Tomorrow, synagogues begin reading the book of Exodus. Jeremy England attempts to make sense of this book in its totality:
Most of us tend to think about Exodus as a story about leaving Egypt, and not only because of what the word means in Greek or Latin. The epic clash with Pharaoh, accompanied by all the shock and awe of the plagues, is what captures the interest of children each Passover seder. When you sit down and read the book in its entirety, however, you quickly come to appreciate that Exodus is about three interlocking things that are not so easy to separate: the liberation from Pharaoh, the giving of the Torah at Sinai, and the building of the portable, proto-Temple structure known as the Tabernacle.
For a curious reader, it is the last item on the list that seems out of place, as those of us who expect the plot to keep running hot find ourselves mired in the instruction manual to a communal arts-and-crafts project. Specific colors of woven fabric, a dozen different minerals embedded in a ceremonial placard for the high priest, and countless other minutiae are required to erect God’s tent and altar (Exodus 25-28). Relative to the rest of the story and to more obviously ethical mitzvot, how could this possibly warrant so much space?
Fascinatingly, the Torah views the Temple (and its precursor, the Tabernacle) as the stronghold of Judaic particularism that will be needed to hold a certain kind of supersessionist challenge at bay.
More about: Exodus, Hebrew Bible, Tabernacle