Yisro: The Ark of Moshe or the Ark of Betzalel? Resolving the Exegetical Tangle

00:05 Hello to all our viewers and listeners. We’re continuing with the book of Mishneh Torah, with Moshe Rabbeinu’s final address to the Jewish people, in which he sums up their history. This week in the parsha, we learn how he recounts the story of the second tablets. After describing the breaking of the tablets, he described how, during the forty days after the first forty days—when he came down and broke the tablets—he pleaded for mercy. Then, during the third forty days, beginning on Rosh Chodesh Elul, he received Hashem’s reconciliation. Now he tells us what happened. We’re in chapter 10, verse 1. Moshe Rabbeinu says: “At that time Hashem said to me: Carve for yourself two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write—and come up to Me on the mountain, and make yourself a wooden ark.” Verse 2: “And I will write,” Hashem says, “I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke, and you shall place them”—place what? The tablets—“in the ark.” Rashi comments on the opening words, “At that time.” Rashi says: “At the end of forty days.” Because there are several instances of “at that time” here. There are the first forty days; then, “I fell before Hashem at that time”—the second forty days also say “at that time.” So we have to be precise: “At that time” here means at the end of the second forty days, that is, the beginning of Elul. “He was reconciled with me.” Hashem was reconciled and told me, “Carve for yourself,” and then, “Make yourself”—“make an ark.” “But I,” says Moshe Rabbeinu, “made an ark first.” Although Hashem first told him, “Carve for yourself,” and only afterward, “Make an ark,” he made the ark first. Why? Moshe Rabbeinu was practical. He says: When I come back down with the tablets in my hands, where will I put them? I won’t be able to

03:09 make an ark then. How will I hold them in my hands? So I made an ark first, so that when I came down from the mountain, I would have somewhere to put them. Rashi isn’t finished; he continues: “And this is not the ark that Betzalel made.” We know that Betzalel made the ark. So Rashi says: No, this isn’t that ark. How do you know? Rashi says that work on the Mishkan did not begin until after Yom Kippur. In other words, what Moshe is describing now, his ascent of the mountain, took place on Rosh Chodesh Elul. Work on the Mishkan began only after Yom Kippur, when he came down: “Moshe assembled the entire congregation of the Jewish people,” and then told them to begin contributing to the Mishkan. They contributed, and it was built by the following Rosh Chodesh Nissan. So work on the Mishkan did not begin until after Yom Kippur, because it was when Moshe came down from the mountain that he instructed them about the work of the Mishkan. And Betzalel made the Mishkan first—that took time too—and only afterward the ark and the vessels. So, Rashi says, it follows that the ark Moshe made was a different ark, not the same one. “And this is the one that went out with them to war.” In other words, the ark Moshe refers to when he says, “I made an ark of acacia wood,” is the ark that went out with them to war. The one Betzalel made did not go out to war except once, in the days of Eli, Rashi says, and they were punished for it and the ark was captured. That concludes Rashi’s words. And this Rashi is full of questions. First question: He begins his comment with “At that time.” So he explains what “at that time” means: at the end of forty days. Fine, that explains the words he quoted. Everything that follows in Rashi is about something else: why Moshe changed the order, making the ark first even though Hashem told him to carve the tablets first and then make an ark. That’s a new subject. Rashi should have started a new comment with a new opening quotation.

05:48 Second question: Why is Rashi talking here about “I made an ark first”? We haven’t yet reached the verse that says he made an ark. That’s in the next verse. We’ve just read verse 2. In verse 3, which we haven’t yet studied, Moshe says: “I made an ark of acacia wood, and I carved two stone tablets like the first ones, and I went up the mountain with the two tablets in my hands.” Ah, that’s where the question arises: Wait, you made an ark of acacia wood first, and only then “I carved”? Hashem told you the opposite. That’s where Rashi should address the question, in verse 3. Why is he answering a question that hasn’t even come up in the verses we’ve studied? And why under the opening words “At that time”? Start a new comment. Third question: If making the ark first was justified on practical grounds—otherwise, where would Moshe put the tablets afterward—why did Hashem command the reverse order? First carve the tablets, and then make an ark. Didn’t Hashem take that practical consideration into account? Interestingly, Rabbi Yoshe Ber of Brisk, the author of Beis Halevi, has a very nice answer to this. He asks: Why was Moshe commanded in the opposite order, first “Carve for yourself” and then “Make yourself a wooden ark”? His idea is this: There’s a disagreement about whether designating something for a mitzvah gives it sanctity. In other words, if I take an object I’ve prepared for a mitzvah, does it already have sanctity, or does sanctity not take effect until I actually use it for the mitzvah? For example, someone makes a tefillin case and designates it as a tefillin case. He doesn’t yet have tefillin. Does the case already have some sanctity or not? That’s something one can debate,

08:41 but he makes an interesting point. Suppose there were no mitzvah of tefillin in the world at all—Hashem had not yet said anything about tefillin—and someone made a case. Surely you couldn’t say that case has any sanctity. Tefillin haven’t even been defined yet. So the same applies here: the ark exists entirely for the tablets. If there hasn’t yet been a command concerning the tablets, then what preparation for the tablets does making the ark constitute? What sanctity would it have? None, because the command concerning the tablets has not yet been given. That’s why Hashem first gave the command concerning the tablets. Once the tablets had been defined, it made sense to say that even if Moshe had not yet brought them and had only made an ark and designated it for them, the ark was already holy. That’s why Hashem put the commands in that order. But his answer is a little hard to understand, for two reasons. First—oh, interestingly, he also brings a proof that the ark’s entire purpose is to hold the tablets. He brings a proof from the Second Beis Hamikdash: they did not make an ark there. Why? Because there were no tablets. So you see that where there are no tablets, an ark has no place. That’s why Hashem first commanded Moshe about the tablets, giving significance to the making of the ark. His answer is a little problematic for two reasons. First, historically, it’s difficult to say that there was no ark in the Second Beis Hamikdash. It says explicitly that the ark was there with the tablets inside it, except that Yoshiyahu ordered it hidden in its place, in concealed chambers beneath the Holy of Holies. There’s an entire sicha of the Rebbe explaining that without it, the building would not have the status of a Beis Hamikdash. It was not visible, but the ark and the tablets were there. So how can he say, as a matter of fact, that there was no ark and no tablets? But beyond that, also

11:13 If Hakadosh Boruch Hu had not told Moshe, “Carve for yourself two tablets of stone,” there would have been the option of ordering an ark. Why? Because during his first ascent, in the first forty days, while he was still on the mountain, he was commanded about the entire Mishkan: “They shall make an ark of acacia wood,” and “You shall place the testimony in the ark.” So the concept of the tablets and the concept of the ark already existed. But because of the sin of the Golden Calf, there was a delay, and after He was reconciled, the matter resumed. So you can’t say that he was making an ark when there was no such thing as tablets yet. There had already been tablets, and there had already been the command concerning the Mishkan. If so, the question remains: Why did Hakadosh Boruch Hu actually command him first to carve the tablets and only afterward to make a wooden ark, when in practice he did the reverse? A fourth question: Moshe’s whole problem is that he can’t leave making the ark until after he comes down from the mountain. He’ll be standing there with the tablets in his hands. How will he make an ark? So he has to prepare it in advance. Fine—but make the ark before you go up the mountain. Why did he make the ark even before he carved the tablets? He could have done as Hakadosh Boruch Hu told him: carve the tablets, and before going up the mountain, prepare the ark so it would be ready when he returned. Why, though, did he make the ark before even carving the tablets? That gained him nothing. Another question: If there’s this practical concern—when I come down, where will I put the tablets?—why didn’t Moshe think of it with the first tablets, before he went up the mountain? He should have prepared something. Where would he put the tablets when he came down? Why didn’t he think of it then? Now, the latter part of Rashi raises several more

13:55 questions. Why does Rashi enter into this whole discussion? Was the ark Moshe made the same ark as Betzalel’s, or not? Does that affect the meaning of our verse? Can’t we understand the verse without it? Rashi also says of Betzalel’s ark, “And this is the one that would go out with them to war.” Why did he need to add the whole matter of war? It would have been enough to say that this was not Betzalel’s ark, but another ark. What did they do with this ark? What difference does that make here? Why is it relevant? Why must he add that it was used in war? Who was talking about war at all? We can also look closely at Rashi’s wording: “And this is the ark—this is the one that would go out with them to war.” When he says “this is the one,” it implies that this is an ark already known to us. In other words, the child already knows that there was an ark that went out to war: You know that ark you heard went out to war? This is that ark. Who says the child even knows that? He could simply have said that there was another ark with which they went out to war. He would then be giving the student new information. But if he says, “this is the one,” it implies that the student already knows of an ark that went out to war. Where does he know that from? The hardest part is the ending. He says that there was one exception in history: in the days of Eli, they went out to war with it and were punished when the ark was captured by the Philistines. Why add that historical account? That is not Rashi’s way. And the biggest question, with which we’ll conclude this series of questions: Who told Rashi that there really were two separate arks? The Gemara records a dispute about this, and this is not the generally accepted view there. Some in the Gemara say it was the same ark. So why does Rashi go out of his way to say specifically that it was not the same ark? Let’s see. To understand this, we’ll first introduce

16:53 a surprising explanation by the Malbim on this question of the arks. He, too, addresses the question: Betzalel made the ark, so how can it say here that Moshe made an ark of acacia wood? He offers a very interesting, very original idea. He says that with the second tablets, Moshe was commanded to make a wooden ark—that is what Hashem told him. So he made it of acacia wood. Why acacia wood specifically? Because that is what he heard during the first forty days he was on the mountain; he heard from Hakadosh Boruch Hu about an ark: “They shall make an ark of acacia wood.” So he also made it to exactly the measurements he had received during those first forty days. He made an ark that was, in fact, ready for the Mishkan. Wait—then why does it later say that Betzalel made the ark? He says Moshe simply did not overlay it with gold. The ark he made was only a wooden ark, not overlaid with gold; he did not make a cover or cherubim for it. Why? Because when he returned, he needed to put the tablets inside it. And to put the tablets in the ark, it was enough even without the cherubim, until there would be a Mishkan. But wait—why does it say that Betzalel made the ark? He says that afterward, when Hashem was reconciled with the Jewish people on Yom Kippur and Betzalel was told to make an ark, he did not need to make a wooden ark. Moshe Rabbeinu had already made the wooden ark. So why does it say that he made the ark? He completed it and overlaid it. There is a Rashi there that says Betzalel made three arks. He means that, in addition to the wooden ark, there was an inner lining shaped like an ark, made of gold, and another outer covering. So Betzalel only overlaid it, completed it, and made the cover. But it was the same ark, an upgrade of the ark whose essential wooden structure Moshe had begun to make, and Betzalel only

19:31 overlaid it and prepared a cover and cherubim so it could be placed in the Mishkan. Interestingly, on this basis he also explains an interesting detail. Let me share it with you. In Parshas Terumah, at the beginning, it says to make the ark, and before the cover is mentioned, it says to place the testimony inside it. After that it says, “You shall make a cover.” After it speaks of making the cover and the cherubim, it says again, “And into the ark you shall place the testimony.” You already told me to put in the testimony, even before you told me to make a cover! Rashi, too, grapples with this there and gives a strained explanation. But the Malbim says: Excellent. When it says to place the testimony inside before making the cover, Hakadosh Boruch Hu foresaw what would happen when Moshe came down from the mountain: there would be only an ark, without a cover. Place the testimony inside it. Later, after the cover is made, Betzalel will take out the tablets and place them inside again, and everything fits neatly. It remains one ark, made by Moshe and finished by Betzalel, not two arks. The question is: Why doesn’t Rashi adopt such a straightforward explanation, which explains both the verses and everything else? So let’s try to see Rashi’s perspective on this account. The key to the explanation is this: First, Rashi comes to establish what the expression “at that time” means. One might have thought that “at that time” means sometime during the middle forty days, when there was anger, and that He was reconciled partway through. No, no, no, no. If He had been reconciled partway through, say in the month of Menachem Av, then He would have said then to make the Mishkan. No. “At that time,” Rashi says, means at the end of the forty days. Only then was He reconciled, because those forty days were spent in anger. “And He was reconciled with me.” So at first glance, what does “He was reconciled with me” mean? That He would give me tablets. The truth is, it goes deeper. “He was reconciled with me” means

22:42 Rashi is telling us that Hakadosh Boruch Hu had already agreed, right then, to cause His Shechinah to dwell among us. Not only to give the Tablets, but also to bring the Shechinah to dwell among us. That is why, in Hashem’s instruction to Moshe, He places “Carve for yourself” right next to “Come up to Me on the mountain.” “He did not command me to make an ark.” Interesting. Look at the verses. He does not say, “Make yourself an ark of wood,” in the language of a command. For carving the Tablets, He says, “Carve for yourself.” He does not say, “And you shall carve for yourself.” He does not say, “And you shall go up the mountain.” When He said “Come up,” He should have said, “And make an ark of acacia wood.” So perhaps we can understand what Rashi says: “He told me, ‘Carve for yourself,’” and afterward, “And you made.” Rashi does not just mean that He first told me one thing and I did the opposite of what He said. Perhaps Rashi means: First He told me, “Carve for yourself,” as a command. What did He say to me afterward? “And you made.” What does “And you made” mean? Moshe understood from this that Hakadosh Boruch Hu meant: Presumably, you have already made an ark of acacia wood. In other words, He was not commanding him to make it now. He was relying on him, saying: Presumably, you have already made an ark of acacia wood. Why? So there would be somewhere to put the Tablets. Wait, why would Hakadosh Boruch Hu care? Moshe could come down with the Tablets in his hands, and they could hold them there for a few hours until they made the Tablets—the ark—and then there would be somewhere to put them. You see the point. Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted His Shechinah to dwell among us as soon as Moshe came down from the mountain, even before the Mishkan was built. Where would the Shechinah rest? In the ark containing the Tablets. That is why Hakadosh Boruch Hu planned from the outset that, by the time Moshe came down from the mountain, he would presumably have made himself an ark of acacia wood. Why? So that the moment he came down from the mountain, the Shechinah would already rest within the ark. You could call it a sort of mini-Mishkan. It would be the laying of the cornerstone

25:31 of the Mishkan. That is why it was so important. And that is the reason for the change in wording: not a command, but past tense. “You made.” Presumably, you have already made one for yourself. So he did not go against Hashem’s will; he merely interpreted it. Ah, but we asked a question. If it was so practical, why did he not arrange to have an ark ready for the first Tablets? “When I return, where will I put them?” The answer is very interesting. When he went up to receive the first Tablets, he had not yet received the command to build the Mishkan while he was on Mount Sinai. So when he went up to receive the Tablets, the plan was only to receive Tablets, not to build a Mishkan. Why ask where he would put them? He could put them on cushions or pillows in Moshe’s tent. What was the problem? Who said they had to be placed specifically in an ark? But here, Hakadosh Boruch Hu had become reconciled with me, and that reconciliation was expressed by His giving me not only the Torah again after the breaking of the Tablets, but also His willingness to cause His Shechinah to dwell among us. So Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted there to be no delay when we came down from the mountain: an ark would be ready immediately, with the Testimony inside it, and the Shechinah would already begin to dwell among us. Even before they contributed the materials and prepared the Mishkan, the Shechinah would already be present. A major insight. Now, then, we asked: Why does Rashi continue? He should finish with this point—that I made an ark first so I would have somewhere to put them. But here the student asks a question. In other words, I understand the remaining parts of Rashi as flowing one from another. This is not a new subject; it follows from the previous one. Once we have established that Moshe made a wooden ark from acacia wood, the student asks: Didn’t we learn in Parshas Terumah that Betzalel made the Ark of the Covenant? And now I am hearing something new—that Moshe made it. There is an explicit verse in Shemos, chapter

28:20 37, in Parshas Vayakhel. It says there, “Betzalel made the ark of acacia wood and overlaid it with pure gold.” And Rashi says there what he made—not like the Malbim. Rashi says Betzalel made three arks. What does he mean by three? The wooden ark in the center and the two coverings, shaped like arks, on the inside and outside. He made all three. So that is not the ark Moshe made. What is going on here? Which is it—did Moshe make the ark, or did Betzalel make it? Rashi therefore has to add: You are right. There were two arks. And this also explains something else. By the way, we asked why he mentions which ark went out to war and which did not. In doing so, he indirectly explains why he does not accept the idea proposed by the Malbim. Let’s say it was the same ark—there is an opinion like that in the Gemara too—and then things would be simpler. Betzalel merely refurbished it, adding the gold covering and the kapores. But it was the same ark. Why doesn’t Rashi say that? Rashi immediately continues: “And this was the one that went out with them to war.” Do you know what the purpose of this ark that Moshe made was? It went ahead of the Jewish people when they went to war. The one Betzalel made did not go out with them to war. How does the student know which ark this is? Rashi speaks as though it is an ark we already know about. The answer is that the student has already learned this in Rashi, in Bamidbar, chapter 10, verse 33. It says there, “And the Ark of Hashem’s Covenant traveled ahead of them a journey of three days, to seek out a resting place for them.” There Rashi says, “This is the ark that went out with them to war.” What does he mean by “this is the ark”? What is he ruling out? It is not Betzalel’s ark. And why, in fact? Seemingly, Betzalel’s ark was the ark that held the Tablets and had the keruvim. Why did it not go out to war? How do you know it was not the one that

31:13 went out to war? The reason is very interesting. Betzalel’s ark was carried by the sons of Kehos. And if you remember the order of travel as Rashi explained it, when the cloud signaled to them to take down the Mishkan and begin traveling, Yehudah set out first with the three tribes under its banner. Only afterward came the Levi’im in the center, including the sons of Kehos, who carried the ark. So that ark did not travel ahead of them; it was in the middle of the Jewish camp, surrounded by the banners. Yet here it says that the Ark of Hashem’s Covenant traveled ahead of them a journey of three days. Did the sons of Kehos set out with the ark three days before Yehudah began traveling? That cannot be. So we must say that this was Moshe’s ark, which traveled ahead of them. Ah, but that raises a question. The Tablets were ultimately in Betzalel’s ark; that is certain. It says, “Place the Testimony inside the ark.” So what does it mean that Moshe’s ark went out to war? What power did Moshe’s ark have without the Tablets? Rashi therefore adds there in Bamidbar: “The broken Tablets were kept in it, and it went ahead of them a journey of three days to prepare a campsite for them.” In other words, Moshe’s ark had great significance too, because it still contained the broken Tablets. That ark traveled ahead of them both to seek out a resting place and as in the verse, “And when the ark set out, Moshe would say: Arise, Hashem, and let Your enemies be scattered, and let those who hate You flee before You.” That is the ark that went out to war. Having seen all this, I want to share with you a gem, a precious insight I saw in a sicha of the Rebbe’s that does not appear in Likkutei Sichos. It is in Sichos Kodesh 5730, page 456. I am explaining its content in my own words. The Rebbe says there that if there had been only one ark, Betzalel’s, containing both the broken Tablets and the Tablets—if there had been one ark, as the Malbim holds—then in that ark

34:15 There are both the Tablets and the broken Tablets, as in the well-known acronym for Elul: “Aron, Luchos, and broken Luchos”—the Ark, the Tablets, and the broken Tablets. So if that is the case, the Rebbe argues, where was this Ark kept? In the Holy of Holies. So what are you saying? Perhaps this was the Ark that went out to war? Because according to the Malbim, there was no other Ark. Right. The Rebbe asks: At a time of war, when they needed to take this Ark out to face the enemy, who would enter the Holy of Holies to take it out? That would violate the prohibition, “He shall not enter the holy place at any time.” No one may enter the Holy of Holies—only the Kohen Gadol, and only on Yom Kippur. So how could they take this Ark out to war? Interesting. During the time of the Mishkan in the desert, that is not such a question. Why? Because when they went to war, the Mishkan was not set up. As they traveled forward toward the... enemy, they dismantled the Mishkan. Right, they took it apart. So there was no need to take the Ark out of the Holy of Holies when the Mishkan was dismantled. But after they entered the Land, when the Mishkan—and later the Beis Hamikdash—stood in its place... In parentheses, one could say that even during the time of the Mishkan, there was an instance when they went to war without dismantling it: the war against Midian. Not all the people went to war. The Mishkan remained standing, with all the camps around it, and only a thousand from each tribe went out to war. So the Mishkan was standing. Who entered it to take the Ark out for the war against Midian? That cannot be. It was forbidden to enter. This is what Rashi meant—proof that, according to Rashi, there were two Arks. Which one went out to war? Moshe’s Ark, which did not stand inside the Holy of Holies. They could take it both to war and to scout out a place for them. But Betzalel’s Ark was in the Holy of Holies, and it did not go out to war because of the prohibition against entering the holy place. We mentioned

37:18 earlier that Elul is an acronym for “Aron, Luchos, and broken Luchos”—the Ark, the Tablets, and the broken Tablets. And we also know what the Gemara says: that in the Beis Hamikdash, the Ark there contained both the complete second Tablets and the broken Tablets. The answer is that this was indeed after they entered the Land. Until they entered the Land, Hashem fought before them. All the wars were won miraculously. The Ark went before them, and their enemies fell before them. Once they entered the Land, the wars became wars fought by natural means. Moshe’s Ark was then put away. The last time they crossed with it was at the Jordan. After that, the wars were fought by natural means, so they no longer needed the Ark to go before them. So, in the end, during the time of the Beis Hamikdash, there were not two Arks. But during the time in the desert, there were two Arks, because they needed to take one out to war. It could not have been the same Ark, since that one stood in the Holy of Holies and there was a prohibition, “He shall not enter the holy place at any time.” Here one could ask a question. A sharp student might ask: Granted, we proved that the verse “The Ark of Hashem’s covenant traveled before them a distance of three days” refers to Moshe’s Ark. It could not have been Betzalel’s Ark, because that remained in the center of the camps until the camp of Yehudah moved on, and only afterward did Kehos set out. So Betzalel’s Ark could not travel ahead of the camp with the sons of Kehos. But perhaps this Ark that traveled before them for three days was used only to scout out a place for them, as the verse says explicitly: “The Ark of Hashem’s covenant traveled before them to seek out for them...” —to prepare a camping place for them. Perhaps that was its role? And perhaps Betzalel’s Ark was used for war. Why? It was the Ark with the two complete Tablets, with the Ark cover and the cherubim. That was the Ark they needed for war. Ah, we asked a question. The Rebbe says: How could they enter? There is a prohibition against entering the

40:28 holy place: “He shall not enter the holy place at any time.” How could they go in there? One could ask: Since war is a matter of saving lives, and victory in war is very important for saving lives, perhaps the need to save lives in wartime overrides the prohibition, “He shall not enter the holy place at any time”? Perhaps. That is why Rashi had to add: The one Betzalel made did not go out to war. He does not say it was because of the prohibition against entering the holy place. That Ark was not intended for use in war at all. Taking Betzalel’s holy Ark out of the Holy of Holies for war would be a desecration of the holy. Heaven forbid, it could lead to defeat rather than victory. Wait—how do you know? He says there was an instance of this. That is why Rashi continues with the historical account from the days of Eli, to demonstrate what happened then. Do you know when the last time Moshe’s Ark was taken out to war before that was? At the conquest of Yericho, it says, “The Ark of Hashem goes before them.” That was Moshe’s Ark, because, as we said, they were then at the transition from Moshe to Yehoshua. So their initial entry into the Land was miraculous: the walls of Yericho fell. There they needed the Ark to bring victory in the war, but from then on it was put away. Only in Eli’s time, when they fought the Philistines, was it taken out to war once more. The question arises: You said there is a prohibition against entering the holy place, so how could they have taken it out to war? Anyone who looks there will see who actually took it out to war. Not Eli. Eli was already old, and he had two sons there, Chofni and Pinchas, whose level of care for holiness in the Mishkan is well known. And the people, in their audacity, saw that they were falling before the Philistines and said, “Let’s bring out the Ark. The Ark will do everything for us.” So, the prohibition against entering the holy place? Saving lives overrides the prohibition

43:49 against entering the holy place. They could come up with such an idea, and they went out with it. They went out with it, fell in battle, and the Ark was captured. That proves the issue was not merely this particular prohibition. The Ark was not meant for war at all. Its purpose was Torah, to be in the Holy of Holies. What can we learn from this? A practical lesson for our times? There is a debate in Israeli society today. People come to yeshivah students with a complaint: Why don’t you take part in Israel’s wars? I will never forget that this came up back during the Six-Day War. We were young students then, and people from Kol Yisrael came to interview students at the yeshivah. They asked why yeshivah students had not gone out to take part. They raised this particularly in light of how strongly the Rebbe had spoken about the war as a mitzvah, about the miracles and wonders involved, and how the Rebbe had encouraged the war. So why hadn’t they gone out to fight? One of the reporters quoted the teaching that in a war that is a mitzvah, even a groom leaves his room and a bride her wedding canopy—people who are otherwise exempt from war—to go to battle. Why didn’t you go? One of the students, a Torah scholar, answered him: It is not the same thing. A bride and groom have only a personal exemption because of their personal joy, so we do not want to involve them in battle. There is also the concern that one might die in war. But if it is a war that is a mitzvah, that exemption is set aside. A yeshivah student, though, he said, does not go into the army not because of an exemption, but because we believe that Torah study is what will bring victory in war. So if someone proposes: Perhaps we should take the Torah scholars out—on the contrary, because they study Torah, their merit will protect us, and they should go first into battle. After all, they are the cherubim that shelter the people. So let’s take them out of the Holy of Holies and into the war. Rashi says: No. Betzalel’s Ark, which held the complete Tablets, was not intended for war at all. And if you go ahead and take them out to war anyway, not only will that fail to bring victory—it could

46:55 G-d forbid that they should cause defeat instead of victory. The role of yeshiva students is for the Ark to remain in the Mishkan, while Hakadosh Boruch Hu goes before you and brings down all the enemies. “And all the peoples of the earth will see that the name of Hashem is called upon you”—this refers to the tefillin worn on the head, to mivtza tefillin. There is no need to take Bezalel’s Ark out of the Holy of Holies for that. The place of yeshiva students is to study beside the Ark in the Holy of Holies. They are the cherubim who protect the people. So we’ve seen how this Rashi unfolds. It begins with “At that time He was reconciled to me,” and that reconciliation is expressed not only in the giving of the Tablets, but also in the good news that He would cause His Shechinah to dwell among us. That is why He tells Moshe about the Ark. If the only question were where to put the Tablets, they could be placed on cushions and pillows in Moshe’s tent until the Mishkan was built. What would be wrong with that? Not dignified enough? Put them on beds of gold and silver. Instead, He tells him, “You shall make an Ark.” And Moshe remembers that back in Parshas Terumah, during the first forty days, He had told him that the Ark would be the place of “I will meet with you from between the cherubim.” So Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted the cornerstone of the Mishkan to be laid as soon as Moshe came down the mountain—even before he had told the people there would be a Mishkan—through Moshe’s Ark, with the Tablets inside it. That raises the question: But Bezalel made the Ark. What is this other Ark? Rashi did not want to explain it as the Malbim does, because if the Ark that went out to war was Bezalel’s Ark, which stood in the Holy of Holies, who could even enter the holy place to take it out? After all, there is the prohibition, “He shall not come ... into the holy place.” Rashi therefore understood this to be speaking of two Arks. And what the Talmud says—that both the broken and the whole Tablets were in the Ark in the Holy of Holies—refers to the time after the Beis Hamikdash was built, when the miraculous wars of Moshe’s era had already ended. Moshe’s Ark was then put away, and only one Ark remained. Good Shabbos.