In Parshas Teruma we have some description of the layout of the Mishkan according to navigational directions, such as the entrance being on the East side.

Seeing a beautiful diagram of the Mishkan in Artscroll's Sapirstein edition Chumash with a compass orientation got me thinking if that really made sense for the portable Mishkan.

For the Beis HaMikdash, a stationary structure, there would be no question.

But for the Mishkan, elsewhere, we have a few concepts I think bring up questions.

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  The Jewish people leaving Egypt one direction eventually doubled back travelling the reverse direction, and Pharoah interpretted this that they were lost.
  
  
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  Later on we learn how the Jewish people travelled for 40 years along a path that seems to loop around
  
  
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  We are told the oder of the tribes, by their divisions, in their travels
  
  
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  A train does not turn on a dime - it can follow a curved track to reverse direction, but the engine is in the front, and the kaboose remains at the end
  

Have you ever observed a dog or cat walk to a rug onto which they will plotz down? Do they circle it once or twice before finding their intended orientation?

I have trouble visualizing that a "train" of the camps would do such a thing, and for myself assumed that for example if the Jewish people were headed East, then the tribe of Yehuda, who traveled in the lead, would camp to the East; and if they were headed West, then the tribe of Yehuda would camp to the West.

That is the orientation of the whole camp could change and be dependent on what direction they were travelling.

If the Mishkan were erected in the same orientation each time, just like we face toward Yerushalayim, that would be independent, but then whichever camps were on the entrance side might find themselves elsewhere depending on the orientation.

So getting back to our parsha - do we understand the navigational directions for the Mishkan to be permanent? Or if the camp would have a different orientation, the Mishkan should also change its orientation to match?

And if the overall camp should also maintain a permanent orientation while encamped, and maintain the specified formation while traveling, does that mean that the travelling formation might have to loop around when they arrived at a camp site so that the tribe of Yehuda remained both at the lead and at the same orientation?

Or perhaps they arrived at a camp site in travelling formation order, but then within the camp site, the individual tribes moved to take their respective positions within the camp.

But this kind of defeats some of the purpose of the travelling order such that the mishkan could seem to be assembled as the Jewish people were coming out of formation order.