Quick Thoughts on the Parsha

In the third aliyah of Parshat Terumah, we learn about the command to construct the menorah. We read מקשה תיעשה המנורה, “the menorah shall be made of hammered work” (Shemot 25:31). The language here is striking-- why the more passive תיעשה (shall be made) and not the more active תעשה (you shall make)? Rashi answers with a story from the Midrash: Moshe found it hard to construct the menorah, and so Hashem said to him, השלך את הככר לאור והיא נעשית מאליה, “Cast the talent into the fire and it will be made by itself” (Rashi on Shemot 25:31). When Moshe is struggling, having already put in the effort to seemingly no avail, Hashem answers that he should cast the job to Him-- God will make the impossible possible and the menorah will make itself. From Rashi’s answer, we draw a powerful message that we can apply to our own struggles. When things are hard and we are feeling unable to do, produce, and construct that which we must construct, we need to cast the job over to Hashem. Hashem stepped in when Moshe felt things were too hard and instead caused the menorah to make itself, and He will do the same for us. Today, choose one thing that you are finding hard and cast it over to Hashem-- ask Hashem to assist you and take over when you need support. When we are willing to have faith and turn the task over to Hashem, תיעשה, it will get done.

-- Rabbanit Alissa

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"A person should always strive to be a ladder resting on the ground, whose head reaches the heavens". This Hasidic take on the imagery of Ya'akov's dream advises us to always think big and to think about the future, but in doing so to never ever lose touch with the ground. "On the ground" are the people we interact with daily, and the important tasks that present themselves daily. Our big dreaming must never unroot us. 

The final passuk of Terumah concerns the יתדות, the pegs that were used to hold down the curtains that marked the contours of the Mishkan's courtyard, making sure that the curtains didn't flap in the wind. Rashi goes to some length to figure out whether these pegs were actually dug into the ground, or simply held the curtains down by virtue of their weight. Either way, the pegs serve as a reminder, like Ya'akov's ladder, of the vital importance of remaining rooted, of never losing sight of the people in our immediate circle, the concrete concerns and needs that we are called to attend to on any given day. Even the Mishkan, the seat of the Divine Presence, needed to be rooted. How much more so, we. 

--Rav Yosef