Shabbat Terumah
Written by Tanya Sakhnovich Tuesday, 12 February 2008
The Torah portion we read this morning is from parashat Terumah and is about the building of the first sanctuary: the Tabernacle. It is called Terumah because at the beginning of the chapter God talks to Moses and instructs him to ask the children of Israel to bring the terumah and take it from each person whose heart so moves him.
The word terumah is used three times in the first three verses; this is significant for those who believe there are no superfluous words in the Torah. Rashi tells us there are three different kinds of terumah offerings. We are interested in the one that is used in our portion today, namely the one for individuals. The word means “contribution”, or “an offering for sacred uses.”
So, God asked the people to make a special donation, an offering for the sacred uses of the Tabernacle, the first sanctuary in the history of the Jewish people. The second verse continues:
ויקחו לי תרומה מאת כל איש אשר ידבנו לבו תקחו את תרומתי
“And take for me a contribution from every person whose heart so moves him” (Exod. 25:2).
A question arises from this verse: when we give something, is it reflected on our face when our heart is moved? And is our face “a give-away” when our heart is not moved? I will put this to one side for now, but we learn from the verse that Moses was instructed to accept a contribution for the Sanctuary only from people whose heart so moved them.
All the words in this verse are understandable, but it is still a question whether the meaning is fully comprehensible. Why is it important that terumah should be accepted from every person asher yidvenu libo – “whose heart so moves him”? And what does it this phrase actually mean?
Rashi is laconic as always: it means ratzon tov – “good will”. The dictionary gives two possible translations for the verb yidvenu which the JPS translates as “move”: incite and impel. It is quite interesting as these two verbs are used in English with fairly negative connotations: causing trouble through action. We might assume that here it is used in the sense that a person’s heart incites, impels him strongly, one might say “from all his heart”, to make a donation for the building of the Sanctuary. So, perhaps it is not just when a person is disposed to doing something that he should give, but when his heart incites him and rouses him really to do so.
This statement sounds natural to us, from our human perception. Who wants help when it is made through clenched teeth? I guess charitable organizations can enlighten us on the topic “people who give money, people who don’t give money, and people who give money in such a way that it would be better if they did not give it at all”. Although sometimes situations are so desperate and any source of funding will seem to do.
Presumably, God knows about negative and positive energy and He wants His house to be made only from material that was given whole-heartedly, willingly, joyfully, trustfully, with a belief that it is the right thing to do. It was to be constructed from only the finest and most expensive materials, such as gold, copper, fine linen, goats’ hair, dolphin skins, acacia wood. Therefore not only should a person give his favorite carpet made from the dolphin skin—itself by some miracle brought from Egypt and taken on a journey to the wilderness—but also to give up even this possession willingly and joyfully. That is to use the anthropomorphic description and say that this God is a tough guy. He teaches us not to worship the material things. But He also trusts that there are enough people with their heart open to what we now call “charity”, in order to collect enough for the building of the Sanctuary. I think God trusts us more then we do.
Judaism places its emphasis on action. Charity is a compulsory part of this set of values. The Shulchan Aruch in its special section devoted to the subject summarizes that it is a positive religious obligation for a person to give as much charity as he can afford. We have been commanded positively to do this many times in the Torah: “Every person is obligated to give charity. Even a poor man who is himself supported by charity is obligated to give from that which he receives”. The Rabbis created the laws obliging people to give without any consideration to their being willing or unwilling to do so. Perhaps the Rabbis did not have very much trust in their fellow human beings.
Mordecai Kaplan said: “…the dependence of the moral law upon religion is a permanent rather than a passing phase of the human spirit.” Abraham Maslow developed a theory about the hierarchy of human needs. He said that first human beings need to satisfy their own biological needs and only after these needs have been satisfied do they move to another level of “humanistic” needs. The Rabbis made laws for those who cannot overcome their own selfishness or unwillingness to perform an act of altruism.
Coming back to our Torah portion it is worth pointing out that there are commentators in our tradition who went beyond the literal detailed description of the Tabernacle. Isaac Abravanel maintains that the entire sanctuary and each of its parts have allegorical meaning. According to him when the Torah speaks about the mikdash, it is not only describing a sacred building in which worship takes place but it is also teaching about the body of each human being. For example our Torah portion speaks about the Menorah made of “pure gold”, so teaching the truth that one must be careful of impure ideas. Abravanel also suggests that the menorah is to be placed so that it faces the Holy of Holies in order to remind us that true wisdom is always in harmony with the teaching of Torah .
If the Sanctuary symbolizes us or our human achievements, it tells us that each person is a small Sanctuary to which many people are contributing: parents, teachers, friends, a friendly person across the road, a cheerful girl next door, and a bus driver who always stops the bus far beyond the bus stop. I hope that when we give a donation, whichever way we do it, we give because our heart so moves us and not because we have to. Sanctuaries do not need a patronizing, arrogant, pitying tzedaka, or an action which has become empty and emotionless, but rather whole-hearted actions. Our Sanctuaries are our synagogues and we need to open generous hearts and to trust people, starting first of all with ourselves.
