Chidushei Shaarei
under the spiritual leadership of the Bostoner Rebbe
Back to this week's Parsha | Previous Issues
Back to this week's Parsha | Previous Issues
Going Through The motions:
By Rabbi Aharon Pfeffer.
The Midrash tells us that when Klal Yisroel finished building the Mishkan, they brought it to Moshe because they were unable to erect it. Since Moshe Rabeinu had not, up till this point, taken a part in the building of the Mishkan, Hakodosh Baruch Hu left the final stage, that of erecting the building, up to him. Moshe however, said to Hakodosh Baruch Hu "How can I possibly put the Mishkan together when it's beams are simply far to heavy for anyone to lift it?" G-d replies to Moshe by telling him that "You just go through the motions and it will erect it itself." That is what the Posuk means when it says "Hukom Hamishkan" - "The Mishkan was erected"
In his sefer Zichron Mayer, Rabbi Rubman explains that this Midrash comes to teach us an important lesson. A person must realize that when it comes to matters of Ruchniyus, the main obligation is to toil, to make the efforts, and that is the objective. This concept is the complete antithesis of goals of a material nature, where the objective is the end results and the toiling and efforts are only the means to reach that objective. Here the goals are the striving and the toiling that precede the outcome. We just have to go through the motions, while Hakodosh Boruch Hu does the rest.
That is what the Tanna in Brochos 28b means when he compiled the Tefillah "we get reward for the "amaylus", toiling. because that in fact is our objective and our obligation. Pirkei Ovos teaches us that it is not upon us to finish the job, yet we are still not allowed to stop trying. Similarly, the Chofetz Chaim always liked to say, "Our job is to do, the results are Hakodosh Baruch Hu's job.
Mi'shenichnas Adar Marbim B'simcha. When a person begins the month of Adar, his happiness will be increased. What better way to start off the month than with this weeks Parsha, Pekudei. Pekudei deals with the building and erection of the Mishkan, the finality of the teshuvah after the Egel Ha'zahav. It was even erected on Rosh Chodesh.....Nissan. Wait a minute, we're a month off here. How does this fit with Adar? The Medrash quotes a pasuk in Mishlei. "Strength and majesty are her attributes, she joyfully awaits the last day." The Medrash then proceeds to relate a story about R' Avahu. One day R' Avahu was afforded a glimpse of the rewards that were prepared for him in Olam Ha'Bo, and he exclaimed, " All this is prepared for me, and all my life I thought that I was laboring in vain." How could someone as Choshuv as R' Avahu think that his whole life was spent in vain. This can be understood a little better through something that the author of the Chossen Yeshu'os said to his son, Rabbi Dovid Meisels. The Chossen Yeshu'os was in the habit of going to his son's house for Pesach, and one year he saw that his son was very dejected. Rabbi Meisels was influential in the government, and always tried to help out if a Jew was condemned, and put in jail. Right before Pesach he had been trying to help someone out, and he had not been successful. His father told him that he should not fret. He will still get reward as if he had saved the person because he tried, only the person could not be freed for reasons that only Hashem Himself knows. He related this Medrash to his son, and said that the reason R' Avahu thought that his life was in vain was that he, like Rabbi Meisels, was very influential with the government, and he failed to save people often. When he was afforded this glimpse of Olam Ha'bo, he saw that he got s'char for those he tried to save as if he had saved them because he tried so hard. Now back to the parsha. Even though the building and erecting of the Mishkan are both in this week's parsha, they did not take place one right after the other. The posuk says, "Vatechel kol avodas ha'mishkan." This equals in gematria, "B'esrim ve'chamishah b'kislev nigmar," on the twenty fifth of Kislev it was finished. They waited from the first day of Chanukah, when they finished the Mishkan, till the first day of Nissan to erect the Mishkan. The Chossen Yeshu'os said to his son that just like R' Avahu, the people that worked on the Mishkan felt dejected because they were not going to erect the Mishkan themselves, but they knew that they were going to get the s'char as if they had been able to. Imagine for a moment the joy they must have felt as their project was coming to a close, or an opening, for that matter, when the Mishkan was about to be erected. Imagine the joy that the whole nation must have been feeling when they knew that they were soon going to complete the final stage of their kaporah for the Egel Ha'zahav, and the final extension of Har Sinai. Then understand why we are marbim b'simchah in Adar, as it gets closer to Nissan, and the erection of the Mishkan, and the culmination of Har Sinai. Good Shabbos, Guten Chodesh.
(based on the Chalav V'Dvash as quoted by Dov Furer in Torah Treasures)
Aaron Henteleff