Exodus 38:21 – 40:38
Keep Saying That
In general, rabbinic interpreters avoided recognizing repetitions in the biblical text as mere repetitions. The interpreters’ motto was “every word counts,” and this meant that no verse, or even part of a verse, should be understood as repeating something that had already been said.
So, for example, when the prophet Isaiah had a vision of the seraphim surrounding the heavenly throne and calling to one another, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts (of angels),” each of those holies was understood to have a different meaning. “Holy in the height of heaven, His dwelling-place; holy on earth, where He performs His mighty deeds; holy for all eternity.”
In the light of this approach, this week’s reading, along with the preceding one, seem to pose a serious problem. In verse after verse (and often word for word) they simply repeat what had already been said in the previous weekly readings, which describe in great detail the desert tabernacle (mishkan) that the Israelites are to make and the priestly garments that are to be fashioned for the kohanim (priests) to wear.
The only difference is that in the preceding readings, God tells Moses what the Israelites are to do in the future, whereas now the Torah reports that the Israelites carried out those instructions to the letter. But surely this could have been communicated in a single sentence: “And the Israelites did exactly as they had been instructed.” Why go through each and every item a second time, saying for each that the Israelites had in fact done as they were told?
One might think the lesson being imparted is similar to that of the book of Ecclesiastes (Kohelet) 7:8: “The end of something is better than its beginning; so too is patience better than arrogance.” What does that mean?
“The end of something” refers to a project that has been completed, whereas “its beginning” is precisely that, the project when it was still in the planning stage. Anyone can start planning to do something, but what counts is the job once completed. So too with the mishkan and the priestly clothing, what mattered was not the set of plans, but the finished product. This being the case, Ecclesiastes says, patience—the willingness to wait and see things to their conclusion—is the right approach; arrogance and impatience will eventually sputter out.
Truthfully, however, it seems that the message of the repetitions in regard to the mishkan and priestly garments is somewhat different. In fact, that message is not particularly elusive. The instructions for making the mishkan and the garments are, in a sense, a model of the Torah as a whole. The Torah is full of commandments, and the point is that carrying them out to the letter is what gives Israel the opportunity to come before God—to stand, in the most real sense, in His mishkan, His very presence. That is why carrying out those commandments is, and always has been, the very essence of Judaism—and why the repetitions in this week’s reading are so important.