Vayakhel-Pekudei: Reaffirming the Bond with Our Creator

Our highest knowledge of the Creator enables us to bond with Him. It sounds obvious that the more we know someone or something, the more we are related to it. The point here is to apply this obvious fact into real practice. This means that there are times in which our knowledge of something doesn't necessarily imply that we are close enough to it.

In this sense we refer to the knowledge of God as our continuing connection with Him. This is what we mean when we call Moses our highest knowledge of God, because he personifies our relationship with the Creator. This explains the role of Moses throughout his life along with the children of Israel, as it is recalled in the narrative of the last two portions of the book Exodus.

“All the work of the Tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting was completed; the children of Israel had done [it]; according to all that the Lord had commanded Moses, so they had done.”, “In accordance with all that the Lord had commanded Moses, so did the children of Israel do all the work. Moses saw the entire work, and lo! they had done it as the Lord had commanded, so had they done. So Moses blessed them.” (Exodus 39:32, 42-43)

Moses our teacher shows us how the connection with the Creator works.

“Thus Moses did according to all that the Lord had commanded him, so he did.” (40:16)

Our connection with God is the entire reason of our life because we come from Him, and to Him we return from ego's fantasies and illusions. Our knowledge of God is directly proportional to our separation from ego's agenda. In other words, the more we live in our own delusions of grandeur, the more we are far away from our true Essence and identity.

It may sound obvious and logical the way we should approach our relationship with God, but it indeed depends on our knowledge of the ways and attributes in which He relates to us and His entire Creation. These are the ways He reveals His Presence in us, because our Essence and true identity emanate from His ways and attributes we call here God's Love.

There is a practical approach to this, because our relationship with God is not theoretical at all. The Torah shows us the ways and means to fully live our permanent bond with God, and in the first Commandment He gave us in the Exodus from Egypt is the starting point.

“It came to pass in the first month, in the second year, on the first day of the month, that the Tabernacle was set up.” (40:17)

We said in other commentaries on this blog that the renewal the Moon also represents our renewal as individuals and as a Nation. This implies that there are no beginnings and endings but constant renewals in our lives when we consecrate them to our Creator.

This explains the inauguration of the Tabernacle in the New Moon of the month in which God delivered us from Egypt, from the house of slavery. There is a connection between our permanent bond with God (represented by the Tabernacle) and the constant renewal of our relationship with Him, as the premise to approach life in the material world.

The Torah reminds us many times that once we establish our permanent connection with God, He is also constantly with us.

“For the cloud of the Lord was upon the Tabernacle by day, and there was fire within it at night, before the eyes of the entire house of Israel in all their journeys.” (40:38)

Vayekhel and Pekudei narrate again the details of the construction of the Tabernacle to emphasize the importance of our relationship with God, because without it there is no real meaning in our life. The details seem to be even redundant but we must understand them in their meanings regarding the aspects and dimensions of consciousness we must direct and dedicate to our relationship with God.

The idea is not repetition for the sake or repetition but to remark and highlight the whole point of our existence. The Tabernacle as our permanent connection with the Creator is precisely such point. Hence we also have to repeat what we have said before regarding this.

As a matter of fact, that has been and is the point of our blog. We want to call our attention about the Jewish identity, its origins, its meanings, and especially its purpose. The Torah contains and integrates all of them for us as Jews to recognize, embrace and perform. Our Essence and true identity in sharp contrast to ego's illusions and fantasies as the idols we are destined to defeat in order to enthrone Love's ways and attributes in all levels and dimensions of consciousness.

We must insist that our relationship with God is based on Love as our common bond with Him. We proclaim this principle before and after reciting “Hear [understand] Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One”. So let's quote the Jewish prayer book with the introductory blessing to this fundamental statement.

“You love us with an everlasting love, O Lord our God (...) Allow our hearts to understand, hear, learn, teach, guard, do, and uphold all the matters of Your Torah's instruction, with love (…) And You have brought us close to Your great Name forever en truth, to thank You, and proclaim Your Oneness with love. Bless are You, Lord, who chooses His people Israel with love.”

In the evening we say,

“With endless love you have loved the house of Israel. (…) May Your love never depart from us. Blessed are You, Lord, who loves His people Israel.”

And immediately we say,

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.”

As we proclaim God's Oneness we are also proclaiming ourselves as part of Him with [in] Love.

Thus we have to understand the Tabernacle as the time and space beyond comprehension in which we know our Essence and identity as part of our Creator. We realize this through Love as our common bond with Him.

In this awareness there are no illusions or fantasies, because the only Truth in which we live is God. And nothing else. Hence we must know Him as the Source from where all emanates. This is why we are here. This is our identity. This is our destiny.

Vayakhel-Pekudei: The Sanctuary we share with God

We may say that the book of Exodus narrates our bondage and liberation from Egypt with one primordial purpose that the following verses summarize.

“You will bring them [the children of Israel from their slavery] and plant them in the mountain of Your inheritance, The place, O Lord, which You have made for Your dwelling, The sanctuary, O Lord, which Your hands have established. [Because it is our destiny to proclaim that the Lord have reigned, the Lord reigns and] The Lord shall reign forever and ever.” (Exodus 15:17-18)

We rejoice in our destiny.

“Jubilant are those who dwell in Your house, [because] they are praising You forever. Jubilant the people who are like this. Jubilant the people whose God is the Lord.” (Psalms 84:5, 144:15)

This is also the primordial purpose of Israel in the entire Torah, since the covenant with Abraham until our permanent settling in the promised land as the home from which we fulfill our destiny.

We have to reveal in all levels of consciousness who we are as the children of Israel, the meaning of our divine deliverance from slavery in Egypt, and what is this place built by God's hands as His house in the material world. All these define our essence and true identity with which we become aware of our eternal bliss as the people whose God is the Creator.

The verse above clearly states that we as Israel are destined to dwell in the same house where the Creator wants to dwell on Earth. Indeed it is a physical place in the land of Israel and within its eternal and undivided capital, Jerusalem.

“Blessed be the Lord from Zion, He who dwells in Jerusalem!” (Ibid. 135:21)

This is the city that He also built in our consciousness because His domain reigns in all time and space.

“And [king] David blessed the Lord in the sight of all the congregation [Israel]; and David said, 'Blessed be You, Lord, the God of our father Israel in all the worlds and times. Yours, Lord, is the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty! For all that is in the Heavens and in the Earth is Yours. Yours is the kingdom, Lord, and You are exalted as Head above all.” (I Chronicles 29:10-11)

The awareness that all belongs to God leads us to humble our vain selfishness as the premise to unconditionally fulfill His ways and attributes as our true identity and destiny.

The sanctuary is the time and space where we are fully aware of God's ways, in which we realize His love and our love as the common bond with Him. The process of building the sanctuary in our consciousness requires our individual and collective effort as the work that we do in this world.

“Six days work shall be done; and the seventh day shall be holy to you, a Shabbat of solemn rest to the Lord. Whoever does any work therein shall be put to death.” (Exodus 35:2)

Our sages point out that “work shall be done” implies that labor is the means and not the end of life, and this explains why the sentence is not “you shall do work”. What is the kind of work that has to be done or needs to be done? Again, the sages refer not to the kind of work to be performed but the way we are entitled to do it.

This means that anything we have to do or choose to do must be done in consonance with God's ways and attributes. Hence in love's ways and attributes because the whole point of life is about love as the material reflection of God's love in His creation.

We have mentioned (see in this blog our commentary on “Parshat Vayakhel-Pekudei: “The Sanctuary of God's Love” on February 20, 2010) that in this sense the Shabbat is a culmination or finalization of the way we have worked the previous six days. Our sages teach that we must emulate the Creator in His ways and means that He used in the six days of His Creation, and with the same magnanimity, goodness and loving kindness with which He relates to His creatures.

The Shabbat is a time beyond the material creation, therefore beyond our comprehension. Most of us Jews don't assimilate the transcendence of this “day” that is more about stillness than rest. Stillness in the sense of belonging to something completely impossible to describe. There are more than 39 “fences” to “guard” and “protect” the Shabbat.

Hence let's reflect for a moment on what is being so heavily fenced, guarded and protected. Many of us got trapped looking at the fences and not on what they protect, to the extreme that most of us forgot what that is and its meanings.

The Torah warns that whatever material thought or illusion that leads to transgress the Shabbat makes us liable to the death penalty. It is not difficult to deduce that we are indeed dead if we are out of what those fences guard.

The Torah is clear about the penalties and punishments for our transgressions, and we have said many times that such penalties and punishments are simply the consequences of our own separation from our essence and true identity.

We already know that we must choose between love's ways and attributes and ego's materialistic fantasies and illusions. Either choice has its consequences.

We can choose love's ways with the same intensity we may choose lust, greed, indolence, envy, impudence, anger and impatience. With this intensity or passion we can give to build the sanctuary for God and us, as our ancestors did.

“And they spoke to Moses saying: 'The people bring much more than enough for the service of the work, which the Lord commanded to make'.” (36:5)

Another example is the following verse.

“And he made the washstand of copper and its base of copper from the mirrors of the women who had set up the legions, who congregated at the entrance of the tent of meeting.” (38:8)

Our sages say that that the Israelite women had mirrors in which they looked to adorn themselves to arouse their husbands' desire, and Moses rejected those mirrors because they were used to arouse lust. God told Moses to accept them because they were more beloved to Him than everything else, considering that with those mirrors the women begot many children in Egypt. When their men were exhausted by forced labor, the women would bring them food and drink, and they used the mirrors to arouse their husbands to cohabit with them, and conceiving and giving birth under the oppression of slavery.

“When the cloud rose up from over the sanctuary, the children of Israel set out in all their journeys. But if the cloud did not rise up, they did not set out until the day that it rose. For the cloud of the Lord was upon the sanctuary by day, and there was fire within it at night, before the eyes of the entire house of Israel in all their journeys.” (40:36-38)

These final verses in the book of Exodus make us aware that God's love in His ways and attributes dwells always in the highest level of our consciousness to protect us and guide us in our approach to life and the material world in all their aspects and dimensions. If this awareness is away from us, we must wait until we reconnect with it.

This is the way we do work six days because in the seventh day we are rewarded with the permanent dwelling in His Place, the dwelling in the Sanctuary that His hands have built, and where we are jubilant to be the people whose destiny is such.

Parshat Vayakhel-Pekudei: The Sanctuary of God's Love

Our highest awareness of the Creator, represented by Moses, is what empowers us to unite (assemble) the multidimensional consciousness represented by the children of Israel: “And Moses assembled (vayakhel) all the congregation of the children of Israel, and said to them: 'These are the words which the Lord has commanded, that you should do them. Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day there shall be to you a holy day, a Shabbat of solemn rest to the Lord; whoever does any work therein shall be put to death'.” (Exodus 35:1-2).

This multidimensional awareness encompasses not just every aspect, trait and level of our consciousness but also the individual reality of every Jew, either he be poor, rich, ignorant, wise, weak, strong, etc. When these multiple dimensions are all gathered into the common purpose of creating a dwelling place in this world for the Divine Presence, the first Commandment is to understand this unity in the context of the Shabbat.

The difference between the Shabbat and the rest of the days is emphasized in this portion of the Torah, in the same way that the labors related to the building of the Sanctuary (Tabernacle) are those we do not perform during the Day of Rest. Our Sages explain this distinction not as a separation between the material and the spiritual worlds but as a connection between both. After all, nothing is separated in the Oneness of the Creator and His Creation. In our material reality work shall be done in order not just to make a living and survive but also to pursue individual and collective happiness in our endeavors. At this point we have to define the kind of “work” the Creator commands us to do. God's Commandments are the work we do as His ways and attributes.

We have said that our work in this material world is to reveal God's Love, and we do it by being and manifesting His ways and attributes. That is our work and we do it by choosing between living in ego's fantasies and illusions, and living in the truth of Love. We make this choice every moment in our daily life. Therefore “working” in anything we have to is about being and doing who we really are: God's image and likeness.

This identity is nothing less than God's Love because we emanate from His Love, and we must reveal Love and experience Love as our common bond with Him. In this sense the daily labors to build the Sanctuary are the same endeavors to build the permanent connection with the Creator in our daily life. Hence, building the Sanctuary to achieve this connection is also working in Love's ways and attributes in order to be connected with Him in our physical reality.

The Shabbat is not another day because its Essence transcends time and space: in it the Creator is beyond His Creation and His creating. We have mentioned many times that our Sages say that “the Creator, the Torah, the Shabbat, and Israel, are One”, and this is how we understand life in this world, in our Oneness with the Creator. Without this awareness we live only in the material aspect of the world, and the consequence of this is a life without the Presence of the Creator. This is what the Torah means when it says that the absence of His Presence is tantamount to death. Therefore it is not about imposing the death penalty against those who do not observe the Shabbat, because death is the consequence of not living in it. Does it make sense to live in the material world without the Presence of its Creator in our lives?

Vayakhel continues with the reiteration of the detailed construction of the Sanctuary as indicated in the previous portions. This time the extremely abundant donations from all the children of Israel for the construction are something to celebrate. When we are fully aware of our endeavors to build our permanent connection with God's Love, our hearts urge us to give as much as we can: “And they spoke to Moses, saying: 'The people bring much more than enough for the service of the work, which the Lord commanded to make'. (…) Because the labors they had was sufficient for all the work to make it, and too much.” (36:5, 7). From these verses we learn that we as individuals have the potential to use all our talents, traits, skills and qualities and direct them in Love's ways in order to reveal God's Love in the world.

This portion is usually joined by the last portion of Exodus, Pekudei, which starts with the verse: “These are the accounts (pekudei) of the Tabernacle, even the Tabernacle of the Testimony, as they were rendered according to the commandment of Moses, through the service of the Levites, by the hand of Itamar, the son of Aaron the priest.” (38:21) The description of the Sanctuary continues, and the details end with the crown of the High Priest: “And they made the plate of the holy crown of pure gold, and wrote on it a writing, like the engravings of a signet: 'Holy to the Lord'. And they tied to it a thread of blue, to fasten it upon the cap above; as the Lord commanded Moses.” (39: 30-31) and this crown symbolizes the sacredness of our permanent connection with the Creator.

“And they brought the Tabernacle to Moses (…) And Moses saw all the work and, behold, they had done it as the Lord had commanded, even so had they done it. And Moses blessed them.” (39: 33, 43) Again Moses is reaffirmed as the highest awareness of the Creator to be in charge of guiding and elevating ALL aspects, levels, dimensions, traits, qualities, and potential expressions of our consciousness in order to be constantly connected to God's ways and attributes. This is Moses' blessing to the children of Israel. When we are ALL united individually and collectively in Love as our common bond with God's Love, He joins us to be One with Him: “Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the Glory of the Lord filled the Tabernacle.” (40:34) and in this awareness the Divine Presence will always be with us: “Because the cloud of the Lord was upon the Tabernacle by day, and there was fire therein by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys.” (40: 38)

The book of Exodus begins with our bondage in the lowest materialism and through the power of God's Love we were redeemed with His miracles. In our awareness of God's Love, He embraces us always. In this awareness, represented by the Sanctuary, He fulfills His promise: “And they shall make Me a Sanctuary and I will dwell in their midst (lit. in them).” (25:8, 29:45-46, Leviticus 26:11, Numbers 5:3, I Kings 6:13)