46 | MARCH 16 • 2023
Clearly, the Torah wants us to connect
the birth of the universe with the building
of the Mishkan, but how and why?
The numerical structure of the two pas-
sages heightens the connection. We know
that the key number of the creation narra-
tive is seven. There are seven days, and the
word “good” appears seven times. The first
verse of the Torah contains seven Hebrew
words, and the second, 14. The word eretz,
“earth,
” appears 21 times, the word Elokim,
“God,
” 35 times, and so on.
So, too, in Pekudei, the phrase “as the
Lord commanded Moses” appears seven
times in the account of the making of the
priestly garments (Exodus 39:1-31), and
another seven times in the description of
Moses setting up the Sanctuary (Exodus
40:17-33).
THE END AND THE BEGINNING
Note also one tiny detail, the apparently
odd and superfluous “
And” at the very
beginning of the book of Exodus: “And
these are the names …
” The presence of
this connective suggests that the Torah
is telling us to see Genesis and Exodus as
inherently connected. They are part of the
same extended narrative.
The final relevant fact is that one of the
Torah’s most significant stylistic devices is
the chiasmus, or “mirror-image symmetry”
— a pattern of the form ABCC1B1A1, as
in “(A) He who sheds (B) the blood (C)
of man, (C1) by man (B1) shall his blood
(A1) be shed” (Genesis 9:6). This form can
be the shape of a single sentence, as here,
or a paragraph, but it can also exist at larger
levels of magnitude.
What it means is that a narrative reach-
es a certain kind of closure when the end
takes us back to the beginning — which
is precisely what happens at the end of
Exodus. It reminds us, quite precisely, of
the beginning of all beginnings, when God
created heaven and earth. The difference is
that this time human beings have done the
creating: the Israelites, with their gifts, the
labor and their skills.
To put it simply: Genesis begins with God
creating the universe as a home for human-
kind. Exodus ends with human beings, the
Israelites, creating the Sanctuary as a home
for God.
But the parallel goes far deeper than this
— telling us about the very nature of the
difference between kodesh and chol, sacred
and secular, the holy and the mundane.
We owe to the great mystic, R. Isaac
Luria, the concept of tzimtzum, “self-
effacement” or “self-limitation.
” Luria was
perplexed by the question: If God exists,
how can the universe exist? At every point
in time and space, the Infinite should
crowd out the finite. The very existence
of God should act as does a black hole
to everything in its vicinity. Nothing, not
even light waves, can escape a black hole,
so overwhelming is its gravitational pull.
Likewise, nothing physical or material
should be able to survive for even a
moment in the presence of the pure,
absolute Being of God.
Luria’s answer was that, in order for the
universe to exist, God had to hide Himself,
screen His presence, limit His Being. That
is tzimtzum.
Now let us come back to the key words
kodesh and chol. One of the root meanings
of chol, and the related root ch-l-l, is
“empty.
” Chol is the space vacated by God
through the process of self-limitation so
that a physical universe can exist. It is, as it
were, “emptied” of the pure Divine light.
Kodesh is the result of a parallel process
in the opposite direction. It is the space
vacated by us so that God’s presence can be
felt in our midst. It is the result of our own
tzimtzum. We engage in self-limitation
every time we set aside our devices and
desires in order to act on the basis of God’s
will, not our own.
That is why the details of the Sanctuary
are described at such length: to show that
every feature of its design was not humanly
invented but God-given. That is why the
human equivalent of the word “good” in
the Genesis creation account is “as the Lord
commanded Moses.
” When we nullify our
will to do God’s will, we create something
that is holy.
To put it simply: chol is the space God
makes for humankind. Kodesh is the space
humankind makes for God. And both
spaces are created the same way: by an act
of tzimtzum, self-effacement.
So, the making of the Sanctuary
that takes up the last third of the book
of Exodus is not just about a specific
construction, the portable shrine that the
Israelites took with them on a journey
through the wilderness. It is about an
absolutely fundamental feature of the
religious life, namely the relationship
between the sacred and the secular, kodesh
and chol. Chol is the space God makes for
us. Kodesh is the space we make for God.
So, for six days a week — the days that
are chol — God makes space for us to
be creative. On the seventh day, the day
that is Kadosh, we make space for God by
acknowledging that we are His creations.
And what applies in time applies also in
space. There are secular places where we
pursue our own purposes. And there are
holy places where we open ourselves, fully
and without reserve, to God’s purposes.
If this is so, we have before us an idea
with life-transforming implications. The
highest achievement is not self-expression
but self-limitation: making space for
something other and different from us. The
happiest marriages are those in which each
spouse makes space for the other to be his
or her-self. Great parents make space for
their children. Great leaders make space
for their followers. Great teachers make
space for their pupils. They are there when
needed, but they don’t crush or inhibit or
try to dominate. They practice tzimtzum,
self-limitation, so that others have the
space to grow. That is how God created the
universe, and it is how we allow others to
fill our lives with their glory.
The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks served as the
chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the
Commonwealth, 1991-2013. His teachings have been
made available to all at rabbisacks.org. This essay was
written in 2018.
SPIRIT
A WORD OF TORAH
continued from page 45
“THE HIGHEST ACHIEVEMENT IS NOT
SELF-EXPRESSION BUT SELF-LIMITATION:
MAKING SPACE FOR SOMETHING
OTHER AND DIFFERENT FROM US.”