The Half-Shekel Tax
Continuing His instructions concerning the Tabernacle, GOD spoke to Moses, saying:

“When you take a census of the Israelites by number, each man must give GOD a monetary ransom for his soul when they are counted. This way, there will not be a plague among them caused by the ‘evil eye’ when they are counted.”

God showed Moses a fiery coin weighing half a shekel, and said, “This is what everyone who passes through the line of those counted must give: a half-shekel. This half-shekel is to be half of the sacred shekel, i.e., the shekel I have designated for use in all holy purposes – at 20 geirah [≈ 16g or 0.6 oz] to the shekel. It is half of this shekel that they must give as a contribution to GOD.

Whoever passes through the line of those counted for the purpose of conscription into the army – i.e., every male 20 years old and over up to age sixty – must give the contribution for GOD.

The rich must not give more, and the poor not less, than half a shekel, when giving the contribution for GOD to atone for your souls through the communal offerings. There are no poor among you now, but there are still differences in everyone’s wealth. Furthermore, this contribution must be given every year, and in the future some of the people may well be poor.

You must take the atonement money you collect from the Israelites in the first of these censuses and allocate it to the work of constructing the Tent of Meeting, using it to make the bases for the Tabernacle’s planks and the hooks for its pillars. It will thus serve the Israelites as a remembrance before GOD, to atone for your souls.”

The Laver
GOD spoke to Moses, saying:

“You must have the artisans make a copper Laver – a large pot with two spouts – and its copper base, for washing. You must place it between the Tent of Meeting and the Outer Altar, i.e., east of the Tabernacle and west of the Altar. Place it south of the space opposite the entrance to the Tabernacle, so it does not interpose between the Tabernacle and the Altar. You must put water in it.

Aaron and his sons must wash their hands and feet from it. They must wash their hands and feet at the same time, by placing the right hand on the right foot and the left hand on the left foot and, while in this position, rinsing the right hand and foot and then the left hand and foot in the water running from the spout.

Entering the Tabernacle without having first washed in this manner is a capital offense. Therefore, they must wash in this manner with water before they enter the Tent of Meeting, i.e., twice daily – before they enter to burn the morning and afternoon incense and perform their subsequent regular tasks – and before they enter to perform other, occasional rites. Thus they will not die. Similarly, performing priestly functions on the Outer Altar without having first washed in this manner is a capital offense, so whenever they approach the Outer Altar to serve as priests, i.e., to burn a fire-offering to GOD,

they must first wash their hands and feet in this manner, and thus they will not die. This will be an everlasting statute for them, for Aaron and his descendants throughout their future generations.”

The Anointing Oil
GOD then spoke to Moses, instructing him how to make the anointing oil, saying:

“You must take for yourself choice spices: 500 shekel-weights [9.65 kg or 21.3 lb] of pure myrrh; 500 shekel-weights of fragrant cinnamon in two half-portions, each amounting to 250 shekel-weights; 250 shekel-weights [4.82 kg or 10.6 lb] of aromatic cane;

and 500 shekel-weights of cassia, all according to the weight of the sacred shekel; as well as a hin of olive oil. Take two half-portions of cinnamon instead of one full portion, so that when the spices are weighed and a small extra amount is added to tip the scales, this will be done twice for the cinnamon.

You must make it into sacred anointing oil, a blended compound as made by a perfumer. When thus compounded, it must serve as oil for sacred anointment.

With it you must anoint the Tent of Meeting; the Ark of the Tablets of the Testimony;

the Table and all its utensils; the Candelabrum and its utensils; the incense Altar;

the sacrificial, i.e., Outer Altar and all its utensils; and the Laver and its base, in order to consecrate them for use as components of the Tabernacle. You must anoint all these by smearing anointing oil over them in the form of the Greek letter lambda (Λ).

You must sanctify them, making them become, relative to the ordinary facets of creation, holy of holies. By virtue of their holiness, anything that touches them, i.e., is placed in any thus-sanctified container, will itself become sanctified, i.e., it will be liable to disqualification as a sacrifice in the same way that all sanctified objects are, and it may not be redeemed by money and thereby revert to its non-holy status. However, this sanctification-by-contact will occur only when an entity is placed in a vessel designed to contain it, i.e., when a liquid is placed in a vessel made to hold liquids and a dry good is placed in a vessel made to hold dry goods.

You must anoint Aaron and his sons, as well, and thereby sanctify them to minister to Me as priests.

You must speak to the Israelites and say: ‘This will be the sacred anointing oil for Me throughout your future generations. No matter how much of it is used, it miraculously will not become depleted. You must also use it to anoint kings, but you must anoint them by pouring the oil over their heads in the form of a crown.

Nonetheless, it may not be applied to the skin of any person whom you are not authorized to anoint, nor may you make any preparation like it using the same proportions of spices to oil; this oil is sacred, and it must remain reserved for you to use strictly for sacred purposes.

Whoever makes an identical blend, or puts any of the oil that Moses will make onto an unauthorized person, will be cut off from his people by dying prematurely and childless.’”

The Incense
GOD then said to Moses, instructing him how to make the incense, “Take for yourself two fragrant spices – myrrh and cassia; plus stacte, onycha, and galbanum; plus five additional fragrant spices – spikenard, saffron, costus, aromatic bark, and cinnamon; and pure frankincense. There must be an equal weight of stacte, onycha, galbanum, and frankincense.

You must make these ingredients into incense, a compound blended as by a perfumer, well mingled. Take care that the compound remain ritually undefiled, and purchase the ingredients solely from the treasury of the Tabernacle so that the incense be holy.

You must grind some of it very finely, and place some of it twice daily on the incense Altar, which is situated in front of the Ark housing the Tablets of Testimony in the Tent of Meeting, where I will meet with you. The incense must be holy of holies for you.

You must not make incense for yourselves in the same proportions of ingredients as you will make for Me; this formula must be holy for you unto GOD, i.e., reserved exclusively for making the sacred incense.

Whoever makes an identical compound for personal purposes, such as in order to smell its fragrance, will be cut off from his people by dying prematurely and childless.”

GOD spoke to Moses, saying:

Betzalel and Oholiav
“Regarding who should oversee the work of building the Tabernacle and its accoutrements, I have singled out by name Betzalel son of Uri son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah.

I have endowed him with a Divine spirit, with wisdom (i.e., the ability to learn both from others and on his own), with deductive understanding, with Divine inspiration, and with the talent for all types of craftsmanship –

to devise woven designs and to work in gold, silver, and copper –

and with the arts of gem-setting and woodcarving, and all kinds of other skilled crafts.

Moreover, I have appointed Oholiav son of Achisamach, of the tribe of Dan, along with him, and I have endowed every wise-hearted person with similar wisdom, so that they may make everything that I have commanded you:

the Tent of Meeting, the Ark for the Tablets of Testimony and the Cover upon it, and all the implements for the Tent of Meeting;

the Table and its utensils, the pure-gold Candelabrum and all its utensils, and the incense Altar;

the sacrificial, Outer Altar and all its utensils, and the Laver and its base;

the netted packing-cloths for the furnishings, the sacred vestments for Aaron the priest, and the vestments of his sons to be worn during their service as priests;

and the anointing oil and the spice incense for burning in the Sanctuary. According to all that I have commanded you, so must they do.”

The Sabbath
GOD said to Moses as follows:

“Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘Eager as you may be to complete the Tabernacle – inasmuch as it expresses how God has forgiven you the sin of the Golden Calf – you must nevertheless observe My Sabbaths carefully, and not let your enthusiasm for building the Tabernacle lead you to inadvertently desecrate the Sabbath. For the Sabbath is a sign for all other nations of the special relationship between Me and you, throughout your generations, in that I have designated as your day of rest the same day of the week on which I rested when I created the world. In this way, the other nations are to know that it is none other than I, GOD, who sanctifies you.

You must therefore observe the Sabbath, for it is holy for you. Those who desecrate it by treating it like any other day and doing any type of work forbidden to be done on it must be put to death by the court, provided there are witnesses who saw those individuals desecrate it and warned them beforehand not to do so. For if no such witnesses exist, the soul of anyone who does work on that day will instead be cut off by Me from the midst of its people, i.e., he will die prematurely and childless.

Work may be done for six days, but on the seventh day there must be an absolute rest from work, i.e., not a rest due to fatigue or a rest due to boredom or idleness, but a rest that is holy – that is, dedicated – to GOD. This is why whoever does work on the Sabbath day must be put to death.

The Israelites must observe the Sabbath, establishing the Sabbath throughout their generations as an everlasting covenant.

It is a sign between Me and the Israelites for all time, that in six days GOD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He ceased from work and rested. Certainly I did not rest because I was tired or had nothing else to do, but because there was a positive purpose in resting. Similarly, you should rest on the Sabbath for the same reason.’”

Having concluded its description of both the contractual and covenantal sides of the relationship between God and the people that was established at the Giving of the Torah, the Torah now resumes the historical narrative from the end of Moses’ first 40 days on Mount Sinai, that is, from the end of parashat Mishpatim. When God finished speaking with Moses on Mount Sinai, teaching him the outline of all the Torah’s laws and the details of the laws found in parashat Mishpatim, He gave him the two Tablets of Testimony, which were tablets of stone inscribed by the “finger” of God.

The Golden Calf
But meanwhile, the people had miscalculated the 40 days. On 16 Tamuz, which they thought was the fortieth day, they saw that Moses had delayed in coming down from the mountain. The people gathered around Aaron and said to him, “Arise, make us substitute leaders who will convey God’s messages to us and thereby lead us, because regarding this man Moses, who led us up out of Egypt – we do not know what has become of him.”

Aaron, sensing that it was not a good idea to do this, said to them, “Remove the gold rings from the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” He hoped that the women and children, who value their jewelry, would not consent – at least not immediately – and this would delay matters until Moses returned.

But instead of asking their wives and children for their jewelry, all of the men among the people immediately stripped themselves of the gold rings that were on their own ears and brought them to Aaron. Thus, the women played no part in this affair.

Aaron took the gold from their hands, bound it in a cloth, and cast it into a fire. Then, the magicians among the mixed multitude came and magically made the melting gold into a molten calf. Seeing this, the mixed multitude said, addressing the Israelites, “This, Israel, is your god, who brought you up out of Egypt.”

Aaron understood that it would be better that he assume responsibility for the sin rather than let the onus rest with the sinners themselves. So, he built an altar before it. Aaron announced, “Tomorrow there will be a festival to GOD!”

Knowing that Moses would descend the mountain before noon, Satan woke the people up early. They rose early the next day, 17 Tamuz, and sacrificed ascent-offerings and brought peace-offerings to the calf. The people then sat down to eat and drink, and then got up to revel, including indulging in forbidden relations.

God Informs Moses
GOD then spoke scoldingly to Moses, “Go down the mountain, and descend as well from your present spiritual level, for the mixed multitude, your people whom you brought up out of Egypt without consulting Me, have become corrupt and have corrupted some of the Israelites. I elevated you to your present spiritual level only for the sake of the people; now that they have become corrupt, your spiritual status must drop as well, and I must expel you from the heavenly court.

They have been quick to turn away from the path that I commanded them to follow; they have made themselves a molten calf. They have prostrated themselves before it and have offered up sacrifices to it, saying, ‘This, Israel, is your god, who brought you up out of Egypt.’ They credited it with all the miracles I did for them!”

GOD further said to Moses, “I have observed this people, and it is indeed a stiff-necked people – they do not accept rebuke easily, if at all.

Therefore, now, I have only one option: Let Me be; I will display so much indignation against them that I will destroy them entirely, even those who did not participate in this act of idolatry. I will start over and make you and your descendants into a great nation in their stead.” Moses had not yet attempted to argue with God, but God intimated to him that if he would pray on the people’s behalf (and not “let Him be”), he could change His mind.

Moses Pleads for the People
So Moses then pleaded with GOD, his God, and said, “GOD, I understand that those who committed idolatry deserve the death penalty, but why should You display such impetuous indignation against Your people, forcing You to execute the guilty without trial and wipe out the innocent, as well? Why are You so jealous of a powerless, molten calf? The people know full well that You brought them out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand, not this calf! They have only been temporarily overcome by the folly of the moment.

Furthermore, why should the Egyptians be allowed to say: ‘He took them out of our country with evil intent: to kill them in the mountains and to utterly eradicate them from the face of the earth’? And why should the Egyptians be further allowed to say: ‘He took them out of our country when the evil star Ra’ah was ascendant, so it is no surprise that they have met this end’? Why give them continued cause to believe in their astrologers? Withdraw from Your display of indignation, and renounce the thought of bringing evil upon Your people. Finally, they are technically innocent: when You gave them the commandment not to serve idols, You phrased it in the singular, as if referring to me alone.

As for Your idea of making my descendants into a new nation, remember Your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, to whom You swore by Your Self – who is eternal – telling them, ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars of the sky, and I will give to your descendants this entire land that I promised, and they will inherit it forever.’ If the combined merit of three patriarchs cannot redeem the people, why should I think that if You wipe them out and make a new nation out of my descendants, my merit alone will be sufficient to redeem them at some future time?”

As a result of Moses’ entreaty, GOD renounced the thought of the evil that He had said He would do to His people.

Breaking the Tablets
Moses then turned and went down from the mountain with the two Tablets of Testimony in his hand. The tablets were inscribed on both sides; that is, the letters were hewn all the way through, from one side to the other. The middle of the samech and of the final mem were thus miraculously suspended in midair. Thus, the tablets were inscribed on one side and on the other.

The tablets were God’s handiwork and the script was God’s script, engraved by God Himself on the tablets.

Joshua had pitched his tent at the foot of the mountain and had been waiting there for Moses during the 40 days since the Giving of the Torah. Joshua heard the sound of the people jubilating, and when Moses met him on his way down the mountain he said to Moses, “There is a sound of battle in the camp!”

He replied, “It is not the triumphant sound of the victor nor the weakly sound of the defeated. A painful sound – the sound of blasphemy and cursing – is what I hear.”

Until this point, Moses had not been confronted with the full gravity of the people’s sin. But as soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses became indignant. He hurled the tablets from his hands and shattered them at the foot of the mountain.

Punishing the Wrongdoers
He took the calf that they had made and burned it in fire, melting it down to unformed gold again. When it cooled, he ground it into fine powder and scattered it over the water of the river descending the mountain, mixed it into a solution, and made the Israelites drink it. The abdomens of those who were guilty swelled and exploded, killing them, just as occurs with the suspected adulteress who is found guilty.

Moses then set up a court to try those who had been legally warned and witnessed. In the course of the legal proceedings, Moses became aware of Aaron’s role in the affair. Moses then said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you that forced you to accede to their demands, and thus you brought such a grave sin upon them?”

Aaron replied, “Let not my master be indignant at the people; you know that the people are bent on doing evil. They are skeptical, always doubting God’s ability to provide for them. When you failed to appear when they thought you should, they did not trust in God to provide them with a substitute for you.

Instead, they said to me, ‘Make us a leader who will lead us, because this man Moses, who brought us up out of Egypt – we do not know what has become of him.’

I knew that as innocuous as this request seemed, it could easily develop in the wrong direction, so I said to them, ‘Who has gold?’ thinking they would hesitate to part with their gold, and thus I could delay matters. But they stripped themselves of it unhesitatingly and gave it to me. I cast it into the fire and [ – either by means of the magic of the magicians of the mixed multitude or by means of Micah’s plate – ] this live calf emerged.” From the perspective that Aaron himself made the calf, he said here, “I cast it into the fire and fashioned it into a calf, intending it to serve as a channel for Divine instruction for the people, as they requested. I did not foresee that the mixed multitude would treat this calf as an idol, but that is what emerged.”

Moses saw that the people were now exposed to ridicule, for by making the calf, Aaron had exposed their latent shortcomings publicly, making them an object of disgrace among their adversaries. The whole world would soon know that the people had committed idolatry, and this would make it much harder for them to respect the Israelites as God’s representatives in the world and accord them the privileges necessary to fulfill their Divine mission.

Slaying the Guilty
Moses realized that he therefore had to punish the convicted wrongdoers publicly. He stood up at the entrance to the camp, in everyone’s full view, and said, “Whoever is for GOD, i.e., did not participate in the crime and is willing to act as the court’s agents to execute the idolaters publicly, join me!” And all the Levites rallied around him, for none of them had participated in the crime.

He said to them, “This is what GOD, the God of Israel, has said: ‘Idolatry is a capital offense.’ Therefore, let each of you place his sword in its sheath by his thigh. Go back and forth from one entrance to the camp to the other throughout the camp, and let each man slay those that the court has found guilty, even if he be his half-brother, his friend, or his relative.”

The Levites did as Moses had ordered, even though this meant in some cases having to kill their close relatives, and some 3000 of the people fell that day.

While the Levites were executing the guilty, Moses said to them, “Until now, the priestly rites have been performed by the firstborn. But now, since some of the firstborn have committed the sin of idolatry, they have betrayed this honor and, as a group, are no longer worthy of this privilege. You, however, have proven yourselves worthy: you did not participate in the sin, and you did not hesitate to execute those guilty of it. Therefore, be inaugurated today for the service of GOD – for each of you has been true to God, even if this meant contending against your grandson and half-brother. Your acts now will serve to bring the blessing of priesthood upon you today.”

The Second Forty Days
On the next day, 18 Tamuz, Moses said to the people, “You have committed a grave sin. We have executed those among you who were both legally warned and witnessed. We have tried by ordeal the born Israelites among you who were neither warned nor witnessed. As for those of you who were witnessed but not legally warned and those of the mixed multitude among you who were neither warned nor witnessed, I will now ascend the mountain again to GOD: perhaps I will be able to secure atonement for your sin.”

So Moses returned to GOD and said, “I implore You! This people has indeed committed a terrible sin. But it is Your fault: You lavished so much gold upon them, both when they left Egypt and at the Sea of Reeds, that they could not resist the temptation, and they made themselves a god of gold.”

God did not accept this argument, so Moses tried coercion. “So, if You will forgive their sin, well and good. But if not, erase me from the Torah, Your book that You wrote before creation and that will eventually be given in its entirety in this world. Let it not be recorded that my merit did not suffice to secure atonement for them.”

GOD replied to Moses, “No. Whoever has sinned against Me, him will I erase from the rest of My Book, since he is the one who has forfeited his right to continue carrying out My mission. You did not sin, so I will not erase you from history. I will, as planned, execute all those who were witnessed committing idolatry but were not legally warned.

God’s Angel will Lead the People
Therefore, now that all the born Israelites who worshiped the calf will soon have been executed, go, and lead the remainder of the people to where I have told you, that is, to the Land of Israel. My angel will go before you, and on the day of My reckoning of their sins, I will bring them to account for their sin in the matter of the calf, as well.”

Thus, while Moses was still on the mountain, GOD struck the people – those who had been witnessed committing idolatry but who had not been legally warned – with a plague that killed them all, because they had made and worshiped the calf that Aaron had made. With this, all those who had committed idolatry were dead, except those of the mixed multitude who had sinned but had been neither legally warned nor witnessed.

GOD then said to Moses, “Go up, you and the people, the mixed multitude whom you brought up out of Egypt, to the Land of Israel. Their conversion is now complete and they have attained the legal status of full Israelites. You may take the mixed multitude there even though it is the land regarding which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants,’ and they are not descendants of the patriarchs.

I will send an angel ahead of you and will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.” God did not mention the Girgashites here because they fled of their own accord.

“You will conduct the people to a land flowing with goats’ milk and date- and fig-honey. Still, the angel – not I – will lead you, for I will not go up among you, lest I utterly destroy you on the way, since you are a stiff-necked people. You are too stubborn in your tolerance of evil and too resistant to admonishment. The full manifestation of My presence is too intense to be revealed openly among you.”

At the Foot of the Mountain
Moses’ second stay on Mount Sinai also lasted 40 days. During this time, too, he neither ate nor drank, but this was not because God miraculously sustained him, for God had been angry with him these entire 40 days. Rather, Moses had been so absorbed in his interactions with God that he did not notice the demands of his body. This period ended on 29 Menachem Av 2448. Moses descended the mountain and informed the people that God would henceforth lead them by proxy. When the people heard this ominous declaration, they mourned, and no one put on his “jewelry”, i.e., the ethereal crowns they had received when they said “we will do and we will learn.”

GOD then said to Moses, “Explain to them why I can no longer manifest My presence in their midst. Say to the Israelites: ‘You are a stiff-necked people. If I were to go among you, and you were to lapse in your behavior for even one moment and suffer a concomitant fall in spiritual consciousness, the intensity of My presence for that one moment would consume you instantly. Now, you have correctly refrained from putting on your crowns. Remove this “jewelry” of yours permanently from yourselves. As for how to atone for the remaining effects of the sin of the Golden Calf, I will know as history unfolds what to do with you – how and when to do this gradually.’”

The Israelites thus divested themselves of their “jewelry” from Mount Horeb.

The Tent of Meeting
Moses, seeing that God had removed His presence somewhat from the people, concluded that he should do likewise. Moses decided that he would thenceforth take his tent and pitch it outside the camp, as far from the camp as possible without making access to it forbidden on the Sabbath. He would call it the Tent of Meeting, where God could be “met,” because whoever sought GOD’s instruction or an experience of His presence would go out to the Tent of Meeting, which stood outside the camp, since the most palpable way to experience the Divine presence is in the persons of the sages of the Torah and their environment. Even the ministering angels knew this and sought God’s presence in Moses’ tent.

Whenever Moses went out of the camp to go to his tent, all the people would rise, each man standing at the entrance to his own tent, and their admiring gaze would follow Moses until he entered the tent. They said, “How fortunate is he who is assured that God’s presence will follow him into his tent!” They remained standing respectfully until Moses disappeared from view.

When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and remain at the entrance to the tent, and God would speak with Moses.

Whenever all the people saw the pillar of cloud stationed at the entrance to the tent, all the people would rise, and each person would prostrate himself before the Divine presence from the entrance to his tent.

Inside the tent, GOD would speak to Moses face to face, just as one man speaks to another. Moses would then return to the camp to teach the rest of the people what God had taught him. God insisted that Moses do this, for, as He told him, “If we both act angry with them, there will be no one to work at reconciling them with Me.” During this whole period (from 10 Tishrei to 1 Nisan 2449), Moses’ attendant, the young man, Joshua son of Nun, virtually never left the tent.

Moses Refuses the Angel
Returning to the events of 29 Menachem Av 2448: After God informed the people that He would no longer lead them directly, Moses said to GOD, “Look: You are telling me, ‘Take this people up to the Land of Israel,’ but You have not told me whom You will send with me. You told me You will send an angel, but I refuse to accept this. You must lead them Yourself. If You ask on what grounds I am making this demand, it is because You said to me, ‘I have granted you recognition above all other men by allowing only you to approach My presence on Mount Sinai, singling you out for this honor by name, and you also have found favor in My eyes.’

So now, if You indeed regard me favorably, please let me know Your way of rewarding those whom You regard favorably. By granting my request, I will know You – that is, I will find out what it means to be in Your favor. Consider, too, that this nation is Your people: they are the descendants You promised to their forefathers. So if You propose, as You did before, to wipe them out and lead the new nation that You make out of my descendants, I am not confident that You will not wipe them out, in turn, at some future time.”

God Agrees
He answered, “Very well; My Presence will go with you, and I will grant you rest from your concern that I will not lead them directly.”

Moses said to Him, “This is indeed what we desire, for if Your Presence does not accompany us by leading us, we would rather You not take us up from here to the Land of Israel at all.

How else can it be known that Your people and I have found favor in Your eyes, if You do not accompany us Yourself? And now, I would like to ask of You something further: in this regard, let Your people and me be distinct from every nation on the face of the earth. Let Your presence be manifest among us alone.”

GOD said to Moses, “I will also do this thing of which you have spoken, since you have found favor in My eyes and I have granted you recognition above all other men, singling you out for this honor by name. My presence will no longer be revealed openly to other nations. Even the non-Jewish prophets will only perceive Me indirectly.”

The Thirteen Attributes of Mercy
Since Moses saw that God was acceding to his requests, he made yet another one. He said, “Please let me behold Your glory. Show me how You reveal Your presence in this world.”

He replied, “As a matter of fact, it is indeed now time for Me to reveal to you partly how I manifest My presence in this world. When you prayed to Me just now to forgive the people, you assumed that your last recourse was to invoke the merit of the patriarchs. However, I possess a higher goodness that may be invoked when necessary – mercy. I will therefore make all My goodness – i.e., My attributes of mercy – pass before you, and will proclaim the Divine Name before you, showing you how to invoke these attributes in prayer. When the people proclaim that My mercy is always available, even when the merit of the patriarchs has been exhausted, I may still forgive their misdeeds. The prerogative to forgive, of course, still remains Mine: I will show favor when I choose to show favor, and I will show mercy when I choose to show mercy.”

God further said, “You will not be able to behold My ‘face,’ for no man can see Me and remain alive.”

GOD said, “There is a place on the mountain near where you usually stand when you communicate with Me, and you can stand on the rock there.

When My glory passes by, that is, when My mercy is revealed and the order of strict justice temporarily suspended, the forces of destruction can also operate unhindered, so I will have to protect you from them. I will therefore place you in a crevice in the rock, and I will shield you with My hand, protecting you until I have passed.

But after My attributes of mercy have passed by and the danger is gone, I will remove My hand. You will be able to see My back as I continue to pass, but My face will not be visible.”

The Second Tablets
GOD said to Moses, “You shattered the original tablets because you assumed that the people were an unfaithful ‘wife’ and you wanted to destroy the ‘marriage contract.’ I commend you for doing this. But now that it has been found that the fault was with the mixed multitude – the ‘handmaidens’ rather than the ‘wife’ – it is time to restore the tablets that you broke. Since you destroyed them, hew yourself two tablets of stone like the first ones, and I will inscribe upon the tablets the words that were on the first tablets that you shattered. There is a lode of sapphire under your tent. Hew the two tablets from this material, and you may keep what is left over for yourself.” Although all the people became rich from the wealth they took with them when they left Egypt and when they plundered the Egyptian chariots at the Sea of Reeds, Moses became even wealthier from this lode of sapphire. God continued, “Make also an ark – a wooden chest – to hold the tablets.

Prepare yourself for the morning, and in the morning you must ascend Mount Sinai for the third time and stand before Me there, on the mountaintop.

This time, no man may go up with you, and no man may be seen on the entire mountain; not even the flocks or the herds may graze before that mountain. I gave the first tablets amid great public fanfare; they were therefore subject to the ‘evil eye.’ I will therefore give the second tablets privately.”

The Third Forty Days
So Moses hewed two tablets of stone like the first ones, but before he ascended the mountain he made the wooden ark, so it would be ready when he would descend the mountain with the tablets. On the following day, 1 Elul 2448, Moses rose early in the morning and ascended Mount Sinai as GOD had commanded him, and he took the two stone tablets in his hand.

GOD descended in a cloud and stood with him there, and God proclaimed the Divine Name before Moses, as He said He would.

GOD passed by before him as an image of a man cloaked in a talit and wearing tefilin, and proclaimed the 13 attributes of Divine mercy: “[1] GOD has mercy on the prospective sinner, helping him resist the urge to sin; [2] GOD has mercy on the actual sinner, allowing him to repent; [3] He is a benevolent God; He is [4] compassionate and [5] gracious; [6] He is slow to demonstrate His anger by inflicting punishment, waiting instead for the sinner to repent; [7] He is abounding in undeserved kindness toward those who do not have enough merits of their own; [8] He abounds also in truth, faithfully rewarding those who obey Him.

[9] He preserves the merit of the acts of kindness a person does for 2000 generations, adding it to the merits of his descendants; He forgives [10] premeditated sins, [11] rebellious sins, and [12] unintentional sins; [13] He acquits sinners from immediate punishment but does not acquit them altogether, punishing them instead little by little – unless the sinner repents, for He acquits those who repent properly and He does not acquit those who do not. He remembers the premeditated sins of the fathers, adding their demerits to those of the children and the children’s children, but only if they follow in their fathers’ misguided footsteps, and only up to the third and the fourth generation.” Thus, God’s attribute of reward is 500 times greater than His attribute of punishment, since He preserves merit for 2000 generations but demerit only for four.

As soon as he saw the image of God’s presence beginning to pass by and heard God beginning to speak – before God shielded him with His hand – Moses hastened to bow down toward the ground and, without any pause, prostrate himself before this direct revelation of God. When God shielded Moses with His hand, Moses’ face became radiant.

After God’s presence had passed by, Moses prayed to God to forgive the people, invoking these attributes. God then asked Moses, “When you saw Me first writing down these attributes, did you not insist that I only manifest them for the righteous?” Moses replied, “Yes, but You corrected me, telling me that they are also meant for the wicked!” Moses then reiterated the requests he had made before ascending the mountain. He said, “If I have found favor in Your eyes, God, may You, God, go in our midst as You have promised. This is now possible because even though this is a stiff-necked people, You will pardon both our premeditated sins and our unintentional sins. There is therefore no concern that the intensity of Your presence will destroy us. And take us as Your own, unique possession. Let Your presence be manifest among us alone, and not among the other nations.”

To this, God replied, “I hereby make a covenant concerning these points: Before all your people I will perform wonders such as have not been performed on all the earth or for any nation. I will distinguish them from all people by manifesting My presence only among them. And all the people of whom you are a part will see how awesome is the deed of GOD that I will perform for you: Although I said earlier that invoking the thirteen attributes of mercy would only be effective subject to My consent, I now declare that they will always be effective; I will always consent to their invocation.

Renewing the Covenant
In addition to replacing the tablets, I will renew the covenant I made with you before the sin of the Golden Calf, by repeating certain elements of it. By repeating these commands, I will make you doubly liable for infringing them; this will impress upon you their importance. Mark well what I command you today. I am going to drive out before you the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. The Girgashites, however, will leave of their own volition, so the following instructions apply to them only theoretically.

Beware, lest you make a treaty with the inhabitants of the land that you are entering, lest they become a snare in your midst.

Rather, you must shatter their altars, demolish the pillars they have set up to worship as idols, and cut down their deified trees.

For you must not prostrate yourself to the god of any other nation, because it is as if the very Name of GOD is ‘Zealous’: He is a zealous God.

Beware, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they stray after their gods and sacrifice to their gods, and one of them invite you and you eat of his sacrifice. Even though partaking of his feast may seem innocuous, I forbid it, for if you fraternize with him

you will eventually take wives from among his daughters for your sons, and his daughters will stray after their gods and will lead your sons who married them to stray after their gods.

You must not make yourselves any molten idols.

The Festivals
You must observe Passover, the Festival of Matzos. For seven days you must eat matzos as I have commanded you, at the appointed time in Nisan, the month of the beginning of the grain-ripening, for in the month of the beginning of the grain-ripening you left Egypt.

The Firstborn
Just as you must observe the holiday that occurs when the grain first ripens, so must you dedicate certain firstborn creatures to Me. Every firstborn son, the one who opens the womb, is Mine. So, too, all your livestock that issues from its mother as a male that opens the womb, whether of a cow, sheep, or goat, is Mine.

Of non-kosher animals, you must redeem only the firstling of a donkey, and do so with a lamb or kid goat. You must give the lamb or kid to a priest and then you may use the donkey as your own. The lamb or kid remains the priest’s private property and is not considered to have been sanctified in any way. If you do not redeem the donkey, you must break its neck with an ax, for by not giving it to the priest you have caused him monetary loss, which must therefore be offset by your loss of the donkey. You must redeem every firstborn among your sons by giving five shekels to a priest. When you come to the Temple-city for the pilgrim festivals, you must not appear before Me empty-handed. You must bring an animal and sacrifice it as an ascent-offering.

The Sabbatical Year
The prohibitions against working the land in the sabbatical year do not apply to the other six years of the Sabbatical cycle; thus, during those years, you may work all six days of the workweek, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, you must refrain from working. The exception to this is that during the last part of the sixth year of the sabbatical cycle you must refrain from plowing, in order not to influence the growth of the produce during the sabbatical year, and during the first part of the first year of the sabbatical cycle you must refrain from reaping, since the produce then in the fields grew during the preceding, sabbatical year.

Returning to the yearly cycle of pilgrim festivals: You must observe Shavu’ot, the Festival of Weeks, by offering up two loaves of wheat bread. This is the first produce of the wheat harvest that may be offered up in the Temple. (The omer offered up on the second day of Passover is barley.) You must also observe Sukot, the Festival of the Ingathering of your produce from the field to the barns, to protect it from the coming fall rains at the turn of the year.

Three times each year all your menfolk must appear before Me, the Master of the World, GOD, who is also the God of Israel.

I am making it obligatory for you to make these pilgrimages because since I will expel nations from before you and extend your boundaries, you may therefore be living far away from the Temple and might not otherwise visit it. Do not worry about leaving your homes unattended during the pilgrim festivals, for I promise you that no one will covet your land when you go up to appear before GOD, your God, three times each year.

You must not slaughter My Passover blood-sacrifice while either the one who slaughters it, the priest who dashes its blood on the Altar, or any member of the group that has joined together to eat it still possesses leavened bread. The fats and limbs of the Passover festive-offering (or any other offering, for that matter) that are to be burned on the Altar must at least have begun to be burned during the night following the day on which the sacrifice was offered up. They may not be left off the Altar overnight until morning, for that would invalidate the sacrifice.

You must bring the first-ripened fruits and produce of your land to the House of GOD, your God. This applies only to the seven types of produce for which the Land of Israel is esteemed: wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates. In addition to not eating any young animal cooked in milk, you must not derive any other benefit from a young animal of the goats, sheep, or cows cooked in its mother’s milk or in milk from any other animal permitted to eat. Doing so is an act of cruelty, and it is forbidden to be cruel to animals.”

GOD said to Moses, “Write down these words for yourself, for it is according to these words that I have made a covenant with you and with Israel. These words will later be incorporated into the written Torah scroll. But do not think that because I command you to write down these words that you may also formally write down the oral explanation I am teaching you. The oral explanation must be memorized and taught verbally.”

Moses Descends the Mountain
Moses remained there with GOD on Mount Sinai for 40 days and 40 nights; he ate no bread and drank no water. This time, however, it was neither because God sustained him miraculously nor because he was so absorbed by his interactions with God that he did not notice his body’s demands; rather, Moses did not eat because his physical body became purified, like that of an angel, and he therefore did not need to eat. Unlike the second 40 days, God showed His good will and favor during these 40 days. On the last day, 10 Tishrei 2449, God was fully reconciled with the people and wrote the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments, on the tablets.

Moses’ Face Shines
When Moses came down on that day from Mount Sinai for the third and final time, and the two Tablets of Testimony were in Moses’ hand as he descended from the mountain, Moses was not aware that the skin of his face had become radiant when God had spoken to him and had sheltered him with His hand. Because Moses’ physical body had become quasi-angelic while he was on the mountain the third time, rays of light shone from his face.

Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, and behold, the skin of his face was radiant. Because they had sinned and descended to a lower spiritual level, they were awed by Moses’ shining face and they were afraid to approach him. In contrast, before they had sinned, they had been able to gaze on the glory of God Himself and not be afraid.

From then on, whenever Moses came out of his tent to teach the people something he had heard from God, he would have to call them back. Aaron would come first, stand before Moses, and Moses would teach him the lesson by himself. Aaron would then sit down to Moses’ left. Aaron’s sons would come, stand before Moses as he taught them the lesson, and then sit down, two at Moses’ right and two at Aaron’s left. The leaders of the community would then approach him, and Moses would speak to them, repeating the lesson for them. The leaders then took their seats on either side of Aaron’s sons.

After that, all the Israelites would draw near, and Moses would command them all that GOD had spoken with him on Mount Sinai.

Each time Moses finished speaking with them, he would put a veil over his face to hide the rays of light – for it was fitting that everyone see the rays of light only when he was teaching them God’s word – and then withdraw back into his tent. Aaron would then repeat the lesson to all the assembled, after which he would also leave. Aaron’s sons would then repeat the lesson to the leaders and the people, after which they would leave. The leaders then repeated the lesson before the rest of the people. Everyone thus heard each lesson four times.

And whenever Moses would enter his tent before GOD to speak with Him, he would remove the veil and remain unveiled until after he went out to teach the people and finished teaching them. For after God spoke to him, he would always immediately go out and tell the Israelites what he had been commanded, as has been described.

While he was teaching them, the Israelites would see Moses’ unveiled face, and thus, they would see that the skin of Moses’ face was radiant. After he finished teaching, Moses would replace the veil over his face, and it remained covered until he entered once again to speak with God.