25:3-7 - Wow, God is asking for a lot of valuable items: gold, silver, brass, dyed fabrics, and animal skins (seal skins?!?) and stones... First, are we to understand that the former Egyptian slaves took all this stuff with them at the time of the Exodus? (They certainly didn't have the time or means to mine these metals in the desert!) Second, while I grant that the mishkan was important, it seems so glaring that a people who were asked to give up the worship of idols would be asked right away to build a religious structure with so much wealth.
(I have heard it suggested that while the mishkan seems borderline-idolatrous from a modern perspective, at the time of its construction, it was indeed a radical departure from the kinds of religious structures employed by polytheistic cultures of the time in that, for example, there were no depictions of the divine. This makes a lot of sense to me. If this is right, however, it implies that idolatry is in some ways a relative, changing concept: the specific things we would identify as idolatry aren't necessarily the same things that our forefathers would (and vice-versa). But if that is true, then isn't it likely that at least some of the rituals and practices from centuries past are no longer able to elicit the kinds of contemplative or emotional responses that they once did and therefore should be changed? I wonder what I -- or any Reform Jew -- would make of the mishkan if we could go back in time and bear witness to the rites that took place in it. Would we be impressed by the animal sacrifices, the burning of incense, etc.? Or would we be alienated and put off by the entire thing?)
25:8 - "And let them make Me a sanctuary [מִקְדָּשׁ], that I may dwell among them." Nicely worded!
25:18-21 - "And thou shalt make two cherubim [כְּרֻבִים] of gold..." How strange these cherubim out of all the things God might ask the Israelites to put on the cover of the Ark, and how wierd the level of detail offered in their description! I wonder what these things meant to them at the time...
25:22 - "...and I will speak with thee from above the ark-cover, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel." Huh?!? This seems to be riding pretty close to the line for God to speak as if from the cherubim. If the point is to wean the Israelites away from idolatry, why not just have the voice eminate from nowhere, or from everywhere, or from just the Holy of Holies?
25:23-30 - All these details about the table for the "showbread" [לֶחֶם פָּנִים]. Seriously, how were they supposed to make something so elaborate in the desert?!?
25:31-40 - Incredible detail on how to make the "candlestick" [מְנֹרָה]. Why are all these details -- of the number of branches (seven), its constitution (a single piece of gold), the "cups" [גְבִעִים ] on the branches that are supposed to be "made like almond-blossoms" -- so specific? What was the point of being so specific here?
26:4-6 - Crazy details! About the way to connect the sections of the curtains together, with holes in specific places, and clasps made of gold. Incredible!
Random questions:
- Apart from these and other passages in the Torah, is there any independent evidence that the mishkan ever actually existed? I'm not saying it didn't, but I am curious: Did anyone else ever see it and leave a written record? I mean, coming across this structure in the desert must have been a sight to behold...
- The tabernacle was a huge thing, with lots of parts, some of which were themselves incredibly large. Are we to understand that this entire thing was taken apart, packed up, moved, then reconstructed every time the Israelites moved their camp in the desert? For 40 years?!? How many times, then, would this have occurred? For how long did it ever stay in one place?
Posts
> So what if the men's hearts didn't 'make them willing' to contribute?
ReplyDeleteThat was the point. A mishkan built by forced donations would have gone against the principle of free participation which is what God wanted. Taxes meant forced participation which violates God's demand that we exercise free will.
> First, are we to understand that the former Egyptian slaves took all this stuff with them at the time of the Exodus?
Yes. Go back and read about the account of their leaving and how they took all the treasures of Egypt with them.
As well, you should know that the Hebrew "tachash" was erroneously translated as "seal" by the King James Bible but clearly that's not what they were. The gemara in Shabbos notes that we have no idea what animal it was.
> asked to give up the worship of idols would be asked right away to build a religious structure with so much wealth.
According to some commentators, this occured after the sin of the Golden Calf. hence the people who have just thrown their gold at building an idol were now asked to do teshuvah by giving their gold to build a mishkan instead.
> I wonder what I -- or any Reform Jew -- would make of the mishkan if we could go back in time and bear witness to the rites that took place in it.
You probably wouldn't catch 99.9% of the symbolism, to be honest. There are countless books examining the depths of the sympblism involved.
First of all, the mishkan wasn't that radical a departure from contemporary worship. The Egyptians used mishkan style structures in worship and it's probably that the mishkan was made to look like that as a point of reference for our ancestors. Rambam points out that God wanted a radical departure in religious worship style but realized the people wouldn't be able to handle it so he arranged for changes to come slowly. Egyptian style structure, but without idols. Sacrifices, but only at a central location. And so on.
As for your other comment, what would you think of animal sacrifice? How about slave markets? Leper colonies? That society was completely different and we would not fit into it very well with our 21st century sensitivities. Doesn't mean it was bad, just different.
> I wonder what these things meant to them at the time...
ReplyDeleteThe Shechinah, the physical manifestation of the Divine Presence, resided above the ark and rested on them keruvim. In addition, they were symbolic of the love between God and us.
> This seems to be riding pretty close to the line for God to speak as if from the cherubim.
Keep reading into Vayikra and you will notice that while the Shechinah spoke to Moshe from "above the keruvim", not to keruvim themselves, Moshe himself was always outside in the courtyard of the Mishkan or elsewhere in the camp. The point of having the voice emanate from the Mishkan, the point to having a Mishkan in the first place, is to provide a focal point for the people. God didn't need it, we do because we are physical beings with a need to anchor our perceptions in the physical world.
> Seriously, how were they supposed to make something so elaborate in the desert?!?
Not all the Bnai Yisrael were field workers in Egypt. They were enslaved in all areas of the country, including the fine metal working. It is quite probably that they had people with the skills to do it. That, and Divine Assistance.
> What was the point of being so specific here?
Remember what I said earlier. Every single detail of the mishkan and its appurtenances has tremendous symbolism. This is one example where the Torah recounted the physical description and left it to the Oral Law to fill in the details.
> Apart from these and other passages in the Torah, is there any independent evidence that the mishkan ever actually existed?
No. It was disassembled when Yehoshua took the people into Israel. Certain parts of it remained in use and show up briefly for cameos in the book of Judges but otherwise it disappeared from history.
> The tabernacle was a huge thing, with lots of parts, some of which were themselves incredibly large.
Actually, it wasn't that big. There's a model of it in a museum in the Old City of Yerushalayim and it's a lot smaller than people think.
And yes, it was assembled and disassembled but remember there were lots of Levites whose job that was and who were trained to do it so the process took place efficiently at each stop.