Ki Tisa - on Creativity

31:2 “See, I have called by name, Bezalel son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of  Judah. I have filled him with the spirit of God, with wisdom, with insight, and with knowledge, and with every craft; to weave designs, to work with gold, with silver, and with copper; and with cutting gemstones to be set, and with carving wood – to work with every craft.”

31:6 “and in the heart of every wise-hearted person I have placed wisdom, and they shall make all that I have commanded you”.

Before Bezalel the only person who was described as filled with the spirit of God was Joseph:  Mikeitz 41:38 “Pharaoh said to his servants, Could we find another like him – a man who has the spirit of God in him?”

I find it insightful and disturbing that the introduction of Bezalel, the designer whom Hashem endowed with wisdom, insight and knowledge, comes in the same parsha as the story of the golden calf.  In two preceding parshayot the Mishkan, the garments of the Kohanim, the Breastplate and the oils are made by the master artisans – the weaver, the embroiderer, the engraver, the perfumer.  The description of Bezalel is the culmination of the display of respect and elevated status that Torah accords to creative people who live by the fruit of their honest, inspired labor.  And then Israelites are plunged down to the bottom by the sin of idolatry.  No doubt there is a connection - what is it? 

When a man designs an object with his mind and hands, be it sewing a dress, or cooking a meal, or writing a computer program, he transforms the physical matter enriching it with information that comes from his mind, filling it with his essence, endowing it with power.  A well designed dress has a power to please an eye, or transmit the wearer’s status, or cause jealousy and anger.  A gourmet meal provides sustenance and enhances relationship, or creates tension when not praised enough.  An information system, locked in a few server boxes connected by a network of cables, controls manufacturing from soup cans to spaceships, moves money around the globe, drives human communication, making kings and paupers. 

When the first human sharpened stick into a tool he got a taste of the power of mind transferred to a physical object.  A man can blow life into inanimate matter through creativity, making an object useful, admirable, destructive, nourishing, inspiring.  One more step, a small leap of imagination, and man believes that the object can make autonomous decisions and acquire super-natural power.  

I think the reason why the sections on golden calf and Bezalel are placed next to each other is to show that Hashem endowed man with an awesome power of creativity, that could be either put in service of God to create holiness on earth, or can go very wrong, leading to destruction, servitude, exile. The power of imagination can bring a human being to the most elevated heights or plunge to the depth of depravity, but without this power people are brain dead.  The weaponry of mass destruction can be seen as a golden calf of our time, where human genius is put to the service of evil, and it is only by the grace of God, by sheer miracle, that we are all alive. 

Creativity can be obsessive, it is easy to be engrossed in what you do at the moment and loose track of the purpose, the big picture reason of why or for whom you are doing it.  It is easy to get annoyed and snap at people most important in your life when they distract you from the work at hand.  Bezalel is not only the genius skilled  in a dozen crafts, but first of all a man of wise heart who knows from Whom to take orders.   

A physical object contains a thought, and depending on which thought is breathed into it the object can be an enclosure for holiness or an instrument of evil.  A human being may care enough for his appearance to use it in the service of God, to influence others and bring them closer to Torah, or groom himself simply to enjoy the attention.  An object can be beautified with the purpose of serving higher good, or to be used in vanity.  An idol is designed for its own sake, it may be made beautiful to please the eye, or ugly to instill fear, but it has no connection to the higher power. Man designs an idol filling it with his own fears and hopes, desire and longing, vanity and obsession.  An idol does not contain the information expressed in words and symbols that would bring man closer to God, it is self-referencing, without external link, the beauty for its own sake that is rejected and prohibited in the second commandment.   

When we were in Jerusalem during the Hanukkah break we saw young people, yeshiva and seminary students, in the streets enjoying free time, mingling with each other.  Their faces looked radiant in their nakedness, without protective layers of indifference and cynicism.  The beauty of their clean faces shined with the love of wisdom and joy of life, they spoke with eagerness to know each other, to see each others soul in all its hidden glowing beauty.  Moving to Tel Aviv as the next part of our journey brought the jarring contrast of advertising posters and scantily clothed men and women drawing attention to the beauty manufactured for its own sake.   

A few years ago we made a major effort to renovate our house, which was bought originally as a handyman’s dream.  We had the entire carpet ripped off and discarded, replaced by the hardwood floor, repainted the walls and replaced the master bathroom.  The house truly needed the renovation and we are still much pleased with the end result, however the effort I took to make it happen was a bit over the top, not surprising given my obsessive nature as a data architect.  I discovered a talent talking to workers and managing remodeling projects and got fully absorbed into it.  I got to identify myself with the shiny new floor made of natural light wood, the clean contemporary colored walls with white trim, the emerald green countertop separated from warm maple cabinets by the elegant band of stainless steel.  I felt like all these subtle well-picked designs were part of me.  I did not go with the most expensive choices – a friend told me of a super expensive massive shower door in her bathroom, that gives her pure pleasure to handle, but since I could not figure out how to derive pleasure from a shower door I settled for a modest sleek frameless option.  Two years earlier when I was shopping for a car the same friend strongly recommended a Lexus – I settled for a Honda that still runs just fine in its seventh year, proudly decorated with stickers of two Jewish day schools.  So it’s not like we were going over the top competing with Joneses, however I got to identify myself with the things I chose to have, feeling like this was a part of my essence. 

So when the remodeling project was almost done, we were invited to a friend’s birthday party in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  This Chabbadnik couple was renting an apartment two blocks away from the lake shore, where they shared one bathroom with their nine children and entertain frequent guests in a small living room with plank wood floors, cooking their meals in a tiny square kitchen, the comforts not far from the conditions where I grew up and never wanted to go back to.  However there was something in that small apartment with the old bookcases and portraits of the rabbis, noisy and messy with nine kids, that made our newly remodeled beautiful house deflate in my mind’s eye.  It’s like you acquire one nice thing after another, climbing up the ladder of affluence, and when you think you have everything you suddenly realize that something is missing, something intangible but important.   

This is not to say that we should not take care of our homes.  A remodeling project can be a source of inspiration and entertainment, it feels good to make a home pleasing to the eye, but the true pleasure comes with awareness that it is a place of holiness and loving-kindness, free from anger and fear, the enclosure for learning and doing mitzvoth.  It is wonderful to cook a gourmet meal and invite guests, while recognizing that the meal and the company is a frame for dvar Torah and joined blessing before and after the meal, or at least the expression of chessed towards the guests who may not recognize the significance of the ritual, but who might be drawn to your individual essence and that could be the hidden, unregistered by their mind but brewing in their heart, start of return.  On the other side if the house is being decorated for its own sake and the meal is prepared only to indulge in its taste, than the physical objects become self-contained and carry the power opposite to the Torah ideal, becoming the tools of materialism, arrogance, false pride, exploitation, expression of idolatry.  

 Terumah

25:40 See and make according to their design that you are shown on the mountain. 

26:1 The Tabernacle of ten linen panels – the craft of a master weaver maaseh hoshev. 
26:31 a Partition-curtain, the craft of a master weaver 
26:36 a Screen for the entrance of the Tent, the craft of an embroiderer maaseh rokem.
Tetzaveh
28:3  And you shall speak to all who are wise of heart that I have filled him with a spirit of wisdom, and they shall make the garments …
28:6 and linen that is twisted, the craft of a weaver.
28:11 The craft of an engraver of gemstones maaseh harash even … shall you engrave the two stones with the names of the sons of Israel
28:15 Breastplate of Judgment, the craft of an artisan maaseh hoshev.
Ki Tisa
30:25 oil of anointment for sanctity, a compound that is blended, the craft of a perfumer.