Tetzaveh - Oh, Brother! - Tehilah Gimpel: The Land of Israel Fellowship

hey guys so today i want to say a little something about the portion but before i do that i want to kind of talk about these portions in general and try to address the elephant in the room i don't exactly know how to say this delicately so i'll tell you a story when we were in the states on our last speaking tour we went out for dinner with our wonderful friends uh pastor and his wife who are doing just wonderful things bringing torah into their community you guys are on the fellowship so you probably know who you are so we went out for dinner and we were talking about uh teaching the torah portion and you know just sharing different ideas i said well you know teaching the torah portion is not easy especially when you get to the boring portions and the pastor nearly choked on his food he said oh my god did you just call the word of the lord boring and i was so embarrassed i'm like oh my god i didn't mean boring why did that just come out of my mouth i meant like deep mystical challenging oh yeah i'm so sorry it was a good cover-up tequila and later i was so embarrassed that i actually said that about the torah and i felt really bad but you know and we're trying to reflect on it i realize that when i get to these portions i do get a little bit nervous i get a little bit challenged in my faith even and like hashem forgive me but sometimes i ask myself why does the torah go into so many details like the tabernacle is not even practically relevant in our life wouldn't it have been better to say okay well you know build a tabernacle general things and then focus all the verses on righteousness and prayer and service couldn't the part about how to build the tabernacle just been like in the oral tradition and the babylonian talmud so you know joking aside it's hard to ignore that elephant in the room you know we take this sharp turn for the most compelling story perhaps ever told the story of a nation of slaves leaving egypt becoming free having revelation at sinai and then we go into these details and i mean even think about it from a pr perspective like hashem wants people to be into the bible portion after portion with the details of building the tabernacle is that really the right way to sell people on the word of god and so this year for the first time it started to kind of connect for me to this idea that we also started talking about in the portion of ishmael that you can look at the torah as a development think about when you know we start the torah it's really just stories and they're great stories like there's so many commentaries of the of the oral tradition but you don't even need it you could just read these stories and they're so inspiring then you get to exodus the stories start to incorporate rules woven in right like in egypt i was like okay you know make the seder and uh make the new month and then you get to the revelation where there's rules that are like the central part of the narrative and then you get to mishpatim which is just rules without any story but they're really relevant like how do you live with your neighbors and you know how do you treat other people and then you get to these portions that are like not even relevant for 99 of the people maybe even for maybe just for priests and even then like how often do you actually need to build the tabernacle and suddenly it really became reminiscent for me to the process that children go through when we raise children and it's as if the torah is raising us going through those natural stages of growth like when we raise our children our children need stories you tell them fairy tales you can't just start with abstract rules of right and wrong you tell them stories exemplifying that embodying that and then as they get older maybe you could like put in a few lessons like what did you learn from that story and then as they get even older you can really start to just teach them concepts they don't need a story just you know a higher level like this is what you should do in life this is what you shouldn't do in life explicitly but then as they get older you kind of want them to be able to meet situations that you didn't even tell them anything about that they're not clearly connected to anything you told them we want our children to not need us anymore to tell them what to do but to actually be able to see something happen in life where they can plumb and dig for their own you know their own meaning that they're going to draw out of them so that's how i look at these portions i i'm so inspired when i look at how much meaning the sages were able to you know draw out of these verses just towers and towers of mysticism and meaning from every word every letter sometimes even the decorations on the letter because when you read these portions they're relevant the relevance for our life and our relationship with hashem are not obvious but we hack away we try to draw these things out it's like hashem is leading us on this growth process first you know he trains us but then he shows us how we don't need to be spoon-fed and we can dig for our own meaning it's not just a one-way street hashem telling us what to do we're supposed to look at these turrets and difficult portions as a challenge this is our opportunity to put some elbow grease in to our torah study and say hashem okay look this is what i was able to pull out of the word you know look at all these beautiful ideas that i'm going to draw out of every hint that you've given us now so so that's the kind of attitude that uh i'm going to take when looking at these portions and you know try to try to actually get excited by the challenge hashem is giving like saying i trust you guys you're going to be able to look at this and dig and find something really deep it's a it's like a level of trust and maturity that we've gotten to in our torah study so now in this week's portion i want to talk about specifically we see that moshe is told to pour the oil over aaron and anoint him now it's interesting because you know this of course reminded me of psalm 133 now psalm 133 always struck me as kind of funny it says behold how good and pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together as the good oil on the head runs down upon the beard the beard of aaron which runs down upon his garment as the dew of hermon which runs down the mountain of zion for there the lord commanded blessing life forever now i have to be honest it's always seemed to me like a funny comparison like what do any of those comparisons have to do with each other like i've hung out with my brothers and honestly i've spilled oil on jeremy true story once i had this little concoction that i made with essential oils and i'm so proud of myself i wanted to rub it on jeremy's face so he was in bed and i said oh come look what i made and i went and i was like so clumsy i spilled it over the oil was dripping down his face onto his beard it even got into his eyes it really hurt him that was not fun but in any event it was not similar to dwelling in peace with my brothers and neither of those feel like do running down from the hermione from zion because if you know the geography of israel the duo of hormone doesn't even run down to zion but as we read the portion it's a little bit easier to understand i know jeremy's touched on this a bit when discussing the character of aaron so in the portion moshe is commanded to pour the oil on aaron now there's so much here to this because so interesting when we think of aaron we call oh aaron the priest the priestly lineage the priestly blessing right but here's the thing up until this portion he was never called aaron the priest we know how the story is going to develop we read it in light of what we know is going to happen but imagine from moshe's perspective it would be reasonable for him to think that he's going to be the priest and that his children after him would be the priest why not he's the one getting all the instructions so far it's just logical and then it's like all right take the oil and you can imagine anybody but moshe being like uh-huh what am i gonna do with the oil and just like and put it on aaron and anoint him and nominate his children after him too meaning your dream of any kind of meaningful lineage is gone as well and what's so amazing is that it's just like when aaron heard that moshe was going to be the leader for the redemption out of egypt it says that he was happy in his heart like deep inside not just smiling on the outside and then moshe turns around and ends up giving the priesthood over to aaron like each of them were able to see each other's true inner strengths motion was meant to be the leader the teacher the logging of the prophet and aaron and his children they were more worthy to be the priests and moshe gets it and he's okay with it because it's not about them it's about doing hashem's will and they were both happy with that they were okay with that as long as what hashem wanted so what's so crazy is that in this week's portion it's actually the only portion in the entire torah from the birth of moshe that doesn't mention moshe's name it's such a perfect embodiment of his personality never seeking his own glory in the same portion that he nominates our own he also is not mentioned you know many of the oral torah commentators actually say that the tabernacle was commanded after the golden calf even though it appears in the torah before because in some way it was a response to seeing the people's yearning for a physical representation and wanting to channel that into holy vessels but it might not have even been commanded if not for the golden calf now we accept that interpretation not everybody does but if we accept that what did moshe do to stop hashem's wrath after the golden calf hashem said i'm going to destroy israel make you into a nation for me and what would you think moshe would say he'd say great right like any person would say great get rid of all those complainers my family and i will be the chosen people hard offer to turn down what does he say he says if you do that erase me from your book and that is what saved israel he stood up as it were to hashem and said i'm not going to be enticed with glory and honor where they go i go you erase them you erase me it's so heroic it's so moving and then this is if this chapter is coming right after that it's like this symbolic actualization of that just embodying his willingness to give up his own glory for us so you know either way whether you think this is before or after you can use this to really understand psalm 133 because how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in harmony when there's peace and harmony you want to know how to do that the psalm is saying look back to this special moment in the portion of titsafe where moshe's name doesn't even appear he gives up all of his glory and honor to anoint his brother the very same brother who was happy in his heart for moshe's chosenness and accomplishments they're the model for us because if you step back for a moment this is not just a beautiful example between brothers it's a deep turn around in the torah if you follow step by step the torah narrative from the beginning of genesis until now every single story had fighting brothers just like you step out of the garden kane kills abel and it never stopped noah's children were fighting all the patriarchs had a beloved brother and you know the jealous brother and everything is just going so badly joseph there's some sort of reparation but even in the end of the book of genesis you see that there's not this great love between them because the brothers are still worried that maybe after jacob dies joseph is going to retaliate and then come aaron and moshe they're able to fix that and only then does the redemption of israel come they're truly willing to give up their own honor for the greater actualization of hashem's will in the world and both of them in our memory ironically end up having the greatest honor and that is like the dew of hermon flowing down from the to the mountain of zion why when i try to imagine that what does that mean do coming down from hermon to me when i close my eyes it looks like the tribes of israel the northern tribes re-accepting jerusalem as their capital and you know david is their king and flowing like dew from the north to the festivals in jerusalem and that's the image that comes to my mind like the ten tribes split and made their own temple they didn't want to accept the lineage as david as their you know david is their true king and the reparation of that it's a future described in the psalm of this unification following the example of moshe pouring that oil recognizing the priesthood of his brother and his lineage that's the beautiful lesson to draw out of this story and the vision for the future of a true reparation and love between brothers and sisters and all the tribes of israel being able to come together in the future temple and accepting the you know the descendant of david as the true leader so with that i wish you guys all a beautiful and inspired week bye everyone hi my name is jeremy gimpel a lot of people want to know exactly what the land of israel fellowship is and what members receive when they join so let me explain the land of israel fellowship is a global online community with hundreds of members from over 40 countries around the world there are live sessions and gatherings that create a direct personal connection to the land of israel and the lovers of israel from around the world there's no online gathering that i'm familiar with that is connected to the land of israel that unites and brings together such a diverse group of people backgrounds and nationalities it feels like prophecy it feels like something we need in these times like a window in to a better future on the horizon there's a divine unity we experience every week in our fellowship broadcast we heard these amazing teachings from an authentic hebrew and israel perspective and our jaws drop not only because they ring so true and are such a blessing because they are so consistent with what we believe these sunday morning gatherings are nothing less than a house of prayer for all nations cindy lo the united states of america the land of israel fellowship is an amazing resource for learning torah the bible and the prophets unfiltered and uncensored directly from the land of israel we've been studying torah for almost 20 years but we feel we are stepping into it more than ever and seeing new depth and dimensions to scripture we're encouraged more and more every week calinardell usa members receive access to all the archives in the library of teachings on every portion of the torah the biblical feast hebrew prayer prophecy sessions on the ancient wisdom of the prophets of israel to help us navigate through these turbulent times these sessions are so rich i re-listen to each and truly each session is the best one yet tehila is a tremendous asset and the teachings ari shares are so rich i've read the bible so many times and i've known the things you are teaching the hebrew understanding is what christians have missed for centuries sister georgian from germany the land of israel fellowship is truly unique because it's built upon personal relationships with the teachers of the fellowship myself rabbi arya bramwitz and tahila gimpel every member has direct access to the staff 24 6 via email or direct whatsapp to ask questions to comment to connect directly to all the teachers and over the last years we've connected to some of the most beautiful people on the planet so if you want to find out more and join the land of israel fellowship you can click on the link below and if you want to try it out for just a month you can email fellowship at the land of israel.com and we'll hook you up i hope to see you shalom from the mountains of judea you