Timeless Torah

Let’s learn a little kaballah.

The two commandments in the Bible of building the Sanctuary and resting on the Shabbos are placed side by side to teach us that the former gives way to the latter. The Talmud observes that the connection between these two mitzvohs is not happenstance. Indeed according to the Sages, the thirty nine malachos (forms of constructive actions) which are forbidden on the seventh day of rest actually parallel the thirty nine types of labor that were necessary to build the Mishkan.

This association between Shabbos and Sanctuary, becomes clearer when we remember that the Torah’s purpose of a weekly rest is so that we can emulate G-d who fashioned the world in six days. But if we are to truly imitate the One Above, we should then abstain from the kind of ‘work’ that the Almighty employed during the six days of Genesis.

But that is an impossibility, since it was not any form of ‘work’ which brought the world into existence, but merely His spoken Word. Therefore, if we are going to refrain from something, it had better be that which most resembles the creation of the universe...and that, as we will soon explain, was the Mishkan.

Now we are ready for the kaballah part.

In Jewish mystical writings, the creation of our physical dimension is termed, “Yesh mai-ayin” which literally translates as, “something from nothing.” This simply means that our spatial world was not formed from previously existing particles, fot there was nothing physical prior to our world. This stands in sharp contrast to our puny creative efforts which are usually refered to as, “yesh mi-yesh” or, “something from something.” As we are well aware, we humans don’t actually create anything new. Instead, we simply form and reshape already existing materials.

There was a point in time however, when man came closest to breaking his own limitations and entered into the realm of true transformation. A time when he performed an act, resembling as closely as possible, yesh mai-ayin (something from nothing). This occured when our ancestors undertook upon themselves to construct the Mishkan.

In Tanya, Rabbi Shneur Zalman’s authoratative Bible of Chassidic theology, we are taught that the creation of our universe might have equally been titled, “ayin mai-yesh...nothing from something.” The reasoning behind this bold statement is that prior to the appearance of a created entity there existed pure and unbounded G-dliness. In the blinding light and energy of that Divine, All-pervading Presence, nothing else did, or even could have, existed. Thus for a free-willed creature like man to exist where he could have the option of deciding that there is no Creator, G-d needed to create a void where His presence could be hidden.

In this context, the Tanya elaborates, G-d is the true reality (yesh) and we, the physical arena, nothing more than an absence, (at least to our senses) of His Omnipresence (which in Kabbalistic lingo is ayin).

Viewed in this light, we now recognize that the building of the desert Sanctuary was actually the process of creation in reverse. Creation, is Hashem making His presence harder to discern by allowing the spiritual reality to be dulled by the veil of physicality, while the construction of the Mishkan accomplished the opposite. T

here the physical materials became a showcase to highlight G-d’s presence in our midst. The emptiness of the physical objects donated for the Temple became filled with the ultimate truth of Him. Spiritually came from physicality. G-d from gold. “Yesh” from “Ayin”.

For six days, Hashem created. His unique, unequalled act was Yesh mai-ayin. He subdued the vision of G-d with the dull image of gold.

We built the Mishkan. Our efforts are a mirror image of His. They too are our attempt at Yesh Mai-ayin. We underscored that the glitter of gold cannot hide G-d.