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The Hugging Cherubs and Dancing With My Wife - Terumah

The Hugging Cherubs and Dancing With My Wife - Terumah

Season 3 Published 2 years, 9 months ago
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 דַּבֵּר֙ אֶל־בְּנֵ֣י
יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל וְיִקְחוּ־לִ֖י תְּרוּמָ֑ה
 

  

  

Eben Ezra The words ve-yikchu
li (that they take for Me) is similar to the form surah elai (turn
in to me) (Jud. 4:18). Surah elai means turn from your place and come to
me. Ve-yikchu li has a similar connotation. It means let him take from
what he owns and give it to me. The same is true of Fetch me (kechi li),
I pray thee, a little water (I Kings 17:10).
 

  

But if we look at the words  

Vyikchu Li  

They should take me  

  

  

וְעָ֥שׂוּ לִ֖י מִקְדָּ֑שׁ
וְשָׁכַנְתִּ֖י בְּתוֹכָֽם׃
 

  

That I may dwell among
(within) them: It does not say
'within it,' which means that the place that God will sanctify to
dwell there is within the children of Israel that encircle the Tabernacle with
four banners.
 

  

  

  

The
Difference Between The Gentile and Jewish View of The Cherubim
 

The
Talmud quotes in the name of Rav Katina that when the Jews came up for the
pilgrimage festivals, the priests would pull back the curtain in the Beis
HaMikdash and show them that the Cherubim (one of which had masculine features
and one of which had feminine features) were embracing one another. The priests
would say: “See how beloved you are before the Almighty, like the love of a
male and female.” [Yoma 54a]
 

  

The
Gemara continues [Yoma. 54b], Reish Lakish stated that when the Gentiles
invaded and entered the Holy of Holies, they saw the Cherubim embracing like
man and wife and they brought them out to the street and mocked. “These Jews
whose blessing is a blessing and whose curse is a curse, look at what they
occupy themselves with in their Holy of Holies.” They debased Klal Yisrael and
ridiculed them for this perceived impropriety. This, Chazal interpret, is the
meaning of the pasuk: “All who once respected her, disparage her, for they have
seen her disgrace (ervasah, literally ‘her nakedness’)” [Eicha 1:8].
 

[The
Rishonim in tractate Yoma ask a very interesting question: The Cherubim were
not always embracing. They were only embracing when the Jews 'did the Will
of the Almighty”. Their embrace mirrored how G-d felt toward His people. When
He loved them, they embraced; when G-d was angry with His people, they were
separate. The Rishonim ask that when the Gentiles came into the Beis HaMikdash
to destroy it, the last thing we would expect to find was the Cherubim
embracing. They should have not even have been looking at one another! Why were
they apparently mirroring G-d’s Love for us at that moment?
 

  

The
Rishonim answer — at that point the destruction (Churban) had happened already.
G-d’s Wrath was already spent. The Temple had already been destroyed. 'Now
let’s make up.” Thus, even while the walls were still burning, the Cherubim
were embracing again. They were back in love.]
 

Why,
in fact, do we have in our Holy of Holies the image of a husband and a wife
engaging in an embrace? This is something that the Gentiles could not
understand. They mocked it. They used it to make us a laughing-stock.