By Lily Simon

It's that time of the week again! This week's parsha is Vayakhel-Pekudei (a double one!!).

Basically, this week, Moses talked to the peeps of Israel, and instructed them (from the words of God) to keep Shabbat, and build the Mishkan (tabernacle). The parsha describes in detail the requirments of the Mishkan, and all the material goods necessary to make it happen. Eventually, the Israelites express that they are overworked and can't donate as much as being asked, so Moses tells them to chill, and give less. They do, and all is good. The Mishkan is built, with lots of gold and curtains and fancy furnishings. When the Mishkan is finally finished, a divine cloud appears, legitimating the Israelites work for God.

This parsha is filled with material details of the material furnishing necessary to make the Mishkan holy and legit. My interpretation focuses on the role of materialism in holiness and community. Is "twenty nine talents" of gold (whatever that means; all I know is that it is a lot!) necessary to please the Lord? While I'm sure most of would say "no," and reject the wealth and materialism embedded in ritual practice, can ritual and religious or community expression ever be independent of such materialism? The Israelites invested their wealth into building the Mishkan, pledging their allegiance to their identity through material contributions and physical labour. In our contemporary consumer context, I wonder if a non-material expression of identity is possible. embedded in Judaism is materialism; each holiday involves material objects, products of Jewish culture include material things like art, synagogues are decorated.

The Mishkan offered an opportunity for the Jews to express their identity loudly and proudly; they finally had enough material wealth and stablility as a community to enable the creation of such a fancy building. I find this an interesting parallel to the North American Jewish community. Our

synagogues have changed through time; as Jews became more integrated into the fabric of American adn canadian social life, and acquired more wealth, our buildings reflected our new social and socio-economic status. Wealth is an expression of a community's vitality. But how far does that go? How much is our Jewish community tied to wealth? how does this materialism affect our culture? while HDNA may be less materialist than other communities, we are not immune to the pressures of materialism. We love shwag, which is an obvious example of direct community solidarity through a material object. What would our community look like without materialism? as socialists and anti-capitalists, shouldnt we be striving towards that? Is that even possible, given that we live ina materialist society, and that materialism and wealth is maybe necessary for community?

Anywhos. The moral is, don't go shopping on shabbat!