Beth Shalom
Seventh-day Adventist

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The Torah portion read in synagogues around the world this week is parashat pqude. parashat pqude runs from Exodus 38:21 to the end of the book. pqude means “inventories of;” the parasha gets its name because it begins “these are the inventories of the tabernacle.” Back in parashat truma and in parashat ki tisa we had the directions for constructing the tabernacle. In parashat vaiyaqhel we had the directions carried out, item by item. Now in parashat pqude the parts need to be inventoried before putting the tabernacle together. In the Torah all the bits and pieces get loving attention. Exodus 40:33b-35

“And Moshe finished the workmanship. And the cloud covered the tent of appointment and HaShem’s glory filled the sanctuary. And Moshe was not able to enter the tent of appointment, for the cloud tabernacled on it and HaShem’s glory filled the sanctuary.”

The repetition of the cloud and the glory twice serves to emphasize a major new development in God’s plan. The construction of the sanctuary is the resumption of creation week. We learned last week from the language of parashat vaiyaqhel that Israel’s workmanship of the sanctuary is comparable to God’s workmanship during creation week [parashat vaiyaqhel Partnership in Creation ]. With the construction of the sanctuary in the wilderness the Creator commits himself not only to continue fixing what was broken by the entrance of sin, but to further develop his workmanship from the seven days of creation. Creation is going to be even better than before the entrance of sin! Things which were only potential in the Garden of Eden are going to be realized.

As human beings we prefer to work sequentially: first we fix what’s broken, then we make improvements. But God chooses to work on two tracks: the world’s redemption and the world’s consummation simultaneously. It’s like a damaged ship that’s undergoing repairs while it’s underway. God doesn’t wait to finish redemption before furthering his creation.

The sanctuary is not only about forgiveness where God assumes responsibility for the repercussions of sin which are beyond human control. The sanctuary is also about shared responsibility. By cooperating with the Holy One who resides in the sancuary, the freed Hebrew slaves begin to take responsibility for their actions and for the welfare of those around them.

Heretofore the plan of salvation has concentrated on the family unit. With the sanctuary the Creator begins to work with an entire society “a kingdom of priests and a holy gentile.” The children of Israel build the sanctuary, but taking part in this construction project is what builds Israel into a community. A midrash explains it in the wording of Exodus 40:33.

“Beloved is the workmanship, for the Holy One blessed be He occupied our fathers and mothers six months in the wilderness with the workmanship of the tabernacle. Now the Holy One blessed be He had the ability to create the tabernacle in the wink of an eye, but rather, his shkhena could not rest upon Israel except by way of workmanship. As it is written, ’And Moshe finished the workmanship. And the cloud covered the tent of appointment and HaShem’s glory filled the sanctuary.’ From this you learn that the workmanship was beloved.” [משנת ר' אליעזר פ"כ quoted in Torah Shlema vol. כג p. 98]

In other words, building the sanctuary is the first joint project between God and his covenant partners. Israel’s workmanship becomes an extension of God’s own workmanship. In the language of the midrash,

“His shkhena could not rest upon Israel except by way of workmanship.”

In the language of the Torah, a deed which God and Israel have in common is called a mitzva. A mitzva is different from merely following a list of rules. At Sinai human beings consciously enter into God’s own deeds. This is why Jews bless God for his partnership when they perform a mitzva. A mitzva is a prayer in the form of a deed. The accepted formula is, “Blessed are you HaShem our God, who has sanctified us by his mitzvot.” The mitzvot are God’s, not only Israel’s. God has obligated himself to keep his covenant, just as the children of Israel have obligated themselves. By performing his deeds, the children of Israel partner with God.

At this point in salvation history, God has suffered a long string of setbacks. If he’s going to recover his lost world, he needs a new modus operandi. Instead of coming down “in the cool of the day” to confront our first parents for attempting to go behind his back, or coming down at the tower to see how far human rebellion has progressed, or coming down to see whether the deeds of Sdom and Amorra are as bad as the protests sound, God determines to stick around. God comes to the realization that for this partnership to work it will require closer cooperation. Only days after accepting his covenant, the children of Israel attribute their redemption from slavery in Egypt to other gods. The children of Israel will need to be accompanied every step of the way in a visible manner. At this point in their relationship Israel needs constant reminders of God’s presence. By carrying out God’s instruction to build the sanctuary the children of Israel gain the assurance of his presence. By the experience of cooperating on a joint project, the children of Israel learn first-hand that this God is permanently committed to them.

In the sanctuary God comes down to guide Israel, not from far off in transcendent heaven, but from within our own little world. God enters Israel’s day-to-day reality. Israel’s partner becomes part of Israel’s world. Our Torah has two distinct ways of speaking about God’s presence. One way is to say when God reveals himself it’s very dangerous to look. Exodus 19:20-21.

“HaShem came down on Mt Sinai to the summit of the mountain. And HaShem called Moshe to the summit of the mountain. And Moshe ascended. HaShem told Moshe, ‘Go down and testify to the people otherwise they may break through to HaShem to see, and many of them will fall.”

Exodus 24:9-11 speaks in the same way. Looking at God is dangerous business, but under the right circumstances, it’s possible. A few times somebody’s managed with no adverse effects.

“And Moshe ascended and Aaron and Nadav and Avihu and seventy elders of Israel. And they saw the God of Israel. Underneath his feet was as it were a construction bricked with sapphire, like the very heaven for transparency. But on the nobility of the children of Israel he did not lay his hand. They gazed at God and ate and drank.”

The other way the Torah speaks about God’s presence is in terms of concealment. When God instructs Moshe how to prepare Israel for his coming down at Sinai, this comes in Exodus 19:9, he tells Moshe,

“Behold, I am coming to you in a thick cloud in order that the people may hear my speaking with you.”

After the covenant is formally ratified God again reveals himself by concealment. Exodus 24:15-18.

“And Moshe ascended the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. And HaShem’s glory tabernacled on Mt Sinai and the cloud covered it six days. And on the seventh day he called to Moshe from the midst of the cloud. Now the appearance of HaShem’s glory was like devouring fire at the summit of the mountain in the eyes of the children of Israel. And Moshe entered the midst of the cloud and ascended the mountain. And Moshe was on the mountain forty days and forty nights.”

The Book of Deuteronomy insists that at Mt Sinai God concealed himself so completely there was nothing to see at all; that the children of Israel only heard his voice. Deuteronomy 4:11-13.

“You approached and you stood beneath the mountain. The mountain burned with fire to the heart of heaven with darkness, cloud, and deep darkness. HaShem spoke to you from the midst of the fire, you were hearing a voice of words, but a form you weren’t seeing. Nothing but a voice. He declared his covenant to you which he commanded you to do, the ten statements. And he wrote them on two tablets of stone.”

Is God’s presence among his people a matter of concealment or of disclosure? We might suppose the Torah’s two ways of speaking are contradictory, but not necessarily. Concealment and disclosure may be complimentary.

God is above and beyond and outside his creation. The technical term is transcendence.  But God has also chosen to enter his own creation in order to interact with the creatures of his hand. The God of Israel chooses to step inside his creation. In parashat pqude he chooses to take up residence in the sanctuary Israel builds for him. The technical term is immanence. The God of Israel is both transcendent and immanent. He is way beyond the created universe and he is right here interacting with the likes of us. He is both inside the system and outside the system. Philosophy has a difficult time holding the two in tension. The Torah simply juxtaposes the two side by side with no attempt to square them: according to the Torah, God’s presence in the world is both a matter of concealing himself and of revealing himself.

In the prayer dedicating the temple he built, Shlomo also puts transcendence and immanence side by side. Shlomo’s prayer is the haftara for this week, the weekly portion of Scripture from the prophets read in synagogue. Shlomo first speaks of God’s presence in terms of immanence. God is inside creation. Although concealed by the cloud, God tabernacles here below in his new house. 1Kings 8:10-13.

“And it transpired when the priests came out from the holy place that the cloud filled HaShem’s house, and the priests were unable to stand to serve in the presence of the cloud, for HaShem’s glory filled HaShem’s house. Then Shlomo said, ‘HaShem promised to tabernacle in the thick cloud. Assuredly, I have built a stately house for you, a cosmic foundation for your dwelling forever.”

Here in verse 13 the term, מכון שבתך “the cosmic foundation” of God’s dwelling refers to the temple in Jerusalem. In the continuation of his prayer however, Shlomo speaks of God’s presence in terms of transcendence. God is outside his creation. Creation is not big enough for God. God is far beyond heaven. Only God’s name dwells here below in his temple. 1Kings 8:27-30.

“But will God indeed dwell on earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain you. How much less this house which I have built! But turn your face toward the prayer of your servant and toward his supplication HaShem my God to hear the resounding cry and the prayer which your servant is praying before you today. May your eyes be open toward this house night and day and toward the place where you promised, ‘My name shall be there’ to hear the prayer which your servant will pray toward this place. And you shall hear the supplication of your servant and of your people Israel which they shall pray toward this place. And as for you, listen toward the place of your dwelling, toward heaven, and when you hear, forgive.”

In the continuation of his prayer, Shlomo pointedly remarks that “the cosmic foundation of God’s dwelling” מכון שבתך is heaven. 1Kings 8:43.

“Hear in heaven, the cosmic foundation of your dwelling, and do according to all the foreigner calls to you, in order that all the peoples of the earth may know your name, to fear you as your people Israel and to recognize that that temple I have built is called by your name.”

This is in apparent contradiction to what Shlomo just said in verse 13 about “the cosmic foundation of God’s dwelling” being the temple in Jerusalem. Shlomo is saying that in one way God is here below and in another way God is not here below. God is very near us, nearer to us than our own thoughts, and God is also incomprehensibly beyond us. In one way he dwells in the temple in Jerusalem and in another way he is far beyond any spatial location. He is infinite and he is intimate. He is Israel’s committed partner in performing the mitzvot, which are all very down-to-earth, involving fleshly concerns of eating and resting, yet he doesn’t belong to this dimension. He commands kosher food and Shabbat rest, not because he’s hungry and tired, but in order to interact with the likes of us.

Jewish people today often express the opinion that the tension between God’s transcendence and God’s immanence is strictly a Christian problem. They say that Christians have a problem balancing transcendence and immanence only because they worship Jesus (Jewish people have a tendency to blame everything on Jesus).

This is one area where we have to firmly say “No.” The common Jewish perception is simply incorrect. The tension between God’s transcendence and God’s immanence is just as much a Jewish problem as a Christian problem. In the Torah and in the prophets, both ways of speaking exist side by side. God has joined us and God cannot possibly be one of us. God is visible, albeit under special circumstances, and God cannot possibly be seen. Instead of saying the tension between God’s transcendence and God’s immanence is strictly a Christian problem, it would be more precise to say only Christians have proposed a solution.

In the Torah, the God of Israel is identified and defined by Israel’s story. The question is whether he is identified by Israel’s story as an outside observer. Can looking in from the outside really be considered participation? I would say, “No.” Participation in Israel’s story means joining Israel.

We know that part of Israel’s story entails exile and death. In what sense then, does God participate in these tragic episodes, and still remain the ever-living God? We are comforted by the assurance that in every experience, however grim, God is right there sharing it with us, yet we rejoice that he is unbounded by our limitations and mighty to save. How then, does God simultaneously experience what we undergo and yet sustain us through it? In what sense does God die with us and in what sense does God live for us?

The servant songs in the Book of Isaiah suggest the answer: In the fullness of time God’s partnership will lead him to identify himself not only by Israel’s story, but also by an individual Jew. HaShem’s servant will be all Israel before HaShem, and HaShem’s servant will be HaShem’s self-giving on behalf of all Israel. HaShem’s servant will die Israel’s death, and Israel will witness her own death.

When the partnership between mortal Israel and the God who is boundlessly alive becomes that intimate, creation’s recovery will then be unstoppable. When God is fully part of Israel’s story, the story will go on forever. Whatever God takes up into himself, and becomes part of him, can never be lost. Israel and the church will live forever as an integral part of God’s own self-identity.

This is because God’s personality is shaped and defined by shared experience, in precisely the same way that human personality is shaped and defined by shared experience. God is not “merciful and compassionate, longsuffering and abundant in truth and faithfulness” in the abstract. These are not qualities which belong to him by virtue of being who he is, they are attributes which God has earned by hard experience. God is “merciful and compassionate, longsuffering and abundant in truth and faithfulness” in the midst of his hurt by the tragedy of sin. God is “merciful and compassionate, longsuffering and abundant in truth and faithfulness” in his interaction with our waywardness. The story of Israel not only identifies God, the story of Israel makes God the person he is. Any parent knows what I’m talking about. Without Israel, God wouldn’t be the same person.

When we retell Israel’s story, particularly the part about Jesus’ refusal to abandon his friends even when the consequences were certain death, their recognition of him as the only person beyond death, and his pouring Israel’s future out on them ― God writes us right into the script. We become part of the story which identifies the God of Israel. We become part of the God’s self-identity! Retelling the story of Israel’s interaction with God, along with its prophetic ritual action, brings us into God’s private life. We are not only saved by God’s life, we actually become part of God’s biography!

Creation is being repaired by this partnership, and this partnership is what pushes God’s purpose forward. Each one of us here has a part in fixing and in fulfilling God’s creation. Just as the God of Israel entered the little tent the children of Israel had made, and filled it with his infinite glory, God is eager to enter our deeds. He wants to fill our lives; and astoundingly he wants to fill his life with us. parashat pqude is about that ultimate partnership.

“And Moshe finished the workmanship. And the cloud covered the tent of appointment and HaShem’s glory filled the sanctuary.”