K'chol asher tzivah Hashem es Moshe kein asu Bnei Yisrael es kol ha'avodah.
Va'yar Moshe es kol ha'melacha... va'yivarech osam Moshe. (39:42-43)
There are two words the Torah uses for work: avodah and melacha. Ramban (VaYikra 23:7) writes that there is a difference between the two. It's a sunny afternoon and you havw a choice between mowing the lawn -- kotzeir -- and making a barbeque -- bishul. Both involve what the Torah defines as work, but we would all prefer the latter to the former. Mowing the lawn is avoda; the barbeque is melacha. Kayin worked the land and is called an oveid adamah. Avodah is what you have to do willy-nilly; you have to force yourself to do it, or sometimes someone else forces you, like in the case of a slave, who is called an eved = avodah.
When the Torah tells us that we can't do work on Yom Tov it uses the term "m'leches avodah," as opposed to on Shabbos where it says simply "lo ta'aseh melacha." Ramban explains that m'leches avodah means only work that falls under the umbrella of also being avodah is prohibited on Yom Tov. You can't mow the lawn, but on Yom Tov, unlike Shabbos, you can have your barbeque. The one place where the Torah writes that melacha is prohibited on Yom Tov (Shmos 12:16), it immediately adds "ach asher yei'achel l'chol nefesh," cooking and the like, is permitted.
The Rishonim debate whether ochel nefesh is hutra or dechuya on Yom Tov. For example, Rashi and Tosfos disagree whether you can carry only if there is a need like tzorech mitzvah to push off the issur, or whether you can carry something just for enjoyment. According to Ramban, it's neither. Hutra/dechuya means there is an issur, but for some reason, we push off the issur, i.e. in this case, you're not allowed to cook, to carry, etc., but comes ochel nefesh and pushes off the issur. According to Ramban, there is nothing to push off -- the Torah never prohibited melacha on Yom Tov, it only prohibited avodah. It's much easier to understand how the concept of mitoch (Beitzah 12) works using Ramban's approach.
Since we're not learning hilchos Yom Tov, back to the parsha. Chasam Sofer writes as follows:
"...Kein asu Bnei Yisrael es ha'avodah." Even though building the Mishkan effected a kapparah for cheit ha'eigel, i.e. there was a benefit to doing it and it would have been something Klal Yisrael would have wanted to do for their own sake, like having a barbeque, that's not what motivated them. The reason they put all their kochos into building a mishkan was purely l'sham shamayim, to serve Hashem, as an avodah.
However, "Va'yar Moshe es ha'melacha..." Who knows what was going on in their hearts? Not even Moshe. What he saw was melacha, the work being done for potentially the selfish benefit of the kaparah. Therefore, "Vayivarech osam..." so that even if it was a melacha, yehi ratzon that there should be a hashra'as haShechina anyway.
It's too good a vort to ask a kashe, on, but I will ask anyway. About 10 pesukim before the pesukim above, the Torah says, "Va'teichel kol avodas ha'mishkan...Va'ya'asu Bnei Yisrael es kol asher tzivah Hashem es Moshe..." Rashi comments: Va'ya'asu Bnei Yisael -- es ha'melacha. The pasuk describes what was done as avodah. Why does Rashi in his explanation switch terms and call it melacha?
I thought I had an answer that fit with the Chasam Sofer and was mulling it over for half the week, but at this point I am throwing in the towel and just posting the question.
Aside from explaining the switch in terms from avodah to melacha (which others comment on as well, e.g. Kli Yakar, Malbim, see also Ramban), we also gain from the Chasam Sofer an explanation of why Moshe's bracha was necessary -- even though Klal Yisrael had dotted even I and crossed every t, Moshe was concerned that it was a melacha and not an avodah and therefore needed his beracha.
Ralbag says a simpler answer: our parsha teaches us that a great leader knows not only how to give mussar, but knows how to give compliments as well. When the tzibur does something right, you have to tell them! If every Shabbos dersha is about how the tzibur is talking in shul, not learning enough, not dressed properly, etc. (the truth is all that stuff maybe is not said often enough these days...) then the Rabbi will eventually find himself alienated from the klal. Sometimes you need to lift people up and tell them how great they are and talk about the good they have done. And what is true for a manhig of Klal Yisrael is also true for each one of us as well.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
"an answer that fit with the Chasam Sofer"
ReplyDeleteRashi of course anticipates, at 39:32, the midrash that he'll adduce at :33, so he COULD mean, like the Chasam Sofer suggests at :42-43*, that there WAS a "selfish" turn in the works-- the kerashim were not overly heavy, as we can see at 36:20 (where young B'tzal'el made them 'omdeem' himself); rather there was fighting over who would get to mark the planks for repeating placement [marking, koseiv, that didn't require the inspired expertise of B'tzal'el]; when this squabble broke out, the kerashim became unnaturally heavy [for one man, and the earlier teamwork in the making of the mishkan was now out of the question]; Moshe himself had to later execute a half-hour of [partial] fingal's fingers, for the good of everyone concerned...
*one could read the description here as like to Devarim 1:1, first Rashi-- Moshe would realize, when hearing and writing "ha'avodah" (39:42) after the fact, that Bnei Yisrael acted "l'sh[e]m shamayim"; he would hear that his cautious suspicion of "melacha" {of avodah "l'sham shamayim"} was unfounded
so what if the Accuser storms one's thoughts on a lovely morning of the seventh day, calling himself Conscience: 'you've got bubkis, talmid hokum, bubkis! no linkage whatever between your heavyweight squabble and Moshe's perception by the Chasam Sofer. bubkis!'
Deletenot to panic! not to wilt! only inform his flaming holiness then and there: 'your glorious wings, or your angelic rank, scare not. note the motive Archbubkis, the motive, why otherwise earnest members of the klal dared to fight over who would score the kerashim...
don't know do you, Noontime Night?
the better to effect "a kapparah for cheit ha'eigel", is why. the better to effect a kapparah!'
(so what if the Tetanus of Titus then hovers in hyperspace, for a cunning moment 'hurt'. so what if he then resumes his taunt, 'M.B. is nowhere near your fingertips, katansky, but is far away, is over the sea, a song in a foreign land...')
Following R SR Hirsch by weaving two of his ideas together:
ReplyDeleteMelakhah is creative activity. The focus is on being creative.
Avodah puts the focus on making oneself secondary to the work.
Now the weave -- Adam I performs melakhah, Adam II performs avodah. Thus, melekhes haqodesh vs. avodas Hashem.