February 14, 2024 / 6 Adar I, 5784 • Parshat Terumah
Issue 808
Dedicated in loving memory of Mrs. Miriam Friedman

There must be 15 cubits of nettings on one side, with their three pillars and three bases. 

Ex. 27:14


The Tabernacle was the earthly embodiment of Divine consciousness. By entering the Tabernacle – even its Courtyard – one was transported from his or her usual, mundane consciousness into an awareness of Divinity so intense that mundane consciousness seemed to fade into the background, or even disappear completely. In this sense, the Tabernacle was a foretaste of the Messianic future, in which “the earth will be filled with the awareness of G-d as water covers the seabed.”

This taste of the future was alluded to in the entrance to the Tabernacle, which was flanked by two sets of nettings, each 15 cubits wide. Two times 15 is the numerical value of the word for “will be” (יהיה) in the verse, “On that day, G-d will be one, and His Name will be one.”

Similarly, when we enter our personal “Tabernacle” – our set times for prayer and Torah study – we taste something of the Divine consciousness that will pervade reality in the Messianic future.

--Daily Wisdom Volume 3