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102  nineteen Building an Inclusive Social Space Parashat Terumah (Exodus 25:1–27:19) Mark George Parashat Terumah provides the initial instructions for building the mishkan, Israel’s wilderness Tabernacle, the portable sanctuary in which the Israelites carried the Ark of the Covenant during their journey through the desert. The Tabernacle’s sacred space created a meeting point between the Israelites and God, but it also helped define the boundedness of the people Israel. Parashat Terumah is characterized by an institutional rhetoric, focusing on structure , design, and ritual more than the social space the Tabernacle would provide. The parasha is filled with descriptions of furnishings and structures, along with details about dimensions and materials. There are promises of further divine pronouncements concerning the people, as well as actions and provisions that must be performed in perpetuity. These institutional concerns are told to Moses as he stands on the top of Mount Sinai, in the presence of the deity. They are the pattern, tabnit, of the Tabernacle that he and the people are to follow closely in order to maintain their connection to God (Ex. 25:40). For all the attention that Parashat Terumah devotes to the details of the Tabernacle , it is not a blueprint. The descriptions of the size and materials of the ark, or the framework of the Tabernacle, are insufficient actually to construct them. For example, the thickness of the ark’s walls is not specified, and neither are the directions in which its poles should run, whether along the ark’s length or width. How the Tabernacle’s framework was to be assembled remains a matter of much scholarly debate. The narrative leaves many aspects of the Tabernacle’s design unclear, suggesting that the actual construction of this space was not the primary concern of Parashat Terumah. If the narrative of Parashat Terumah was not intended to help in the construction of the Tabernacle, why so much detail? The text itself suggests one answer: God wants to dwell among the people (Ex. 25:8), and this divine desire necessitated the Tabernacle’s construction. The God of Israel is holy and commands Israel to be holy (Lev. 11:44), a sentiment echoed at the beginning of the Sinai section of the text when God states that, while the entire earth is God’s, Israel shall be “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Ex. 19:6). Holiness requires attention to detail in order to protect and preserve the divine. Because the Tabernacle is a divine dwelling, special care must be given to its construction. Parashat Terumah 103 A second explanation for such a lavish sacred dwelling is that Israel entered into a formal relationship with its God at Mount Sinai (Ex. 24). That relationship required an appropriate space within which to practice the cult, that is, the rituals and worship of God. Such worship could not occur just anywhere. On the contrary, it required a suitably sacred space, which in time would be the Jerusalem Temple. But with the Israelites not yet in the Promised Land, much less able to use the Temple, the Tabernacle filled the gap. Both these explanations assume that the reason for the Tabernacle is a concern about God. In the first answer, God needs a place to dwell among the people and therefore commands the building of the Tabernacle. In the second, the people need a place to worship God, so they must build the Tabernacle. But these answers place too much focus on God and God’s needs. The Priestly writers of these narratives are as interested in the people, Israel, as they are in God. These writers understood Israel to have a unique position in the divine economy. As the people of HaShem, they serve a special role in creation, because as a people, Israel acts as priest vis-à-vis the rest of the peoples of the world. This role is not restricted to the priests alone. Rather, it includes all of Israel, male and female alike. And this “democratic” understanding of Israel’s role in the world is realized in the very structuring of the Tabernacle. Menahem Haran, writing about the Tabernacle, argues that there is a logic and system to this space.1 This system was predicated on a series of “zones of holiness,” which had their reference point at the center of the Tabernacle, the “most holy space.” “Most holy space” was surrounded by “holy space,” and then “court space,” in a hierarchical structure. Moving outward...

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