Meir Einei Chachamim: Vayakhel: Moshe’s Authority

The 19th of Adar is the Yahrtzeit of Rav Meir Yechiel (ben Avrohom Yitzchok) HeLevi Haldshtok, founder of the court of Ostrovtze (1851-1928). A talmid of Rav Elimelech of Grodzinsk, a scion of the Kozhnitzer dynasty. Ostrovtze was one of two courts in Poland known for their yeshivos and high level of learning; the other was Sochatchov. Rav Meir Yechiel’s intricate sermons, which drew heavily on gematria, came to be known as “Ostgrovotze pshetlach.” They have been collected in Meir Einei Chachamim, and his teachings on Bereishis in Ohr Torah.

Whenever the Children of Israel sinned while in the desert, they were not only breaking the immediate law, such as the prohibition(s) against idol worship when they constructed the Golden Calf, they were also violating two other commandments: They were violating the positive commandment to Obey a True & Established Prophet by ignoring Moshe’s instructions, and they were also considered as Rebelling Against the King; Moshe!

When Moshe spoke, “The Voice of God spoke from his throat.” Moshe spoke as God’s voice, as the King. Anyone who ignored him was rebelling against the King.

This is why many of the Children of Israel were executed for the sin of the Golden Calf not according to the established punishments for idol worship, but, “Death by the Hands of Heaven,” they were executed by Heaven for rebelling against their King; Moshe.

When Moshe gathered the people at the beginning of this week’s Parsha; he gathered them as subjects before their King. The laws of the Mishkan were given by a King to his nation, and therefore have an extraordinary status, from which we cannot derive principles to apply to other areas of Jewish law.

Meir Einiei Chachamim: Volume I, Chapter 126