משברי אמונה בפרשת כי תשא

יהוה spoke to Moses: See, I have singled out by name Bezalel son of Uri son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. I have endowed him with a divine spirit of skill, ability, and knowledge in every kind of craft; to make designs for work in gold, silver, and copper, to cut stones for setting and to carve wood—to work in every kind of craft. Moreover, I have assigned to him Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan; and I have also granted skill to all who are skillful, that they may make everything that I have commanded you: the Tent of Meeting, the Ark for the Pact and the cover upon it, and all the furnishings of the Tent; the table and its utensils, the pure lampstand and all its fittings, and the altar of incense; the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils, and the laver and its stand; the service vestments, the sacral vestments of Aaron the priest and the vestments of his sons, for their service as priests; as well as the anointing oil and the aromatic incense for the sanctuary. Just as I have commanded you, they shall do.

And יהוה said to Moses: Speak to the Israelite people and say: Nevertheless, you must keep My sabbaths, for this is a sign between Me and you throughout the ages, that you may know that I יהוה have consecrated you. You shall keep the sabbath, for it is holy for you. One who profanes it shall be put to death: whoever does work on it, that person shall be cut off from among kin. Six days may work be done, but on the seventh day there shall be a sabbath of complete rest, holy to יהוה; whoever does work on the sabbath day shall be put to death. The Israelite people shall keep the sabbath, observing the sabbath throughout the ages as a covenant for all time: it shall be a sign for all time between Me and the people of Israel. For in six days יהוה made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day [God] ceased from work and was refreshed.

Upon finishing speaking with him on Mount Sinai, [God] gave Moses the two tablets of the Pact, stone tablets inscribed with the finger of God. When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, the people gathered against Aaron and said to him, “Come, make us a god who shall go before us, for that fellow Moses—the man who brought us from the land of Egypt—we do not know what has happened to him.” Aaron said to them, “[You men,] take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” And all the people took off the gold rings that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. This he took from them and cast in a mold, and made it into a molten calf. And they exclaimed, “This is your god, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!” When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron announced: “Tomorrow shall be a festival of יהוה !” Early next day, the people offered up burnt offerings and brought sacrifices of well-being; they sat down to eat and drink, and then rose to dance. יהוה spoke to Moses, “Hurry down, for your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt, have acted basely. They have been quick to turn aside from the way that I enjoined upon them. They have made themselves a molten calf and bowed low to it and sacrificed to it, saying: ‘This is your god, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!’”

Now Mount Sinai was all in smoke, for יהוה had come down upon it in fire; the smoke rose like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled violently. The blare of the horn grew louder and louder. As Moses spoke, God answered him in thunder. יהוה came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the mountain, and יהוה called Moses to the top of the mountain and Moses went up. יהוה said to Moses, “Go down, warn the people not to break through to יהוה to gaze, lest many of them perish. The priests also, who come near יהוה, must stay pure, lest יהוה break out against them.” But Moses said to יהוה, “The people cannot come up to Mount Sinai, for You warned us saying, ‘Set bounds about the mountain and sanctify it.’” So יהוה said to him, “Go down, and come back together with Aaron; but let not the priests or the people break through to come up to יהוה, lest [God] break out against them.” And Moses went down to the people and spoke to them. God spoke all these words, saying: I יהוה am your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, the house of bondage:

יהוה spoke to Moses, saying: Tell the Israelite people to bring Me gifts; you shall accept gifts for Me from every person whose heart is so moved. And these are the gifts that you shall accept from them: gold, silver, and copper; blue, purple, and crimson yarns, fine linen, goats’ hair; tanned ram skins, dolphin skins, and acacia wood; oil for lighting, spices for the anointing oil and for the aromatic incense; lapis lazuli and other stones for setting, for the ephod and for the breastpiece. And let them make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them.

Now that G-d had told Israel face to face the Ten Commandments, and had further commanded them through Moses some of the precepts which are like general principles to the [individual] commandments of the Torah — in the same way that our Rabbis were accustomed to deal with strangers who come to be converted to the Jewish faith — and now that the Israelites accepted upon themselves to do all that He would command them through Moses and He made a covenant with them concerning all this, from now on they are His people and He is their G-d This is in accordance with the condition He made with them at the beginning: Now, therefore, if ye will indeed hearken unto My voice, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be Mine own treasure, and He said further: and ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. They are now holy, in that they are worthy that there be amongst them a Sanctuary through which He makes His Divine Glory dwell among them.

Therefore He first commanded concerning the Tabernacle, so that He have amongst them a house dedicated to His name, from where He would speak with Moses and command the children of Israel. Thus the main purpose of the Tabernacle was to contain a place in which the Divine Glory rests, this being the ark, just as He said, And there will I meet with thee, and I will speak with thee from above the ark-cover. ...

The secret of the Tabernacle is that the Glory which abode upon Mount Sinai [openly] should abide upon it in a concealed manner. For just as it is said there, And the glory of the Eternal abode upon Mount Sinai, and it is further written, Behold, the Eternal our G-d hath shown us His glory and His greatness, so it is written of the Tabernacle, and the glory of the Eternal filled the Tabernacle. Twice is this verse, and the glory of the Eternal filled the Tabernacle mentioned in connection with the Tabernacle, to correspond with His glory and His greatness. Thus Israel always had with them in the Tabernacle the Glory which appeared to them on Mount Sinai. And when Moses went into the Tabernacle, he would hear the Divine utterance being spoken to him in the same way as on Mount Sinai....

And let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them (Exod. 25:8). On which day did He relate to Moses the portion relating to the Temple? It was on the Day of Atonement. That was so despite the fact that the Torah portion describing the Sanctuary precedes the incident of the golden calf. R. Judah the son of R. Shalum said: There is actually no such thing as preceding or following in the Torah, as is said: Lest she should walk the even path of life, her ways wander, but she knoweth it not (Prov. 5:6). This verse refers to the arrangement of the Torah and its sections. Hence, it was on the Day of Atonement that He told Moses: Make Me a Sanctuary. Whence do we know this to be so? Moses went up Mount Sinai on the sixth day of Sivan, and remained there for forty days and forty nights. He stayed there another forty days, and then a final forty days, totaling one hundred and twenty days in all. Thus you find that it must have been on the Day of Atonement that he told Moses about the Temple, for it was on that day that they were forgiven. And on that day the Holy One, blessed be He, told them: Make Me a Sanctuary, that I may dwell therein, so that the nations might know that He had forgiven them for the episode of the golden calf. It was called the Sanctuary of the Testimony, for it bore witness to the nations of the world that the Holy One, blessed be He, dwelt within their Sanctuary. The Holy One, blessed be He, declared: Let gold be placed within the Sanctuary to atone for the gold with which the golden calf was fashioned, as it is said: And all the people broke off the golden rings (Exod. 32:3). Thus they atoned with gold; And this is the offering which ye shall take of them: gold (ibid. 25:2). The Holy One, blessed be He, said: For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds (Jer. 30:17).

ויתן אל משה וגו׳ AND HE GAVE UNTO MOSES etc. — There is no “earlier” or “later” (no chronological order) in the events related in the Torah: in fact the incident of the golden calf (related in ch. 31) happened a considerable time before the command regarding the work of the Tabernacle was given (ch. 25 and the following chapters). For on the seventeenth of Tammuz were the Tablets broken (when the people were worshipping the calf) and on the Day of Atonement God became reconciled with Israel (after Moses had prayed 80 days for forgivenness; so that it is very unlikely that the command for the building of the Tabernacle should have been given before that day) and on the next day, the eleventh of Tishri (cf. Rashi on Exodus 33:11, at end of comment on ושב אל המחנה), they began to bring their contributions for the Tabernacle which was set up on the first of Nisan. (From the seventeenth of Tammuz until the eleventh of Tishri are almost three months — ימים רבים) (Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Tisa 31).

ושב אל המחנה .( AND HE RETURNED INTO THE CAMP — After God had conversed with him, Moses used to return to the camp and teach the elders what he had learned. This Moses practised from the day of Atonement until the Tabernacle was set up, but no longer. For on the seventeenth of Tammuz the tablets were broken, on the eighteenth he burnt the calf and punished the of fenders, on the nineteenth he ascended the mountain, as it is said (Exodus 32:30) “And it came to pass on the morrow (the day after he had punished the wrongdoers; cf. vv. 26—29), that Moses said unto the people”, [Ye have sinned a great sin and now I will go up to the Lord]”. There he spent forty days and sought mercy for the people, as it is said, (Deuteronomy 9:18) “And I threw myself down before the Lord [as at the first, forty days and forty nights]”. These terminated on the last day of Ab (there were 11 days from the 19th to the 29th of Tammuz therefore 29 days in Ab complete the forty) and he then returned to the people. On the first day of the New Moon of Ellul it was said to him, (Exodus 34:2) “And be ready in the morning] and go up in the morning unto mount Sinai” — to receive the second tablets. He again spent there the forty days of which it is stated, (Deuteronomy 10:10) “[And I stayed in the mountain, according to the first, days, [forty days and forty nights]”. The words כימים הראשונים, “like the first days”, cannot refer to the number of days for this is stated immediately afterwards; they are to be joined with עמדתי — I stayed in the same state as on the first days: How were the first forty days passed? In God’s good-will (because the Israelites had not yet sinned)! So, too, the last forty days were passed in God’s good-will — from which you must admit that the intervening forty days were passed in God’s anger. On the tenth of Tishri God became reconciled with Israel in joy and perfect affection and said to Moses: “I have forgiven!” and handed him over the second tablets, whereupon Moses went down and began to command them concerning the work of the Tabernacle (cf. Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Tisa 31; Seder Olam 6; Rashi on Exodus 18:13, Deuteronomy 9:18 and also Taanit 36b). They were occupied in its construction until the first of Nisan and from the time when it was set up God did not converse with him any more except from the tent of meeting.