This Shabbat morning we will read from three Torah-scrolls:
From the first, we will read the weekly Torah-reading, Parashat Terumah (Exodus 25:1-27:19); however it is divided into six Aliyot instead of the usual seven.
From the second scroll we will read the Reading for Rosh Chodesh (Numbers 28:9-15), which constitutes the seventh Aliyah.
And from the third we will read the Maftir for Shabbat Shekalim (Exodus 30:11-16).
Then we conclude with the Haftarah for Shabbat Shekalim (2 Kings 11:17-12:17).
Shabbat Shekalim is the Shabbat which either coincides with or immediately precedes Rosh Chodesh Adar (or in a leap year Rosh Chodesh Adar II), and memorialises the half-shekel tax which every Jew had to donate to the Holy Temple.
In the words of the Rambam:
“On the first of Adar the announcements concerning the shekalim were made, so that everyone would prepare his half-shekel and would be ready to give it. On the fifteenth, the treasurers would sit in each city, and demand [the half-shekel due] gently; whoever would give it to them, they would accept it from them, and those who did not give, they did not force them to give. On the twenty-fifth they would sit in the Temple to collect it; and from then on, they would force those who had not yet given to pay up” (Laws of Shekalim 1:9).
These half-shekel taxes were then used, from the first of Nisan a few days later until the first of Nisan the following year, for the Tamid (twice-daily sacrifice) and the Musaf offerings (the Additional Sacrifices on Rosh Chodesh, Pesach, Shavuot, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkot) of that year (Tiferet Yisrael to Mishnah Shekalim 1:1).
So in memory of the half-shekel donation that once was, and looking forward to the half-shekel donation that will be again, we read this portion in the same week that the Sanhedrin would once begin to impose (and will again begin to impose) this tax.
Parashat Terumah invariably falls in the month of Adar (in a leap year of Adar I): almost always the first Shabbat, occasionally the second.
The confluence of Parashat Terumah, Rosh Chodesh Adar, and Parashat Shekalim is rare: it happens solely in a non-leap year which begins on Thursday and in which Marcheshvan and Kislev both have 30 days. The last time this happened was in 5754 (1994), and the next time will be in 5805 (2045).
What is the message of this confluence in this year?
We all know and love the aphorism, מִשֶּׁנִּכְנַס אֲדָר מַרְבִּין בְּשִׂמְחָה: “When the month of Adar enters, we increase our rejoicing” (Ta’anit 29a). And what greater joy can there be than building the Mikdash (Sanctuary), the prelude to the Holy Temple?
Last Shabbat, Parashat Mishpatim concluded with Moshe ascending into the cloud enveloping Mount Sinai, where he was to stay for forty days and forty nights for G-d to give him the Torah (Exodus 24).
This Shabbat, Parashat Terumah continues with G-d telling Moshe, atop of Mount Sinai, to collect the voluntary contributions from the Children of Israel with which to build the Mikdash.
“Hashem spoke to Moshe saying: Speak to the Children of Israel, that they shall take a donation for Me from every man whose heart inspires him... And they shall make for Me a Mikdash and I will dwell among them” (Exodus 25:1-8).
From here until the end of the Book of Exodus, the building of the Mikdash will be the sole theme (with the unfortunate hiatus of the sorry episode of the golden calf in Chapters 32-33).
In non-leap years (like this year 5785), the final Shabbat of Adar is invariably the conclusion of the Book of Exodus (usually the double parashah Vayak’hel-Pekudei, sometimes the Parashat Pekudei by itself). In leap years, the final Shabbat of Adar I is either Parashat Pekudei, concluding the Book of Exodus, or else Parashat Vayak’hel, meaning that the first Shabbat of Adar II is Parashat Pekudei, concluding the Book of Exodus.
This means that the Torah-readings for all the Shabbatot in Adar – the month in which we increase our joy – concern the preparations for building the Mikdash.
Let us come back to the aphorism “When the month of Adar enters, we increase our rejoicing”, and see the context in which it appears:
“When the month of Av comes in we minimise our joy; Rav Yehudah, the son of Rav Shmuel the son of Shilat, quoted Rav as saying: Just as when the month of Av comes in we diminish our joy, so too when the month of Adar enters, we increase in joy”.
The month of Av is the month in which both Holy Temples were destroyed, which is why “when the month of Av comes in we diminish our joy”.
And the corollary is that it is supremely appropriate that the Torah-readings for the entire month of Adar, the month in which we increase in joy, prepare us for the building of the Mikdash in the wilderness – the temporary, portable structure which served as the paradigm for the future permanent Holy Temple which would stand in Jerusalem.
Shabbat Shekalim is the introduction to the month of Adar. The Maftir for Shabbat Shekalim is Exodus 30:11-16, the requirement that every Israelite man aged 20 years or more donate half-a-shekel every year for the upkeep of the Mikdash, later in history for the upkeep of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
And building the Mikdash was the prerequisite for G-d infusing His Shechinah [Divine Presence] into the Jewish nation: “Rabbi Tarfon said: G-d did not infuse His Shechinah over Israel until they performed work, as it says ‘and they shall make for Me a Mikdash and I will dwell among them’ (Exodus 25:8)” (Avot de-Rabbi Natan 11:1).
The Ba’al ha-Turim (Rabbi Ya’akov ben Asher, Germany and Spain, c.1275-1343) notes that the word וְשָׁכַנְתִּי (I will dwell) alludes both to the First and the Second Holy Temples:
The first, because the word וְשָׁכַנְתִּי connotes וְשָׁכַן ת"י, meaning “He will dwell for 410”: the First Holy Temple stood for 410 years.
And the second, because the letters of the word שָׁכַנְתִּי rearrange to form שְׁנֵי ת"ך, meaning “420 years”, the time that the Second Holy Temple stood.
I note here that the phrase וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם (“and I will dwell among them”) occurs only twice in the entire Tanach: the first time is here in Parashat Terumah, and the second is in the Book of Ezekiel, when the Prophet depicts the third and final Holy Temple:
“Now let them distance their harlotry, and the corpses of their kings from Me – וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם, and I will dwell among them forever” (Ezekiel 43:9).
As with building the Mikdash in the Sinai Desert, as with building the First Holy Temple, as with building the Second Holy Temple, so too with building the Third and final Holy Temple: G-d will dwell among us when we seize the initiative and start doing the work, putting brick upon brick, constructing the Holy Temple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
מִשֶּׁנִּכְנַס אֲדָר מַרְבִּין בְּשִׂמְחָה, when the month of Adar enters, we increase in joy. This is not merely some insubstantial philosophical homily, it is actual practical halakhah (Mishnah Berura 686:6, Kitzur Shulchan Aruch 141:1).
The Talmud cites this principle that “when the month of Adar enters, we increase in joy” in the name of Rav Yehudah, the son of Rav Shmu’el bar Shilat, who was citing Rav.
“Rav” was the honorific given to Rabbi Abba, a first-generation (3rd century) Babylonian Amora. (Iggeret Rav Sharira records a tradition that he passed away in the year 4006, or 246 C.E.).
Rav Shmu’el bar Shilat was contemporaneous with Rav, though considerably younger: he was a first- to second-generation Amora. He was one of Rav’s close disciples (Yerushalmi Berachot 7:2), and his son Rav Yehudah was also one of Rav’s disciples (Berachot 47a). Therefore Rav Yehudah was a second- to third-generation Amora (early 4th century).
Rav Pappa, a fifth-generation (late 4th century) Babylonian Amorah, extrapolated from this principle: “Therefore, any Jew who has any judgement with any non-Jew…should hold that judgement in Adar, for that is an auspicious time” (Ta’anit 29b).
Again, this is not just an ethereal Midrashic idea: it is practical Halakhah (vide Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 551:1 and Aruch ha-Shulchan, Orach Chaim 686:6, also Kitzur Shulchan Aruch 141:1).
Months ago, the Israeli Government began negotiating with the genocidal psychopaths of the Hamas, in a desperate attempt to release the hostages they had seized on Sh’mini Atzeret and Simchat Torah almost a year and a half ago.
The first phase of exchanges was set to expire on 1st March, and then talks about the second phase are due to start. Neither side gave any thought to the implications in the Jewish calendar; but the 1st of March is this Shabbat, the 1st of Adar.
We can but pray that this is not idle coincidence; that this date will prove auspicious for us: that this Rosh Chodesh Adar, coinciding as it does with Shabbat Shekalim, will be the start of a wonderful new phase, a month in which we will finally defeat our enemies.
This could be a תִּקּוּן, a partial rectification for the extirpation of all Jewish presence in Gaza 20 years ago: when the Knesset decided on the “disengagement”, the forced removal of all Jews from Gaza, the date they chose was Sunday 14th of August. It took some two weeks for anyone to think of looking at a Jewish calendar, and realised that the date they had chosen was the 9th of Av.
Consequently they decided to postpone the “disengagement” by two days.
It was that destruction that brought the Hamas to power. It was that process, originally planned for the 9th of Av, which led directly and inexorably to the attack of 7th October 2023.
The 9th of Av was the day of destruction. Now, 20 years on, the month of Adar has the potential to rectify that travesty.
The time is now: there is no reason to wait, no reason to delay. Our Sages infused us with hope and optimism by calibrating the calendar so that we would read Parashat Terumah as Adar begins and we recall the half-Shekel tax to the Holy Temple.
May this truly become a time of joy!