Enduring Beauty

Every year when I read Exodus, I begin to feel like the last few weeks’ parshiyot are a long repetition (in case that wasn’t obvious to you from my recent reflections). Maybe they’re a little boring, but then I turn to the real question: Why are these instructions repeated, their fulfillment repeated – the same details over and over again? The question isn’t necessity – while we may feel like there’s no way these instructions need repeated so many times, the Torah insists that they do – but rather, what is G!d teaching us, and what can we learn from each new descriptive construction manual?

Sometimes the answers are cliche: G!d wants our attention, worship, respect, and gratitude. G!d seeks a dwelling place among the people he has set out for a purpose. In Shemot, this dwelling place becomes a physical location, albeit moveable (for a people on the move). [In the future, of course, G!d’s dwelling place will be permanently established in the Jerusalem Temple.] A new question emerges: Does G!d’s dwelling place need to be physical? Wasn’t G!d already dwelling amongst the Israelites before the building of the Tabernacle, before even the instructions Moses received? Yes, the Torah suggests implicitly and asserts explicitly that G!d is with the people spiritually (sometimes there is no physical sign of G!d’s presence) and through visible manifestations (such as the pillars of clouds and fire).

I’ve always been drawn to the beautiful description of the Tent of Meeting (as have many other people throughout history – check out this model in Timna Park). Even moreso (to my sensibility) than the Temple, I imagine the intricate, varied, colorful, and airy beauty of the Tabernacle’s veiled “walls.” G!d’s calling out of specific artisans, instructions for multi-colored fabrics, symbolic and visually pleasing designs, and the careful detail express overtly G!d’s desire for and appreciation of beauty – both the beauty of G!d’s creation and the beauty created by G!d’s creations. [Later, the Temple includes similarly marvelous intricately designed details, even if implemented in a different fashion.]

This Tent of Meeting – a desert dwelling, an airy, open structure – along with the necessary implements (furniture, vessels, tools and utensils, sacred objects, imagery) and instructions for the elaborate garments and anointing of the priests who will serve G!d, G!d’s people, and G!d’s dwelling place – comprise a majority of the last third to half of the book of Exodus. Communicated to Moses (and then the people) as a set of mitzvot, G!d leads the people to express their devotion in a certain place, and soon will begin to instruct them in the specific ways they should show honor, thankfulness, and repentance in this location.

Today, the physical dwelling place of G!d doesn’t exist in the same way. Each of us enacts our relationship with G!d both in physical and spiritual locations. Learning from the Tent of Meeting and the Temple, we often gather in congregational communities to pray, listen, and learn. Generally, the sacrifices are not physically completed, so we have developed language to express our honor, thankfulness, and repentance. Every year as we read the Torah anew, we imagine the physical and “cultic” expression of a communal and personal devotion to our Creator. In the same way, every year we may ask ourselves how we can grow in our own expression of love for G!d.

As a people, the idea of a physical dwelling place for G!d still occupies our thoughts, reflections, and often, hope. Hence, a new question: What is the reality of a physical location for G!d today? Reform Judaism particularly asked the question: Do we need a Temple/Tabernacle? What are the implications of our answer to this question?

The second book of the Torah, Shemot, builds a claim on our existence as a people. Often, teachers and scholars assert that the story of the Passover establishes our nationality, our “ethnicity.” Our repetitive annual enactment of the Passover, the story of our Exodus from Egypt, renews our memory and builds up our pride as a people and our confidence in G!d. After this communal bonding and celebration of divine providence, even with our kvetching, G!d deems our ancestors worthy of building and hosting a physical residence for our Creator. In this chain of events, Exodus tells the story of G!d’s faithfulness – how G!d freed the Israelites, brought us out of slavery, redeems us over and over, takes us as a people, and will be forever our G!d (Exodus 6:6-7). These were promises for the Hebrew people in Egypt, the Tanakh tells continued stories of these promises and their fulfillment, history shows – amidst struggles, oppression, terrors, genocides – G!d’s continued promises to us (even as we question “theodicy”), and we may observe G!d’s promises coming to fruition today and in the future. Often faith in these promises becomes difficult, especially as terrible circumstances weigh us down, but Shemot offers a story of hope even under duress. Can we rely on this story to teach us how to handle adversity, how to question yet return to G!d, how to trust in G!d’s promises and have a hope for the future? I think so, and G!d’s repeated faithfulness to the Hebrew people in the story encourages me to both seek and return that faith.

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This week, Komps Kaos included reading The Jewish Gospels: The Story of the Jewish Christ by Daniel Boyarin. He explains the real, enduring connection between Judaism and Christianity historically through modern times, and how the two groups have polemically divided themselves over time. This is an easy, short read that I would recommend to everyone!