A House: A Home

Rabbi Melanie Aron

Saturday, March 12, 2005

Looking over this week’s Torah portion and various commentaries, both ancient and modern, I found a wonderful Jewish story with a somewhat Buddhist theme.

It concerns the Chofetz Chayim, a rabbi well known for his ethical teachings, especially about lashon hara – gossip, who lived in the early 20th century.

A reporter had come to visit him in his home in Poland and was surprised at his home’s sparse and simple furnishings. The rabbi owned very few things and the things that he did own were very modest.

At the end of the interview, the reporter asked: You’re such an important and revered rabbi, yet you live like this. Where’s all your furniture?

Let me ask you a question, the Chofetz Chayim responded. You’re an important reporter, yet you’re living at an inn with just a bed and a dresser. Where’s all your furniture?

Well, the reporter responded, I’m only traveling through.

I too am only traveling through, the Chofetz Chayim replied.

The rabbi was hinting at the Jewish teaching with which the book of Kohelet, Ecclesiastes, begins – Hevel, hevellim hakol hevel, which loosely translated means – don’t be confused, everything is impermanent, it is all transitory like the vapor that appears as our breath on a cold day.

This story is told in relation to the very end of this week’s Torah portion where the Israelites, having completed the construction of the tabernacle, begin to move on in the direction of the Promised Land.

The completion of that construction, prompts another question for the rabbis – when does the tabernacle, the mishkan, stop being a construction site and start being the sanctuary?

The rabbis seem to love these definitional questions.

The Talmud begins with the question – when does night end and morning begin? The rabbis also ask – when does the work week end and Shabbat begin and conversely – when does Shabbat end the work week resume?

They ask about a wedding – at exactly what moment do a bride and groom become wife and husband? What if there’s a fire or some other disturbance that interrupts a wedding – are the couple married if they just stood under the chuppah? What if the whole wedding took place but they didn’t break the glass?

There are important transitions, in life, and we don’t want to miss them.

A modern rabbi, Stephen Baars, responding to these kinds of questions asks some of his own.

When does a house become a home? When does an interest become a cause? When does an acquaintance become a friend? A teacher become a mentor? Affection become love?

And I would ask – when do the words in the prayerbook become prayers?

In all of these cases it is not a matter of furniture, of stuff, but of something much less tangible. As Ryan pointed out earlier, there is lots of accounting in this parashah, and long descriptions of materials and work that took place. All of this might make us think, that the gold and the crimson, the accacia wood and the anointing oil, were what was most important – were what made the mishkan a holy place. But in the end, we are reminded of what really mattered, as the dedication of the tabernacle is summed up in a four word phrase:

“And the glory of God filled the tabernacle.”

When does a house become a home, an acquaintance become a friend, a construction site a holy place?

It’s not the square footage of the house, or the presents an acquaintance gives, us or even a successful fundraising campaign. The difference is in something intangible, something as hard to capture as the vapor that appears as our breath on a cold day.