This week’s parasha, Terumah, opens with one of the Torah’s most famous lines about sacred space:
וְעָשׂוּ לִי מִקְדָּשׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם
(V’asu li mikdash v’shachanti b’tocham)
“Let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.” (Exodus 25:8)
Rabbi Menachem Mirski
Simple words, profound promise: God wants to be close, to dwell right in the midst of the people, right? But what follows isn’t a quick “build Me a basic tent.” Instead, God launches into a three chapters long detailed Home Depot catalog: gold overlays, blue-purple-scarlet yarns, finely wrought menorah with almond-shaped cups, acacia wood beams, and precious stones. This isn’t mere functionality; it’s aesthetic splendor. Then God reveals himself as the chief engineer of the universe and gives the exact dimensions for the Ark, detailed description of the menorah with its almond-shaped cups, curtains in blue, purple, and scarlet. The Creator of the universe is saying, “Make it perfect—because I’m moving in!”. A few chapters later God is appointing Betzalel – the chief artisan – to lead the construction of Mishkan – so the plan is delivered, as it should be. All this work has a fundamental goal: the place where we encounter holiness should be appealing. Beautiful. Maybe even spectacular or jaw-dropping.
The construction of Mishkan, together with the description of the priestly garments, reveals something essential: God’s own presence is tied to beauty. One verse even calls God “the beauty of their strength”
For You are their strength in which they glory;
our horn is exalted through Your favor.
(Psalms 89:18).
Holiness and splendor—and the word tiferet used here also means “beauty”—go hand in hand.
Rabbinic tradition takes this further with the principle of hiddur mitzvah — beautifying a mitzvah. The concept is rooted in Exodus 15:2: “This is my God, and I will glorify Him”. The Talmud (Shabbat 133b) teaches us that while it is ok to perform mitzvot simply, it is proper to perform the mitzva as beautifully as possible. Make before Him a beautiful sukkah, a beautiful lulav, a beautiful shofar, beautiful tzitzit, beautiful parchment for a Torah scroll, and write in it in His name in beautiful ink, and wrap the scroll in beautiful silk fabric. The structure, the garments, the offerings: all are beautified because they connect us to the Divine. And while our rabbis have always emphasized that true beauty is spiritual beauty, our tradition, generally, does not denigrate beauty in its aesthetic sense. But it warns us not to thoughtlessly chase after it.
In terms of physical beauty that is not related to religious experience, the sages of the Talmud and beyond often elevated the soul’s radiance over the body’s form, teaching that true beauty lies in Torah study and piety. As we learn in Proverbs 31:30, “Charm is deceptive, and beauty is vain; but a woman who fears the Lord shall be praised”—a verse echoed across generations to remind us that physical allure is fleeting, while wisdom endures. Yet, amid this prevailing view, a minority of rabbinic voices acknowledged the value of physical beauty as a divine gift that could reflect spiritual harmony or inspire awe. For instance, Rabbi Yochanan, a Talmudic sage renowned for his exceptional handsomeness despite his corpulence, embodied this rare appreciation, seeing beauty as a mark of proportion and symmetry aligned with creation’s order. Similarly, the practice of reciting blessings upon beholding someone strikingly attractive hints at an undercurrent of esteem for aesthetic grace, though always secondary to inner virtue.
Venturing into medieval and early modern eras, this minority perspective persists through figures like Maimonides, who insisted that Temple priests required physical comeliness and elegant attire to evoke reverence, mirroring the divine splendor they served. Likewise, the Vilna Gaon interpreted the flawless beauty of matriarchs such as Sarah and Rachel as symbolic of Torah’s completeness, suggesting that outer perfection could correspond to inner wholeness. These voices, though outnumbered by those who prioritized the “illumination” of scholarship—often portraying sages as frail from devotion—invite us to drash: perhaps beauty, when humbly worn, becomes a vessel for glimpsing God’s image in humanity, urging us not to disdain the physical but to sanctify it through righteous living.
Fast-forward to today. We live in a culture obsessed with beauty: curated Instagram feeds, flawless home renovations, aesthetic everything. People chase perfection in filters and finishes. And while there is a movement pushing back against it, beauty and aesthetics are more important than truth and truthfulness, not only in the realm of what’s visible but in the realm of thought and ideology as well. Yet Terumah reminds us: if we’re going to create spaces where holiness dwells — our synagogues, our homes, our personal moments of prayer — they too should be appealing, neat, pretty, even majestic when we can manage it.
Why? Because beauty invites. A beautiful sanctuary isn’t about showing off; it’s about saying, “This place is special. Come in. Feel the presence.” In a world full of superficial shine, our sacred spaces can offer the real thing: beauty that points beyond itself to the Divine who dwells among us, to spiritual beauty of mitzvot and righteousness that lasts forever.
This Shabbat, let’s take the Mishkan’s lesson to our hearts. Whether it’s straightening the siddurim on the shelf, choosing fresh flowers for the bimah, supporting our shul’s upkeep, or simply setting a Shabbat table that feels elevated — let’s beautify what we can. Because when we do, we’re not just decorating. We’re making room for the Shechinah to feel at home.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Mirski
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