The Cohen family was on good terms with their Catholic neighbors, the O’Brian’s. In fact, little Yankele Cohen and Chris O’Brian from next door would play together from time to time. Or at least they used to.
Well, one late December’s day, Tim O’Brian, the non-Jewish father, came storming in to the Cohen’s house holding poor Yankel by the ear. “Your son is not going near my Chris again; he just has no respect for us and our religion!”
“What’s the matter; what did he do?” inquired Mr. Cohen.
“I’ll tell you” said Tim in a rage. “He saw our Christmas tree and started making fun.”
“He did?” said Mr. Cohen. “What did he say?”
“He saw our tree and started asking all sorts of ridiculous questions – which kind of pine trees can be used for a Christmas tree? What’s the minimum required height? How close to the window does it need to be? Do too many decorations render it unfit? What if it’s under a neighbor’s balcony?!”
This week we start the first Parshah out of five in which we are bombarded with detail after detail with regard to the Mishkan (The Tabernacle), the items that were contained within, together with the clothes that the priests would wear. By way of introduction I think the following story expresses the correct attitude to detail.
In the 20th century, there was a Polish government which had several self-hating Jews in it. The prime-minister at the time was not Jewish, but was respectful of the Jewish faith. These Jewish ministers wanted to belittle their religion in front of the prime minister, and thus cited several halachos about ’insignificant’ actions, e.g. the way one must put on their shoes (right, left, tie left, tie right) and the order that one should cut his nails in. The Polish prime minister responded ’I think your religion is amazing if it can even find meaning in actions so small as cutting nails.
We see that attention to detail potentially can bring meaning into everything that we do. The building of the Mishkan was no exception, and the commentators are full of the deeper meaning and symbolism behind every detail in the Mishkan.
However with the above in mind Rabbi Y Marmonstein asked a penetrating question. Given that the Mishkan was a place completely above physicality, it is seemingly strange that so much emphasis is put on the physical appearance of the building, the vessels inside and the clothes that were worn?
Many of the occurrences in the Mishkan point to the fact that it was above any physical limitation. We know that the bread that was baked in the Mishkan would stay fresh all week long – thus indicating that it was a place ‘above time’. The actual Aron (Ark) that resided in the most holy places actually took up no space, hence it was ‘above space’. Why would the place that is so spiritual have such a stress on its physical dimensions?
A fundamental comment by Rav Hirsch will help us understand the answer. At the very end of these five Parshiyos, when the Mishkan is finally set up, we are told, “And Moshe saw all of the work, and behold! – they had accomplished it as Hashem had commanded, so had they done; and Moshe blessed them”.
The phrase [bolded] in the middle of the verse is particularly cumbersome. Explains Rav Hirsch that Moshe was observing two things. 1) “they had done it” – the Jews had devoted themselves to the project but nevertheless 2) “as Hashem had commanded them, exactly so had they made it”. “This whole energetic zeal and enthusiasm had nevertheless restricted itself meticulously to the Divine commands…. Each and every workman accepted the careful and precise carrying out, not of his own ideas, but the ideas and thoughts which were embodied in the commands of Hashem.”
The result? Moshe blessed them, “May the Divine Presence rest on the work of your hands”. Only through meticulously abiding to the word of Hashem does one achieve spirituality.
The Mishkan, a sanctuary where one served Hashem was a place where no detail was decided by man. No human was to decide even the slightest dimension of anything. No human was left to debate how best to make a beautiful Menora, only by the Divine command was everything decided. Hence when you came to serve Hashem you entered into a place which screamed out the message – five weeks worth of details in the coming Parshiyos – that “Hashem governs”.
The great sage the ‘Chazon Ish’ cryptically wrote that the way to perfect our character traits is only through scrupulous adherence to the details of Halachah. Adherence to the details is to discipline oneself to be under a regime. The more one trains oneself to follow rules and to be subservient to The Master, the better one is equipped to controlling one bad character traits.
Good Shabbos, Yaakov