The Ark Within Us (Terumah / Rosh Chodesh Adar)
Today is Rosh Chodesh Adar, and, as the rabbis instructed us, “Mi’shenichnas Adar, marbin b’simcha — when Adar arrives, joy increases (Taanit 29a).” But joy isn’t always automatic. After an excruciating week, joy might feel distant. And yet, given all that has happened, let us make it a point to find joy — here, in this moment, in this sacred tradition, in this community. We have built each other up, every single day, for almost five years. We have not only known good days, but we have always known each other. What a gift it is to wake up, to do good work, to bear witness to life itself.
This week was filled with pain, including heartbreaking funerals, yet we also learned from the granddaughter of a beloved grandfather who was returned from captivity for proper burial. She carries the legacy of her family forward and taught with grace and passion this week: Life persists. We are blessed in ways we don’t always see. And this week’s Torah portion, Parshat Terumah, is a reminder of what it means to give, to build, to raise up something sacred. We had that capacity. We have that capacity still.
“V’yikchu li terumah” — “Take for Me a gift. (Ex. 25:1)” Interesting phrasing. Not “give Me a gift,” but “take for Me a gift.” Every person was asked to bring an offering from their own willing heart. This isn’t about transaction; it’s about transformation. We have to decide — every day, especially today — that our hearts will be willing.
There is room in our hearts for both hurt and joy. The Ark of the Covenant, the Aron, held both the whole tablets and the broken ones (Bava Batra 14b). We carried them together — wholeness and brokenness, side by side. This is the human condition. We are not only our wounds, and we are not only our celebrations. We are the totality of all we have lived.
The word Trumah comes from the root that means “to raise up.” God didn’t need a physical Mishkan — we did. We needed a space to orient ourselves, to acknowledge our joys and our losses, to return again and again to our center. Institutions, traditions, rituals — these are the scaffolding that hold us together as a people, as a world. And within us, within each of our hearts, is an Aron — an Ark that carries both what is whole and what is broken.
Have you seen the faces of our beloveds freed from captivity? Have you seen them dance? Have you heard them speak about whispering Shema in the darkness? There is something profoundly holy in that. Even in tunnels of despair, they reached for light. They demanded a Chanukah candle. They were given a glue stick. And they used it. Because joy, like faith, is an act of resistance.
The broken tablets and the whole tablets are carried together. We remember destruction so that we may one day help rebuild. And we will rebuild. We will bring them all home. And until then, we will hold the joy, not in spite of the pain, but alongside it.
“V’asu li mikdash v’shachanti b’tocham” — “Make for Me a holy place, and I will dwell within them. (Ex. 25:8)” Not “within it,” but “within them.” Within us. It is as if God is saying, “I need you to be okay so that I can be okay.” What profound joy that indicates. What a privilege it is to bear this responsibility.
As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said, “Happiness is the certainty of being necessary.” You are needed. All of you. Every part of you — the whole and the broken.
As we enter Adar, let us find joy. Let us be light. Let us raise it all up.
