A Tidbit of Torah – Parshat Pekudey 5784

The silver of those of the community who were recorded came to 100 talents and 1,775 shekels by the sanctuary weight: a half-shekel a head, half a shekel by the sanctuary weight, for each one who was entered in the records, from the age of twenty years up, 603,550 men. The 100 talents of silver were for casting the sockets of the sanctuary and the sockets for the curtain, 100 sockets to the 100 talents, a talent a socket.                 Sh’mot / Exodus 38:25-27

With all the components of the Mishkan and its appurtenances completed and ready to be assembled, the Torah provides an accounting of all the gold, silver, copper, gemstones, along with the blue, purple, and crimson yarns which had been provided by the Israelites. This financial record includes the passage above which details the results of the census commanded in Parshat Ki Tissa and the use made of the poll tax monies.

Rabbi Yitzchak Meir Alter1 in his commentary on this passage writes:

• One hundred sockets were created out of the one hundred talents of silver for the Mishkan and this corresponds to the one hundred blessings that a Jew is required to recite daily. Just as the sockets were foundations of the Mishkan, so too, the blessings are the foundation of personal holiness for each Jew daily. The Hebrew term for socket, “Aden” evokes the Hebrew term “Adanut/Lordship”, affirming that through the recitation of these blessings, the Jew testifies to the truth of God as Creator and Sovereign of the universe. These one hundred blessings are the one hundred foundational sockets of the individual Jew’s internal Mishkan.

Cha”zal, our sages of blessed memory, arrived at the total of one hundred blessings through a combination of structured worship, the blessings which form the daily liturgy,2 and the spontaneous blessings recited as expressions of gratitude for our daily food3 and as reactions to our experiences in the world.4 Our teachers saw these as creating thereby a residence of holiness for the Divine Presence in one’s soul and a place to encounter the Holy One in one’s life.

Shabbat Shalom –
Rabbi David M. Eligberg

1 Rabbi Yitzchak Meir Rotenberg-Alter (1799 – 10 March 1866), was the founding Rebbe of the Ger Hasidic dynasty, in the town of Gora, Poland (“Ger” in Yiddish). Rabbi Alter was also known as The Chiddushei HaRim after his commentaries on the Torah and the Talmud.

2 While the liturgy varies from community to community, and from siddur to siddur, we can see the building blocks of blessing through the thrice daily recitation of the Amidah (39), the blessings surrounding the recitation of the Shema (7), Birkot HaShachar (the morning blessings – 16), several others that form our public worship (5), as well as putting on tallit and tefillin (3). Total: 70.

3 This number is variable and would encompass blessings recited before and after eating anything, from a full meal starting with Motzi and ending with Birkat HaMazon (5), a snack (2), or a drink (2). Yes, snacks count too!

4 These are situational blessings, triggered by something we see, hear, smell, or experience. Perhaps the most familiar of these would be Sheh-heh-cheh-yanu on reaching special milestones and acquiring new things. Groceries don’t count, new clothes do.