The Sin of the Golden Calf and the Tabernacle in the Wilderness

Author: Esther Ehrman, Adar 5772/March 2012

In the Book of Exodus,the Bible relates that, after the giving of the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai and the ceremony that marks the covenant between the Lord and the Children of Israel, Moses went up to receive the Torah. At this point, the Torah tells of the instructions given to Moses by G-d to build a Tabernacle where G-d's presence will dwell and which will hold the Tablets of the Law. The instructions take up two and a half Torah portions( Teruma,Tetzave and part of Ki Tisa ). The text now switches back to the people, distressed because Moses has not returned. Fearing that he might not return at all, they turn to Aaron and he makes them a golden calf. When Moses saw what the people had done, he broke the two tablets on which G-d had written the Ten Commandments. Moses grinds the golden calf to dust, strews it on the water, makes the people drink it and punishes them. Moses then goes up the mountain once more, to seek forgiveness. The Lord grants this and tells Moses to hew two new stone Tablets. Again the scene changes and we then see Moses assembling the people to relate to them the instructions about the Tabernacle, which they build and which is then erected. The time covered by this narrative is from Shavuot (Pentecost), when the Ten Commandments were given, until the first of the month of Nissan, that is a year less nine weeks.

The question that has puzzled Bible commentators is the sequence of the two events related, the sin of the golden calf and the building of the Tabernacle. Was the Tabernacle always part of the Divine plan? Was it built because of the sin of the golden calf? The two perspectives accord somewhat different functions to the Tabernacle and, indeed, to the sacrifices that will be brought there. Two great commentators, Rashi and Ramban (Nachmanides) each have a different understanding of the text beacause each sees the sequence of events differently.

Rashi says, re Ex.21.v.18: 'the incident of the golden calf precedes the commandment of the construction of the Tabernacle (ma'ase ha egel kodem le tzivui melechet ha mishkan).' In this perspective, the Tabernacle can be seen as something that is there as a result of the sin of the golden calf. Its sacrifices are intended to atone for the sin. The Divine presence in the Tabernacle is something granted by the Lord once He had forgiven the people and allowed a second set of Tablets (luchot ha brit) to be given to the Children of Israel. Rashi gives a time-table to the events, re. Ex.21.11: 'On the 17th of Tammuz the tablets were broken and on the 18th he burned the calf and sentenced the sinners and on the 19th he went up...and on the 1st of Ellul, it was said to him “come up [again] in the morning unto Mt Sinai to receive the second tablets. And he tarried there 40 days..on the tenth day of Tishre the Holy One, blessed be He was reconciled with Israel..and he said to Moses 'I have forgiven' and He gave over to him the second tablets. Then Moses descended and began to command them regarding the construction of the Tabernacle'. Moreover, Moses took his tent outside of the camp of the Israelites 'from the time of the sin and further' (re Ex21.7), that is around the 18th of Tammuz. Moses would teach the elders there 'and this practice continued from the Day of Atonement until the tabernacle was set up and not longer' (ibid re.v 11).

Ramban, a century later, does not share Rashi's interpretation. With minor exceptions, Ramban accepts the sequence of events in the order that the Torah presents them, that is: G-d's instructions for the Tabernacle follow immediately on the Revelation on Mt Sinai; then comes the sin of the golden calf, G-d's anger and reconciliation, followed by the actual construction of the Tabernacle. Ramban sees the Tabernacle as a continuation of the Revelation on Mt Sinai : 'the main purpose of the Tabernacle was to contain a place in which the Divine Glory rests, this being the ark..' (re Ex.25.1). Consequently, the sacrificial worship there offers to the people the opportunity to come to the 'Tent of Meeting' – the other name for the Tabernacle – to have the privilege of proximity to the Divine presence. Ramban , too, believes that Moses came down on Yom Kippur or the next day and 'assembled' (vayakhel Ex 35.1) the people, to tell them the instructions concerning the Tabernacle that the Lord had given to him before the sin of the golden calf. According to Ramban, Moses simply continues where he had left off before the 'calf', - with the injunction that the Sabbath has priority over the work of the Tabernacle.

It follows that, for Ramban, it was always part of G-d's plan to have a location, a meeting-place for a continued Revelation to be possible, even if the sin of the golden calf had never happened. That is why the relevant instructions are given to Moses immediately after the Revelation on Mt Sinai. However, the people were not supposed to spend a long time on their journey to the Promised Land, so a temporary Tabernacle may only have been one option, with the emphasis on a permanent Temple (Beit haMikdash).

For Rashi, the major function of the Tabernacle is its atonement for the 'calf'. The Tabernacle is a physical symbol, just as the 'calf' was meant to be. Both are built with the gold, etc, the contribution of the people. The sacrifice of inauguration for the Tabernacle and the appointment of Aharon to serve is a bull.. All these seem to be echoes linking the two.

Yet, taking all of the above into account, it is possible to say that the two Bible commentators also accept each other's point of view. At the end of the five Torah sections that deal with the Tabernacle, in Pekudei, re Ex.40,2, Ramban writes about the account in Lev.9,23 where Aharon blesses the people and the cloud of glory descends on the Tabernacle on the eighth day of the inauguration 'this should have been the beginning of the Book of Leviticus. Why is it here? Because there is no 'before or later in the Torah' – the view taken by Rashi and here written by Ramban! And it is Rashi, on the verse,” On the first day of the first month shall you set up the Tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting (Ex.40.2) who writes that the people were upset when the cloud of glory did not descend on the first day and so they said to Moses '..all the trouble that we have taken so that the Divine Glory would dwell among us and that we would know that the sin of the calf had been atoned for ...'   Moreover, Ramban quotes this passage of Rashi's. Clearly, the text lends itself to both perspectives. Whether to atone or to continue the Revelation, the people built the beautiful Tabernacle so that the Divine Glory would dwell in their midst.

Har Sinai and Har haMoriah

Author: Esther Ehrman, Iyar 5772/May 2012

Judaism is unthinkable without the mountains that bear the names, Har Sinai and Har haMoriah. One is located in the wilderness where the Israelites spent forty years learning what was required to be the people that walked in G-d's ways. The other is set at the heart of the Promised Land. The one-time Revelation takes place on Har Sinai. On Har haMoriah, the people of Israel seek to serve and find a link to the Divine Presence on a daily basis. Are they now simply part of our 'history'?

We do not, to-day, know the exact location of Mount Sinai. Its significance, geographically, seems to be that it is 'in the wilderness'. That is the context every time the text refers to it, often by different designations. Thus Moses leads the sheep of his father-in-law, to the 'rear of the desert (achar ha midbar), to the 'mountain of the Lord, to Horeb (el har ha elokim, Horeva) (Ex 3,1). A little later, Zippora circumcises their son and the Lord tells Aaron to go and meet Moses ha midbara and they meet at the mountain of the Lord (be har haElokim). ( Ex.4,27).Moses' father-in-law comes just before the Revelation el ha midbar, to camp at har haElokim (Ex. 18,5) and that is where the Israelites are encamped ba midbar.....neged ha har, 'in the wilderness, in front of THE mountain'

(Ex 19,2). After the Revelation, Moses asks his father-in-law to stay with the Israelites and lead them ba midbar, he refuses and they then leave har H, the mountain of G-d (tetragrammaton) (Num.10, 33)And, just for emphasis, the opening words of Deuteronomy are 'These are the words that Moses spake...ba midbar, eleven days' journey from Horeb'.

The symbolism of 'wilderness' has been much discussed. The Midrash (Bamidbar Rabba) sees it as something 'hefker, open, available to all and says that whoever does not make himself ka midbar hefker, open as the desert, cannot acquire wisdom and Torah. Thus Mount Sinai, whence Torah and its wisdom emanate, needs to be set in a space that denotes availability, openness to all.

The Torah also describes the desert as eretz lo zaru'a, land where nothing grows; one could understand this as no man's land, extra-territorial with no ready-made associations; it is the opposite of the Garden of Eden, where everything grows and which comes with given rules. Mount Sinai could then be seen as a new beginning for the Israelites.

Mount Moriah is, we believe, the Temple Mount, the mountain of the Akeda, of the first and second Temples, According to Midrash it is also the place where sacrifices were brought by Adam, Cain and Abel and Noah. Although we know, now, where the Temple Mount is and where the Temples stood, the Torah text was not specific. In Gen,22,2 we read 'And He said: take now your son.....and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as an olah sacrifice on one of the mountains that I shall tell you'.

Where the Temple was to be built is not told to the Israelites either. They are instructed by Moses (Deut. 12,5-6):'To the place that the Lord you G-d will choose...you shall come; and there you shall bring your burnt offerings and your sacrifices....' A place only acquires sanctity when the Almighty determines. The Temple is called the Beit haMikdash, the House that has the sanctity.

Mount Moriah, the Temple Mount, during the Second Temple and until the 5th Century, was also the location of the Great Sanhedrin, the supreme halachic court. Once again, we now know that the Sanhedrin sat in a place that was partially within and partially outside the Temple. It is there because Moses had said: 'If a matter be too difficult for you to decide....then you shall go to the place that the Lord your G-d will choose...and you shall do according to the word that they will tell you from the place that G-d will choose' (Deut.17, v.8.10). We pray that Har haMoriah will again see the renewal of kedusha, sanctity, and Divine justice in our midst.

The Midrash sees the two mountains as essentially linked, even physically: 'So Mt Sinai plucked itself out of Mt Moriah, as a priest's portion is plucked out of the dough and that is how it came into being '(Midrash re Num.15,20) and, when the Torah was given on Har Sinai, 'The Temple Mount uprooted itself and came to the Sinai desert, so that the Torah would be given on holy ground' (Midrash re Yithro).

Har Sinai and Har haMoriah are the two witnesses to the Divine and the human course in Judaism.

'The Temple Mount in our Hands' and the Value of Sacrifices

Author: Esther Ehrman, Iyar 5772/May 2012

This talk was given to mark Yom Yerushalayim.

In June 1967 we were living on the campus of Bar Ilan University; the radio was not turned off for the week – which is how we heard the words har ha bayit be yadeinu. 'The Temple Mount is in our hands'. Har haBayit, the Temple Mount, is, of course, the location of the Bet HaMikdash, the Temple, and I would like to say a few words about the service there, the sacrifices and our attitude to them.

We make a distinction between deeds that are committed deliberately and those that are inadvertent.

If you kill someone deliberately, it is called murder. The murderer is taken out of the society. If the killing is not intended, we call it manslaughter and the consequences are different.

The Gemara makes the same distinction. There are actions, the consequences of which mean that you are cut off from the Jewish people, you have, as it were, killed the link with G-d. In Mesechet Kareitot, we have a list of such transgressions, forbidden marriages, idol worship, violating the Shabbat, Yom Kippur, Pesach etc. If deliberate, they incur the punishment of Karet, being cut off. If, however, the violations are be shogeg, inadvertent, you owe the Temple a chataat, a sin offereing (a lamb, pigeons, two measures of flour) according to your financial circumstances, acknowledging the wrong doing.

Because there is no longer a Bet Hamikdash on the Temple Mount, we have lost this opportunity of a concrete acknowledgement – all we have to offer are words of tephila. Prayer. I think we may have been a bit quick to take this easy way out.

The Gemara in Mesechet Arakhin discussses the monetary value, the erekh of things dedicated to the Temple, be it property, animals or human beings, that are then redeemed for money that is given to the Temple service – the Torah speaks of the monetary valuation of people, according to age and gender. Why, until the Bet HaMikdash is once again on the Temple Mount (bim' hera be yameinu) should we not take upon ourselves to acknowledge our debts to G-d and 'pay'. If you have inadvertently eaten chametz on Pesach, you owe a chataat. I don't know what the current rate is for a lamb or pigeons - the Bet HaMikdash had a system for evaluating things – but it should be possible to establish that. There would be money Zedaka, for helping the poor, the disadvantaged, for education and all the things that Jews should care about. The words Har haBayit be yadeinu might carry something of the real meaning and function of the Temple Mount.