Terumah

Exodus 25:1−27:19

The Eternal One 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." - Exodus 25:1-2

D'var Torah By: Rabbi Peter S. Knobel; Reprinted from ReformJudaism.org

Sacred Space Is Where God Dwells and Hearts Are Moved

Parashat T'rumah begins, "The Eternal One 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 let them make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them" (Exodus 25:1-8). And eleven chapters later we read, " 'The people are bringing more than is needed for the tasks entailed in the work that the Eternal has commanded to be done.' Moses thereupon had this proclamation made throughout the camp: 'Let no man or woman make further effort toward gifts for the sanctuary!' So the people stopped bringing: their efforts had been more than enough for all the tasks to be done" (36:5-7). The standard joke is that this was the first and last Jewish building project that was oversubscribed.

Two themes are central to this Torah portion:

building of the Mikdash (the Holy Place), which is ultimately understood as the Temple in Jerusalem and a place where God will dwell among the people
contributions that come from people whose hearts have been moved to give, that is, voluntary gifts

As we read about the building of the Mikdash, we also consider our modern sanctuaries – our synagogues – and their relationship with our present-day Jewish communities. Today, our community is consumed with analyses of the recent Pew Research Center study on Jewish Americans and concerned about some of its findings, such as this:

The percentage of U.S. adults who say they are Jewish when asked about their religion has declined by about half since the late 1950s. Meanwhile, the number of Americans with direct Jewish ancestry or upbringing who consider themselves Jewish, yet describe themselves as atheist, agnostic or having no particular religion, appears to be rising.1

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Mishpatim

Exodus 21:1−24:18

D'var Torah By: Rabbi Peter S. Knobel; Reprinted from ReformJudaism.org

Halachah and Aggadah: The Interplay between Law and Narrative to Determine God’s Will for Us

In Parashat Yitro, we are overwhelmed by the power of the encounter of God and the Jewish people at Mount Sinai. The people respond to God's Presence saying, "All that the Eternal has spoken we will do!" (Exodus 19:8). The thunder, lightning, smoke, and horn blasts that accompany the giving of Aseret HaDib'rot, the Ten Commandments, are the most perceptible aspects of that moment. It is likely that few people who were there remembered anything but the smoking mountain and the Divine Presence. This week's parashah, Mishpatim (meaning "rules"), translates the experience into concrete legislation. In The Torah: A Modern Commentary, Rabbi W. Gunther Plaut divides this portion into three parts: laws on worship, serfdom, and injuries (21:1-36); laws on property and moral behavior (21:37-23:9); and cultic ordinances and affirmation of the covenant (23:10-24:18).1

This law (halachah) is embedded in the story (aggadah) that the Israelites experienced. As the modern Jewish literary figure Haim Nahman Bialik wrote in his famous essay Halachah and Aggadah, "Halachah is the crystallization the ultimate and inevitable quintessence of Aggadah; Aggadah is the content of Halachah."2 Robert Cover, a twentieth century Yale Law School professor, furthered this idea in his groundbreaking essay "Nomos and Narrative," where he wrote, "No set of legal institutions or prescriptions exists apart from the narratives that locate it and give it meaning."3

Jewish law and legal institutions are embedded in the stories of the Exodus from Egypt and the giving of Torah at Mount Sinai. The Exodus establishes an ethical method for evaluating particular legislation and the Sinai experience roots this method in Divine intention. In other words, God intends the law to create a just society with special emphasis on treatment of the weak and disenfranchised, categorized by concern for the widow, orphan (Exodus 22:21), and stranger (22:20), which is followed by a reminder our having been strangers in Egypt.

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Yitro

Exodus 18:1–20:23

D'var Torah By: Rabbi Peter S. Knobel; Reprinted from ReformJudaism.org

Do We Still Remember?

On Rosh Hashanah night we read the following in Gates of Repentance1:

Remember
The words You spoke in stone and thunder
The mountain smoked
And the dismayed multitude
Stood off, hearing the first time
The words they could not refuse,
Fearing the burden and the God that set
Them in history.
And there are mountains still. We are the Jews.
We cannot forget

In my mind's eye I picture the scene at Mount Sinai. I imagine that I am standing at the bottom of the smoking mountain with more than six hundred thousand former slaves hearing the blast of the shofar and experiencing the Presence of God and responding, Naaseh v'nishma, "All that the Eternal has spoken we will faithfully do!" (Exodus 24:7; see also 19:8, 24:3). In the midst of my reverie, I look out at the congregation and I wonder: What is my congregation thinking? Do they feel the awesome power of the moment? Does the ancient experience draw them into the covenantal promise?

This week's parashah, Yitro, describes the confusion and fear surrounding the giving of the Torah. God and Moses engage in a strange dialogue. There is a scurrying up and down the mountain. God tells Moses that the purpose of God's descent is, "that the people may hear when I speak with you and so trust you ever after" (Exodus 19:9). This implies that only if the people experience God's Presence themselves will they believe Moses. But the people are also warned not to come too close: it is dangerous to be too close to God. The people are so frightened that they beg Moses to speak to God for them and tell them what God wants.

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B'shalach

Exodus 13:17−17:16

D'var Torah By: Rabbi Peter S. Knobel; Reprinted from ReformJudaism.org

Experiencing God’s Miracles: Being Ready to Act

Each year, when we reach Parashat B'shalach, I try to imagine how frightening it must have been for our ancestors to reach the Red Sea and to know that the Egyptian army was closing in on them. Was freedom only an illusion? They must have thought it was a mistake to believe that they could escape from the great Egyptian military power. How foolish they had been to believe Moses who spoke for an invisible God!

We read in Exodus 14:10-12:

As Pharaoh drew near, the Israelites caught sight of the Egyptians advancing upon them. Greatly frightened the Israelites cried out to the Eternal. And they said to Moses, "Was it for the want of graves in Egypt that you brought us to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us, taking us out of Egypt? Is this not the very thing that we told you in Egypt, saying, 'Let us be, and we will serve the Egyptians, for it is better for us to serve the Egyptians, than to die in the wilderness?' "

What was Moses thinking with the Reed Sea in front of them and Pharaoh's army behind them? As a good leader he tried to reassure them.

"But Moses said to the people, Have no fear! Stand by, and witness the deliverance which the Eternal will work for you today; for the Egyptians whom you see today you will never see again. The Eternal will battle for you; you hold your peace!" (Exodus 14:13-14).

God's response is somewhat enigmatic.

"Then the Eternal One said to Moses, 'Why do you cry out to me? Tell the Israelites to go forward. And you lift up your rod and hold out your arm over the sea and split it, so that the Israelites may march into the sea on dry ground.' " (Exodus 14:15-16).

God seems to be saying do not pray – or perhaps do not whine – just act to save this people. God seems angry that Moses is either lacking in faith or perhaps, more importantly, wisdom. Has Moses learned nothing? As much as God has been present in this Torah portion, and as much as God has seemed to control the situation, the real lesson is that God cannot accomplish God's purpose without human beings. God relies on us to do what is necessary. With all of the power that God demonstrates in this Torah portion, why does God need Moses? The answer seems to be that God requires human initiative.

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