Parshas Vayakhel 5781
“Objects in mirror are closer than they appear.” These familiar words are emblazoned across the bottom of the passenger side mirror of every car sold in the United States and serves as an important reminder to the driver as he tries to maintain perspective. It is precisely these sorts of mirrors that were used in creating the Kiyor, the laver, in the Mishkan.
וַיַּ֗עַשׂ אֵ֚ת הַכִּיּ֣וֹר נְחֹ֔שֶׁת וְאֵ֖ת כַּנּ֣וֹ נְחֹ֑שֶׁת בְּמַרְאֹת֙ הַצֹּ֣בְאֹ֔ת אֲשֶׁ֣ר צָֽבְא֔וּ פֶּ֖תַח אֹ֥הֶל מוֹעֵֽד׃
שמות לח:ח
He made the laver of copper and its stand of copper, from the mirrors of the women who performed tasks at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting.
Shemos 38:8
Rashi explains that these mirrors had an intriguing history. It was these mirrors that women in Egypt would use to apply makeup and beautify themselves for their husbands in the hopes of conceiving. Despite the danger in giving birth in Egypt during government imposed infanticide, these heroic women insisted on doing their part to ensure the future of the Jewish People.
Rashi also describes that Moshe was initially put off by the idea that such items should be incorporated into the Mishkan. They seemed out of place, at odds with the sanctified atmosphere of the Mishkan. Hashem assured him that these were indeed holy objects and very much belonged.
In truth, Moshe’s concern resonates. While Judaism does not shy away from the reality of marital intimacy, is the Mishkan really the place to be reminded of it? In preparing to receive the Torah, husbands and wives needed to separate from one another for three days. Intimacy may well be viewed as holy in the proper context, but the foothills of Har Sinai was not the appropriate place. So why was the Mishkan?
Perhaps the key to solving this puzzle lies in coming to terms with where in the Mishkan they are found. Not only does Hashem insist that the Mishkan is where they belong, but moreover, they should be used to construct the very item that purifies the Kohanim in advance of their service, the laver where the Kohanim would wash their hands and feet prior to performing the avodah. On the surface, no component of the Mishkan in its basic function is more at odds with the role that the mirrors had served in the past.
But consider the statement made by having the Kohanim use just such a tool. Yes, the Kohanim are meant to be the most elevated and sanctified members of Jewish society. They are to live a life apart, detached from so much of what comprises the contours of daily living for other Jews. They receive no tribal plot of land to tend, receive gifts in the form of animals and agricultural bounty from their neighbors, and largely avoid the rigors of earning a livelihood. But the mirrors serve as a reminder of just how much like the rest of us the Kohanim really are.
The mirrors represent a dimension of life that Kohanim are fully engaged in. Kohanim go home to their wives and children and in their own homes live lives not much different from anyone else. There is no expectation that a Kohen lives a monastic life; indeed, he is obligated to marry and bear progeny no less than any other Jew. Kohanim may be holy, but that holiness is grounded in a largely normal, typical life. One that he shares with his wife and children. Just like other families.
When a Kohen would approach the Kiyor, a spiritually elevated figure in a spiritually elevated place would come in contact with that which made him ordinary and familiar. He, too, is married man and engages in married life like every other Jewish husband. For all a Kohen’s detachment from society, when he washed at the Kiyor, he would cut a figure of someone remarkably relatable to the average Jew.
When those we look up to become too distant, they no longer serve as true role models. If I cannot relate to the spiritual successes of the Kohen, his life does not blaze a trail for me to follow. If spirituality is achieved only by someone who lives a life dramatically different from my own, then it is an expectation I no longer need be encumbered by.
But if the Kohen is like me, the pressure’s on. The Bais HaMikdash was no monastery and the mirrors of the Kiyor remind us that the Kohanim were no monks. Because the rest of the nation could identify with the lives of the Kohanim, the spiritual heights achieved by the Kohanim suddenly became more attainable. Living a normal life would no longer be an exemption from holiness. Holiness and normalcy could actually co-exist.
A number of years ago, Rav Nosson Tzvi Finkel, the late Mirrer Rosh Yeshiva, met with a group of American teenage boys in Israel for the NCSY Kollel summer program. The Rosh Yeshiva asked the group, “Anyone here from Chicago?” A number of hands shot into the air. “Anyone go to Ida Crown?” Most of those hands remained in the air. “Anyone play on the basketball team?” A handful of hands stay raised. The Rosh Yeshiva added, “So did I.”
It is convenient to think of spiritual giants as living lives fully beyond the pale of normalcy, because for those of us committed to normal, their successes would make no demands of us. But in telling that narrative, we sell ourselves short. The upbringing of a Rosh Yeshiva and the private life of a Kohen are surprisingly familiar. When the Kohanim approached the reflective surface of the Kiyor, the people appearing in those mirrors were far closer than they may have appeared.