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What the Torah Teaches Us About Contributing to Our Communities
A Torah scroll. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
We come this week to the end of the second book of the Torah, Exodus or Shemot (as we call it).
For the past weeks, we have been focused on the construction of the Tabernacle in great detail. One may wonder why everything is being repeated three times. We have come across this phenomenon in the Torah before. Often the same subject, narrative, or law is repeated in similar and yet slightly different ways over the course of the Torah. An obvious explanation is that important messages are reiterated to give them greater significance — and very often different nuances and terms help expand fundamental principles.
For the Tabernacle, God gives instructions to Moshe on how the Tabernacle should be conceptually. Then the construction is handed over to Betzalel and Oholiav. Finally, the completed construction is anointed and dedicated with every detail mentioned. It’s not unlike the idea of having an idea of a building that you want to construct. You call in an architect to design it. Then the construction team to carry it out. And finally, when it’s all completed, you check that everything is as you wanted, and that it functions effectively.
We can apply this to ourselves, our actions, and our approach to life. We start off with a view of the world, how we should live within it and encounter it. Then we go through the process of actually experiencing life with its challenges, when all our dreams and ideals are put to the test. And finally, we can look back and see how we have performed and whether we have come up to our own expectations.
Within these chapters, there are some interesting elements that are worth noticing that add different dimensions to the overall picture of the Tabernacle as a metaphor for both our community and ourselves. This week as the Tabernacle is competed, the word Vayechal is used twice (39:32 and 40:34). This word is only used previously with regard to creation and Shabbat. It is used in Kiddush on Friday nights. So that the creation of the physical world and the spiritual are intertwined.
But let’s look at the contributions to the Tabernacle. There are different words for different kinds of contributions. There is Terumah, which is an obligatory sort of poll tax on everyone. But the very rich elders, the Nesiim, were obliged to contribute priceless jewels. Then there is a Nedavah, a voluntary contribution and men and women participated. And finally, the skills of individuals, which applies equally to men and women, so that everyone could contribute one way or another.
It’s interesting how many times the Torah comments on the fact that the women were contributing even more enthusiastically than the men. Towards the end of last week’s reading of the Torah, comes an interesting extra. The Kiyor, the metal laver, a huge copper bowl for people to purify themselves with, was made-up of the contribution of women, donating their brass mirrors, to provide the metal for the construction. The Torah describes the contribution as coming from the women who congregated around the Tabernacle, the Nashim HaTzovot.
A similar phrase is used in 1 Samuel 4:22. The Hebrew word Tzava can mean coming together in general to pray, or to express their religious sentiment. It could equally mean those women who were employed in cleaning and repairing and providing services for the maintenance of the building. And there’s a third interpretation based on the fact that the word can also mean an army, Tzava, as it does in Israel today. Does this mean these women were fighters? It’s a fanciful idea, but does emphasize their importance on so many levels.
We are all responsible for maintaining our communities by contributing to them in any way that we can and using whatever skills we have. It is what we do that counts.
The author is a writer and rabbi, currently based in New York.
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Trump’s Travel Ban on 12 Countries Goes Into Effect Early Monday
US President Donald Trump attends the Saudi-US Investment Forum, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
US President Donald Trump’s order banning citizens of 12 countries from entering the United States goes into effect at 12:01 am ET (0401 GMT) on Monday, a move the president promulgated to protect the country from “foreign terrorists.”
The countries affected by the latest travel ban are Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
The entry of people from seven other countries – Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela – will be partially restricted.
Trump, a Republican, said the countries subject to the most severe restrictions were determined to harbor a “large-scale presence of terrorists,” fail to cooperate on visa security, have an inability to verify travelers’ identities, as well as inadequate record-keeping of criminal histories and high rates of visa overstays in the United States.
He cited last Sunday’s incident in Boulder, Colorado, in which an Egyptian national tossed a gasoline bomb into a crowd of pro-Israel demonstrators as an example of why the new curbs are needed. But Egypt is not part of the travel ban.
The travel ban forms part of Trump’s policy to restrict immigration into the United States and is reminiscent of a similar move in his first term when he barred travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations.
Officials and residents in countries whose citizens will soon be banned expressed dismay and disbelief.
Chad President Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said he had instructed his government to stop granting visas to US citizens in response to Trump’s action.
“Chad has neither planes to offer nor billions of dollars to give, but Chad has its dignity and its pride,” he said in a Facebook post, referring to countries such as Qatar, which gifted the U.S. a luxury airplane for Trump’s use and promised to invest billions of dollars in the U.S.
Afghans who worked for the US or US-funded projects and were hoping to resettle in the US expressed fear that the travel ban would force them to return to their country, where they could face reprisal from the Taliban.
Democratic US lawmakers also voiced concern about the policies.
“Trump’s travel ban on citizens from over 12 countries is draconian and unconstitutional,” said US Representative Ro Khanna on social media late on Thursday. “People have a right to seek asylum.”
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Israeli Military Says It Struck Hamas Member in Southern Syria
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron after a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, May 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/Pool
The Israeli military said on Sunday that it struck a member of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in southern Syria’s Mazraat Beit Jin, days after Israel carried out its first airstrikes in the country in nearly a month.
Hamas did not immediately comment on the strike.
Israel said on Tuesday it hit weapons belonging to the government in retaliation for the firing of two projectiles towards Israel for the first time under the country’s new leadership. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz held Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa accountable.
Damascus in response said reports of the shelling were unverified, reiterating that Syria does not pose a threat to any regional party.
A little known group named “Martyr Muhammad Deif Brigades,” an apparent reference to Hamas’ military leader who was killed in an Israeli strike in 2024, reportedly claimed responsibility for the shelling. Reuters, however, could not independently verify the claim.
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Israel Orders Military to Stop Gaza-Bound Yacht Carrying Greta Thunberg
FILE PHOTO: Activist Greta Thunberg sits aboard the aid ship Madleen, which left the Italian port of Catania on June 1 to travel to Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid, in this picture released on June 2, 2025 on social media. Photo: Freedom Flotilla Coalition/via REUTERS/File Photo
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz told the military on Sunday to stop a charity boat carrying activists including Sweden’s Greta Thunberg who are planning to defy an Israeli blockade and reach Gaza.
Operated by the pro-Palestinian Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC), the British-flagged Madleen yacht set sail from Sicily on June 6 and is currently off the Egyptian coast, heading slowly towards the Gaza Strip, which is besieged by Israel.
“I instructed the IDF to act so that the Madleen .. does not reach Gaza,” Katz said in a statement.
“To the antisemitic Greta and her Hamas-propaganda-spouting friends, I say clearly: You’d better turn back, because you will not reach Gaza.”
Climate activist Thunberg said she joined the Madleen crew to “challenge Israel’s illegal siege and escalating war crimes” in Gaza and highlight the urgent need for humanitarian aid. She has rejected previous Israeli accusations of antisemitism.
Israel went to war with Hamas in October 2023 after the Islamist terrorists launched a surprise attack on southern Israel, killing more 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages back to the enclave.
Katz said the blockade was essential to Israel’s national security as it seeks to eliminate Hamas.
“The State of Israel will not allow anyone to break the naval blockade on Gaza, whose primary purpose is to prevent the transfer of weapons to Hamas,” he said.
The Madleen is carrying a symbolic quantity of aid, including rice and baby formula, the FFC has said.
FFC press officer Hay Sha Wiya said on Sunday the boat was currently some 160 nautical miles (296 km) from Gaza. “We are preparing for the possibility of interception,” she said.
Besides Thunberg, there are 11 other crew members aboard, including Rima Hassan, a French member of the European Parliament.
Israeli media have reported that the military plans to intercept the yacht before it reaches Gaza and escort it to the Israeli port of Ashdod. The crew would then be deported.
In 2010, Israeli commandos killed 10 people when they boarded a Turkish ship, the Mavi Marmara, that was leading a small flotilla towards Gaza.
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