3.1.25

Good morning!

We learned a valuable lesson last night in our zoom call: God who owns everything, gives to us something so we can give it back to Him in service and He perfects what we gave us as Bridal garments.

In the past we have put on our Sherlock Holmes investigative mind to look at the 13 items that the Children of God, God's bride, gave to build a home for God to dwell in (Ex. 25:4-9). It's obvious to most where they got the materials...from Egypt (Ex. 3:22; 11:2). But where did all the wood come from to build so much of the Tabernacle structure; The often identified as cedarwood or acacia/atzei shitim?From Jacob? Huh?

To know this answer, we'd have to go back hundreds of years to when Jacob left the land of Canaan, with all his goods to dwell in Egypt with his son Joseph. But, why carry trees from the Holy Land to plant in Egypt for use in a building to be constructed centuries later?

From the day Jacob descended to Egypt till the Exodus, 210 years passed. In life, it is good to plan long-term. Did Jacob feel that he needed to prepare the cedar wood 210 years before it was needed? Could he not have told his children to obtain cedars in or around Egypt? Why Jacob would engage in this seemingly unnecessary toil, two centuries before his descendants would need the cedar.

Let me intimate a thought for you: Jacob, our father, knew that one day the very country which has been so hospitable to him and his family, the country saved by his son Joseph, would turn its back on the Hebrew tribe and transform their lives into a purgatory of enslavement. Jacob knew that the people of Israel would need something to hold on to, something tangible to remind them that they don’t belong here; something concrete to imprint upon their tormented hearts that they come from somewhere else, and they will one day leave this hellish concentration camp and return home.

A promise? Yes. He and Joseph promised the family that they would leave Egypt one day. But a verbal promise is insufficient. People can’t live on words alone. Jacob needed to give them something tangible that could comfort them and offer a measure of relief as they walked in a valley of tears and watched their infants plunged into a river.

Hence, the cedar trees! Jacob transported, from the Land of Canaan, young, tender saplings of cedar and lovingly planted them in the soil of Egypt, instructing his children that one day, when they depart from this country, they must take these trees with them.

Jacob dies. Joseph dies. All the siblings die. Then all the grandchildren die. The first generations of Abraham's seed who still knew Jacob and his children passed on. A new Pharaoh began to enslave the young nation. Brutal labor and the extermination of babies began to become the Israelite plight (Ex. 1, 2).

And throughout this entire horrific ordeal, the crushed Hebrew slaves watched these cedars grow. And with it, their hope grew. They harbored the knowledge that long before their enslavement by the Egyptians, these trees had grown in the soil of Holy Land—the land promised to them as their eternal heritage (Gen. 15, 17). Each generation pointed out these cedar trees to their children, transmitted to them Jacob’s instructions to take these trees along when they would leave Egypt, to be fashioned into a Sanctuary for God to dwell in.

And so, throughout their long and bitter exile, these cedars had whispered to the Egyptian slaves: "This is not your home. You hail from a loftier, holier place. Soon you will leave this depraved land behind, to be reclaimed by God as His people. Soon you will uproot us from this foreign land, this place of exile/galut, and carry us triumphantly to Sinai, where you will construct of us an abode for the Divine presence, which shall once again manifest itself in your midst."

These cedar trees stood as a permanent, tangible, silent but powerful, and tall symbol of courage, dignity, and hope in a bright future. They gave a nation of tormented, wretched slaves something to "hold on to" in a very concrete way, as they struggled under the yoke of their Egyptian oppressors.

When the God's 1st born son (Ex. 4:22) held on to Jacob’s "prehistoric" cedar trees, for a brief moment, they felt free. And that’s what you need in order to endure. It reminded them that in their essence they were not slaves, they did not deserve to be beaten and oppressed; they were inherently free and one day they would see that freedom.

Ok. So, nice history lesson. How does that translate into 21st century "give me hope" in the midst of my exile?

"The righteous/tzadik shall flourish like the palm tree: he shall grow like a cedar. Those that are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be fat and flourishing; to show that the Lord is upright: He is my rock and there is no unrighteousness in Him."
(Psa. 92:12-15)

Just as Jacob planted Cedars in the land of their exile, God plants exactly such cedars in our midst throughout our long journey. These are the Tzaddikim, the spiritual giants, defined in Psalms as "cedar trees," providing us with a link to the past and hope for the future.

The Tzaddik/the righteous person is a soul that towers above the transience and turbulence of exile; a soul that is rooted in Israel’s sacred beginnings and pointed toward the ultimate Redemption—a soul whose two feet stand on earth, but whose head touches heaven. When our subjection to the temporal and the mundane threatens to overwhelm us, we need only look to the cedars implanted in our midst. In them we find guidance and fortitude, comfort, and encouragement. We remember who we are and what we are capable of becoming.

When we connect to a Tzaddik, we too become, at least for a moment, free. We are all exposed to challenges, obstacles, and pressures; we must face trauma, darkness, pain, addiction, depression, disappointment, filth, and degradation. We can become apathetic, cynical, and indifferent. But when we gaze at the cedars in our midst, and at the cedar inside each of our souls, we remember that we are fragments of infinity, sent to this world to transform its landscape. We remember that we are on a journey from Sinai to the Promised Land; that as beautiful as America is, it is not our true home; it is but a temporary stop in our journey toward our inheritance. As comfortable as this great country is and as much as we cherish it, it is not the place we call home. A child who has been exiled from the bosom of his father, even if he is living in the government funded Hilton, is living in exile.

The world needs these Cedars. It could be you!

Shabbat shalom