall, while their wings in the center of the chamber touched each other. (28) He overlaid the cherubim with gold.

How were the cherubs standing? Rabbi Yoḥanan and Rabbi Elazar disagree about this. One says: Their faces were turned one toward the other. And one says: Their faces were turned toward the House, i.e., the Sanctuary. But according to the one who says that their faces were turned one toward the other, isn’t it written: “And their faces were toward the House” (II Chronicles 3:13)? How does he explain the meaning of this verse? The Gemara answers: This is not difficult, as their faces miraculously changed directions in reflection of the Jewish people’s relationship to God. Here, when it states that the cherubs faced each other, it was when the Jewish people do the will of God. There, the verse that describes that the cherubs faced the Sanctuary and not toward each other, was when the Jewish people do not do the will of God.

Rav Ketina said: When the Jewish people would ascend for one of the pilgrimage Festivals, the priests would roll up the curtain for them and show them the cherubs, which were clinging to one another, and say to them: See how you are beloved before God, like the love of a male and female...

Rav Aḥa bar Ya’akov said: In the Second Temple, there were images of cherubs there, i.e., drawn or engraved pictures of the cherubs on the walls... As it is written: “And he carved all the walls of the house round about with carved figures of cherubs and palm trees and open flowers, within and without” (I Kings 6:29), and it is further stated: “And he overlaid them with gold fitted upon the graven work” (I Kings 6:35), which teaches that in addition to the cherubs within the sacred place, other cherubs were drawn on the walls. And it is written: “According to the space of each with loyot” (I Kings 7:36). The Gemara asks: What is the meaning of: “According to the space of each with loyot”? Rabba bar Rav Sheila said: It means like a man joined and clinging to his livaya, his partner, i.e., his wife. In other words, the cherubs appeared to be embracing one another.

Reish Lakish said: When gentiles destroyed the Second Temple and entered the Sanctuary, they saw these drawings of cherubs clinging to one another. They peeled them from the wall, took them out to the market, and said: These Jews, whose blessing is a blessing and whose curse is a curse, due to their great fear of God, should they be occupied with such matters, making images of this kind? They immediately debased and destroyed them, as it is stated: “All who honored her debase her because they have seen her nakedness” (Lamentations 1:8).

(1) לא תעשון אתי YE SHALL NOT MAKE WITH ME — Ye shall not make an image of My ministers that minister before Me in the heights (Mekhilta d'Rabbi Yishmael 20:20:1). (2) אלקי כסף GODS OF SILVER — This statement is intended to lay down a prohibition regarding the Cherubim which you will make to stand with Me — that they shall not be made of silver, for if you make any alteration in them by making them of silver and not of gold they will be before me (regarded by Me) as idols. (3) ואלקי זהב AND GODS OF GOLD — This statement is intended to lay down a prohibition that one may not add to the number of two Cherubim which are prescribed: for if you make four they will be regarded by Me as gods of gold (Mekhilta d'Rabbi Yishmael 20:20:2). (4) לא תעשו לכם YE SHALL NOT MAKE FOR YOURSELVES — Ye shall not say: Behold I will make Cherubim in the Synagogues and the Houses of Study of the same kind as I make in the House of Eternity (a term for the Temple at Jerusalem); on this account it states: “ye shall not make for yourselves” (Mekhilta d'Rabbi Yishmael 20:20:2).

It is known that the heathen in those days built temples to stars, and set up in those temples the image which they agreed upon to worship; because it was in some relation to a certain star or to a portion of one of the spheres. We were, therefore, commanded to build a temple to the name of God, and to place therein the ark with two tables of stone, on which there were written the commandments "I am the Lord," etc., and "Thou shalt have no other God before me," etc. Naturally the fundamental belief in prophecy precedes the belief in the Law, for without the belief in prophecy there can be no belief in the Law. But a prophet only receives divine inspiration through the agency of an angel. As it says, "The angel of the Lord called" (Gen. 22:15); "The angel of the Lord said unto her" (ibid. 16:11); and other innumerable instances. Even Moses our Teacher received his first prophecy through an angel. "And an angel of the Lord appeared to him in the flame of fire" (Exod. iii.). It is therefore clear that the belief in the existence of angels precedes the belief in prophecy, and the latter precedes the belief in the Law. The Sabeans, in their ignorance of the existence of God, believed that the spheres with their stars were beings without beginning and without end, that the images and certain trees, the Asherot, derived certain powers from the spheres, that they inspired the prophets, spoke to them in visions, and told them what was good and what bad. I have explained their theory when speaking of the prophets of the Ashera. But when the wise men discovered and proved that there was a Being, neither itself corporeal nor residing as a force in a corporeal body, viz., the true, one God, and that there existed besides other purely incorporeal beings which God endowed with His goodness and His light, namely, the angels, and that these beings are not included in the sphere and its stars, it became evident that it was these angels and not the images or Asherot that charged the prophets. From the preceding remarks it is clear that the belief in the existence of angels is connected with the belief in the Existence of God; and the belief in God and angels leads to the belief in Prophecy and in the truth of the Law. In order to firmly establish this creed, God commanded [the Israelites] to make over the ark the form of two angels. The belief in the existence of angels is thus inculcated into the minds of the people, and this belief is in importance next to the belief in God's Existence; it leads us to believe in Prophecy and in the Law, and opposes idolatry. If there had only been one figure of a cherub, the people would have been misled and would have mistaken it for God's image which was to be worshipped, in the fashion of the heathen; or they might have assumed that the angel [represented by the figure] was also a deity, and would thus have adopted a Dualism. By making two cherubim and distinctly declaring "the Lord is our God, the Lord is One," Moses clearly proclaimed the theory of the existence of a number of angels; he left no room for the error of considering those figures as deities, since [he declared that) God is one, and that He is the Creator of the angels, who are more than one.

"The cloud covered the Tent of Meeting and the Glory of G!d filled the Mishkan…” It appears from this that the Glory of God is not the cloud, but rather that the fire and the light. That is to say, the Glory of God, was seen within the cloud. For without the cloud, it would not have been possible to gaze at it, for no human being can gaze at the light of the sun, and all the more so at the light of the radiance of the Shekhinah! Therefore, the holy light continuously appeared from within the cloud. And when the Mishkan was built, the two separated from each other. For the light of God entered into the Mishkan, for there was the place of its exalted holiness, and the cloud remained outside.

At the time when the Gentiles entered to find the cherubs embracing face to face. Rabbi Joseph ibn Migash (11th Century Spain) brings a difficulty to this from Bava Batra where it says that [the cherubs] were only facing each other when Israel was doing the will of God... The answer, according to Ibn Migash, is that there was a miracle done to reveal their embrace.