The name of the Parshah, “Vayakhel,” means “And he gathered”.

Moses assembles the people of Israel and reiterates to them the commandment to observe the Shabbat. He then conveys G‑d’s instructions regarding the making of the Mishkan (Tabernacle). The people donate the required materials in abundance, bringing gold, silver and copper; blue-, purple- and red-dyed wool; goat hair, spun linen, animal skins, wood, olive oil, herbs and precious stones. Moses has to tell them to stop giving.

A team of wise-hearted artisans make the Mishkan and its furnishings (as detailed in the previous Torah readings of Terumah, Tetzaveh and Ki Tisa): three layers of roof coverings; 48 gold-plated wall panels, and 100 silver foundation sockets; the parochet (veil) that separates between the Sanctuary’s two chambers, and the masach (screen) that fronts it; the ark, and its cover with the cherubim; the table and its showbread; the seven-branched menorah with its specially prepared oil; the golden altar and the incense burned on it; the anointing oil; the outdoor altar for burnt offerings and all its implements; the hangings, posts and foundation sockets for the courtyard; and the basin and its pedestal, made out of copper mirrors.

[!note] Mishkan
This is a very detailed account of the materials and building of the Mishkan. This parasha contains little new material, and is a fairly mundane part of the narrative.

[!question]
Why the long detailed description of the Mishkan and its components, repeated a number of times, and in excruciating detail.

Six days work shall be done; and the seventh day shall be holy . . . (35:2)

[!quote] The Chassidic Masters
The Torah describes the Jew’s work in the course of the week as a passive endeavor—“six days work shall be done” (not “six days you shall do work”). For the Jew regards his workday endeavors not as the source of his sustenance, but merely as a “vessel” in which to receive G‑d’s blessing.

Passive Labour

Six days of passive work in the sense of mental detachment and the realization that human work is only an instrument of G‑d, culminating in and inspired by a “sabbath of sabbaths” that focuses utterly on the source of our blessings—are the corrective for, and the denial of, the instincts of idolatry.

Man is not sustained by his own efforts, but through G‑d’s blessing. Man’s work merely provides a natural channel for the divine blessing of sustenance.

The Chassidic masters take this a step further. They say, the proper response to the ever-present nature of G‑d would be to stand in absolute passivity.

Citing the verse, “Six days you shall labour, and do all your work,” the Sages say: “On the Sabbath, a person should regard himself as if all his work were complete.” If, however, during the six days a person had been preoccupied with material concerns, on the seventh day anxieties will invade him; even if his body ceases work, his mind will not be at rest. On the other hand, if he has given his work its proper place during the week, the light of Shabbat will illuminate him, and Shabbat will then permeate his whole week.

Maimonides traces the origins of idolatry to the fact that Divine Providence is channelled through natural forces and objects. The original idolaters recognised that the sun, moon and the stars derived their power to nourish the earth from G‑d, yet they attached divine significance to them. Their error was to regard them as objects of worship, whereas they are no more than the instruments of G‑d, like "an axe in the hands of the hewer.”

In a certain sense, the excessive preoccupation with business and the material world is also a form of idolatry. For this, too, involves the error of attaching significance to what is no more than a vessel or channel of Divine blessing. The materialist’s preoccupation with material things is a form of bowing the head, of misplaced worship. Only when a person sees his workday effort for what it truly is—a way of creating a natural channel for the blessings of G‑d—will his work take the passive form and the focus of his thoughts be on G‑d alone.

[!quote] Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi
The Mishkan not only defines the type of work forbidden on Shabbat, but also the type of work the Jew is engaged in on the other six days of the week: the work of building a home for G‑d out of the materials of physical life.

[!note]
Most of the work that is described in the Torah most of us no longer do. That electricity is forbidden on Shabbat removes our ability to function in the modern society, and thus, to labour.

Ladies First

Chassidic teaching delves deeper and finds the explanation in the essence of manliness and womanliness. Man derives from the “line of light” (kav) that penetrates the vacuum (makom panui) formed by G‑d in which to create the world. But it turns out that the makom panui is not an absolute “vacuum” — a residue of divine light remained behind, forming an invisible ether of G‑dliness that pervades and underlies our existence. It is from this “residue” that the female component of creation derives.

So man is an actor, a conqueror; his role in creation is to banish the earthly darkness and bring down light from the heavens. Woman is a nurturer, relating to what is rather than what must be done, finding G‑dliness within the world rather than importing it from without.

Both are integral to the Creator’s plan: our mission in life is to bring G‑d into the world (the male role) and to make the world a home for G‑d (the woman’s speciality); to vanquish darkness (male), and to uncover the light implicit within the darkness (female).

For the first twenty-four centuries of history, humanity had its hands full battling darkness. So the male component dominated. But then came the day when G‑d, yearning for the home He desired when He made the world, prepared to reveal Himself on a mountaintop in the Sinai Desert and transmit to His chosen people a Torah outlining the plans for His home’s construction. Man will still have to do battle, but all his battles will henceforth be founded upon the principle that, underneath it all, the world is a G‑dly place.

Tzimtzum

![[tzimtzum_pic.webp]]

[!quote] Rabbi Isaac Luria (the “Ari”)
In the beginning, a simple divine light filled the entirety of existence. . . . When there arose in His simple will the desire to create the worlds, He contracted His light, withdrawing it to the sides and leaving a void and an empty space in its center, to allow for the existence of the worlds. (However, this was not an absolute void, for there remained a residue of the divine light within the void.) He then drew a single line of His infinite light into the void to illuminate the worlds . .

The Splitting of the Light

The separation of the female from the male, creating the tension that draws them to each other and to their ultimate reunion, is a theme that runs through the entire process of creation, all the way to its very beginnings in the primordial will of G‑d.

In other words, the divine light, as the expression of G‑d’s infinite power and perfection, also includes the divine capacity for finite self-expression. In the words of the Kabbalist Rabbi Meir ibn Gabbai, “Just as He possesses the power of infinity, so does He possess the power of finiteness. For should you say that He possesses the power of infinity but does not possess the power of finiteness, you are detracting from His perfection.” What to our perception was a tzimtzum—a contraction and concealment—was actually the separation of the divine power of finiteness from within the omnipotence of G‑d.

Male and Female

Thus the endeavour to undo the concealment of the tzimtzum includes both a “male” and a “female” dynamic. On the one hand, we strive to overcome the limitations of our existence, to break free of the confines of the material. We strive to impose a higher, spiritual truth upon our world, to infuse the infinity of G‑d into our finite lives. This is the “male” active/aggressive effort to overcome the nature of reality, to expand its frontiers, to draw in “new” G‑dliness from the outside via the “line” that links our world to the infinity of G‑d.

But there is also another aspect to our mission in life, another source of G‑dliness for our world. A source that is to be found within, in the “residue” of divine light that underlies our reality. This is the “female” endeavour to seek the divine in what is, to stimulate our inner essence instead of overwhelming it with light from without. To cultivate rather than to conquer, to be rather than to do.

Ultimately, the goal is to effect the marriage between the male and female. When the light that was withdrawn from the void is reinfused and the “residue” of light left behind is revealed, the divine light will again be one. The “power of infinity” and the “power of finiteness” in our world will again constitute a singular expression of the quintessential truth of G‑d.

Infinite Light

Good as Gold

Compulsive overeating is a horrible disease: it’s unhealthy, it can even kill you. But the urge to eat is not only healthy—it’s vital to life itself.

The same is true of every negative phenomenon. There is nothing intrinsically bad in G‑d’s world: every evil is a perverted good, every psychosis a healthy instinct gone awry.

Let us try to understand the tendency of humans to splurge, flaunt and luxuriate in their wealth. We understand why we need food; we understand why we need shelter; but why do we crave gold?

In essence, the craving for gold is a yearning for transcendence. It is man saying: I am not content to merely exist and subsist; I want to exalt in life, I want to touch its magnificence and sublimity.