This week’s parsha, Trumah, covers the construction of some of the most holy relics in all of Judaism: the Menorah, Table of Showbread, Sacrificial Altar, the Tabernacle itself, and of course, the Ark of the Covenant. God commanded the Israelites to procure gifts of gold, silver, copper, precious stones like lapis lazuli, fine and multicolored yarn, linen, animal hides, and acacia wood. The last three months had been incredibly busy for the Israelites. Following their exodus from Egypt, they had been given fresh water, manna from the heavens, and the Ten Commandments, so it is easy to forget that less than half a year before, they had been slaves in a land not theirs. God was not simply asking for contributions from His most generous donors, but the Israelites were expected to give all their material wealth for the construction of the Tabernacle and its holy relics.
In typical fashion, God provided precise detailed instructions to follow to turn these gifts into the sacred artifacts. The Tabernacle and its furnishings became the center for ritual practice in Israelite life, traveling into the Land of Israel with them, to Shiloh, and then finally to Temple Mount. In 597 BCE the Babylonians conquered the Kingdom of Judah, destroyed the Temple, and carried the holy artifacts back to Babylon with them. While the Altar, Table, and menorah made it back to Jerusalem, the Ark did not. And, in 70 CE the remaining artifacts were carried off by the Romans, never to be seen again.
These relics were not just the central pieces around which Jewish ritual practice revolved. They represented everything the Israelites had with them when God released them from slavery in Egypt. They were concrete representations of the faith they placed in God and their devotion to following His commandments. They were the Israelites’ faith in God to a degree, and their loss had the potential to disrupt that faith.
But it didn’t.
We all put a lot of work into our passion projects, and sometimes they get carried off by others, like the story with the Babylonians. It’s our job to move past this type of defeat. If the First Temple hadn’t been destroyed there would have been no Second Temple, and without its destruction, the rabbis wouldn’t have gained their prominence. Faith wavered, devotion wavered, but it never ceased to exist. When the physical symbols of the Jewish faith were lost or destroyed, they reemerged in new forms.
In the same way, when everything starts to fall apart, when we feel there is nothing we can do, we must have faith and apply ourselves. If there’s one lesson to be learned from the full story of the Ark, no loss is ever truly final, even if recovery takes a long time. We must always put our faith in our ability to recover what is lost, even if it has changed along the way. We put in the effort because it’s never truly lost, so long as we never let our faith in it fade.
Shabbat Shalom
