Here’s the d’var Torah I’ll be giving tomorrow at CBI. (If you’re coming to services, you might want to skip this post!)
This week’s parsha, T’rumah, begins with God telling Moshe to tell the children of Israel to bring gifts. Moshe is to accept gifts from “each person whose heart is so moved.” The gifts — leather and wood, fabric and gold — will be used to build the mishkan, the portable tabernacle: the house for God’s presence.
The word mishkan comes from the same root as the word Shekhinah, the immanent, indwelling divine Presence. Shekhinah is the aspect of God which dwells here in creation; which dwells in us. And sure enough, in the verses we read today, God says, “let them make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them.” Or, perhaps, “let them make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell in them.”
We build the sanctuary out of our freewill offerings, the gifts of our own hearts. And in return, God dwells not in the physical structure, no matter how beautiful it may be — but in us.
So if God dwells in us, why do we need to build the sanctuary? Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by congregationbethisrael 
