Parasha Pekudei 2025 - Rabbi Lumbroso

Pekudei

The Priorities of Betsalel

ובצלאל בן־אורי בן־חור למטה יהודה עשׂה את כל־אשׁר־צוה יהוה את־משׁה׃

B’tzal’el the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Y’hudah, made everything that Adonai ordered Moshe to make. – Exodus 38:22

In this parashah, Moshe relays HaShem’s instructions for the building of the Tabernacle to Oholiav and Betsalel. He relays these instructions in a certain order, but according to our text, the two anointed craftsmen follow the instructions in the reverse order. This may be considered unimportant, or even an oversight in the text, but it is dangerous to start attributing oversights to the sacred text of the Torah, so let’s say that these are accurate renderings of what happened. The issue did not escape medieval commentator Rashi. Let’s look at what he had to say about it. Rabbi Shmuel bar Naḥmani said that Rabbi Yonatan said: Bezalel was called by that name on account of his wisdom. When the Holy One, Blessed be He, said to Moses: Go say to Bezalel, “Make a tabernacle, an ark, and vessels” [see Exodus 31:7–11], Moses went and reversed the

order and told Bezalel: “Make an ark, and vessels, and a tabernacle” [see Exodus 25–26]. He said to Moses: Moses, our teacher, the standard practice throughout the world is that a person builds a house and only afterward places the vessels in the house, and you say to me: Make an ark, and vessels, and a tabernacle. If I do so in the order you have commanded, the vessels that I make, where shall I put them? Perhaps God told you the following: “Make a tabernacle, ark, and vessels” [see Exodus 36]. Moses said to Bezalel: Perhaps you were in God’s shadow [betzel El], and you knew precisely what He said. You intuited God’s commands just as He stated them, as if you were there. 1

Rabbi Yeruchem Levovitz has an interesting take on the issue. He comments on Rashi’s idea by adding this: “We are to learn the importance of having things done in their proper order; we learn about the importance of prioritizing.” 2 According to Rashi’s midrash, Betsalel was blessed with a spirit of wisdom. His wisdom was his sense of prioritizing, of what is important, of what comes first. In his book, Growth through Torah, Rabbi Zelig Pliskin says, “We will never have enough time to do everything we would like to. But by being aware of the order of importance of what you have to do, you will ensure that you will effectively accomplish the most possible within the limitations of the time allotted to you.” Jumping forward to modern times, here is the testimony of a car salesman: Many people have really made a mess of their lives by having the wrong priorities in life. I had a job as a car salesman for about twelve years, and every day I was amazed at the choices that many people were trying to make. There were very few people who really needed a new car but were trading in their “old” car to get the newest style or maybe a new feature. I do not have a problem with people buying a new car, but where it really amazed me was when people were trying to trade a car that they owed more than it was worth in order to incur more debt that they oftentimes could not afford. These choices often led to disastrous consequences in other areas of life.

1 Rashi in Berachot 55a.

2 Daas Torah: Shmos pp.350–1

But I cannot point my finger too far as we all (if we are honest) struggle similarly in this area of priorities. Maybe you don’t struggle in buying a new car, but what about your time? Do you put God first in your life with the time you spend with him? Or how are we doing in the area of service and loving our neighbor? We often get this priority out of balance and desire to be served instead of following the model and example that Yeshua showed. Time and money are related. HaShem gives us time, which allows us to earn money. How we spend our money therefore defines how we spend the time HaShem gives us; it defines what is important to us. For example, my wife doesn’t care about very expensive brand-name clothing, but she will spend money on her grandkids. She doesn’t care about spending her hard-earned money on fancy clothes, but she’ll work herself ragged to be able to spend money on the grandkids. That is because they are a priority to her. They are worth both her time and money. The question for each of us is, what is important to us? What are our priorities? The Tanach has much to say about this, starting with: “You are to have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3). Here, HaShem teaches us that he is to be the most important priority in our lives. The midrash could end here, as all the rest of the Torah teaches us is how to accomplish that.

Let’s look at the first specific instruction on making HaShem a priority: “And you are to love Adonai your God with all your heart, all your being and all your resources” (Deuteronomy 6:5 CJB). This tells us that HaShem needs to utterly dominate the usage of our will (heart), our body (soul), and our money (resources). We accomplish that by agreeing to do it. We have the choice not to. Yeshua put the same principle in different words when he said, “No one can be slave to two masters; for he will either hate the first and love the second, or scorn the second and be loyal to the first. You can’t be a slave to both God and money” (Matthew 6:24 CJB). This statement comes at the heels of a teaching about prioritizing our money: Don’t lay up treasures for yourselves on the earth, where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consume, and where thieves don’t break through and steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Matthew 6:19–21) It makes sense not to store up wealth during this lifetime because that which is not seen is eternal (2 Corinthians 4:18). Our heart is in whatever we prioritize as important, in what we value. We should, therefore, carefully inspect the things we place in our lives with great importance. Yeshua uses a Hebrew idiom that compares a stingy person to someone with an evil eye, and a generous person with having a good eye. Bear in mind that idioms are not interpreted literally.

Here is what he says: The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is evil, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! (Matthew 6:22–23) The conclusion is that one who is stingy serves money, but one who is generous serves HaShem, and you can’t serve both. One might ask, is having wealth and saving money wrong? To further clarify the subject of worldly wealth versus spiritual wealth, our Master did not say that worldly wealth was wrong, he only chided us for making it a priority in our lives. He teaches us a sense of balance with priorities when he says, “But seek first God’s Kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33). Fame is also a big priority for some people. It has become yet another god of this world, the god of self. About this, Yeshua said, “For that which is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God” (Luke 16:15) and “Woe, when men speak well of you, for their fathers did the same thing to the false prophets!” (Luke 6:26). We can learn even more about righteous prioritizing from King Solomon’s wisdom: For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace. (Ecclesiastes 3:1–8)

Prepare your work outside and get your fields ready. Afterwards, build your house. (Proverbs 24:27) And "He who follows after righteousness and kindness finds life, righteousness, and honor. (Proverbs 21:21) Also, "The fear of Adonai is the beginning of wisdom. All those who do his work have a good understanding. His praise endures forever! (Psalm 111:10)

Here is what may happen when we don’t rightly prioritize our lives. This is the word of HaShem to Israel through the prophet Haggai when Israel failed to prioritize the work of the Temple in favor of doing their own thing: ‘You looked for much, and, behold, it came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why?’ says Adonai of Armies, ‘Because of my house that lies waste, while each of you is busy with his own house’” (Haggai 1:9).

May we know how to establish our life’s priorities. May we be blessed with the wisdom of Betsalel.