Dear Friends,
Our Torah portion opens with this simple charge, “Tell the Israelite people to bring me gifts…” (Ex. 25:2) These gifts would be used in crafting the desert tabernacle, as the portion further indicates.
Yet, in a midrashic commentary, The Midrash Tanchuma, we find the following diversion from this text, offering a brilliant recasting of the idea of bringing gifts:
That they take for Me an offering (Exod. 25:2). Scripture says elsewhere in allusion to this verse: For I give you good doctrine; forsake ye not My teaching (Prov. 4:2). R. Simeon the son of Lakish explained this verse as follows: Once there were two merchants who were traveling together. One of them held a bolt of silk material in his hand, while the other held some pepper. They said to each other: “Let us exchange our merchandise.” One took the pepper and the other took the silk. What one of them had previously owned was no longer his, and that which the other had owned was, likewise, no longer his. With the law, however, this is not so. If one man studies Tractate Ze’raim, and another Tractate Mo’ed, and they instruct each other, each possesses knowledge of both. Truly, is there any merchandise more valuable than this? Therefore, For I give you good doctrine; forsake ye not My teaching.
Brilliantly, the commentary teaches that when one brings to another gifts of material – silk and pepper, or chocolate and flowers on February 14 – once the items are exchanged, it is a zero-sum game: each gains as well as loses some items.
However, when one brings to one’s fellow gifts of wisdom or of thought and exchanges those items, instead of each gaining and losing, each gains! This is a simple message. We teach it continually – that a candle igniting other candles doesn’t diminish but adds to the light – so, too, when love is shared. And, so, too, when wisdom or knowledge is imparted. The teacher does not lose, nor does the student; rather they both gain and grow.
Thus, we study our Jewish traditions weekly. We engage in Shabbat morning Torah study, and preparation of these Thursday Divrei Torah (Words of Torah), and we share our ideas with family, co-workers, neighbors and friends. The world of thought and ideas is designed not to be a depository, but an economy, where ideas are always in circulation, passing from mind to mind and heart to heart.
Let’s bring these gifts, as Torah commands!
Rabbi Douglas Kohn
Our Torah portion opens with this simple charge, “Tell the Israelite people to bring me gifts…” (Ex. 25:2) These gifts would be used in crafting the desert tabernacle, as the portion further indicates.
Yet, in a midrashic commentary, The Midrash Tanchuma, we find the following diversion from this text, offering a brilliant recasting of the idea of bringing gifts:
That they take for Me an offering (Exod. 25:2). Scripture says elsewhere in allusion to this verse: For I give you good doctrine; forsake ye not My teaching (Prov. 4:2). R. Simeon the son of Lakish explained this verse as follows: Once there were two merchants who were traveling together. One of them held a bolt of silk material in his hand, while the other held some pepper. They said to each other: “Let us exchange our merchandise.” One took the pepper and the other took the silk. What one of them had previously owned was no longer his, and that which the other had owned was, likewise, no longer his. With the law, however, this is not so. If one man studies Tractate Ze’raim, and another Tractate Mo’ed, and they instruct each other, each possesses knowledge of both. Truly, is there any merchandise more valuable than this? Therefore, For I give you good doctrine; forsake ye not My teaching.
Brilliantly, the commentary teaches that when one brings to another gifts of material – silk and pepper, or chocolate and flowers on February 14 – once the items are exchanged, it is a zero-sum game: each gains as well as loses some items.
However, when one brings to one’s fellow gifts of wisdom or of thought and exchanges those items, instead of each gaining and losing, each gains! This is a simple message. We teach it continually – that a candle igniting other candles doesn’t diminish but adds to the light – so, too, when love is shared. And, so, too, when wisdom or knowledge is imparted. The teacher does not lose, nor does the student; rather they both gain and grow.
Thus, we study our Jewish traditions weekly. We engage in Shabbat morning Torah study, and preparation of these Thursday Divrei Torah (Words of Torah), and we share our ideas with family, co-workers, neighbors and friends. The world of thought and ideas is designed not to be a depository, but an economy, where ideas are always in circulation, passing from mind to mind and heart to heart.
Let’s bring these gifts, as Torah commands!
Rabbi Douglas Kohn
