Pekudei: An Arresting Question
A Final Accounting
The previous three Torah portions dealt with the specifications for building the Tabernacle and its holy vestments. In this portion a very important detail: is contributed – a calculation of the total sum of donations received for the cause.
In this regard the Torah acts as a competent accountant. A itemized report is provided of every donated item concluding with the grand total.
This aspect of our Parsha can be very instructive in our every day lives.
What Have I Accomplished?
Following the sin of the forbidden fruit, G-d turned to Adam and asked Ayekah? Where are you? One of the interpretations to this question is “what stage are you at in life? What have you accomplished your thirty or forty years of living? This question gives us pause. Indeed what have I accomplished in my lifetime? Am I proud of those accomplishments? Could I have done more? Am I living my life to its fullest potential?
The answers to these questions cannot be known unless we stop to take an accounting, to put together a life-long register of failures and successes. This is the only way to view life from a comprehensive perspective, this allows us to make the adjustments that will alter (or steady) our course, ensuring that we are headed in the direction we want to go.
I conclude with an unsolicited piece of advice:
Ask yourself this arresting question tonight before you go to bed, “what have I accomplished today?”
Don’t go to sleep until you give yourself an answer you are proud of.
