Reaching Beyond Limits: The Power of Will and Faith in Difficult Times
by R. Eliezer Simcha Weisz

Parashat Pekudei is the final parasha in Sefer Shemot. Therefore, we must find a connection between the conclusion of Sefer Shemot and its beginning.

"סופה נעוץ בתחילתה"—the beginning contains the foundations that lead to the end, and the connection between the start and conclusion of Sefer Shemot illustrates this beautifully.

At the beginning of Sefer Shemot, we find the story of Pharaoh’s daughter, who stretched out her hand to retrieve the baby she saw floating in the waters of the Nile. The verse states:
וַתֵּרֶד בַּת-פַּרְעֹה לִרְחֹץ עַל-הַיְאֹר, וְנַעֲרוֹתֶיהָ הֹלְכוֹת עַל-יַד הַיְאֹר; וַתֵּרֶא אֶת-הַתֵּבָה בְּתוֹךְ הַסּוּף, וַתִּשְׁלַח אֶת-אֲמָתָהּ וַתִּקָּחֶהָ (שמות ב:ה)
"And the daughter of Pharaoh went down to bathe by the Nile, and her maidens walked along the Nile. She saw the basket among the reeds, and she stretched out her arm and took it." (Shemot 2:5)

Regarding the words "וַתִּשְׁלַח אֶת-אֲמָתָהּ"—"she stretched out her arm"—Chazal expound:
את אמתה – את ידה, שנשתרבב אמתה אמות הרבה (רש"י)
"‘Her arm’—this means her hand, for her arm extended many cubits beyond its natural length." (Rashi)

At the end of Sefer Shemot, the Mishkan was completed and ready to be erected, but no one could lift it because it was so heavy. It was therefore brought to Moshe to handle its assembly.

How was Moshe expected to lift something so heavy when everyone else had failed?

Rashi explains:
לא היו יכולין להקימו, ולפי שלא עשה משה שום מלאכה במשכן, הניח לו הקדוש ברוך הוא הקמתו. שלא היה יכול להקימו שום אדם, מחמת כובד הקרשים, שאין כוח באדם לזקפן, ומשה העמידו
"They were unable to erect it, and since Moshe had not performed any work in the Mishkan, Hashem left the assembly of the structure to him. No one was able to erect it because of the weight of the beams—no human had the strength to lift them—but Moshe set it up."

Moshe said before Hashem, "איך אפשר הקמתו על ידי אדם?"—"How is it possible for a person to erect it?" Hashem replied, "עסוק אתה בידך, נראה כמקימו, והוא נזקף וקם מאליו."—"You occupy yourself with it, make it appear as though you are erecting it, and it will rise up by itself." Thus, the verse states:
וַיָּקֶם מֹשֶׁה אֶת-הַמִּשְׁכָּן—הוקם מאליו
"And Moshe erected the Mishkan"—it was raised by itself.

At the beginning of Sefer Shemot, we see that Pharaoh’s daughter accomplished an impossible task when she successfully reached the ark. But the question arises: What made her think she could reach it? After all, she saw that it was far away!

With Moshe, we understand—he attempted the impossible because Hashem explicitly told him to: "עסוק אתה בידך."—"You occupy yourself with it."

But how did Pharaoh’s daughter know she would succeed in performing the impossible—that a miracle would occur, and her hand would extend?

The answer is that she simply did what was within her ability to do, and Hashem blessed her efforts.

From this, we learn a crucial lesson: Never refrain from attempting a task just because it seems unattainable.

If we do what we are meant to do, Hashem will bless our efforts with success.

In any case, we must always remember the words of Rabbi Tarfon:
לא עליך המלאכה לגמור, ולא אתה בן חורין להיבטל ממנה (אבות ב:טז)
"It is not your duty to finish the work, but neither are you free to desist from it." (Pirkei Avot 2:16)

Many aspirations go unfulfilled because people think: "I won’t be able to finish everything" or "I will never succeed." Perfectionism, the relentless pursuit of completion, and the failure to appreciate partial achievements—all of these are obstacles that prevent progress.

Every accomplishment is valuable. Even if the path to the summit seems blocked, every step taken up the mountain is still considered an ascent.

Our challenge today, especially in times of war, is not to avoid effort simply because the task appears difficult or impossible. Precisely in times of tension and hardship, we must focus on understanding what we can do—and never give up.

If we make our best efforts with faith that Hashem will bless our actions, we can move forward even in the most challenging circumstances.

We are not free to give up or despair; we are not permitted to surrender and fail to implement the good ideas that come to mind. Let us do what is within our power—and we will be rewarded by success, בעזרת השם.

Revaluing Labor

Author
by David Zvi Kalman

Why don’t we make things in this country anymore?



You’ve probably heard that sentiment at some point in the last decade and the truth of it is hard to dispute. In 1953, a third of the American workforce was in manufacturing. Today, fewer than eight percent of Americans work in this sector. The American economy is now largely a service economy.



I’ve seen this shrinkage with my own eyes. As the owner of an independent publishing company, I used to have my books printed in Michigan, but at a certain point, this stopped being economically viable. Today, most of my books are printed in China, as are my boutique dreidels. Many Judaica manufacturers have made the same choice. Once you’ve seen the sheer power of East Asian manufacturing firsthand, it’s hard not to feel its absence over here.



As a country, we’re split about how to feel about this, about who to blame, and about whether we should be trying to reverse it. But while some of the contours of this debate are uniquely American, the question of manufacturing’s inherent value has a long history — so long, in fact, that you can find it in the Bible.



This Shabbat we will conclude the Book of Exodus, traditionally seen as one of the dullest parts of the Bible. Much of it recapitulates the building of the Tabernacle, which had already been described a few chapters earlier — except now, instead of describing the construction to Moses, the Bible is recounting the actual building. The construction process is so tedious that even the Bible’s most stalwart commentators cannot find much of interest in it. Open any version of the Bible with the classical rabbinic commentaries and you’ll get the impression that they’ve gone on vacation until the start of Leviticus.



I won’t try to justify the Bible’s repetition of so many finicky details, but wrapped up in this manufacturer’s textual paradise is a basic question: Do builders know something that designers do not?



This question is embodied in the biblical figure of Betzalel, the individual selected by God to lead the actual construction process. Across the centuries, commentators have vacillated about how to treat this working stiff and their ambivalence is deeply revealing about the meaning of physical labor itself.



Take Josephus, for example. In the first-century historian’s retelling, Betzalel was not appointed by God at all, despite the Bible’s explicit statement to the contrary (Exodus 31:3). Instead, God simply rubber-stamped a decision that the people would have made anyway (Antiquities 3.104–6).



But the Talmud isn’t so sure. The word betzalel, it notes, literally means “in the shadow of God,” implying that Betzalel had access to divine wisdom. The knowledge that Betzalel possessed, the Talmud claims, extended beyond mundane manufacturing, for Betzalel also had the ability to “join the letters with which the heaven and earth were created” in order to achieve his ends. This elevated status is carried through in later rabbinic sources, one of which claims that Betzalel actually ascended Sinai separately from Moses to consult with God on the Tabernacle’s construction (Midrash Zuta 4:14).



If it seems strange that Betzalel would be afforded a status akin to Moses, consider that Betzalel’s role required him to be a sort of “craft Moses.” Yes, he is a builder — but building and teaching are inextricably linked, as any apprentice can tell you. This teaching role was particularly important for a people leaving Egypt with a skills deficit. According to both Nahmanides and Abarbanel, the Israelites lacked many of the artisanal skills necessary for a functioning society. The Tabernacle, then, was more than a home for the divine presence. It was a place for a new generation of Israelite builders to learn their trades. (This is still how academics recover lost building practices.)



Crucially, many commentators point out that Betzalel also needed to be a master interpreter. The Bible isn’t an Ikea manual; it doesn’t convey all the finer details of construction. Moses, according to the rabbis, did not understand how to construct the menorah from God’s instructions alone — and yet Betzalel built it without any trouble. In designating Betzalel, God recognizes for the first time the need for a Torah that goes beyond the written word: an oral Torah, if you will, conveyed from teacher to student down the generations.



In a world that does not yet know of rabbis, Betzalel sets the rabbinic template: a master of interpretation, a translator of abstract instructions into real-world solutions, and a transmitter of practical knowledge to new coteries of tradespeople.



Today, Betzalel is a footnote in Jewish history. Despite being a proto-rabbi, the rabbis do not claim him. This is unfortunately predictable. Us “knowledge workers” have historically been quite bad at recognizing manual labor as a worthy occupation, and frequently treat people who work with their hands as some separate class of beings who are incapable of a full mental workload. In the Talmud, an aristocratic rabbi is chastised for forgetting that some of his colleagues also had grueling day jobs. But in an age when many of us do work so ethereal we can do it from home, it’s easy to forget.



From a corporate perspective, it is certainly the case that better-paid work tends to be more abstract, less technical and wordier. There is something attractive about the idea that we can press a button to make a thing happen, that we can accomplish a task by a mere act of thought. The Bible itself suggests that hands-free achievements are divine, that they bring us closer to the divine ideal of creating light by simply saying “let there be light.”



There’s nothing wrong with these sentiments, but they need to be moderated. Physical labor has a value of its own; it’s a form of knowledge and action that resists abstraction and is stubbornly (and sometimes joyously) material. It cultivates endurance, precision and attention, rooting us in the limits and capacities of our bodies and environments in a way no algorithm can replicate.



If we want to restore the value of physical labor, we should probably raise up Betzalel, the model of what it means to transform words to action.

Peace at Home
By Tzvi Freeman

The relationship of a man and a woman is the way our world reflects the relationship of the Creator with His creation. There is nothing more pivotal to the world’s ultimate fulfillment than this.

Therefore, as the world nears closer and closer to its fulfillment, the resistance grows stronger and stronger. By now, absolutely everything appears to be undermining the most crucial key of peace between man and woman.

Igrot Kodesh vol. 4, #1154.

Joy
Be Happy!

“Serve G‑d with joy!” sings the Psalmist.

Joy is central to connecting to G‑d. Being happy when you do a mitzvah demonstrates that you like this connection, this tremendous privilege of serving the Infinite Author of All Things. And in fact, the Arizal, 16th-century master Kabbalist, once asserted that the gates of wisdom and divine inspiration were opened for him only as a reward for doing mitzvahs with boundless joy.

Not just mitzvahs, but everything you do—eating, sleeping, business, and even leisure activities—can be part of the way you connect to G‑d. All it takes is the right intentions. If so, “serve G‑d with joy” applies to all times and every situation.

“Serve G‑d with joy!” actually applies to all times and situations
When you’re happy, the toughest tasks are a cinch, the strongest adversaries are easily vanquished. If you’re down, on the other hand, even simple challenges seem overwhelming. Winning the lifelong battle against temptations, self-centeredness and just doing the right thing is largely dependent on staying bright, happy and optimistic.

A happiness meditation:
Envision being given the opportunity to host your nation’s head of state in your humble home. Picture how overjoyed and excited you’d be at the honor.
Consider G‑d’s unfathomable greatness.
Take another moment to appreciate how small and insignificant you are by comparison.
Contemplate now how He loves and cherishes you.
Consider how, when you do a mitzvah, you cause Him to dwell with us here in our world—and you get to host Him!
Let a sense of purpose lend bounce to your step as you go about your daily activities.
And one more:
Recognize that all that transpires is part of G‑d’s plan, and that G‑d is in control.
Understand that no evil could emanate from G‑d—for He is entirely good.
Feel secure in the knowledge that everything is exactly as it is supposed to be, and Someone is looking out for you.