Tomorrow night is Rosh HaShanah – the daily Elul thought will transform into daily thought for the High Holy Days or Days of Awe, as the month of Elul will end, and become the month of Tishrei. Make sure to take time out to acknowledge the Jewish New Year on Sunday night, and Monday, and Tuesday. L’shanah tovh u’metukah – a good and sweet new year to everyone!
Today we look at Va-yak-heil, Exodus 35:1 – 38:20 – the gathering of the donations to build the Tabernacle, and the fashioning of the pieces and construction takes place.
Perhaps the only not-for profit effort in all time to be so enthusiastically completed, as it says here in Exodus, Chapter 36:
5: …The people are bringing much more than enough for the service of (doing) the work that God has commanded, to make it!
6 So Moses commanded and they had a call go throughout the camp, saying: Man and woman-let them not make-ready any further work-material for the contribution of the Holy-shrine! So the people were stopped from bringing;
7 the work-material was enough for them, for all the work, to make it, and more.
As we think about Elul, we might look back on the last year and note how often we felt the opposite of this. How often did we feel depleted and without the resources to complete the tasks we set before us?
Is this about the demands made upon us by our tasks, or is it about the number of tasks and the details we promise to get done?
When the task is finite, we can complete it with enthusiasm. If the goals we have set require work without end, we mistreat ourselves as unlimited resources.
For the year to come, let us try to set ourselves reasonable tasks – and find ourselves bringing more than enough to them.
We must treat this world’s existence as limited in order to better find connections with the infinite.
I know I will be working on this for a long time!
