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CHUMASH
Parshas Terumah - Rishon with Rashi
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Today we are starting a very exciting parsha — all about the Mishkan!
On Har Sinai, Hashem tells Moshe Rabbeinu about the Mishkan that the Yidden will need to build later!
Here are the things they will need to use to build the Mishkan:
- gold, silver, and copper
- certain colors of wool (blue, purple, and red)
- linen
- goat hair
- animal skins (ram skins dyed red, and tachash-skin)
- the wood Yaakov planted in Mitzrayim (Atzei Shitim)
- olive oil (for the Menorah)
- besamim (spices for the Shemen Hamishcha and for the ketores)
- jewels (for the Efod and the Choshen)
Then Hashem says, “Ve’asu Li Mikdash VeShachanti Besocham — they should make for Me a Mishkan and I will live in them!” The posuk doesn’t say “Veshachanti Besocho,” I will live in IT, it says “Veshachanti Besocham,” I will live in THEM!” Hashem doesn’t just want to live in the Mishkan, Hashem wants to live in every single Yid!
By all of the Yidden together building the Mishkan where Hashem’s Shechinah will rest, Hashem’s Shechinah will also be able to rest in every Yid!
The Yidden should make the Mishkan the way Hashem tells Moshe, and later they will make similar things for the Beis Hamikdash.
First Hashem tells Moshe Rabbeinu how to make the Aron:
The Aron should be made of wood, with a gold case inside and outside. It should have a “crown” around the top. There should be poles attached to the Aron with golden rings, in a way that the poles can never come out.
Inside of the Aron, they should put the Luchos!
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In Kapitel Tes-Vov (15), we learn about the special midos that a Yid needs so his neshama will be able to go to Gan Eden.
One of the things it says is “Nivzeh BeEinav Nimas” — “he is embarrassed of himself, and thinks he is disgusting.”
What kind of midah is that?!
The Alter Rebbe tells us what it means soon in Tanya: That when our Yetzer Hara is getting too big and too proud, and not leaving room to think about Hashem and another Yid, we need to do something about it! We need to spend some time thinking about the part of us that is a Nefesh Habehamis, and how it’s disgusting that it tries to take us away from Hashem.
Then we’ll be able to make room in our hearts for Hashem, and daven like a Yid and win over our Yetzer Hara!
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TANYA
Likutei Amarim Perek Chof-Zayin
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When a person is feeling sad, he doesn’t have enough energy to fight with his Yetzer Hara and only listen to his Yetzer Tov!
One of the things that can make a person feel sad and slow is that even when he’s doing other things, his mind keeps trying to think about aveiros! A person might say, “I only want to think about GOOD things, why do such terrible things keep coming into my head?”
The Alter Rebbe says that he is making a big mistake! Instead of being SAD about it, he should be HAPPY! Because when a person says “NO! I won’t think about that aveira!” he is doing a mitzvah, which should make him very happy!
The Chachomim say that a person who is tempted to do an aveira but stops himself, gets a reward just like he did a mitzvah! So when a person thinks something he shouldn’t be thinking, and he stops and think something else instead, he should be happy that he is able to do this mitzvah, and will be rewarded for it, just like for any other mitzvah.
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The Avodah of Chabad that the Alter Rebbe set up for Chassidim is to find the pnimius in our Avodas Hashem. We need to have kavana in the mitzvos we do, and do them with an Emes!
What does that mean?
It means that when we do a mitzvah, we need to know what we are doing.
For example, when we are learning a posuk in Chumash, we need to know that these are the words of Hashem! When we are davening, we need to prepare ourselves and know that we are standing before Hashem. When we say a bracha, we need to have kavana that we are bringing kedusha into the world. When we do a favor for another Yid and help him, it should be with a feeling of Ahavas Yisroel, not just because it makes us feel good!
In order to accomplish this, we need to learn Chassidus, which teaches us all of these things, and try to understand it the best we can. Then we need to make it part of our lives, and part of the way we live as a Yid.
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In today’s Rambam, we are starting a new set of halachos: The halachos about borrowing or lending money. There are many mitzvos about this, and today we are learning two of them:
1) (Mitzvas Asei #197) To lend money to poor people, to make their life a little bit easier. The Rambam says that this is even more important than tzedakah! That’s because people don’t want to become poor and need to ask for money — it will be very embarrassing for them! When you give them a loan, you save them from needing to ask for tzedakah!
We learn this mitzvah from a posuk in Parshas Mishpatim: אִם כֶּסֶף תַּלְוֶה אֶת עַמִּי אֶת הֶעָנִי עִמָּךְ
The details are explained in many places in Mesechta Kesubos and Mesechta Bava Basra.
2) (Mitzvas Lo Saasei #234) Not to ask a person to pay back your loan if you know he can’t.
We learn this mitzvah from the same posuk in Parshas Mishpatim: לֹא תִהְיֶה לוֹ כְּנשֶׁה
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In Perek Alef, we learn that it’s a special mitzvah to give a loan to a poor person, or anyone who needs it. Lending money is a very big mitzvah!
But borrowing money is a very serious thing too — if a person borrows money when he does not need to, and then can’t pay back the loan, he is called a rasha.
Perek Beis teaches us how the Chachomim helped make it easier for us to lend money: After the time of the Gemara, there were a lot of sneaky people who said they couldn’t pay back their loans — even though they really could. The Chachomim decided to force people to make a shevuah (a very strong Torah promise in Hashem’s name) in front of the Beis Din if they said that they did not have money. That stopped people from lying, and kept everyone from being afraid to lend money!
We also learn the halacha that when someone gives a loan, he should have witnesses, a mashkon, or a contract, to show that it is a serious thing and make sure all of the details of the loan are clear (like the exact amount he lent).
In Perek Gimmel the Rambam teaches us about a mashkon: A mashkon (a security) is when someone takes an object from someone he lent money to, and gives it back when he is paid back. We learn the details of mitzvos we will be learning later, like not taking a mashkon from an almanah (widow), or not taking a mashkon from keilim that are used to make food with.
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In today’s Rambam, we learn about when a person is chayav to be punished by the Beis Din for eating asur food. Just like at the Seder we eat a certain amount of matzah in a certain amount of time, a person only gets punished if he eats a certain amount of food in a certain amount of time.
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Do you give tzedakah every day? It feels good to know that we are doing a mitzvah when we are helping someone else!
But what about when someone else is helping US? Did you know that we are ALSO doing what Hashem wants then?
In the beginning of this week’s parsha, Parshas Terumah, the Torah says “Veyikchu Li Terumah,” “you should take for Me gifts,” which were used to build the Mishkan.
Many of the meforshim ask, why does the Torah say it this way? It should say, “you should GIVE gifts for Hashem!”
The Rebbe explains that the Torah is teaching us an important lesson: Even when we are taking (“Veyikchu”) from another person who is helping us, it should also be “Li” — for Hashem.
Hashem made the world in a way where we can all help each other! Sometimes it is with our time, with our smile, or with our money. All of these are ways we do Chesed, being kind to each other. Of course, for someone to be able to give, another person has to be able to take the help.
We need to remember that even when we are just getting help from someone, we should remember that we are doing what Hashem wants — keeping the world a place where we help each other, the way Hashem wants it to be!
See Likutei Sichos Chelek Gimmel, Parshas Terumah
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In this week’s Chumash, we learn about the mitzvah of “Ve’asu Li Mikdash Veshachanti Besocham” — that we should build Hashem a Mishkan. Even though we can’t do the mitzvah nowadays by building a Mishkan or a Beis Hamikdash, it is still a mitzvah for us to do nowadays.
How? By making sure that we are a Mikdash for Hashem, and that our home is a Mikdash for Hashem!
When we learn Torah, daven to Hashem, and have Ahavas Yisroel, we are like a Mishkan! When we learn Torah, it is like we have an Aron, which had the Luchos with the words of Torah inside. The Chachomim tell us that davening is in the place of korbanos, so when we daven, it is like we are bringing korbanos on our own Mizbeiach. When we do Gemilus Chasadim to give others food and other things they need, we are like the Shulchan, which was full of warm bread that the kohanim would later eat.
The Rebbe taught us that children need to make sure that their own rooms are a Mikdash for Hashem! By having Seforim like a Chumash, a Siddur, and a Pushka, our room is a mini-Mishkan. But it’s not just enough to HAVE them, we need to DO the avodah of the Mishkan by USING them too!
Do you have a Chumash, siddur, and pushka in your room? Do you use them regularly?
See Likutei Sichos chelek Chof-Vov, p. 412
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Boruch She’amar is the bracha at the beginning of Pesukei Dezimra. In Pesukei Dezimra, we speak about the greatness of Hashem. The Chachomim taught us that we should spend some time praising Hashem before asking for our needs in Shemoneh Esrei.
By speaking about Hashem’s greatness in Pesukei Dezimra, we wake up our feelings of connection to Hashem. This helps us daven with a proper kavana.
We say the bracha of Boruch She’amar at the beginning of Pesukei Dezimra, and the bracha of Yishtabach at the end. This way the whole Pesukei Dezimra is surrounded by brachos!
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The Anshei Kneses Hagedolah were the ones set up the nusach of brachos, Tefillos, Kiddush, and Havdalah for all of the Yidden.
In their time, when the Yidden were coming back to Eretz Yisroel to build the second Beis Hamikdash, many of the Yidden were very poor. Not all of them could even afford enough wine to make Havdalah! So instead of telling the Yidden to make Havdalah on a kos of wine, the Anshei Kneses Hagedolah put Havdalah into Maariv.
They put Havdalah into the bracha of Ata Chonen, which asks Hashem for chochmah, in a paragraph starting with the words Ata Chonantanu. They did this for two reasons: First of all, because separating between two things, like Shabbos and weekday, kodesh and chol, needs chochmah! Second of all, on Shabbos we don’t ask for our needs in Shemoneh Esrei, so they put Havdalah into the first bracha of Shemoneh Esrei where we start asking for our needs, so that we could ask for all we need right away in the rest of Shemoneh Esrei.
Later the Yidden weren’t so poor anymore. The Chachomim told the Yidden to start making Havdalah again the way we are supposed to, over a kos of wine.
But then again, things changed. Many Yidden couldn’t afford to use wine for Havdalah anymore! Would the Chachomim keep having to switch things?
Instead, the Chachomim decided to tell all the Yidden that Havdalah should always be said in Tefillah, and should also be said over a kos of wine if we are able to.
So we do both — Havdalah in davening and on a kos, even if it is in the opposite order. Even if we already heard Havdalah on a kos before davening Maariv, we also say the paragraph of Ata Chonantanu, since the original takanah the Anshei Kneses Hagedolah set up was to say Havdalah in Maariv.
See Alter Rebbe’s Shulchan Aruch siman Reish-Tzadik-Daled se’if Alef and Beis
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לעילוי נשמת הרה״ח ר׳ דניאל יצחק ע״ה בן ר׳ אפרים שי׳ מאסקאוויץ
שליח כ"ק אדמו"ר נשיא דורנו למדינת אילינוי
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One year (Shabbos Parshas Mishpatim 5749/1989), the Rebbe asked that when we learn about the Mishkan in Chumash (in Parshas Terumah, Tetzaveh and the beginning of Ki Sisa), in addition to learning Rashi, we should also learn what the Gemara and Torah Shebaal Peh explains on these pesukim.
By learning more about the Mishkan (which is the basis for the Beis Hamikdash which was later built) it will bring Hashem to build the Beis Hamikdash Hashlishi much faster!
We will learn an explanation from the Rebbe about how the Aron connects the Mishkan and each Beis Hamikdash together, and makes them last forever!
In today’s Chumash, we learn about the Aron.
Even though the Beis Hamikdash was destroyed, the Aron was NOT destroyed!
When Shlomo Hamelech built the Beis Hamikdash, he knew the Beis Hamikdash would later be destroyed. He had tunnels built underground to hide the Aron in! Later, King Yoshiyahu moved the Aron there to keep it safe, under the Beis Hamikdash.
That way, the same Aron that was in the Mishkan was there during the time of the first and second Beis Hamikdash, and will be brought out again to be part of the third Beis Hamikdash!
Since this important part of the Beis Hamikdash is always there, the Beis Hamikdash was never completely destroyed. And since the same Aron was there for each Beis Hamikdash, they are all connected!
This is similar to the Luz bone that every person has, one of the bones in a person that is impossible to destroy! Even after a person passes away, the Luz bone stays. From this bone, Hashem will rebuild the person at the time of Techiyas Hameisim! The Aron is like the Luz bone of the Beis Hamikdash — Hashem will rebuild the Beis Hamikdash around the Aron, which was never destroyed!
See Likutei Sichos chelek Chof-Alef, parshas Terumah
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לע"נ התינוק זאב ארי' ע"ה בן יבלט"א הרה"ח ר' שניאור זלמן שי' גליק
נפטר ב' מנחם אב ה'תשע"ג
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