Speak to the children of Israel, and have them take for Me an offering; from every person whose heart inspires him to generosity, you shall take My offering (Shemos 25:2).

Rashi explains: “and have them take for Me” means dedicated to My name (Midrash Tanchuma).

Is you were asked to give a donation to help rebuild the 3rd Temple wouldn’t you give with a full heart and for the sake of the mitzva? Why does Chazal need to tell us that the giving of the money for the mishkan needed to be with such pure intentions?

Rav Henach Leibowitz learns that even when the evil inclination cannot stop us from doing a mitzva he can corrupt our intentions and degrade our service to our Creator.

We need to be constantly on guard that we do not perform the mitzvoth for honor, prestige, or other side motivations. Since we are spending much time and energy to do the mitzvoth anyway, it makes sense that we should work on purifying our motives. One mitzva done with a truly pure heart can upgrade and change the quality of our entire being.

Application:
Choose one mitzva that you are going to do with absolute purity.

Give 10 quick answers to the following sentence stem:
If I could do this mitzva with absolute purity, I would…

Good Shabbos!

quote:

Is you were asked to give a donation to help rebuild the 3rd Temple wouldn’t you give with a full heart and for the sake of the mitzva? Why does Chazal need to tell us that the giving of the money for the mishkan needed to be with such pure intentions?

For us now, we have a tradition that the one we would be contributing to is the 3rd and Final Beis HaMikdash and thus giving our all to such an effort might be easier to do than giving to an annual fundraising event over the past year since all the rules are likely to change regarding how we acquire our basic living needs.

Back then, in the time of our parsha, did the Jewish people have any indication that the Mishkan was permanent? or that there would be any reason to hold back for their own personal daily living needs?

Or back in the time of the construction of the 1st or 2nd Beis Hamikdash did the Jewish people have any tradition that the Temple being built in their time would be the Final one?

This is a good kasha (difficulty). Bereishit45:14 states about Josef- And he fell on his brother Benjamin's neck and wept, and Benjamin wept on his neck.

Rashi says there:

And he fell on his brother Benjamin’s neck and wept: for the two sanctuaries which were destined to be in Benjamin’s territory and would ultimately be destroyed. [From Meg. 16b] and Benjamin wept on his neck for the Tabernacle of Shiloh, which was destined to be in Joseph’s territory yet would ultimately be destroyed. [From Meg. 16b, Gen. Rabbah 93:12]

So we see that there was a tradition for the destruction.

I would answer that even though one may have known about the ultimate destruction on the temples, they still would have given with a full heart and pure motivations because of the indescribable benefits of having the temples even temporarily.

Shalom
If I could protect all trees and water reservoirs with absolute purity, I would be bringing Divine nature to earth.
If I could study Talmud all day with absolute purity , I would be filled with wisdom and goodness.
If I Could help my fellow brother and sister to get a bit closer to Hshm I would certainly be allowed to receive.
If I could fullfill all Three Mitzvot expresed in the Shema I would be closer to the essence of giving our exterior the same holiness than our interior.
If I could give Tzedaka as much as I wished I would certainly feel closer to repairing this world.

Lej Leshalom

quote:

So we see that there was a tradition for the destruction.

Wow, very powerful answer!

But do we have any indication that Yoseif and Binyamin revealed what they knew to the common people?

Or furthermore, since we have a principle that any negative decree can be set aside, is there any indication that the Jewish people at the time of these constructions thought that the decrees had been lifted?

For example, Moshe Rabbeinu's special command to stop praying for entry to Eretz Yisrael is an indication that he thought the decree against him had been lifted...

The group after the "spies" another misunderstanding. And I understand there was a group who attemped to leave Egypt 100 years prematurely?

We have those recently who did not believe that the Israeli government would actually forcibly evict Jews from our land, and to the last minute had faith.

Is there any indication that this part of humanity was at play?

Was the term "2nd and final" ever seen anywhere?

quote:

Choose one mitzva that you are going to do with absolute purity.

Give 10 quick answers to the following sentence stem:
If I could do this mitzva with absolute purity, I would…

Good Shabbos!

Okay, here is one I know I am good at so.....Do not covet, by being happy for other's accomplishments.
Do not covet, by helping them when they need help(this helps kill the evil inclination). Doing good deeds for others without expecting anything in return AND without caring which kind of Jew (or other) they are builds feelings in our hearts for the person we're doing/caring for. This makes it virtually impossible to have a feeling of jealousy, because people we care about we naturally want good things for.

quote:

Originally posted by Hawke:

quote:

Choose one mitzva that you are going to do with absolute purity.

Give 10 quick answers to the following sentence stem:
If I could do this mitzva with absolute purity, I would…

Good Shabbos!

Okay, here is one I know I am good at so.....Do not covet, by being happy for other's accomplishments.
Do not covet, by helping them when they need help(this helps kill the evil inclination). Doing good deeds for others without expecting anything in return AND without caring which kind of Jew (or other) they are builds feelings in our hearts for the person we're doing/caring for. This makes it virtually impossible to have a feeling of jealousy, because people we care about we naturally want good things for.

Oops! That was supposed to include 10 quick answers. Let me get back to you on that, since I'm trying to wrap up work.

Thank you for posting the application and question part to the dvar torah rabbi mitterhoff- its been on my mind all shabbos. its been bothering my conscience that each mitzvah should not only be done- but that it should be done on the highest level possible.
thank you. sometimes we need to be reminded of the level we must hold by.

gut voch.

I would love to do a "double mitzvah" wholeheartedly and with pure intentions.

quote:

Originally posted by Raybin:
I would love to do a "double mitzvah" wholeheartedly and with pure intentions.

How about giving charity on Purim to a poor widowed orphan? That could count as 4 Mitzvos.

I AM Tzedaka! I'll THINK of my poor widowered orphan on Purim. Happy Purim Thanks