Torah blog Ki Sisa - Strength through Unity

BS”D

Strength through Unity, Prayer in unity and more insights into Parasha KI SISA!

KI SISA – means to uplift, to lift up and elevate (the head of each other) our sedra uses the term as part of an instruction by Hashem to count the nation of Israel, but why to lift up each other through a coin, this is because we do not relegate people to a number, a person is way too special for this, we see each individual as a fountain of unique potential with capability to contribute and uplift the nation as a whole, thus we use coins to count the nation, we don’t count people, but not a complete coin Hashem instructs us to use a half coin – the symbolism  is obvious the nation is only complete when we contribute our share together with the other half – to make the whole!

The passuk talks about the giving of the half coin  - as an atonement, (important to know as this sedra also deals with our sin,) we see the power of charity which ultimately is a move away from self and into the realm of caring for another, I heard from a friend (may Hashem consider his merits), about the Hebrew word for give “natan” you can spell it both ways back and forward in Hebrew, the lesson here is the getter receives, and the giver receives, both get through the one giving the other!  I have seen this is a reality in my own life, I would argue that often we do not realise how much more we get when we give, much more than the recipient! (It should be so, and our charity should please G-d always go to the best and most holy and important places, we need to daven that this happens.) Rabbi Pinchas Khan taught us that when we do the Mitzvah of charity the focus should not be on the money, but the focus should be on the recipient, we should give with heart.

http://shortvort.com/ki-sisa-parasha/11681-parashas-ki-sisa-was-the-sin-of-the-golden-calf-even-idolatory  please click on the link to view the full drasha on Ki Sisa by:

Daniel Sandground, (student at Ohr Somayach Yeshiva, Jerusalem)

The sedra begins with Hashem commanding Moshe to take a census of the Jewish people through the giving of a half shekel coin which were then all counted in order to determine the census. The Torah teaches that it is forbidden to count Jews in an ordinary way, and that when it is necessary to conduct a census, it should be done by having the people contribute items, which would then be counted. The half shekel coin was then used as a charitable contribution in the construction of the Tabernacle. The Torah states, “This shall they give” [30:13]... according to Rashi, Hashem showed Moshe a coin of fire and said to him, 'Like this shall they give'... the mefarshim bring down some interesting insights on this, among them are... that G-d showed Moshe through this image that money is like fire, both can be either beneficial or destructive depending on how they are used. Another insight is that if one seeks atonement through the giving of funds for charity, the good deed should be done with fire and enthusiasm. So why a half shekel coin? Many commentators interpret that the requirement of half a coin alludes to the concept that no Jew is complete unless he joins with others; as long as we are in isolation, each of us is only 'half' of our full potential... we are a nation firstly, then individuals. According to a possuk in Proverbs Tzedakah has the ability to save one from death, when we break down the word used by the Torah for the half Shekel... מחצית השקל, we can see illusions to this...

If we take the central letter of the word מחצית.... we have a צ which represents צדקה/Tzedakah..[CHARITY]

And what is on either side of the צ... the word חי, which means life.... And what is on the outside which the Tzedakah will keep you distant from... מת, which means death.

Therefore we can bring down that the giving of charity will bring life closer and distance you from death…

Exodus ch 30:

12. "When you take the sum of the children of Israel according to their numbers, let each one give to the L-rd an atonement for his soul when they are counted; then there will be no plague among them when they are counted." By giving of ourselves to another we assert it is not about the "I", but we recognise the collective creation we are all from the cause of all causes, and thus have responsibilities to each other – this brings atonement for sin! (We see during WWII how the enemies of G-d imprisoned us, treating us as unimportant - like cattle branding us with a number into our skins- each Jew became a mere statistic – symbolic of how unimportant they wanted to make us, these evil actions were counter to what G-d tells us about treating each holy soul in this week’s sedra KI SISA! To them we were just a statistic Chas ve Shalom, Hashem rather is telling us we, each of us are very important with our own uniqueness, we are taught each and every Israelite as they gave the half coin they approached and went through the counting and passed by and were each recognised by our leader Moshe as a unique valued contributor to the nation!

13. This they shall give, everyone who goes through the counting: half a shekel according to the holy shekel. Twenty gerahs equal one shekel; half of [such] a shekel shall be an offering to the L-rd.

15. The rich shall give no more, and the poor shall give no less than half a shekel, with which to give the offering to the L-rd, to atone for your souls.

The lesson here I believe is we need each other to be complete, rich and poor – all contributed the same affordable amount, emphasizing no one was more important than the other despite the earthly perspective of status and ability to give!

Another insight we learn is the washing of hands prior to conducting service (prayer):

Exodus Ch 30

17. The L-rd spoke to Moses, saying:

18. "You shall make a washstand of copper and its base of copper for washing, and you shall place it between the Tent of Meeting and the altar, and you shall put water therein.

19. Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and feet from it.

http://shortvort.com/ki-sisa-parasha/11681-parashas-ki-sisa-was-the-sin-of-the-golden-calf-even-idolatory  please click on the link to view the full drasha on Ki Sisa.

Washing prior to Praying

The laver was a large, copper water-filled utensil from which the Kohanim were required to wash their hands and feet before performing the service. Rashi informs us that it was a basin which had two spouts at the bottom through which the water would flow. According to Ramban the hands and feet represent the upper and lower extremities of the human body [PICTURE A MAN WITH HIS HANDS HELD HIGH ABOVE HIS HEAD], and by sanctifying them, the Kohanim symbolise their total devotion to the service they are about to perform. For this same reason, it was instituted that we wash our hands before prayer. Whereas the anointment oil and incense were products to be used in the Mishkan, the laver was an actual vessel... so an obvious question to ask is, why wasn't it mentioned with the other ones which were described in Parasha Terumah? Sforno answers this question by stating that the laver was not mentioned with the other utensils in previous chapters because its function was different from theirs. The other parts and vessels caused the Divine Presence to rest on the Tabernacle, whereas the laver merely served to prepare the Kohanim to undertake their mission.

SPICES USED – Also symbolic of the nation as a collective:

Exodus ch 30

34. And the L-rd said to Moses: "Take for yourself aromatics, [namely] balsam sap, onycha and galbanum, aromatics and pure frankincense; they shall be of equal weight.

Galbanum – is actually foul smelling?!

Rashi teaches us a lesson, foul and sweet smelling spices were mixed together to teach us when we come together some have good deeds other less so, but when we come together as one, we the unit are endeared to Hashem as a beautiful smelling whole – riding the dovetails of the righteous has merit, which is why being part of true and righteous community is so important, we thus find when we pray together calling out in the merits of the entire congregation our requests are more likely to find favour before G-d Almighty blessed is he. Also only Hashem knows the true merits of a person, the Yetzer Horah may tell us how righteous we are, it will tell us we are so full of good deeds, but to rely on our individual righteousness, is not the Jewish way, we learn from our teachers that the best way to pray is in a congregation of ten (we learn this number from the 12 Meraglim spies of which 10 of the tribe’s  leaders came back and gave an evil account of Canaan, the word used in scripture at this event describing the group is “Congregation” – this is where we learn the minimum number of 10 people is the best way to pray, we only conduct certain special prayers of holiness amongst a group, a congregation of 10.)

Numbers 14:27 We see from here that ten men are considered a congregation.

"How long shall I bear this evil congregation?" G-d is referring to the 10 spies who slandered the promised Land.

You will also notice when reading the standing prayer we say in Shul, called the Amidah the entire prayer is written in the plural, we daven as a nation, not as individuals! An important lesson in caring for the whole.

http://shortvort.com/ki-sisa-parasha/11681-parashas-ki-sisa-was-the-sin-of-the-golden-calf-even-idolatory  please click on the link to view the full drasha on Ki Sisa.

Daniel Sandground, (student at Ohr Somayach Yeshiva, Jerusalem)

The anointment oil and the incense were made by Moshe himself who had the list of superior spices, their heights and weights dictated to him by Hashem. The sages derive that there were eleven ingredients in the incense and they were offered twice a day, morning and night on the Golden Altar which was inside the Tabernacle. The fragrance of the incense was a representation of Israel's responsibility and desire to serve G-d in a manner pleasing to Him. We learn from a Midrash that one of the spices, Galbanum, emitted an offensive odour... if we are told that the Incense was representative of the Jewish people serving him then why have a foul smelling spice in the mixture? With the help of our Sages (as quoted by Rashi) we learn from this that sinners should be included with the community in its fasts and prayers. The incense therefore also expresses the idea of Jewish unity, that everyone from the righteous to the Arsenal fans has a share in the service of G-d.

On Betzalel – A community should utilise those bestowed with Divine grace!

Ch 31 v 3 : And I have imbued him with the spirit of G-d, with wisdom, with insight, with knowledge,

Rashi of blessed memory teaches us the meaning of the above terms in verse 3:

Wisdom – what you are able to learn from people around you.

Insight – what you are able to work out with your own faculties and intelligence.

Knowledge – A divine gift and holy spirit bestowed on an individual;

We see in the above qualities the import of attaching ourselves to learned people who have been blessed with good minds and those with experience and knowledge, (how blessed we are in Johannesburg!) It is important to come close to those who have spent many years toiling in Torah, those who have been blessed with different talents and abilities, and harness their power to unite with those of lesser capabilities and knowledge in service to our Creator G-d Almighty.

http://shortvort.com/ki-sisa-parasha/11681-parashas-ki-sisa-was-the-sin-of-the-golden-calf-even-idolatory  please click on the link to view his full drasha on Ki Sisa.

Daniel Sandground, (student at Ohr Somayach Yeshiva, Jerusalem)

The sages expounded that Betzalel knew the art of combining the sacred letters with which the heaven and earth were created, and that he possessed a degree of wisdom similar to that with which G-d created the universe vessels used for the preparation of a meal-offering. In fact, if we de-construct the name, Betzalel/בצלאל... we get the words בצל which means shadow and א-ל which is one of Hashem's names. We therefore see that his name actually meant, 'he who was in the shadow of the almighty' as his abilities were so great.

Sourced Ohr articles from Ohr Somayach Institutions www.ohr.edu:

http://ohr.edu/3849

“See, I have called by name: Betzalel…” (31:2)" — "And behold I have appointed with him Oholiav…" (31:6)

A shadow on the ground.

Itself without substance, ephemeral, yet it reveals the existence of something somewhere else.

Nothing is as insubstantial as a shadow, and yet the shadow is the silhouette of something that is beyond.

Faith is like a shadow.

The essence of a succa is its shade, its shadow, if you like; a succa that has more sun than shadow is invalid. Our Sages teach that when we sit in the succa we are sitting in “the shadow of faith.” The spiritual masters derived this phrase from a verse in the Song of Songs, “In His shadow I delighted and there I sat, and the fruit of His Torah was sweet to my palate.” (2:4)

We can experience closeness to G-d through tasting “the fruit of His Torah.” We can experience the sweetness of that Existence that is beyond, but, for the very reason that He is beyond, we can never see that Existence. When Moshe asked G-d to show him a revelation of that Existence, G-d replied, “You cannot see My face, for man cannot see Me and live.”

The name Betzalel means, “In the shadow of G-d.”

It was Betzalel who was responsible for the building of the Mishkan — the Ohel Mo’ed (Tent of Meeting). G-d used the letters of the aleph bet to create the heavens and the earth, and Betzalel's particular gift was that he knew how to combine the letters of the aleph bet, the DNA of creation, and create a microcosm of the universe. Interestingly, if you look at the name of Betzalel's partner in the building of the Mishkan, Oholiav, you will see that it comprises the words Oheli — "My tent" — and "aleph Bet." Oheli – aleph beit. It was as though G-d placed into Oholiav's name "My tent, My Mishkan, is made of the aleph bet."

This is why the Mishkan and the Beit HaMikdash were beautiful.

The Talmud says “if you never saw the Second Beit HaMikdash (HolyTemple), you never saw a beautiful building in your life.” The Beit HaMikdash was called the “eye of the world.” The eye is a physical organ but it receives something that is about as non-physical as you can get: Light. The Beit Hamikdash was called “the eye of the world” because it was the portal for the Light. The Beit HaMikdash was the most beautiful building not because of its dimensions and proportions or its finishes but because it revealed the resting of the Divine Presence in this world.

Faith is like a shadow. Faith is the knowledge of something that you cannot see.

The nation that dwells in the shadow of faith proclaims that existence extends beyond the here-and-now, beyond what can be perceived by the five senses of man. Faith is something that takes place in the shade. In the shadow.

http://ohr.edu/690

Every talent has a place in Judaism. Every talent is a gift of G-dly spirit: A beautiful voice, a brilliant mind, the skill of an artist. Every talent is a gift and a responsibility.

"By His breath the Heavens are spread (shifra)" (Iyov 26:13).

G-d spreads aside the curtain of cloud to reveal that which is beyond. He disperses the clouds that conceal so we can see past the obstruction, past the surface. The word "spread," "shifra," has the same root as "shapir" which means "to beautify."

In Jewish thought, beauty means seeing past the surface to the essence. That which is beautiful is that which takes us beneath the surface, beyond the clouds, to reveal the endless blue heavens to reveal the truth.

Similarly, the word for "ugly" and "opaque" in Hebrew are the same "achur." Something that conceals essence is ugly, however "beautiful" it might seem.

"Art for Art's sake" can never be a Jewish concept. For, if the definition of beauty is that which reveals, something that reveals nothing but itself can never be beautiful.

The true beauty of the Tabernacle and the Temples was that it was the place of the greatest revelation in this world. It revealed that existence is not bounded by the physical constraints of space and time. It demonstrated that this world is connected to that which is beyond this world.

It was a Work of Craft.

I found this above article truly inspiring, so many including myself fall into this trap of looking to the physical, how quick we are to judge others, we look at the outside of a person, instead of taking time to understand what lies beneath!   Media throw at us images of the physical all the time, we need to guard against it, it is just a limited surface image, however the spirit of each individual is infinite and deep, yet how quick we are to judge another based on the outward limited appearance. G-d is hidden we need to search deep, when we do this wow what true beauty we find understanding and depth, we reveal the true beauty in this world!

Shabbat

Ch 31

Rashi teaches us scripture then moves on to the theme of Shabbat to teach us to stop building the Mishkan as the Sabbath approached, in our service we must never lose sight of who we are serving and why and what is his will: The L-rd spoke to Moses, saying:
13. "And you, speak to the children of Israel and say: 'Only keep My Sabbaths! For it is a sign between Me and you for your generations, to know that I, the L-rd, make you holy.
14. Therefore, keep the Sabbath, for it is a sacred thing for you. Those who desecrate it shall be put to death, for whoever performs work on it, that soul will be cut off from the midst of its people.
15. Six days work may be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of complete rest, holy to the L-rd; whoever performs work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.'
16. Thus shall the children of Israel observe the Sabbath, to make the Sabbath throughout their generations as an everlasting covenant.
17. Between Me and the children of Israel, it is forever a sign that [in] six days The L-rd created the heaven and the earth, and on the seventh day He ceased and rested." Daniel Sandground, (student at Ohr Somayach Yeshiva, Jerusalem) http://shortvort.com/ki-sisa-parasha/11681-parashas-ki-sisa-was-the-sin-of-the-golden-calf-even-idolatory  Please click on the link to view the full drasha on Ki Sisa. Having told us what is to be created for the Mishkan and by who, the Torah is ready to jump back into the narrative on the giving of the Luchos (or Two Tablets of Testimony for the more poetic amongst us) but before we do so the Torah gives us yet another reminder of the importance of keeping Shabbat. This seems like a random place for the Torah to start discussing how we should guard and sanctify the Shabbat considering we already had the laws given over in the giving of the Ten Commandments, only a few parashot ago. The placement here is of course no accident however and it is written just after our completion on the blueprints for the Mishkan as a caution to the nation that the construction of the Tabernacle, however important this mission is, does not override the commandment to keep Shabbat. The Jewish nation are being told here that they must observe Shabbat even while they are fashioning the resting place for G-d's presence. Our sin Exodus CH 32 THE CHEIT HAEGEL – Be careful of the negative influences around you! 1. When the people saw that Moses was late in coming down from the mountain, the people gathered against Aaron, and they said to him: "Come on! Make us gods that will go before us, because this man Moses, who brought us up from the land of Egypt we don't know what has become of him." How could we forget the first two commandments given to us by G-d directly: Know the L-rd you G-d Have no other G-d’s but me! Http://ohr.edu/3401 “…and fashioned it into a molten calf.”(32:4) There’s something uncanny about a statue. I’m not talking about an agglomeration of scrap metal that passes for sculpture in many art galleries today, but a beautifully executed and accurate model of an earthly form. A sculpture can be amazingly real — a single moment frozen for eternity. It’s no secret that Judaism gives sculpture short shrift. The second of the Ten Commandments prohibits the making or owning of any likeness of any earthly form, and the Oral Torah explains that (with the exception of the celestial bodies) this prohibition is aimed specifically at three-dimensional forms. Why is sculpture so repugnant to Torah that it earns second place in the Ten Commandments? What is so terrible about a statue? Another question. We tend to trivialize idol worship as puerile. Yet the Talmud tells us that had the Sages not prayed that the desire for idol worship be removed from the world, we would find idolatry as compelling as physical attraction. What could be so gripping about genuflecting to an oversize dolly? And don’t think that idolatry appealed merely to the simple and the gullible; the intelligentsia were no less smitten by the overwhelming urge to prostrate themselves. How should this be understood? There are three parts to man: thought, speech and action. The highest, most spiritual part of a person is thought. Thought’s defining characteristic is its evanescence; no sooner has a thought entered our mind than it has already ceased to exist. Speech, on the other hand, exists only in time. With the exception of G-d’s utterance of the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai nothing can be understood in a single moment. Speech takes time. To understand what someone is saying cannot be grasped in a single moment. Nevertheless speech is still ephemeral. It ceases with the silence of the speaker Actions, the creation of things, persist independently of the one who created them. Actions seem to have a life of their own And herein lies the problem. At the root of all atheism is the belief that there is something called “concrete reality” — that because things exist, they have to exist. The seeming immutability of a physical object seems to demand its existence. A statue is a moment frozen in time. It seems to say “I exist by myself; I am divorced from the moment of creation; Because I exist – I must exist.” When G-d created this world, He created it through the power of speech. Why didn’t he create it through writing, or through physical construction? This world is virtually no more than G-d speaking, as we say in the blessing, “…for everything exists through His Word.” Every statue in the world tries to convince that there is such a thing as “concrete reality”, but in reality we live in a world of words that exists just as long as the Speaker continues to speak. (A lesson again against treating life situations at surface value instead of with deeper understanding!) Let us look at the text that follows: Ch 32 v 2. Aaron said to them, "Remove the golden earrings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters and bring them [those earrings] to me." Notice Aaron says take the jewels off your wives and kids, Rashi teaches us it must be that this was done in the hope that the kids and wives would be upset and refuse, thus causing a delay to buy time for Moshe to return. Now note the next line carefully 3. And all the people stripped themselves of the golden earrings that were on their ears and brought them to Aaron. They did not listen to Aaron and took the earrings off themselves! 4. He took [them] from their hand[s], …. "These are your gods, O Israel, who have brought you up from the land of Egypt!"

Rashi highlights the language is not that of Israel themselves otherwise the verse would have stated “These are our…, O Israel” Rashi says the Israelites were influenced into misguided worship by the Erav Rav (the mixed multitude that left Egypt with Israel) this is a dire warning of Israelites to be faithful to scripture and the teachings handed down from Sinai lest pagan practices infiltrate our methods of worship. This is what the Medianite women did to the Israelites too when we fell later on in scripture.

7. And the L-rd said to Moses: "Go, descend, for your people that you have brought up from the land of Egypt have acted corruptly

Notice here, that Hashem ties the people's sins with Moshe their leader and holds him as leader responsible for the people performing Idol worship.  We learn from here too, a great leader can only be great if he has great followers, otherwise he and his leadership qualities are relegated to being meaningless… again a theme of the importance of the collective. But what follows is another key message - the leaders love for his followers:

10. Now leave Me alone, and My anger will be kindled against them so that I will annihilate them, and I will make you into a great nation."

I wrote in a previous post a teaching I heard from Rabbi Aurbach, that the fact the G-d tells Moshe to leave him alone, (can G-d be held – of course not, but G-d would be held from destroying the nation through the Prayers of the righteous Moses, he was hinting to Moses to pray for them in his merits and those of our ancestors)  this is a clear indication that when the righteous pray for the wicked to return, G-d may listen or at least we can buy time so to speak until they rectify the wrongs they have done, and thus we see our collective responsibility for each other and towards our children the future generation, as hinted to Moses by G-d, pray for them or I will destroy them - Rashi.

We see Moses got the hint from the next verse

11. Moses pleaded before the L-rd, his G-d, and said: "Why, O L-rd, should Your anger be kindled against Your people whom You have brought up from the land of Egypt with great power and with a strong hand?

12. Why should the Egyptians say: 'He brought them out with evil [intent] to kill them in the mountains and to annihilate them from upon the face of the earth'? Retreat from the heat of Your anger and reconsider the evil [intended] for Your people

13. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Your servants, to whom You swore by Your very Self, and to whom You said: 'I will multiply your seed like the stars of the heavens, and all this land which I said that I would give to your seed, they shall keep it as their possession forever.' "

We see here the merits of the forefathers used in the Prayer of Moses to save their children. He pulls out all the stops. We learn out how important merits are in this world, so start accumulating as many as you can, we or our descendants may need them one day!

14. The L-rd [then] reconsidered the evil He had said He would do to His people.

We also see the danger of a negative influences around us - the entire nation was almost destroyed on the account of a minority of people, good needs to stand up and face those who wish to perpetuate wrongs:

28. The sons of Levi did according to Moses' word; on that day some three thousand men fell from among the people.

After this all transpires G-d returns his divine presence to the Israelite camp !

How powerful is repentance and prayer!

http://shortvort.com/ki-sisa-parasha/11681-parashas-ki-sisa-was-the-sin-of-the-golden-calf-even-idolatory  Please click on the link to view the full drasha on Ki Sisa.

Daniel Sandground, (student at Ohr Somayach Yeshiva, Jerusalem)

When Hashem finished giving over the instructions and the additional reminder on the observation of Shabbat, we are told that he gave Moshe the two Luchos which the Torah tells us were made of stone. The Luchos were a physical reminder that Moshe had communication with Hashem... now we just have the narrative in the Torah but originally we had a 'souvenir' from the event which removed any doubts about the revelation at Sinai. Stone is permanent and this choice of material represented the eternalism of the Torah... in fact if we outline the fact that two stones, hit together, create fire we can begin to understand the deeper meaning behind the Luchos. Torah is likened to fire and is mentioned throughout our writings as having the ability to 'burn' the Yatsa Horra or even more colloquially, 'give us that spark'. If we dissect the first word in the Torah, 'בראשית', we get the words אש and ברית which translates as the covenant of fire, Torah is fire... the Luchos were the physical creation of this. Unfortunately as we all know, the first Luchos (which were inscribed by G-d) didn't last long with Moshe famously smashing them following the incident of the sin of the Golden Calf which takes up the rest of the Parasha.

When analysing the incident of the sin of the Golden Calf it seems on the surface to be an almost inconceivable act from the fact that the Jewish nation undertook such mass idol worship after the height of the revelation to the fact that Aaron appears to be the ring leader of it all... the brother of Moshe and G-d's chosen anointed Kohen Gadol. We learn that a Jew is required to give up his life rather than worship idols so how can it be that Aaron failed the test that countless amounts of Jews have withstood over the centuries. What appears to be the strange truth is that instead of being liable to the death penalty, he was virtually whitewashed of the apparent sin and went on to serve in the Tabernacle for the next forty years, not to mention the fact that he was Moshe's partner in leading the nation and receiving many of the commandments from Hashem. In fact we learn that the only sin Aaron was charged for was when he joined with Moshe in striking the stone to draw water in Parasha Chukas. So what is going on?

According to the mefarshim the people did not deny Hashem, and specifically stated that they needed a replacement for Moshe following a tragic error in calculating his descent down from Mount Sinai. With this miscalculation and the thought that Moshe had died, they attempted to produce a replacement for Moshe by thinking that G-d assigns powers and responsibilities to subordinate powers which they saw Moshe as (along with the pillars of smoke and fire according to Ramban). We therefore learn that though such a misconception could lead to idolatry, their goal was not to worship an idol at all! More evidence to suggest such a conclusion is found in the fact that they would not have fled the scene when Moshe returned, and they certainly would not have let him destroy their 'idol', rather the enthusiasm for the Golden Calf was merely because it was a substitute for their vanished leader... once Moshe was back, they recognised that their allegiance to the new 'god' had been a terrible and foolish mistake. According to Midrashim, even the Jews who truly worshipped it as an idol were a tiny minority of about one half of one percent of the grown male population, and even they were the Egyptian rabble that flocked to join the Hebrews when they left Egypt. In fact in the Torah it states... “This is your god, O Israel” [32:8], they didn't refer to it as 'our god' because they were outsiders who were addressing the Jews.

So what about Aaron? Aaron agreed with them though he knew they were wrong, because their sin did not involve idolatry. Having seen Hur (the person Moshe had assigned to share the leadership in his absence with Aaron) be murdered in his efforts to try and stop the desperate gang, Aaron attempted an approach of appeasement after calculating that they would kill him if he defied them. In this approach he hoped to stall for time until he hoped he could wean them from their mistake. By asking for the gold jewellery of the women and children, he was certain that they would refuse to surrender it immediately, and by the time the rebels succeeded in seizing the gold, Moshe would probably be back. Rashi tells us that he was not correct with this however and the people were so enamoured of the prospect of the Golden Calf that they had the gold in hand without delay. This provides us a classic example of crowd psychology, in which a mob is capable of excesses beyond the imagination of any of its individual members.

Towards the end of the Sedra G-d tells Moshe to make new tablets, this time hewn directly by Moses, these man made tablets would last, when we put in the effort the results become sustainable - Hashem then reveals to Moses the formula to invoke mercy that we use on the holy days of repentance culminating in Yom Kippur.

We are warned from all this to be highly sensitive to negative forces around us i.e. the external environment we face, to guard against the forces that detract from service of the creator that of Idol worship, intermarriage to outside beliefs, and also the law forbidding the combination of eating  milk and meat together, (maybe teaching us to be sensitive to eating the meat of the dead cow together with the milk meant for the calf (milk is a gift to give life to a new born). Hashem then confirms his love for us, and a want for us to come close to him by teaching us the laws of the festivals of Pesach, the laws of the first-born, the first-fruits, Shabbat, Shavuot and Succot.

When Moshe descends with the second set of tablets, his face is luminous as a result of contact with Hashem!

To conclude we see in the Parsha in many places the power of the collective for both good and G-d forbid it, bad that we can pick up from the external forces around us!  Our thoughts actions and deeds should always, despite our challenges be please G-d be for the good, done with depth and understanding to bring us all closer to the revelation of the cause of all causes G-D Amighty!

In Exodus Ch33 we again see the importance of building a relationship with great scholars and those faithful, who are close to Hashem, as they will enhance your bond and relationship through their knowledge and learning - Chapter 33 v:

11. Then the L-rd would speak to Moses face to face, as a man would speak to his companion, and he would return to the camp, but his attendant, Joshua, the son of Nun, a lad, would not depart from the tent.

Through this close relationship Joshua would enventually merit to be the successor of Moses!

 I’ll end off with some poetic license on a paper I prepared for my team on a project on strategic implementation, what they may not have known was the principles, the insight I used were sourced from our Holy Torah

We are a group of people with ideas and values we know what is right we share these virtues, together we will make it happen – like coals on a fire together we converge to enhance each other’s potential. 

Wishing all a great and restful Sabbath

And good health to all who need it!

Amen (for those who do not know Amen is an acronym for Ke’l Melech Neehman –it means G-d King who is faithful!)

Shabbat Shalom

Michael.

I dedicate this week’s entry for a Refuah Shalaima to all my family and friends who need some help and guidance from above they should please G-d see the signs and it should be for the good!  Soon and speedily... AMEN!