PEKUDEI 5771

Adapted from Reform Voices of Torah, 2008

Rabbi Jonathan E. Blake

What is the purpose of the synagogue?

The Hebrew term for synagogue is Beit Knesset. It means “House of Assembly” and thus approximates the Greek συναγωγή, transliterated synagogē, also meaning “assembly.” For centuries the synagogue functioned primarily as the ancient world’s idea of a “JCC,” a place for Jews to assemble. These institutions dotted the Jewish landscape even while the Second Temple—shrine of our ancient worship—stood. The synagogue of antiquity might have struck us as surprisingly “secular” in orientation. Originally, people may not have come to the synagogue primarily to pray or study. In the synagogue they conducted local business, promoting the general welfare of the Jewish community. Accelerated by the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, synagogues evolved to absorb many of the ritual and religious observances of an emergent Rabbinic Judaism. Over time the beit knesset also became a beit tefillah, a house of worship, and often a beit midrash, a house of study, too.

The archetype of the synagogue, the Tabernacle that constitutes the focal point of the wandering wilderness community, completes construction in Parashat Pekudei. “In the first month of the second year, on the first of the month, the Tabernacle was set up” (Ex. 40:17). The text credits Moses with erecting the completed structure and arranging all of its fixtures, beginning with its planks and posts, and concluding with the screen covering the outermost gate.

“When Moses had finished the work, the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the Presence of the Eternal filled the Tabernacle” (Ex. 40:33b-34). The Tabernacle, spiritual antecedent of the synagogue, is complete. The text signals God’s satisfaction with the work when God’s Presence enters the structure. A cloud rests over the Tabernacle by day, fire in it by night, as a constant, visible reminder of God’s nearness and as a guiding presence for the Israelites’ journeys (40:36-38).

That human beings have successfully brought God into their midst through the construction of a sacred sanctuary marks a dramatic shift in Ancient Near Eastern mythology. The Mesopotamian Epic of Creation is typical in its depiction of the gods creating their own dwelling place on earth, here to be named Babylon:

The Anunnaki [Babylonian deities] began shoveling.

For a whole year they made bricks for it.

When the second year arrived,

… They had built a high ziggurat for the Apsu [other deities] (Tablet VI, from Myths from Mesopotamia, trans. Stephanie Dalley. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989, p. 262).

The Torah, in contrast, imagines human beings teaming up to fashion earthly materials (precious woods, metals, fabrics) into a place where God’s Presence will abide. The inversion is poetic and brings God’s work of creation full circle. In the first chapter of Genesis, God creates a home for human beings to inhabit. In the last chapter of Exodus, human beings, Israelites charged with a holy purpose, create a home for God to inhabit.

This image invites us to return to our original question: “What is the purpose of a synagogue?” Ultimately the answer is, “to make God’s Presence noticeable.”

Sometimes the architecture itself can achieve this. Certain synagogues through purely physical means can elicit spiritual inspiration. Some sanctuaries through their sheer magnitude can inspire a feeling of awe; others achieve this effect through opulent materials, beautiful art, and carefully designed lighting and sound. Other spaces strive for intimacy or warmth. Natural light and windows that open to the world provide a different kind of inspiration than representational art or stained glass. Still other synagogues evoke the glory of Jewish history or images from the Bible and thus may both instruct and inspire. Many people report that a synagogue’s architecture helps them feel God’s Presence.

However, the synagogue must also make God’s Presence noticeable through other means. A famous midrash proposes that it was only through the meritorious behavior of humanity, culminating in the deeds of Moses, that God—long since alienated from the human realm by our transgressions—could return to earth and dwell among us (Pesikta de-Rav Kahana, Piska 1:1). God migrates to and from the world of human affairs in accordance with our ethical attentiveness or inattentiveness. Behavior matters more than a building. Indeed, the fulfillment of mitzvot on behalf of others, compassionate action for people in pain, and tzedakah for people in need, can all make God’s Presence more noticeable in the world. And the synagogue is the primary Jewish engine for organizing people into communities of caring.

Study, prayer, ritual observance, community building, tzedakah, concern for the welfare of all Jews and all humanity: these constitute the pillars of a thriving, inspirational synagogue. Every time I see our congregation reach out with a loving embrace, with hot meals and gentle words, to a family walking in the valley of the shadow of death, I see the synagogue making God’s Presence noticeable. Every time I see congregants awaken to a new insight during Torah study, I see how the synagogue has helped to make God’s Presence noticeable. When youth and adults from our congregation felt inspired to travel on a local Jewish relief mission to New Orleans, I saw our synagogue making God’s Presence noticeable. When we sing our Kabbalat Shabbat service on Friday night and even the people struggling with Hebrew are moved to sing along with “Lecha Dodi,” I see the synagogue making God noticeable.

Jewish mystical tradition claims that God is everywhere and in all things, if only our vision permits us to see. The shattering daily news makes it too easy to conclude that we live in a godless world. Our parasha would endorse the vital role of the synagogue in restoring our faith in a world in which God’s Presence abides. The synagogue functions as a spiritual magnifying glass. It helps us to see what has been there all along.

Mirrors & Midrash: Reflections on Parashat Vayakhel 5771

“Mirror, mirror on the wall: Who’s the fairest of them all?”

So it was asked every day by the Wicked Queen of “Snow White.” And so, it turns out, it was asked by the women of ancient Israel. These women possessed mirrors of highly polished copper, and they would look into them when they made themselves up. We know this from a rabbinic tradition about this week’s Torah portion, Vayakhel. Because fresh resources are scarce in the wilderness, the Tabernacle was constructed primarily out of recycled goods: its precious stones and metals from jewelry, its curtains from fabrics already owned by the people of Israel. So generous were the people, the Torah reports, that Moses had to command them to stop bringing their goods. The artisans used mirrors donated by the women to construct the washstand of burnished copper that stood before the priest in the center of the sanctuary.

A midrash relates that when Moses saw these mirrors, he did not want to accept them. He said, “This is something that helps the Evil Inclination (that basest part of human nature, often linked to lust). These women make themselves up and then the men are led to sin! They may not be used for a holy purpose.” But God said to Moses, “Accept them. These mirrors are more precious to Me than anything else that was brought.”

To understand why is to understand our amazing power to transform the profane into the sacred. A mirror is, in fact, a fine reflection of just this point. We can use this simple tool to accomplish good or ill. We can use it to harm or to help. A mirror can be used in such a way that justifies Moses’ worst fear: as an instrument of vanity. Remember the myth of Narcissus, who stares at his own reflection forever as his body wastes away. In the words of Ovid: he “fell in love with that unbodied hope, and found a substance in what was only shadow.” Mirrors can be used to deflect and deceive: “house of mirrors,” “smoke and mirrors.” Some mirrors distort reality and convince us we are fatter, thinner, taller or shorter than we are. Mirrors can fool you into thinking a room is twice its real size. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear. But mirrors can serve beautiful, helpful, and holy purposes as well: in kaleidoscopes, telescopes, and periscopes; in cameras, solar power generators, and lasers; in flashlights and headlights. Mirrors are essential to safe driving, safe shaving, and safe dentistry. When used to catch the sun to signal for help, mirrors can save lives. You see, there’s nothing inherent about the mirror that makes it good or bad: it’s how we use it.

That’s what God recognized in demanding that Moses accept the mirrors from the women. In the next few moments, I’d like to share with you some midrash that relates a few different sacred ends toward which these mirrors were used. All of these traditions are compiled and recorded by the Me’am Lo’ez, a monumental early eighteenth-century Ladino commentary on the Torah begun by Rabbi Ya'akov Culi of Constantinople.

“These mirrors are more precious to Me than anything else that was brought.” Why? Midrash offers four reasons. (1) The mirrors were used to increase harmony in the household and build up the people of Israel. (2) The mirrors were used to help the women concentrate on the study of Torah. (3) The mirrors were used to bring reverence and decorum into the ancient house of worship. And (4) The mirrors were used to not for vanity, but for modesty and self-reflection.

The first midrash goes back to the time of enslavement in Egypt. While their husbands were out working with mortar and bricks, these women would bring them food. Each one would look at herself along with her husband. This would arouse their desire. Well, one thing would lead to another, and nine months later, the women would give birth. “You see,” God told Moses, “these women did a holy deed through these mirrors. They wanted to fulfill the mitzvah of having children, causing many Israelites to come into the world.” As a result, the righteous women in Egypt had many children and thereby caused a critical mass of faithful Israelites to arise and leave during the Exodus! Even the Torah’s word for mirrors, mar’ot ha-tzova’ot, is linked to the word tzeva’ot, which means “troops,” referring to the ranks of Israelites who went free.

A second midrash concludes that these mirrors were not used for the women to make themselves up. A disclaimer: at first, this tradition appears to apologize for the gender-bias present in classical Judaism; but if you listen closely, you’ll notice that the midrash is actually an early feminist notion. The story goes that the women felt uncomfortable coming to the Tabernacle to pray or to hear words of Torah because they were concerned that the men would be ogling them, distracting the women from the service. To prevent the men from staring, they made these mirrors and reflected the sunlight into the men’s eyes. When the washstand was built out of these mirrors, it reflected everything that was done in the Tabernacle, so that even the women who, according to custom, were seated in the rear gallery, could nevertheless pray and observe the reading of Torah.

A different midrash relates that the mirrors were made for the priest who would come to wash their hands and feet from the washstand. They would look in the mirrors to see if they had any spots or stains on their sacred garments. This enabled them to look their best before they performed any Divine service. From this midrash, Jewish tradition taught that one should look his or her best before coming to services. The Me’am Lo’ez observes: “Some people have a habit of coming to synagogue without an outer garment and without shoes on their feet in summer. This is not proper. Sometimes they place a towel over their shoulders and think that this is as good as wearing an outer garment and shoes. This is obviously not correct…. Some people come to synagogue just as they get out of bed. This shows a lack of respect for God. They do not realize before whom they are going to pray. They do not stop to think that they are going to be standing before the King of kings, the Holy One, Blessed be He.”

Well, clearly this is an issue for the Me’am Lo’ez; and though I have yet to conduct a religious service in the presence of barefoot towel-wearers, I must register no small measure of discomfort when I see students, adolescent girls in particular, wearing all-too immodest dresses, sitting in the sanctuary of WRT at B'nei Mitzvah services, or adolescent boys wearing sweatpants and baseball caps to Kabbalat Shabbat services on Friday nights.

One final midrash. Some say that the mirrors belonged to women who had actually stopped worrying about make-up, appearances, and self-ornamentation. In other words, they donated the mirrors to holy service because they simply did not have a use for them at home anymore.

They gave up their instruments of self-reflection to concentrate on true self-reflection: an evaluation of what mattered most to them and their community. This message we see reflected as well in the Jewish custom of covering mirrors in a house of shiva, so that mourners not face the continual distraction and temptation to stand vainly before our own image when honoring the life of a departed loved one. And so the mirrors left the homes of these noble Israelite women and instead adorned the holiest space in the community, a place, Torah tells us, graced with God’s Presence.

For that is the amazing power we possess: to transform the profane into the sacred. When we progress from vanity to genuine self-evaluation and self-improvement, we transform the profane into the sacred. When we cease using our tools of communication to spread gossip, sleaze, commercialism and instead communicate respect, knowledge, and love, we transform the profane into the sacred. Let today’s grim headlines instill anew the primeval lesson: when we use fire not to power weapons or for reckless entertainment, but to cook food and warm homes, we transform the profane into the sacred.

So may we become mirrors to reflect the Divine Presence that inhabits every sacred space and every sacred moment.

Shabbat Shalom and happy REFLECTING!

Terumah 5771 - Spiritual Authenticity and the Ark of the Covenant

Shabbat Shalom, faithful followers!

What can a little architectural detail of the Tabernacle teach us about spiritual authenticity? Watch, study, and comment below!

PS - And yes, I apologize for the error in the video: this week's portion is TERUMAH, not Mishpatim. Sorry for any confusion! -JEB

Beha'alotecha 5770

Dear Friends,

I am writing to you from my College Reunion where I am enjoying a quick overnight before returning to Scarsdale for Shabbat. By the time many of you read this, I'll already be back in town!

Ben Bag Bag, that improbably named Sage, was right to teach of the Torah, "Turn it, and turn it again, for everything is in it" (Pirkei Avot 5:26). Rare, even impossible, is the encounter with Torah that does not reveal some new insight, some new detail waiting to be discovered, turned over, explored, interpreted.

So it is this week in my discovery of a detail from the Torah portion called Beha'alotecha, the passage we read this week from the Book of Numbers. In Chapter 10 the Torah relates the marching order of the Israelite Tribes and their respective chieftains. With the Tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant traveling, piecemeal, up front, under the porterage of three Levitical clans, the The Torah depicts the tribes marching in a fixed formation and fixed order each time the Israelites would break camp, marching until they reached their next station in the wilderness, each encampment and departure prompted by God's atmospheric signals: a pillar of cloud by day, a pillar of fire by night.

Here, then, is the detail that caught my attention this week. For all of the tribes a simple formula is used to describe the marching: "Then the banner of the camp of [tribe name] set out, according to its ranks...." The formula deviates only once, when we get to the final tribe in the formation, the tribe of Dan.

"Then the banner of the camp of Dan set out, the collector for the other camps, according to its ranks..." (Num. 10:25, emphasis mine). What are we to make of the inserted phrase, "the collector for the other camps?"

RaSHI explains by way of the Talmud Yerushalmi: "The collector for all the other camps: The Jerusalem Talmud [states]: Because the tribe of Dan was numerous they traveled last, and if anyone had lost anything, they would [find it and] return it to him." (RaSHI ad loc.)

It's a touching and significant image: the Tribe of Dan, the final tribe in the Israelite formation, shouldering the responsibility to collect or gather up anything left behind by the tribes ahead of them.

It's an image, I believe, that offers wisdom to us Jews today, particularly us Reform Jews. Each of us marches behind the generations of forbears who have bequeathed to us Jewish wisdom, Jewish practices, the ethics of Jewish generations gone by. In most cases our forbears, our parents and grandparents and great-grandparents, and countless departed generations we never could meet, carried their Jewish banners with pride and commitment, leading the way from Sinai to all their lands of Promise, the Jewish tradition safe and intact under their care.

But every now and then our forbears let drop into the desert sands of time a teaching, a tradition, a custom, practice, or ritual--at times inadvertently and at times eagerly. Perhaps some of our forbears, all too eager to shed particular signifiers of Jewishness like ritual dress, restricted diet, Old World language and traditional synagogue melodies let drop their kippot and tallitot, their kosher food and their Yiddish words, their niggunim and their nusach into the sand.

And we who march last in formation, we who come of late trailing their footsteps in the sands of time, perhaps have spotted those little tribal treasures scattered here and there on our own Jewish journeys, and perhaps we have deemed them worthy enough to examine, blow off the accumulated dust of time and travel, and try them on for size again. The Tribe of Dan, collector for the all tribes who marched before them, thus played an important part in the life of the People of Israel and so do we who march only latest: gathering up the lost fragments of Jewish life, seeing how they might make sense today, and cherishing those treasures that enrich and deepen the Judaism that we shall leave for those who march after us.

As always, I encourage and welcome your comments below.

Happy Studying!

Rabbi Jonathan Blake

Terumah 5770: Where Taxes and Torah Intersect

Dear Friends,

Greetings from Phoenix where I'm enjoying the escape from the elements. Well, there are still elements here, if you count sun and 75 degree weather.

I'm posting remarks on this week's Torah portion, Terumah, from an essay I prepared a couple of years ago.

Happy reflections and meaningful study.

RJEB

If I did the math right, these words reach you concurrent with a flurry of tax returns. It's time to go through our receipts, meet with our accountants, put our finances in order.

Some of us anticipate a refund this year. Others must pay. Reading the fine print on the worksheets, we consider a perennial question. Where’s our money coming from, and where’s it going?

Our Israelite ancestors must have wondered the same thing when they received a windfall before leaving Egypt. The Torah reports that on their way out of town, the freed slaves “borrowed” objects of silver, gold, and clothing from the Egyptians who, probably fearing another plague, were uncharacteristically “disposed favorably” toward their former captives (Ex. 12:36). Thrusting goblets and bracelets and silk and linen at them, they must have cried, “Take the money and leave us alone already!” “So the Israelites stripped the Egyptians,” the text reports (Ibid). (“Borrowed,” indeed!)

What did the Israelites do with all that loot?

As you might imagine, public opinion among the million-fold desert throng was not unanimous, which takes us to this week’s Torah portion. In Terumah, a word that means a donation, we read that members of the community were invited to donate a portion of their precious materials toward the building of a Tabernacle, a place for God to dwell among them. “You shall accept gifts for Me from every person whose heart is so moved,” God tells Moses (Ex. 25:2). No one forced anyone to finance this project, but many did, contributing the rare woods, metals, and fabrics that were required for a sanctuary that would befit God’s presence.

We can infer, however, that not everyone's philanthropic budget financed the Tabernacle. Soon after, a second, different public works project is also financed with the freewill contributions of the community. Enough gold earrings and baubles are donated and melted down to fashion a golden calf, a glitzy idol acclaimed with song and dance, sacrifice and fealty. Some three thousand Israelites, the Torah reports, determined that the golden calf was a worthy investment.

We scoff at such obvious folly. But the message of these two adjacent tales applies today more than ever. Namely: the way we spend our money reflects our priorities, our values.

Consider the different ends to which contributions went. In Parashat Terumah, the people’s wealth ultimately serves to bring God into the midst of the community—to create a home that would enshrine the Jewish principles of morality, holiness, and justice, and that would bind the members of the community each to the other. In one notable example, some of the gold given by the people was used to overlay—and inlay—the Ark of God’s commandments. Why put gold on the inside, where no one would ever see it? The Talmud suggests that the gold within and without signifies that the exterior reflects the spiritual luster of its innermost contents (Yoma 72b). Similarly, the way we spend our gold out in the world should (and does) reflect our innermost values.

In the Golden Calf story that we will read two parashiot from now, the people’s gold serves an unholy purpose. Their donations alienate God. A famous midrash depicts Moses descending Sinai, tablets in hand. So powerful and uplifting were the words inscribed on them, we read, that it was not Moses who carried the tablets, but the tablets that carried Moses. But when he approached the base of Mount Sinai, he spotted the golden calf. Then God’s holy words and the unholy idol confronted each other. The sacred letters detached themselves from the stone, and floated away. Moses was left holding a blank, inert thing, too heavy for him to carry.

It is not the case, the legend continues, that Moses threw the tablets to the ground, shattering them. He had no choice. Either he had to let go or be crushed beneath their weight. Once devoid of meaning, the stones became too much to bear (Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer 45).

A line in the Talmud describes the use of wealth for such an ignoble end: “Hadein arka min hadein mashka,” literally, “Such a [shoddy] belt, and from such [fine] leather!” In other words, what a poor product, considering the precious goods invested in it. Too often our precious goods end up invested in valueless ends. No wonder the Talmud refers to a person who refuses to give charity as one who has committed idolatry (Ketubot 68a, cited in Joseph Telushkin, Jewish Wisdom, 16).

Judaism invests us with the freedom to invest our money where we see fit, but it also names the consequences. Our money can bring God into our midst, or it can finance any one of modern idolatry’s many forms. When, to the exclusion of God and Torah, our money sponsors power, materialism, or celebrity, we promote idolatry. Judaism discourages asceticism. It does not demand deprivation of our worldly goods or luxuries. But Torah urges us to choose our priorities wisely, and to allocate our currency accordingly. God’s home among humanity is built with donated resources. Could we allocate our resources to bring God into our midst? What causes might we support? Would we invest in a future free from fossil fuels? Would we give more to alleviate sickness or poverty? Would we build up our synagogues? Would we change our investments to end genocide? Right now, our investments in PetroChina (to name but one company) aid the Sudanese government, perpetuating the catastrophic situation in Darfur. If you want to know where to give and where not to give, look within and find your inlay of gold.

Do you know what the most important book in a Jewish home is? It's your checkbook! There we find the truest accounting of our values. Who benefits from our gold? Where do we spend the freewill offerings of our hearts? Take a look. It’s all there.