Parshat Vayakhel-Pekudei: The Building Freeze

Sometimes I doubt that our normative tradition contains within itself the moral resources to overcome its entirely understandable yet corrosive biases toward the outside world. The flashes of ethical insight which once brought us to life have become so institutionalized, so fossilized. Yet the Torah assures us that “these bones can truly live”: the past can bring forth new meaning, if only we listen carefully enough.

In that spirit of openness, let’s consider the ominous warning that begins this week’s Torah portion, Vayakhel-Pekudei. Immediately before ordering the construction of the Mishkan, an elaborate portable sanctuary meant to house God’s presence, Moses reminds the people: “On six days work may be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a Shabbat of complete rest, holy to God.”

The timing of this repetitive reminder to observe Shabbat, coming as it does immediately before what amounts to a detailed architectural manual, strikes early rabbinic readers as odd. The great medieval commentator Rashi observes: “[Moses] gave a warning about Shabbat before [explaining] the commandments of the Mishkan — in order to say that [the Mishkan] doesn’t push aside Shabbat.” (Rashi on Exodus 35:1; his Sephardic counterpart the Ramban makes this point in almost identical terms.) In other words, the physical work necessary to build the sanctuary — lifting, digging and so on — is forbidden on Shabbat. Shabbat takes priority even over the project of constructing God’s summer home, as it were.

This is not an obvious conclusion. One could argue that building a house for God should take priority over the human celebration of a holiday. Hurrying to fulfill a commandment is a general principle, and there seems to be no greater reason for haste than completing God’s dwelling place. Furthermore, as the Ramban notes, we know of several other commandments that do override Shabbat, most famously the saving of human life. (Ramban on Exodus 31:7; see also Mishnah Menachot 11:3.)

What makes the Mishkan different? Rashi and the Ramban don’t say, so we have room to speculate. I want to claim that the choice of Shabbat over the Mishkan comprises a moral and theological statement. Consider: Shabbat is essentially a day for personal and metaphysical reflection, zekher maaseh bereishit, a remembrance of the creative act. Shabbat reminds human beings that we are as of yet the fullest flowering of a beautiful, dynamic process. Most days we fret away at our work; on Shabbat we realize that we’re the greatest piece of work of all. In biblical terms, we’re the end of creation. In philosophical terms, we’re ends in and of ourselves.

So Shabbat puts to shame the building of the Mishkan, or any human attempt to treat our surroundings as a tool for our own purposes. Building by definition means imposing the architect’s will on the world and its people. That task is often necessary, but it’s also dangerous. The rabbis are all too aware of what may come to pass when some human beings treat others as means rather than ends for the sake of some abstract purpose. They tell a story about the builders of the Tower of Babel: “If a person fell and died they did not trouble their hearts about it; but if a single brick fell, they sat and cried and said, ‘Oy! When can another one be brought up to replace it?” (Pirkei Rabbi Eliezer 24)

In all our own literal and metaphorical construction projects, therefore, we would do well to ask ourselves if we’re treating human beings as means instead of ends, if we’re ignoring the beauty of creation, if we’re pushing aside the meaning of Shabbat. This applies even to the building of the Mishkan, the holy sanctuary; all the more so to the desecration of, say, Hebron, or to the entire religious settlement movement originating with Gush Emunim, whose edifice ultimately rests upon the disenfranchisement of human beings in the name of the God of Israel.

Let’s continue to seek out the better angels in our tradition and our institutions, so that our own story can end as our Torah portion does: with constant and gentle guidance of kavod, dignity, “in the eyes of all the house of Israel throughout their journeys.”