God: Up Close and Personal (Tetzaveh)

Yet some there be that by due steps aspire

To lay their just hands on that golden key

That opens the palace of Eternity. -John Milton

God commands the Children of Israel to build a Sanctuary for Him, providing excruciating detail regarding every aspect of its construction, the sacrifices, and the priestly service. In the midst of this divine blueprint, He declares that He will dwell among us and be our God (Exodus 29:45).

This statement seems both obvious and redundant.

Rabbi Ovadia Sforno (1475–1549) questions the seemingly extraneous phrase and offers a theologically significant insight:

“And I will be their God: To direct their affairs without an intermediary.”

Sforno introduces the idea that divine decrees are typically executed through a host of angelic intermediaries. However, when it comes to the Children of Israel, God takes a personal and direct role. We receive His full and undivided attention—for better or worse.

Other nations experience divine influence through celestial bureaucracy, governed by rules, regulations, and the natural order. The Jewish people, on the other hand, have the direct attention of the ultimate authority. He can swiftly override His own emissaries and intervene—sometimes dramatically—in the lives of His people.

Sforno continues:

“And they will not need to fear the heavenly signs, for they will be more honored before Me than the heavens, whose movement is directed through the angels.”

Here, Sforno seems to suggest that the Children of Israel are not only immune to or protected from the forces of the natural world, as governed by angelic beings, but in some sense, they are even above them.

He concludes with a powerful statement:

“And as a result of all this, their eternity is ensured.”

It is no coincidence that the Children of Israel have been called the Eternal People. By maintaining a close connection with the Eternal One and fulfilling our mission—both as individuals and as a nation—we, too, become part of eternity.

May we make our homes places where He would feel welcome and may we eternally merit feeling His proximity.

Shabbat Shalom,

Ben-Tzion

Dedication 

To the memory of Ruben (Rubão) Rotenberg z”l. May his family be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.