Kavanot: פרשת פקודי תשפ״ב

This week’s parsha summarizes the past month of construction:

What’s Bothering Danny?

The problem (to me) is obvious: why the redundant כן עשו? Once the Torah tells me they did everything, why add that they made it so? The Torah doesn’t usually give us Star Trek memes.

And it’s important enough, that when Moshe looks at all they had done, the Torah repeats the redundant כן עשו (it’s a redundant redundancy!):

Now, Ramban says it’s just a Torah idiom:

It means “they didn’t leave anything out”. But is that really relevant here, when the Torah tells us exactly what they did in excruciating detail?

Sforno takes the opposite approach. He parses the pasuk differently: ותכל כל עבדת משכן אהל מועד—the work was complete—and ויעשו בני ישראל—the people did it, semicolon—ככל אשר צוה ה׳ את משה כן עשו—and what they did was exactly what ה׳ had commanded.

In other words, where Ramban reads the pasuk to emphasize that the people didn’t forget any of the work, Sforno reads it to emphasize that they didn’t do any extra. But then the כן is redundant; ככל אשר צוה ה׳ את משה עשו would be right.

Rashi doesn’t seem to help:

What does that mean?

If ותכל כל עבדת משכן אהל מועד then ויעשו בני ישראל, maybe they did more than the required, so Rashi is telling us that the מלאכה that is the object of ויעשו בני ישראל is the same as the עבדת משכן אהל מועד (i.e., similar to Sforno).

I am very afraid to disagree with Maharal, but I can’t see that in Rashi’s words. If Rashi is telling us that the object of ויעשו is the עבדת משכן of the previous phrase, why change the word? Rashi should say ויעשו בני ישראל את העבודה ככל אשר צוה ה׳. And we are still left with the redundant כן עשו.

David Pardo explains Rashi as separating the עבדת משכן אהל מועד into two parts:

מלאכה has two meanings in תנ״ך: ”work“ and “assets”:

I don’t think that is adequate; why would Rashi explain the pasuk with a word that he knows is ambiguous?

The Ohr HaChaim addresses the redundant כן עשו directly, and proposes that כן refers to something different from the עבדת משכן אהל מועד. In addition to doing ככל אשר צוה ה׳, the people also did כן. Made כן? Raised Cain?

That’s the exact opposite of the Maharal. Maharal says there was no additional ככל אשר צוה ה׳; the pasuk is only talking about עבדת משכן אהל מועד. Ohr HaChaim says that the ככל אשר צוה ה׳ את משה כן עשו refers to the תרי״ג מצוות that would continue after the משכן was completed.

And perhaps Rashi means that as well. The ויעשו בני ישראל ככל אשר צוה ה׳ was the מלאכה—both the donations and the craftsmanship—but כן עשו was something more. The Alschich reads it that way:

When the משכן was completed, they looked in awe at what they had accomplished. Less than a year from being liberated from abject slavery, they created something worthy of the שכינה:‎ ועשו לי מקדש; ושכנתי בתוכם. Read the pasuk as: ותכל כל עבדת משכן אהל מועד, the work of the tabernacle was completed. ויעשו בני ישראל ככל אשר צוה ה׳ את משה, when the people did as much of what ה׳ had commanded as they could, כן עשו, they had made it so (note the past perfect).

And the כן that they had made was nothing less than a recapitulation of creation itself.

And that perhaps is what Rashi means by “ויעשו בני ישראל ”אֶת הַמְּלָאכָה. They had done the מלאכה of creation. Just as ה׳ created a space for Man, they created a space for ה׳. And that is what Moshe saw when he blessed them: וירא משה את כל המלאכה והנה עשו אתה כאשר צוה ה׳ כן עשו; ויברך אתם משה.

I haven’t seen anyone make the connection between וּמַעֲשֵׂה יָדֵינוּ כּוֹנְנָה עָלֵינוּ and כן עשו but it seems obvious that both words are from the same root. כן doesn’t just mean “so” but “real, permanent”:

When the work was completed, בני ישראל actually had done what ה׳ had commanded—they had built a place for the שכינה. And כן עשו—they had made it כן, something on a par with the creation of the world. And Moshe sees this—וירא משה את כל המלאכה and behold— והנה—‎ עשו אתה כאשר צוה ה׳ כן עשו. And he gives them the bracha of וּמַעֲשֵׂה יָדֵינוּ כּוֹנְנָה עָלֵינוּ—‎הקב״ה has made our creation כן; so too in the future וּמַעֲשֵׂה יָדֵינוּ כּוֹנְנֵהוּ, may everything we do have that same purpose and permanence.