A Thought on Parshas Pekudei

"...u'kavod HaShem malae es ha'mishkan..." "...and the glory of G-d filled the mishkan..." (40:34) In this final parsha of Sefer Sh'mos, the Torah gives us a glimpse of the sacred shrine - the mishkan in the desert - and the implied interaction between Heaven and earth, between the Divine Presence and the material abode which was constructed after the giving of the Torah. There are a number of verses which require careful analysis in an attempt to form an image of that mystic scene of long ago. Each verse is like a piece of a puzzle, a mosaic, which sheds some clue as to what happened there. We read about clouds, about light, about serving HaShem in that place yet not being allowed to go there at all times. Our verse above, at a literal level, poses difficulties for us as well, since the Presence of HaShem is infinite and endless yet the verse seems to say that this dimensionless Glory of G-d somehow filled the mishkan. We know that HaShem is known as "Makom", about which our sages have taught us that "He is the Makom (place) of the world; this world is not His place. All that exists in form, in time, in space and in numinous essence, is contained within the Divine. The opposite idea - that the world contains HaShem - is a theological impossibility in Jewish thought. If so, what does our verse intend, with its initial implication that HaShem's Presence was contained within the physical mishkan? If the entire world, the entire universe, cannot contain or enclose His limitless vastness, how could this small structure do so? To resolve this enigma, the Panae'ach Raza writes that the verse must be understood in a different manner than the word sequence would imply. The verse should be understood as if saying "ha'mishkan malae es Kavod HaShem" - the mishkan was filled with HaShem's Glory. At those moments in time when the Presence was near to our senses, the space within the walls of that structure seemed filled with heightened sensitivity to His Presence. The Panae'ach Raza refers to this phenomenon with the kabbalistic term knows as tzimtzum - contraction. The Ain Sof - the HaShem who exists within Nothingness - makes His Presence present through a "mechansim" which the mystics termed tzimtzum. (I cannot go into this further herein. Those who want to grasp more of the concept can listen to the talk I gave last Shavuos at Aish Tamid which was not recorded owing to Yom Tov.) The earth and the heavens cannot enclose or encompass HaShem, nor could the tabernacle in the wilderness do so. However, those who encountered or entered that place knew that there was an elevated spiritual sensation there. Something seemed to envelop, rather than occupy, the three dimensions of the space within, just as something was present atop Sinai at the moment when the Divine Torah was brought down to earth in physical form. The Presence is always present, everywhere and at all times. As verse 35 says, there was always a "cloud" surrounding the mishkan, even when Aharon and his sons would enter there for daily devotions. However, there was moments when another "cloud" hovered within, and when that occurred, no one, even Moshe Rabbeinu, could enter there. The Torah calls that second cloud (verse 39) "the Cloud of HaShem." During those moments, the mishkan seemed filled with the Glory of HaShem. Good Shabbos. D Fox