This week we read the last two sections of the Book of Exodus, called Vayakhel and Pekudei. They recount the construction of the Mishkan, the portable Sanctuary that revealed God's presence with the Jewish people during their journeys through the desert.<\/p>\n
While most of them are just detailed accounts of how what God had told Moshe in the parashot Terumah and Tetzaveh was done in practice (making the latter parashot almost a repetition of the aforementioned ones), there are certain verses that give us information that we did not know before.<\/p>\n
One of these new additions is the Kior (in Parashat Vayakhel), a kind of giant samovar filled with cold water that had spouts which the Kohanim\u2014priests\u2014used to wash their hands and feet before service in the Mishkan. In fact, of all the utensils in the Sanctuary, the Kior is the only one for which we know who donated the materials to build it.<\/p>\n
The Torah tells us that it was made from the copper mirrors of the women. The rest of the utensils were made of gold, silver, copper, wool of different colors, wood, and other materials, but we don't know the details of who owned them\u2014for example, the gold of the Menorah, or the silver of the bases of the Sanctuary walls, or the wood from which the altar was built. The Kior is different; it was made from copper donated by the women.<\/p>\n
What does this teach us? First, we must understand what the Sanctuary symbolizes and, within it, what the Kior means.<\/p>\n
It is understood that every matter in the Torah has both a material and a spiritual dimension. Even though the material expression of something no longer exists, like the Sanctuary, its spiritual expression is eternal. The spiritual Sanctuary that each person must build is their own home, where the Divine presence is revealed through living a life according to the Torah and its mitzvot.<\/p>\n
The Kior, as we mentioned, was used to "sanctify" the Kohanim before beginning the service in the Sanctuary. This symbolizes the concept that before beginning work in the Sanctuary, that is, in the home, there must be a washing of feet and hands. In other words, when a person arrives home from the street to build or continue developing their personal sanctuary, they must "cleanse" themselves and rid themselves of all the influences of the street, of that which is outside the sanctuary. The very fact of living in exile leads us to acquire certain customs and behaviors that are not our own, that do not appear in the Torah, and that have no relation to Judaism.<\/p>\n
And who bears the primary responsibility for making this selection and discerning what enters the house from external influences and what does not? The woman. That is why the Torah tells us that the Kior was built with copper donated by Jewish women. Because they, as the "foundation of the house," are the ones who must perform this sacred task of preserving the Jewish atmosphere in the home, free from any external and foreign factor that might affect the Sanctuary.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Esta semana leemos las dos \u00faltimas secciones del libro de Shmot, llamadas Vaiakh\u00e9l y Pekud\u00e9i. Las mismas relatan la construcci\u00f3n del Mishk\u00e1n, el Santuario transportable que revelaba la presencia de Di-s junto al pueblo jud\u00edo en sus viajes por el desierto. Si bien en su mayor\u00eda son s\u00f3lo relatos detallados de c\u00f3mo se hizo en… Read More \u00bbFirst you have to wash yourself<\/span><\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5089,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9,58,57],"tags":[972,1019,994,942],"series":[],"class_list":["post-2262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editoriales","category-pekudei","category-vaiakhel","tag-mishkan","tag-moshe","tag-mujer","tag-tora"],"episode_featured_image":"https:\/\/tuviaserber.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/Lavado.jpg","episode_player_image":"https:\/\/tuviaserber.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/avatar1400.jpeg","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"light","subscribeUrls":{"castbox":{"key":"castbox","url":"","label":"CastBox","class":"castbox","icon":"castbox.png"},"rss":{"key":"rss","url":"","label":"RSS","class":"rss","icon":"rss.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/tuviaserber.com\/en\/feed\/podcast\/rabino-tuvia-serber","embedCode":"Primero hay que lavarse<\/a><\/blockquote>