Month: March 2023

Parshat Tsav (צו – prescribe), Leviticus 6, 1 – 8, 36.
G‑d details the function of each offering, then asks Moses to teach the cohanim the rules for eating the offerings and the rules for serving the sanctuary.

For Shabbat Ha-Gadol the Haftarah is read in Malachi (3, 3 to 24).

Malachi 3, 22
זִכְרוּ תּוֹרַת מֹשֶׁה עַבְדִּי אֲשֶׁר צִוִּיתִי אוֹתוֹ בְחֹרֵב עַל-כָּל-יִשְׂרָאֵל חֻקִּים וּמִשְׁפָּטִים 
Remember the Law of Moses my servant, to whom I served at Horeb statutes and ordinances for all Israel.

The Maran¹, is one of the greatest Jewish halakhic decision makers. Between 1523 and 1536, he lived in Nikopol in Bulgaria, where he established the synagogue and the yeshiva “Beith Yosseph”². It was there that he wrote most of his work Beith Yossef³ (1522-1562).

¹ Rabbi Yosef ben Ephraim Karo Zatsa”l was born in 1488 in Toledo and died on the eve of Passover, April 3, 1575 (13 Nissan 5335) in Tfsat. נסמך (Matayim Rabanim Nismakh = recognized by 200 imminent rabbis).
² Destroyed by the Germans in 1941.
³ The Beit Yossef (בית יוסף – House of Joseph) is a code of law that deals with the practical aspects of Jewish life. At the end of his life, he will make a more accessible summary of it in the שולחן ערוך (Shouhan Arukh – laid table).

Vayaqhel (ויקהל – and he gathered) – Peqoudei (פקודי – inventories)
Exodus from 35.1 to 40.38.

Moshe in front of the assembled people again states the commandment to observe Shabbos. Recalls the obligation to build the Tabernacle, to make the objects of worship and to make the priestly vestments. The book of Exodus closes with the inauguration of the said Tabernacle and the manifestation of divine glory in the completed sanctuary.

Exodus 40, 1
בְּיוֹם-cam הָרִאשׁוֹן, בְּאֶחָד לַחֹדֶשׁ, תָּקִים, אֶת-מִשְׁכַּן אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד
The first day of the month, the first month,
you will erect the Tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting.

The portable shrine built by the Children of Israel in the Sinai desert is inaugurated on the first day of the month of Nissan in the year of creation 2449 (1312 BCE). Timna Park, about 30 km north of Eilat, has a life-size replica of the Tabernacle and its furniture.

Ki Tissa (כי תשא – when you take), Exodus 30, 11 to 34, 35.

Exodus 31 2-3
ראה קראתי בשם בצלאֵל בן-אורי בן-חור למטֵה יהודה. ואמלא אתו רוח א-להים בחכמה וּבתבונה ובדעת ובכל-מלאכה.
Behold, I have expressly designated Bezalel, son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Yehuda, and I have filled him with divine inspiration, skill, judgment, knowledge, and aptitude for all the arts.

Bezalel (בצלאל – in the shade [under the protection] of G‑d) is the chief architect of the Mishkan. He is the archetype of the best apprentice, the artist par excellence.

In 1977, at the instigation of the Rebbe of Lubavitch, a place of learning and worship, named Bais Bezalel, opened in Los Angeles. In 1996, the center expanded and moved into a building on Pico Boulevard, on the Beverly Hill side.

Tetzaveh (תצוה – you will command), Exodus 27, 20 to 30, 10.
Shabbat Zakhor (זכור – Remember), Deuteronomy 25, 17-19
Chida’s Hilula (11 Adar 5783)

The New Synagogue of Livorno is the most famous work of the Italian architect Angelo Di Castro. The shape of the building is reminiscent of the Mishkan. In the center, the tevah is built from marble elements of the old synagogue. The Arch in carved and gilded wood (1708) comes from the Synagogue of Pesaro. The basement rooms house an oratory, Oratorio Lampronti, whose 18th-century furniture comes from the Spanish synagogue in Ferrara.

217 years ago, on Shabbat Zakhor (11 Adar 5766) in Livorno, where he settled in 1780, Rav Chaim Yosef David Azulai, better known by the acronym Chida (חיד”א) died. In 1956 his bones are transferred to Jerusalem.

לכבוד החיד”א, זכותו תגן עלינו
Likhvod hachida, zekhuto tagen ‘alenu.
Honor to the Chida, may his merit protect us