by Rabbi Evan Krame

Moses hands off spiritual leadership to his brother Aaron and Aaron’s sons in Parashat Tzav (Leviticus Chapter 8 : 2 – 5) in a very public ceremony,   He becomes a facilitator for Aaron and his sons to assume the priestly roles, thus signaling a profound change in leadership structures.  At first I wondered why Moses was not to be high priest, finding this development unfair and out of order.  Upon reflection, the discomfort at the leadership shift was all mine.  The Torah and the lead actor, Moses, once again exhibited the finest of political and management skills as Moses relinquishes spiritual leadership duties to demonstrate that religious growth will come with decentralization of authority.

The Torah instructs that it is a mistake to bundle up political, spiritual, military, judicial and economic roles in one person.  Previously, in parashat Yitro, Moses learned to share judicial power with the elders.  Military control is given over to Joshua in phases as the Children of Israel prepare to enter their new homeland. In this particular moment there comes a spiritual leadership reassignment.

But notice how the change is finessed.  It is both public and expansive.  First, God instructs Moses and then Moses gathers all of the people together at the tent of meeting to bear witness to the anointing.  To insure a successful sharing of spiritual access, Moses makes certain that the entire community is engaged as witness to the shift.

Second, Moses had a relationship with God that was as if friends were speaking face to face.  The priestly rituals, focused on offering sacrifices, demonstrate another and less direct line of connection to God.  While both representational and derivative, the priestly rituals expanded access to the Divine beyond the private line between God and Moses.

The modern technology of communicating with God is vastly different from the time of the Exodus.  No one has singular access to God.  No goats die for the sake of our connection as prayers and meditation have supplanted priestly processes.  Yet, the shifting of power and introduction of new rituals in this parasha makes for a poignant message.  Today’s religious governance should be inspired to share spiritual leadership and expand access to God.   As per God’s direction, the change must be public and inclusive.

Spiritual leadership paradigm change is necessary for the future growth of Judaism.  It is time for us to figure out what the next transfer of spiritual Jewish leadership should be. Our challenge is to select new spiritual leaders to inspire and guide us through to the new paradigm.

We speak of sacred time and sacred space as if they exist on their own. But they don’t – their sacred nature is an attribute that we impose or imbue them with. We can easily ignore Shabbat and treat it like any of the other six days in the week – there is nothing inherent in the seventh day that compels it to be responded to in a different way. It is because we have been told to do so, that it takes on a sacredness, it is our awareness of a connection to the spiritual that it becomes sacred.

In this double portion, Vayakhel-Pekudei, Moses convenes the whole Israelite community and the first thing he says is that the seventh day is to be set aside, sacred, for Y-H-V-H. There are two ways to mark this day as distinct from other days – in contrast to the other six days, no work is to be done as it is to be a complete rest and no fires are to be kindled. The previous parsha begins the Shabbat description but is interrupted by the building of the Golden Calf.

Does this interruption in the narrative reveal something about our ability or inability to let go of our plugged-in lives, full of busy-ness? Is it idolatry, a devotion to something other than the spiritual, that interferes with our willingness to set aside time? The juxtaposition of the details of building the Tabernacle and the ark to hold the tablets with both the golden calf and shabbat, serves to emphasize the value of sacred time. Even the construction of the sacred mishkan is paused for Shabbat. Abraham Joshua Heschel refers to Shabbat as a cathedral in time. As Jews, we attempt to construct a calendar of values, focusing on freedom, responsibility, justice, forgiveness, communal joys and communal sorrows.

As we approach the holiday of freedom, may we all think about what enslaves us and how to enrich our lives the gift of Sacred Time.

JoHanna Potts

by  Rabbis Evan J. Krame & David Evan Markus

Architect Frank Lloyd Wright famously said, “I believe in God, only I spell it Nature.”  Construction trades tend more to concern gutters and girders than God, but Wright proclaims his connection with divinity, constructed in and through nature.  This week’s Torah portion (Ki Tisa) agrees, and offers us key reminders about how we can build Jewish lives meaningfully. 

Detailing plans for the Tent of Meeting, last week’s Torah portion laid out in exquisite detail the structure, fixtures, vessels and ritual objects that are to be crafted with great flourishes and artistry.  The purpose was to build a physical place to remind that God, ever the Creator and Redeemer, will meet with the people and dwell among them.  The “amen” to the blueprints wasn’t to stand back and admire: rather, the people – all the people – contributed raw materials. Now Torah appoints Betzalel – essentially the Frank Lloyd Wright to build the Tent of Meeting in all its enumerated splendor (Ex. 31:1-11) – and Torah’s next instruction is to honor Shabbat, to stop building one day each week so that we can know holiness through God (Ex. 31-13-14).  The work of our hands may be divinely inspired (Ps. 90:17), but we build holiness not for the sake of an actual place but to immerse ourselves in relationship with the power and splendor we call God.

In that spirit, it’s no surprise that some of us more deeply experience spirituality outdoors in nature than indoors in houses of worship.  Mountains, oceans, dazzling sunsets and star-studded skies evoke wonder, awe and transcendence.  Despite Torah’s detailed instructions to build a house of God, we still seek temples of sky and cathedrals of towering trees – which is why Frank Lloyd Wright’s most well-known structures seamlessly glide between the human and natural, open to vistas and seeming to leap out of landscapes.  What’s more, Judaism’s holiest temple isn’t a place of space at all but rather, as Abraham Joshua Heschel famously taught, a “palace in time” we call Shabbat – a day of grandeur designed precisely not to build anything at all.

The ancient Tent of Meeting is long past into history, but places to meet holiness still abound.  They are our physical prayer spaces, our synagogues of sky, our temples of tall trees, and our Shabbat palaces in time.  Whenever and wherever we give our heart to build awareness of wonder, awe and transcendence (in Hebrew, “build” and “meditate” share a common root), there God dwells among us.  There we can build a Jewish life dynamic as any Frank Lloyd Wright’s design, timeless as the mountains, deep as the oceans.  What a mobile spiritual gift we inherit, capable of being sparked anew anytime and anywhere we join together for that purpose.