Remember the Everything

Rabbi Noa Kushner

May 22, 2020

1. 

This shabbat in Torah we are in b’midbar / in the wilderness

A place in-between places

A wilderness where we are aware our safety is not fully guaranteed

Where there are challenges we have to rise and face 

We’re in the wilderness, headed somewhere we’ve never been, a promised land we’re not even sure exists

Sound familiar? 

2. 

R. Abraham Isaac Kook teaches that there are different kinds of holiness and they operate in different times and different ways. 

All are necessary, none are extraneous

So Jerusalem has a permanent kind of holiness, he says, whether we are there or not, it is holy to us 

But Mt. Sinai, where we received Torah, the holiness of Sinai was temporary – and it only lasted for the giving of Torah (what we will celebrate next Thursday on shavuot). 

Likewise, 

he says, that there are mitzvot / holy commandments that are eternal and get passed from generation to generation but then there are mitzvot that just exist for one specific time. 

So in our Torah this week, some of the mitzvot we received in the wilderness were the just specific for that time, just for the generation of the desert — they didn’t apply anywhere else.

Specific acts just for a specific time.  

Kook calls that kind of holiness that does not last forever, Kedushat sha’ah / 

a special, holy time 

One should not think that Kedushat sha’ah is on a lower level than permanent holiness

On the contrary, it is precisely because of its intensity that it cannot last forever. 

We wouldn’t be able to keep it up 

I think in this moment of in-between, like the generation of the desert, we have a spiritual challenge in front of us

A rung of holiness for just this time 

If we try to apply the old rules, just follow the usual mitzvot, we will not meet this challenge

And we will surely endanger one another 

For we are living in a time of kedushat sha’ah / a special, guarded, 

provisional time, a chapter 

Which carries unique spiritual challenges in it 

Now, in this time, our holiness must also be cultivated in each of us 

Now (yes, in addition to zoom) we will each build palaces for shabbat in our studios, apartments and homes, no matter the size

we will bring the shabbat bride into each of our own homes

She will sit at our tables 

Now we will think about praying in the mornings in our homes or maybe before we go to sleep

Not on zoom, 

just setting aside a time to cultivate the sanctuaries in our neshamot, souls to cultivate our ability to feel the presence of one another again, 

to know as we are praying many of us are trying also to pray, 

to relearn how to talk to heaven when we are alone

These are commands for this kedushat sha’ah / this holy time 

To protect and guard one another, 

To protect and guard the sanctuaries in each of us 

To protect our precious lives in this holy in-between time. 

3. 

Now I noticed in our parasha 

Which, as I mentioned, describes our life in the wilderness 

And among other things talks about how we should set up the mishkan

The traveling meeting place for us and God that we bring with us throughout our wanderings — 

And I noticed that 

When God instructs us how to take the mishkan apart 

See we set it up and take it down 

God says, put the Levites, the priests in charge of everything having to do with the mishkan— “v’al kol keilav / all the vessels or utensils”

And then there is (seems to me) an added phrase, “v’al kol asher lo”

(and make them in charge) also 

“over everything that belongs to that holy place”

Now we know Torah doesn’t add words, all the words have meaning. 

We’ve already had or will have a lot of detail about the different pieces of this holy place, why this catch all, this “kol asher lo” ? / this “everything” ? (Num. 1:50). 

What is this, “everything that’s in it” business? 

Ibn Ezra teaches that this “everything” refers to the utensils used for the utensils.

The vessels for the vessels 

But I find that unsatisfying. 

Even more so because, a few chapters later, again — 

God says, talking about the responsibility of a priest

“Pekudat Eliezer… pekudat kol ha mishkan…” 

Aaron’s son is responsible for (and then God lists it out) and follows the instruction by saying — he’s responsible for the whole holy place followed by —

“V’chol asher bo / and everything in it —“ (whether the holy things or the vessels) (Num. 4:16). 

Maybe Torah is just being extra careful, these people are responsible for ensuring everything is in order, serious

But I think there is another possible reading: 

I want to suggest that 

“v’chol asher bo”

This, “everything that’s in it” is what arises only when the holy place is put back together. When it is intact. 

Given that we’ve already heard about all the holy vessels and oils and utensils we have to pack up

I think this “v’chol asher bo” / this “everything in it”

Means the totality of the holy place

It is what happens when everything all comes back together and we all come back together

It is the thing that is greater than the sum of the parts

Greater than any one person (even Moses)

Greater than any one tribe

Greater than any one piece of the ark or even any one letter on the tablets

Greater even than any one collective gathering b/c 

It is the time and the place and the moment and the ongoing love and dedication in those places and in those moments, the commitment 

This is what God wants us to guard

Keep THAT says God, when you are taking care of all the utensils and roles and getting ready to move to the next place, 

don’t forget what it is you are creating together with me. 

Guard that “everything.”

Perhaps we need to understand that our role in this kedushat sha’ah 

In this time of heightened spirituality and heightened potential for change 

Is to protect ourselves as sanctuaries, yes, 

but also to guard the memory of this “everything” that we experienced

To not let ourselves forget

To remember what that “everything” was, what it felt like 

and to know our “everything” will return — of course, not the same, 

but maybe Torah is teaching us 

To guard it so that it will return. 

4. 

In fact

When we think about our time in Torah in the desert

Maybe we imagine ourselves set up in our camp, the tribes arranged in a particular formation around the mishkan / 

the dwelling place for God and us that we just set up 

But I am also thinking this week

That for every time we set up that ark and built that mishkan

For every time we put it all together — the poles and decorations and gold 

We also took it all down

We disassembled the whole thing 

Again and again, we would build it and experience as the holy one showed up with us

Holiness, clouds, fire, the whole thing —

Only to take it all down again later 

Only to make everything we had built disappear.

Almost as if God wanted to teach us how to hold onto holiness and our connection to God and our connection to each other through memory when we are 

In-between 

When we are traveling a long way for a long time 

Not really knowing where exactly we are going 

Almost as if God wanted to teach us how to stay intact without a holy space altogether

Without the precise formation of our tents in the desert, all of us arranged  just so in our camps with our flags

It’s as if God wanted to help us develop spiritual muscle, stamina, maturity

Trust 

Sometimes we can’t sit in our favorite row at SF Friends

Sometimes we can’t even gather to hear our people sing because we would endanger each other 

Sometimes we can’t eat and argue together 

Sometimes, in fact, often in Torah 

We have to take it all down, every pole, every wall must be disconnected

Because the taking down, the disassembling, then and now, has something fundamental to teach us: 

And in fact Rashi (to 1:50) points out that when we are asked to take down the mishkan / the holy meeting place

This does mean we lower it or desecrate it 

But rather it means we disassembled it 

As if to underscore the difference 

Disbanding, dis-assembly is not desecration 

In other words

What we have built exists whether it is put together or taken apart

What we have built exists no matter where we are in the desert or how long we will be here 

What we have exists independently of whether the mishkan / our holy meeting place is standing in full glory or in pieces on our backs. 

5. 

Last

Not only did we take our holy place apart knowing we would build it again

We carried that holy place through the wilderness 

For many years, we carried it on our backs

Because real holy places require our strength 

If we keep the memory of our “everything” alive

And we ignore what is happening in our city 

If we relearn how to get up and pray in the mornings, feeling the strength of one another, but don’t hear the silent cries of our neighbors

If we curate our spiritual through line in the wilderness but ignore the unhoused, those who are lined up for dinner right now, those who have been in the wilderness for a long time 

If we don’t ever find our way to GLIDE or another way to volunteer (they now need people at 6 AM every morning)

If we don’t give or I would say return some of the extra money we have to places serving the desperate where they have double the requests 

If we don’t figure out how we will involve ourselves and invest ourselves in the politics of our city

Then our holy place, no matter how modest it is, no matter how pure our intentions, will not be a holy place, it will just be some pieces but missing other, vital ones, it will never have the “everything” 

It will never stay upright 

And we will have missed our opportunity to fulfill the most critical mitzvah in this kedushat sha’ah / in this holy hour. 

May we find the strength in the days ahead not only to remember our everything, not only to make our way through the wilderness, but also to carry one another.