Lampstands and Angels (Terumah)

In memory of Oded Lifshitz z”l

Today, we mourn Oded Lifshitz, z”l. At his funeral today, Israel’s President יצחק הרצוג – Isaac Herzog eulogized him with the highest praise: Oded was an “Ohev Shalom v’Rodef Shalom,” a lover and pursuer of peace. What higher aspiration could there be? Oded, an 83-year-old grandfather, was murdered, abducted, and taken from his family by Hamas on October 7, 2023. His wife Yocheved, also kidnapped, was released in November 2023. Their family members have become friends to so many of us. Today, our hearts break for them. We send them comfort, knowing that comfort is never enough. We will remain present, loving, healing, and courageous. Together.

This week’s Torah portion, Terumah, speaks to this moment. It marks the beginning of a significant section of the Book of Exodus—the construction of the Mishkan, the portable desert sanctuary. A divine invitation calls upon the Israelites to bring offerings: gold, silver, crimson and blue yarns, dolphin skins. (How did they have all this? The text doesn’t ask us to wonder—only to give.)

Two sacred structures stand out. First, the Keruvim, the cherubs, hammered from the gold covering the Ark of the Covenant (Ex. 25:18). They are not separate pieces joined together; they are part of the Ark itself, formed from the same slab. Second, the Menorah, the seven-branched candelabrum, also hammered from a single piece of gold (Ex. 25:31). The Menorah is described as a tree, its branches and petals growing from its base (v. 33). These are not disparate parts soldered together; they are one.

And so are we.

From the same divine breath, from the same sacred material, we are formed. Experience may hammer us into different shapes, but we remain of the same stuff. Yet, in moments of pain, trauma, and war, it is so easy to forget. It is so easy to see the other as separate, as lesser, as undeserving. But we must resist that urge. The Torah begins not with the Jewish people, but with humanity itself. Adam—Adamah. Earth. Breath. Shared origins. Shared holiness.

Oded Lifshitz, z”l, embodied this truth. As a founder of Kibbutz Nir Oz, he spent his days helping those in need. He drove Palestinians from Gaza to Israeli hospitals for treatment their own leadership denied them. He knew—he lived—the truth that we are all made b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God. He was not alone. Many righteous souls did the same. And many were murdered. That does not diminish the righteousness of their actions.

The great Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel warned of a “cancer of the eye”—a disease of perception that allows us to see others as less than human. Xenophobia, racism, misogyny, antisemitism, Islamophobia, transphobia—all of these stem from the same error: the belief that we are not of the same sacred substance. But we are.

The Mishkan, the holy sanctuary, was carried through the desert as a reminder that holiness moves with us. It is not fixed in one place, one people, or one way of being. Our task is to set it down wherever we go, to root it in justice, in love, in the sacred recognition of each other.

As we continue to pray for the safe return of the hostages, as we fight for our people and our future, let us not forget the lesson of the Mishkan. We must see each other. We must hold each other. We must insist on each other’s humanity. That is our charge. That is our faith. That is our hope.