This parsha displays the vast and varied details of the making of the priestly garments. One of my favorite themes found here is in the fact that the hems of the tunic are to be decorated with an alternating pattern of pomegranates and golden bells. The Beit Yaakov shares that these dangling ornaments symbolize the tension between the emptiness and fullness of our lives. The bells symbolize emptiness – where the hollow crown allows for the sounding of “kolot”, the voices that are born out of the encounter with the void. And then there are the pomegranates – bursting with brilliant red seeds - the archetypal Jewish symbol of fullness and fertility. Indeed, this alternation between fullness and emptiness dangles at the hems of all of our lives. The poem below is written in the voice of the wife of the soon-to-be-suited priest. It hints at the hidden vacillations between her personal sense of fullness and of lack. She relishes in a fullness of pride and support for her priestly husband...as well as wonders over the nagging sense of emptiness around her own personal calling and service in the world. This poem was written at the emotion-laden intersection between my life and the text. It is transparent to my most intimate of issues: My relationship with my husband, with my sense of calling, with Torah law and women''s roles in our tradition, and in the end, my relationship with God and the trust I place daily in the Divine as the essential provider and decisor of my life path. The Wife of the Priest Let me stitch the priestly suit for you, my husband. After all, didn''t you always fashion me a seamstress crafty and homey maternal, amid materials always wished I''d knit you keepas and wooly sleepers for our little ones All the while I was too busy organizing the women, singing praises or staging protests - but never mind... I''m ready now, my service to sit, to sew, to stew, pensive and grounded at the quiet vortex of me and needle and fabric. My fingers will fumble, I assure you. I will sop the fabric with sobs of frustration the blue will seep through to my skirt my nails, dyed burgundy with the blood of clumsy punctures. But I want to paint my hands for this for you, for us... to weave-in your becoming to believe-in your calling to suit and suture you strong in sacred yarns of service Our five year plan – suddenly a five-thousand year plan... And I fight off my resistance in the face of the eons Though in all honesty, sometimes I''m impatient and my faith well-tested - after all, what kind of a living does a priest make? And what fate for our descendants generations of shekle-sparse priests righteous paupers with a wealth of spirit, but meager means? Our lineage for all time will live -- off of what? donations? - the generosity of a stingy clan? ''What''s the gematria of “501c3” anyway?'' destitution? depravity? - Or is it grace? So here I stand, ready to thrust our stability straight into the sweaty palms of another person''s spiritual impulse to trust in a sense of abundance to count on the communal will to give and to grow and to gown ourselves in nothing but this hope... So, let me at the garment I want to pray over every stitch And maybe with my needle-work I will work out my own needless doubts I will knit the vision together and My service will be to seamstress-in Your service to materialize the earthy expression of our otherwise ethereal faith * And in the final hours as I finish the garment in the candle-light and the silence of the sleeping children I will step curious to the mirror and slip on the sounding tunic of bells and pomegranates with a wistful mirror-gaze And wonder why you were chosen to be the priest and not Moses... or deeper still, why you were chosen and not me? And in the silent roll of the scroll I will breathe deep disrobe and lay down next to you to sleep Accepting that the commandment was meant for you, not for me and robe myself instead in garments of yearning with pomegranates and bells - the empty and the filled As the tunic lay folded, waiting for the waking of your feet my hands dyed techelet - painted in honor of the priest
(photo credit: The Jerusalem Post)