פרשת פקודי תש"ח - המשכן

ויפרש את האהל AND HE SPREAD THE TENT The אהל is the curtains of goats’ skins.

לעיני כל בית ישראל בכל מסעיהם [THE CLOUD WAS ON THE TABERNACLE] … IN THE SIGHT OF ALL THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL, THROUGHOUT ALL THEIR JOURNEYS — At every מסע which they made (according to Rashi this means: at every station at which they stopped) the cloud rested upon the Tabernacle in the place where they encamped. A place where they encamped is also called מסע (the literal meaning of which is “journey”). Similar is, (Genesis 13:3) “And he went on to his resting places (למסעיו)“ (cf. Rashi on this verse); similar also is, (Numbers 33:1) “These are the מסעי” — “the places of encampment”. Because from the place of encampment they always set out again on a new journey therefore all the different stages of their journeys (including the places where they encamped) are called מסעות.

And Moses reared up the tabernacle, and laid its sockets, and set up the boards thereof, and put in the bars thereof, and reared up its pillars.

And he took and put the testimony into the ark, and set the staves on the ark, and put the ark-cover above upon the ark.

But if the cloud was not taken up, then they journeyed not till the day that it was taken up.

“And confused” – "The brother of", and the vav in place of the hey, like the vav in [the word] vayishtachu (“and he bowed”) Genesis 18:2, “and they pastured amongst he reeds (achu)” Genesis 41:2. The meaning is [as follows:] The creation of the firmament and the dry land was not in a area to be settled, since it was covered with water, and thus G-d placed its generative power to be beneath the water. Now don’t be surprised by the vav of veha’aretz (“and the earth’), for its meaning is like the feh in Arabic and like “and a mist” v’ed would rise up from the earth” Genesis 2:6, for Moshe did not speak about the World to Come, which is the world of the angels, but rather of this transitory world. And those who explain that the heavens in the first verse are really the heavenly heavens, what will they do [here] with the earth? Behold, complete proofs, for reasonable people, that there is only earth. Now it is expounded that there were seven earths is [actually] that the earth is divided into seven and the Temple was in the center of the settled region, for it was distant from the center of the earth.

eternal redemption i.e., permanent redemption. After mentioning the permanent right of redemption, Scripture uses the same word when it says whoever redeems from the Levites; but here the word simply means “to buy” (others say that the choice of words teaches us that the house may be redeemed even from a Levite buyer). The vav in expires is like the f of Arabic. The same laws apply to a single house as to an entire city .

Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.