The place which HaShem your G-d shall choose

                   (Deuteronomy 12:5)

Av 29, 5778/August 10, 2018

This week's Torah reading, Re'eh, opens with a challenge and a riddle:

"Behold, I set before you today a blessing and a curse. The blessing, that you will heed the commandments of HaSHem your G-d, which I command you today; and the curse, if you will not heed the commandments of HaSHem your G-d, but turn away from the way I command you this day, to follow other gods, which you did not know." (Deuteronomy 11:26-28)

This is the challenge: to "behold," to "see" (Hebrew re'eh) with our eyes the blessing or the curse. The riddle follows:

"But only to the place which HaShem your G-d shall choose from all your tribes, to set His Name there; you shall inquire after His dwelling and come there. And there you shall bring your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, and your tithes, and the separation by your hand, and your vows and your donations, and the firstborn of your cattle and of your sheep. And there you shall eat before HaShem, your G-d, and you shall rejoice in all your endeavors you and your households, as HaShem, your G-d, has blessed you." (ibid 12:5-7)

The riddle, of course, is which place will G-d choose to establish His Holy Temple? After all, there are so many beautiful and inspiring places in the world. Why choose (spoiler alert) Jerusalem? Mount Moriah is not the highest of the mountains within the land of Israel. It doesn't overlook the breakers of the sea, or vast verdant valleys below. Why choose Jerusalem? And can an omniscient, all knowing G-d even possess the ability to choose? And don't we know that from even before creation Jerusalem was the designated place of the Holy Temple?

G-d, who has created for us a world of choice, between good and bad, blessing and curse, wearing a white shirt today, or a blue shirt, would seem to not possess Himself the same option of choice. After all, all of creation is a manifestation of G-d's will. It is what it is. G-d can't be taken by surprise or blindsided. G-d's will, His ratzon, is steady and constant. However, we can point to one moment in G-d's infinite being when He did make a choice: G-d chose to create our world. Creation wasn't a given. If it had been, it would not be filled and animated with G-d's prevailing and eternal will. And this is the secret of "the place which HaShem your G-d shall choose:" G-d chose to create and the place that G-d created was the place of the Holy Temple. In fact, it's the onlyplace! G-d created a place, infinitely small, that expanded in time and space to fill all of creation. But it is all of the same place. When our patriarch Yaakovwoke from his dream of the Holy Temple, G-d said to him "the land upon which you are lying to you I will give it and to your seed." (Genesis 28:13) Our sages teach us that, at that moment, the entire land of Israel was concentrated under the prone body of Yaakov. In truth, all of creation emanates from the place of the Holy Temple. G-d chose Jerusalem to establish His house, because it was G-d's only choice! The entire, vast, ever expanding universe was born in the place of the Holy Temple, and owes its continuing existence to this portal of G-d's will.

One can even see the clues to our riddle's answer in the very words of Torah's account of creation: "Now the earth was astonishingly empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the spirit of G-d was hovering over the face of the water." (ibid 1:2) The spirit of G-d is manifested in the Ark of the Covenant, which sits upon the Foundation Stone, in the Holy of Holies, resting upon the waters below. The seven lamps of the Temple menorah are alluded to in the light which illuminated each of the seven days of creation, and the Table of the Showbread is represented by the endless bounty with which G-d filled His creation. G-d placed man in the Garden of Eden, which, as we know, is in the place of the Holy Temple. When man chose to follow his own will, and part ways with G-d's will, he left Eden and history began. But now, G-d, through His holy Torah, has addressed all of man's wants and desires, and given them a way to be fulfilled through the Torah commandments, providing a path back to Eden! And this brings us back to Re'eh's opening challenge:

See the blessing, the source of life itself, of creation, in the place of creation, the Holy Temple, the portal of G-d's will in our world, where Torah commands us, "Three times in the year, every one of your males shall appear before HaShem, your G-d, in the place He will choose," (Deut. 16:16) and where Avraham "named that place, HaShem will see, as it is said to this day: On the mountain, HaShem will be seen." (Genesis 21:14)

-The Temple Institute