KMTT - the Torah Podcast
KMTT - Parshat HaShavua - Tetzaveh
KMTT - Parshat HaShavua, shiur on Parshat Tetzaveh, by Rav Ezra Bick
KMTT. This is KMTT, Kimi Tsionte cetora. And today is Thursday. Tett be ada, the ninth day of ada. And today's share is in poshata shavua. And I will be giving the share. It is my turn. This week's poshata is poshata tetsada. If I would ask you, last week's poshata, poshata tsuruma. What was it about? I know that most of you are not in a position where you can open a humash now. But poshata turuma, what is the entire poshata? The answer I believe that is being given, poshata turuma is about the construction of the mishkan. 100%. That's the right answer. From the beginning, to the end, poshata turuma is how to construct it. The architectural plans, the construction plans of the mishkan. What is poshata titsada about? This week's poshata. We haven't made it yet. Not easy to remember. Taking an overview, what is poshata titsada about? If we look at the poshata, it's clear what 90% the poshata is about. poshata titsada is about the koanim. And these two poshayat form a dual hold. One poshata about the physical construction of the mishkan, and one poshata about the koanim. In other words, the building and the people run it. In other words, it's really the construction of the mishkan as a working building. poshata turuma began the asulim iktash beshakantibitoram. How is that going to take place? You will build the building. You will install the koanim. The koanim will run the mishkan. And therefore, close to the end of this week's poshata after having everything to do with the koanim. The bigadim and the inauguration ceremony and the sanctification. When all that is finished, in fact, the Torah sums up these two poshayat. And says, "The kedash d'it o'an mo'aid, the etam is ve'ar, re'it armon ved banav akadesh, l'chahin li. I will sanctify o'an mo'aid, the tent and the altar and our own and his children. I will sanctify to serve me the two parts, the building, the o'l, the tent, and the koanim, the koanim, the shakantibitor and the koanim. The beginning of Torah. The beginning of Torah, the shakantibitoram make me a miktash. And I will dwell on the mists. Here it says, "I will dwell in the mists of the mists of the mists of the mists of El, and I will be their god." End of section. Now there is one section afterwards, which is very difficult, very, very last section of Pashat. It's a there. Describes the construction of the mizbe'ar miktah katurat. The mizbe'ar katurat, the inner, the inner altar, which was used for incense. It should have been offhand in Pashat, ruma. After everything is finished, after we have this concluding pashakat that I just read, it says, "Basita mizbe'ar miktah katurat, you should now make a altar for incense." The exact same kind of physiology of which Pashat ruma is full. "Basita and you shall do a, b, you shall make a agon, you shall make a altar, you shall make a menorah, you shall make a shochan." And here it says, "You shall make an altar, it's out of place." I'm not going to talk about that. It's a very interesting and important topic. It's not a topic for today. I want to speak about the previous section. After it says how to get the koanim ready, to make their garments, and then there's a ceremony for seven days, we call the miluim where the koanim are being inaugurated, they're being consecrated for service. We have the following seven sukiim. Seven days, the koanim were getting ready, by bringing certain sacrifices and becoming koanim. Shivat yamim tikra pair alamizbe'ar, viktidashtah oto, those seven days, which were clearly used to consecrate the koanim, also, on those seven days, you will atone on the altar and sanctify it. Vayyamizbe'ar, kodishkodashim, konnagamizbe'ar, viktidashtah. Then the mizbe'ar would be, holy of holies. Now comes the following six sukiim, a section of six sukiim. Vizar asheta asanamizbe'ar. This is what you should do. Anamizbe'ar, kva simbinesha, nashnai naiyamtawid. You bring two sheep, one year old sheep, two a day, tamid, constantly. And then, in the next five sukiim, the Torah describes what we call the kobana tamid. Taka vasakata savavok. Vaytaka vasakata savain habain habain. We saw one saw that Uba Shemin katit will be tahin. It gives you exact how to bring the tamid sha sha sha read, the daily morning sacrifice, and the daily afternoon sacrifice. This pasuah tatakimasahrata savavok. Vaytakimasah shanitha savain habain habain. It's probably familiar to you, but not from here. Because this section is exactly paralleled in another section found in sapabamid bahr, in pasuat pinchas, in the section which we read on, or sholish, and consequently on holidays. The section of the daily sacrifices, which begins with the kobana tamid, two kvasim every day, and then continues with the kobana musaf, musaf sha sha sha bat, musaf sha sha sha sha desh, and all the other hagiim. We read those sections on every single hag, because it's the kobana musaf, and it begins with the kobana tamid. The sukiim are almost completely powerful. There's some minor differences, but I'm not going to discuss, I'm not going to even show what the explanation for the minor differences is. The first question is, why the two sections, and also what is the section doing here? We're talking about the construction of the mishkhan, the sanctification of the kowanaim, but not what you're doing it. What you're doing is all the sapabayikra, and quite properly, and also later on in sapabamid bahr, that's poshat pinchas, in bamid bahr. Why here, after it says, you should make an altar, you should make a kowanaim, make a mishkhan, and this is what you should do on the altar, on a daily basis, shnayim, shnayim la yom tamid, two daily sacrifices. The laws of sacrifices are not found in sapashmoth. They don't belong before the mishkhan has been completed, and then there'll be a whole long, very long list of laws what to do inside the mishkhan, how to run it on a daily basis. This entire section is unnecessary, and in fact duplicated later on in a place where it should be. There is one difference, one major difference, between the two sections, the one in poshat pinchas. When I say major difference, it's a difference that literally is contradictory, not a small change of one word for another, but at least when we read it literally, it says two different things. In our poshat, it says at the end, olaat tamid le dorot erem, a constant offering, ola, for all generations, petar oron mo'ed lefnei adonai, asher eva'ed lerem shamba, le dabbir et lecha sham. Where is it take place in the entrance to the ola mo'ed, before God? That's where the olaat is. The place where I will come meet with you there to speak to you. Okay, so you bring the kavan ola in the entrance to ola mo'ed, the place where God will speak to you. And in fact then the poshat concludes vinot adoti shamad efnei sal vinik dash bhikod ein. I will meet with there with the Jewish people, and I will be sanctified in my honor. The parallel poshak in poshat bin has, begins similarly, begins the same way. Olaat tamid, a daily, a constant sacrifice, it doesn't say the dorot erem, but what's more striking is the place. Bahar sinai, the re'er nihar, ichal adonai. On Mount Sinai, the re'er nihar, for a pleasant smell, ichal adonai, a burnt, a burnt karban for God. Now, Bahar sinai, it was me, Bahar sinai, so I should hear explains. There's a technical meaning, it means you should do the same way as the olaat which was brought in Bahar sinai. I'm not interested in what the poshai in bin has means, but just comparing the tupsukim. Here it says, by us, that the ola is brought in the entrance to ola mo'ed, where I will meet with you, and there it says it's brought on how sinai, and it's a present offering before God. That's a clear, a totally different idea, and that I think will help us understand what, in fact, it's doing in our poshai. Not only does our poshuk say that it's olaat tamid in Petachal mo'ed, but it defines what Petachal mo'ed is, the place where I will meet with you, to speak to you with you there. Why was that necessary? You want to tell us where the koban is brought, so it's brought Petachal mo'ed, not every single time in the Torah where ola mo'ed is mentioned, does it say, ashe'il eva'ed l'he'im shamah, then the be'il eva'ed l'he'shahm. The place where I will meet with you, to speak with you there. I think it's clear that what the poshuk is saying is, this is why I'm mentioning what this is. What is the purpose of the mishkhan? The purpose of the mishkhan is, the asulim ikdash, vishakantibetacham. The purpose of the mishkhan is to be a place where God will dwell in the midst of the Jews. That's why it's called 'o'hel mo'ed, the tent of meeting, where God meets the Jews. So it's clear that this unusual section in our poshah, what to do on the mismir, is not telling us the daily mitzvah which needs to be done because the Jews have a lot of mitzvah. It has to be the completion of the construction of the mishkhan, which is why it's immediately followed by that concluding poshuk I quoted in the beginning, and I will sanctify almo'ed in the koanim, and I will dwell in amongst the Jews. In other words, there are three steps in the construction of the mishkhan to fulfill its purpose as a place where God meets the Jews. One, you construct it physically, two, you prepare the koanim, and three, you have a daily sacrifice. In other words, the daily sacrifice isn't a mitzvah, it's a feature. And that I think is the meaning of this phrase which we are so familiar with, 'olat tamid, a constant ola. It can't be a constant ola. Constant ola means twice a day. And as my fushan point out, something which is done regularly is called constant. Tamid can mean not all the time, but on a regular basis. But nonetheless, the phrase is striking. 'olat tamid, why is it called 'olat tamid'? So I think that's what it means. It's a permanent feature. It's not a mitzvah you do. It's not an ola that you bring. It's an ola that is there. Just like the mishkhan has a ron, it has a orta, it has a menorah, it also has as one of its features, 'olat tamid'. And what is the purpose of the 'olat tamid'? Why does the mishkhan have to have a constant sacrifice on the orta? Because, the noad tishamah lit nayso vinik pashmikrodi, because that's the place where God meets man. In other words, the pashookah saying, and I do not presume to explain exactly why this is true. I mean, kobanota really very difficult to understand. We're so far from understanding their inner meaning, but the pashook says that the vehicle, the thing which brings God to meet with man, is the fact that man sacrifices a koban, a sacrifice on the orta in the mishkhan. The purpose of the mishkhan is vishakantibitoham. This is accomplished by doing everything found in pashatrumah and pashatizaver. And the last step is placing a constant sacrifice. In other words, every day bringing two sacrifices, but that means having a feature in the mishkhan of a constant sacrifice called the orta tamid. And therefore, where is it? Where is its place? Of course, its place is 'olmoad', which is what? The place where I will meet with you to speak to you. Why does it have to say that? Because that's explaining why you do it there. The koban is in the patter 'olmoad', which is the place of meaning. In other words, the koban is the vehicle, is the cement, which creates the meaning, and the speech between man and guy. The pashat in pashat pinchas, on the other hand, is just the mitzvah. It's telling us all the mitzvah what you have to do. The mitzvah specifically of kobanat. Why do you bring the orta tamid? The orta tamid represents the service of God. To reason backwards, the murah says that to fill out the muqom to medium. We dive in, we say shmanas say, we have to fill out in the place of the kobanatamid. Why does one dive in? It's the service of God. The kobanatamid is the daily service of God. We're servants of God. We bring the koban every single day. What is the purpose to serve God? So what is the place, which is the foundation of our serving God? Halsinay, not 'olmoad', but Halsinay, the place where we got the Torah. We received the Torah, we received the mitzvah. We were told what to do. We do. And bringing the kobanatamid indicates that we are the servants of God who have received this command. And as servants we bring a kobanatamid. So it's a totally different tamid. The tamid by us is a feature of the mitzvahn which completes the mitzvahn and brings God to speak to man. It serves the purpose of the mitzvahn as 'olmoad', the meaning place. The kobanatamid of poshat pinchas and sephabamidvahr is our constant service of God. Not the basis for God's communion with us, and our communion with us, but basically our God's communion with us, but our constant service of God. And therefore, although the pasha is in its facts, completely parallel, but in its purpose you're dealing with two totally different things. Here we have the kobanatamid as the final building, the final feature, the final thing necessary to be done. So that miskan can fulfill its purpose as a place where God meets man. In a poshat pinchas you have the kobanatamid as a mitzvah that's done on the mitzvahn. Like on the mitzvah to done on the mitzvah. Like the mitzvahn is brought on the shabbat and khagim. Like other kobanat in the sephabamid, you're brought on the mitzvahn when you have to be in a khattat when you have to be in a yoga. There are many, many kobanat and one of them is the kobanatamid which is described in poshat pinchas. Now there is one other exception in poshat. It's a ver to the general picture of it dealing with the common name. It's a third exception, but it's actually very short. It's only tupsukim. It happens to be the first tupsukim in the poshat. And therefore we do tend to notice it. The shat it's a ver begins with the lighting of the nomah. The atat it's a ver, vinai sa el vihu elecha. Shaman zai zakh, katit lamah ola halot ner tamid. You should tell the Jews to, like in poshat tumah, you told them to bring things and build. So here let them bring oil, it's different. It's not part of the construction. You're being oiled. You always have to bring oil. Every day you have to bring oil. You're being oiled in order to, la halot ner tamid. Why am I mentioning this? Because of the word tamid. It's the second time. It's our border. This one comes first. And the olaat tamid is at the end of the poshat. The beginning of the poshat you have a ner tamid. And at the end of the poshat you have an olaat tamid on the misbeir. If we're correct in what I explained about the olaat tamid, that it's not describing a misbeir. It's describing the way the misbeir should look. It's not just a misbeir. It's a misbeir with a sacrifice on it. That's the misbeir which makes the misbeir. Then here too, the toe is not describing the misbeir of lighting. Candles. This is found in poshat vahadotra later on. Here it's describing the way the menorah should be. The menorah is not a menorah without ner tamid. Again, the word tamid, what do the word tamid mean in my explanation? A permanent feature. Here it's really permanent. The candles burnt all the time. The oil burnt all the time. But the point is that it's ner tamid. What does the michkan look like? It doesn't only have a menorah. It has a lit menorah. And so you have two to medium. Two things which are not physical entities. There are two permanent activities which make the michkan the michkan. One is the olaat on the misbeir and one is the light on the menorah. If there are two things, we have to try to understand the difference between them. And here I don't really find much of a hint in the text of the Torah itself. We can surmise that the koban, the ola, the sacrifice brought on the misbeir is a meeting place between man and god because it symbolizes man's side of the equation. Man brings a sacrifice. The sacrifice represents perhaps himself. This is the idea of the mumban. The sacrifice is your own body, your own blood, your own flesh. By bringing a sacrifice, we are bringing ourselves to meet god. That's the course for god to meet us. If you do that, god will meet with you. The light in the menorah, although the Torah says that it's brought from, the oil is brought by the Jews, but when the light shines, I don't think the light shines, it's something which the Jews are doing to god. We are sacrificing to god, but the light shining manorah off hand, I think, symbolizes the opposite. It's god shining on you is a minorah in the beta miktash which gives light. The light comes from unhigh, it comes from god and in light ends our lives. The gama says concerning the beta miktash that the light in the era lit up all of you shall I was a miracle, which would fit in with the idea that I've just said, that the light of the nova is something which comes from the miktash into our homes, into our lives. So I think the two points here are the Torah basically because shatasala is bracketed by in the beginning. The ne'er tamid and in the end almost the very last piece, but the last piece before the completion of the mishkhan, before the completion of what the Torah says of the completion is the ola tamid. After having built the physical thing, you're now going to bring in people, the koanim, the koanim are real people, they're humans, they're Jews, they represent the bridge between man and god. So in the beginning you have light candles, I will shine on you, at the end you have pina kogan, and then it says the vinoate, then you will have succeeded in having that meeting, the noate between between god between god and man. Both these things are called tamid, and these are the only two things that are called tamid. For the mishkhan, to be the mishkhan you need two not physical features, but two permanent activities, two dynamic, dynamic existences, two dynamic features, one is a continual fire burning on them nova, and two is a continual sacrifice, which is also fire, continual fire burning up of a sacrifice on them is bear. The mishkhan is our approach towards god, and them nova is god's shining onto us. The link between those two things is what the rest of the pasha is the koanim, the koanim tend to the minavar, the koanim tend to them is bear, they are the link between god anhai into the mikdash, the jews coming to the mikdash or the mishkhan. To reach god and the koanim, these people who are sanctified and dedicated and basically created, their existence is created in most of this pasha, they are the people who link between god and man in this meeting that the all-moate describes. Then I think is the explanation of the structure of the pasha, and if you will allow me, I would like to generalize a little bit about this. After all, we don't have kobanot today, and we don't have an all-moate, we don't have a tent of meeting, a place where one can say that god meets man with debarity and god speaks to man, is then the entire idea gone, kazal say that filoatbim comes to medium, specifically about the kobanatameed, we sdavin, shaharit umincha are in place of the tameed. The usual explanation, and offhand, a correct explanation for sure, is that this relates to the idea that I attach to pashaat bimchaas. What is fila? fila is avodata sham, the ramam says that fila is learned from the pasuk of avodata shabalev, it's the service of god. The koban, as described in pashaat bimchaas, was the service of god, hukkah, something which you told to do because you are the servants of god, but I think that if filaabbimcom, kobanot come to medium, filaab comes in the place of the kobanatameed, and I think this also has to be true for the kobanatameed that is described in our pasha. Not the service of god, but the our bringing ourselves into position where god meets with us and speaks to us. So, our daily to feel out, take the place. I assume a deficient place, not as good as the original, but nonetheless, in some sense, our daily to feel out, take the place of the kobanatameed, in this sense, by our davin, by our bringing ourselves. To meet with god, we create a world, a house, a tent, a situation, a Vedic nesset, where vin no aditih le qasham, vidibouti itra. I will meet with you and speak with you there, and god speaks to us, meets with us. We have a communion with god because of the daily to feel out, not because you dav, not because you speak, god has speak to you, but because of the tamed, in other words, the idea of shahrith min haa as being to meet them, as being a daily exercise, or being a constant exercise. Not constant of a single second, but constant in its regularity, we create a situation whereby there is a permanent communion between man and god. That's the importance of davinikitamid, davinik as a regular, constant occupation, not running to god when you have something to say to him, but meeting with him all the time so that there is a basis, a mishkan basis, for our meeting with him. Stretching it a little bit further, what is the parallel to the minora, because we said before that you need two sides of this equation, from our side, the kobanat, from god's side, the minora. So Khazal, in many, many places, say that the orham norah represents Torah, and therefore reversing that equation, if there is no orman orah, there is Torah. Again, Torah is something which we do, just like bringing the oil or something we do, but the light that shines is not that we are enlightening the world when we learn Torah. By our learning Torah, we allow the light of the Torah to enlighten our lives. You have to learn, just like you have to light the lamp, but the light that comes out of it comes not from you, but from the Torah. And therefore the two sides of the equation are Torah, in the place of the of the norah. By our learning Torah, I would like to hope and believe, among other things, by learning Torah in KMTT, by our learning Torah, we have the light of God. God enters into, comes to meet with us, by our divining on a regular basis, we have kobana tamed, these two tmedim, Torah tmedit, regular Torah, learning Torah all the time, what does it mean all the time? The minora really did burn all the time, but we know that tamed can also mean on a regular basis, so having regular learning of Torah, hopefully on a daily basis, is having God speak to you, and kobana tmed, which means tmedit, constant tmedit, also on a regular basis, twice a day, three times a day, when we add marivh, that's our common to speak to God, that's the physical basis for macomb, a place which is no adity, an ohel mo'ay, the place of meaning. Someone who dabbens regularly and allows Torah to shine on him regularly, because he learns regularly, has created the conditions where it's possible to say, even in our times, where we lack the beta mikdash, that there is a no adity, a place where God and man meet, and vinikdash d bit tokham, and God is sanctified in their midst. With that plug for kmtt, obviously for davening, but also for kmtt, I conclude this year in poshata shabua, and now we go over to the halakhai yomit. The shukhanah ruch in simansa dibet, paskins, sarmir, l'hryot siyadab, bamayim, imi'ishna. The imain not sallik al-hazalah, rim ad parsa. The halakhai that you have to wash your hands before you daven. Now, there are a number of reasons, this is not a halakhade we are familiar with, that when you wake up in the morning, you have to wash your hands. After sleeping, there is a habbat to wash your hands before reciting any bukhah whatsoever, because the assumption is that when you were sleeping, your hands have become dirty, you have touched, punched, and touched, as well as the fact that sleep itself, which is similar to death, requires one to re-enrogate one's hands by washing them in the morning. But there is another halakhade that says, before shmana srai, one has to wash one's hands. Obviously, if you wash your hands in the morning, it went to daven, so you have done that. But shmana srai, per se, mincha, enmayyah, as well, require one to wash one's hands. The gama in shabbat says, without connection to tithila, and afnun, rochets adan pannav y adabhir agrabh bholiyom bishvil konon. Vishwim shinnamar kol pahalashem lemah anayu. Vishwim says that one should wash one's face, hands, and feet. First, we can say you don't have to wash your feet today, because we don't walk around there. But you should wash one's face, hands, and feet every day. Bishvil kononon before God. Now, notice that, because you touch something, which you shouldn't touch your shoes, or parts of your body, and one has to wash one's hands. It's part of getting ready for davening, that you, you're supposed to be groom yourself. So, appearing, davening is definition, amidah lefnehah manah. By definition, davening means standing before the king. And therefore, just as the figures are ala haut, which we will say about how one dresses, so there are also ala haut, the one should take care of one's body. As I mentioned, the ramam divides up hikot vila to a number of categories. Before we were talking about tikkun ham makom, ram is another category called tikkun naguf, the fixing, the preparation of one's body. In watching one's hand, there's a preparation for one's body. Now, if one washed one's hands in the morning, do you have to wash again for minram? Perhaps watching the morning is enough. The answer is theoretically, that's true. If you know that your hands have touched, say, a part of your body that's normally covered, or your shoes, or something which causes them to be not in the pristine state, then why don't you have to wash again? If not, so, the makava says, "Achatsya dal shacharit vi siyyah dato." You weren't thinking about your hands the whole day, as presumably you weren't. So, you have to wash them again. If you have water, if the water is not available, even if you could get it by walking some certain distance, you don't have to do that. You can simply rub them, make sure they're clean, rub them on your piece of water, and something which will rub off any abi stirred and almond. But the katrile, if water is available, then hese khadat, the fact that you haven't been, you've interrupted your concentration between the first washing. And what you're doing now, so you should wash your hands again. That's the reason why, normally, I think everyone always has hese khadat between shacharit and mikra. So, therefore, when one comes to davim mikra, in a sure there will always be water, or some other place. And we don't really have a situation today, which Khazawa concerned about in the makava says, you made a place where there's no water. We're not normally found in the desert, water is everywhere. And therefore, the rahat says, it's passing by the shachan abur that the one should wash. One doesn't make a bakha on this washing, but when washes, lakhavadat fila, because one is entering into the king's court, therefore, one washes again. If, in any condition, even if you washed your hands in the morning and went to davim, but you touch something which requires one to wash one's hands again, I'll come them into naf baguf, a place which is not clean in the body, which basically any place that's covered, or if you scratched your head or put your fingers in your ears, or your shoes or something which is dirty, then that in itself requires one to wash again, because washing isn't merely a ceremony, it has to do with getting yourself clean. For God, participation is being cleaned, so if one knows that there is a certain amount of dirt, one washes, but even if one doesn't, hasechadat means one should wash one's hands again, at least lakhavriva, if water is available. As I mentioned, Alachain Shabbat says, "Pannab y adab veraglav," posthum rate, originally Ashkenazi posthum, eventually, or posthum rate that we don't normally wash our feet, because the feet are not exposed to dirt the way they once were. Regardless, say, "Pannab," and apparently, one should make sure, not just a good idea, but one should make sure, to wash one's face as well, one's face is that which one presents to God. And if we're washing one's face and washing one's hands, one's hands are the things which we do things with, the face is the face, the face is what we present, and both of them should lakhatriva be washed before going, before going, before going to that. That's it for today. We'll be back tomorrow with the Arab Shabbat program. My guest about tomorrow will be Arab Shallenberger. Till then, wishing you call too, this has been Ezra Bik, speaking for KMTT from Gushit Xiong, Kim Yt Xiong Tetsay Torah, or the Vahra Shem Mihu Shalayim.