TERUMA 5781

Want to Partner With Gd? Here’s How

Imagine you’re going into an Apple Store. All your friends and family have iPhones and Mac computers and you’re now ready to make the switch because all the devices are fully integrated. You purchase a new Mac desktop for your office with a wide screen, Mac laptops and iPhones for yourself and your wife, iPads for your kids, an Apple watch, and Apple TV for your home entertainment system. 

You purchase all these items. The salesman gives you the receipt and then carries them to your car and places them in the trunk. How rare it is for the salesman to give you such service. But that’s not all. You drive home, excited about your new devices. When you arrive, you’re greeted with a pleasant surprise. The salesman has driven to your home to help you unpack them. Shocking! This is no longer merely rare, it’s unheard of.

But wait, that’s not all. The salesman then sits down with you, helps you unpack all your new devices and then shows you their subtleties, guiding you step by step in how to get the most out of every one of them. He helps you transfer all your files where you need them and into the Apple iCloud as well. He spends the entire day with you. The next day he shows up at your office to help with your desktop. In fact, he now shows up every day. You sit in amazement—jaw agape. Finally, you ask him why is he doing this? He answers, “When you purchased these devices...I came along with it.”

Sheer fantasy? Not necessarily. It’s in this week’s Torah portion which begins: Vay’dabeyr Hashem el Moshe leymor. Dabeyr el bnai Yisrael v’yikchu li teruma (And Hashem spoke to Moses saying: “Speak to the Children of Israel and let them take Me a portion.” The purpose of this command was to ask for donations to build the Mishkan, the portable, tent-like sanctuary that our people built to worship Gd during their wanderings from Egypt to the Promised Land.

The Midrash (Shemot Rabbah 33:6), however, mines a precious nugget in this verse: It is written in the Book of Proverbs (4:2), Ki lekach tov natati lachem Torati al taazovu (For I have given you a precious gift, My Torah, do not forsake it). Said Rabbi Berechya HaKohen...“Usually when one buys an article in the market, is he then able to acquire its owner too? But the Holy One Blessed be He, gave the Torah to Israel and said to them, “You are acquiring Me!” Hence the Torah says, “and let them TAKE Me a portion.”

My friends, this is the beauty of Torah. The Apple Store experience we imagined is the reality of Torah and Jewish life. When we study Torah, when we observe its mitzvot, we’re actually—in a sense—acquiring Gd. He comes along as part of the package. The nature of Torah study and living a Jewish life is that we acquire both a relationship and direct link with Gd! In a real sense, Gd becomes our partner in life.

Gd implores us later in the Torah (Lev. 19:2): Kedoshim t’hiyu, ki Kadosh Ani Hashem Elokeychem (Be Holy because I, Hashem your Gd, am holy)! Gd challenges us to emulate Him and try to be holy. How? The answer points to a major Torah principle: Ma hu af ata (Just as Gd does, so must you do). The Talmud (Shabbat 133b) by illustration, teaches that just as Gd shows His compassion by clothing the naked—as He did with Adam and Eve; visiting the sick—as He did with Abraham; comforting the mourners—as He did with Isaac, and burying the dead—as He did with Moses—so must we!

Also in our Torah portion (Ex. 25:10) Gd tells us that the Holy Ark that housed the Torah and 10 Commandments should be made of atzey shitim (acacia wood). Why acacia wood? Other woods might have been more suitable or easier to find in the desert. The Midrash explains: that acacia wood is not from a fruit tree and just as Gd doesn’t destroy fruit trees to build His home, so we mustn’t destroy fruit trees to build our homes. Fruit trees are for food! Ma hu af ata (Just as Gd does, so must you do).

My friends, just about everything in Jewish life is like that. This past Coronavirus year has been a year of introspection. I ask you to think seriously about upping your relationship with Gd. You see, when you eat kosher, when you show appreciation and thank Gd and bless your food before you eat, when you pray daily, when you rejoice on a Yom Tov, when you give to charity…you bring Gd to your side to help you with life’s challenges as well as life’s joys—leaving you more integrated and connected with life than any of your Apple or android devices. Amen!