Inhabiting your Bayit: When your home becomes a synagogue and an office and a gym and a library and a school and a... Spring/Summer 5780

(1) How goodly are your tents, O Jacob, your habitations, O Israel!

(2) By Your abundant grace, I enter Your house.

(3) I worship before Your holy shrine with reverence.

(4) O Lord, I love Your abode, the place where Your glory dwells.

(5) I will worship and bow down; I will bend the knee before the Lord my Maker.

(6) I offer prayer to You, O Lord, at a time of grace.

(7) O God, in Your abundant kindness, answer me with Your saving truth.

(1) The LORD appeared to him by the terebinths of Mamre; he was sitting at the entrance of the tent as the day grew hot. (2) Looking up, he saw three men standing near him. As soon as he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to greet them and, bowing to the ground, (3) he said, “My lords, if it please you, do not go on past your servant. (4) Let a little water be brought; bathe your feet and recline under the tree. (5) And let me fetch a morsel of bread that you may refresh yourselves; then go on—seeing that you have come your servant’s way.” They replied, “Do as you have said.” (6) Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah, and said, “Quick, three seahs of choice flour! Knead and make cakes!” (7) Then Abraham ran to the herd, took a calf, tender and choice, and gave it to a servant-boy, who hastened to prepare it. (8) He took curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared and set these before them; and he waited on them under the tree as they ate. (9) They said to him, “Where is your wife Sarah?” And he replied, “There, in the tent.”

Moses heard the people weeping, every clan apart, each person at the entrance of his tent. The LORD was very angry, and Moses was distressed.

(34) the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the Presence of the LORD filled the Mishkan. (35) Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting, because the cloud had settled upon it and the Presence of the LORD filled the Mishkan. (36) When the cloud lifted from the Mishkan, the Israelites would set out, on their various journeys; (37) but if the cloud did not lift, they would not set out until such time as it did lift. (38) For over the Miskkan a cloud of the LORD rested by day, and fire would appear in it by night, in the view of all the house of Israel throughout their journeys.

(4) On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place from afar. (5) Then Abraham said to his servants, “You stay here with the ass. The boy and I will go up there; we will worship and we will return to you.” (6) Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and put it on his son Isaac. He himself took the firestone and the knife; and the two walked off together.

(10) Jacob left Beer-sheba, and set out for Haran. (11) He came upon a certain place and stopped there for the night, for the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of that place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. (12) He had a dream; a stairway was set on the ground and its top reached to the sky, and angels of God were going up and down on it. (13) And the LORD was standing beside him and He said, “I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac: the ground on which you are lying I will assign to you and to your offspring. (14) Your descendants shall be as the dust of the earth; you shall spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All the families of the earth shall bless themselves by you and your descendants. (15) Remember, I am with you: I will protect you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” (16) Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the LORD is present in this place, and I did not know it!” (17) Shaken, he said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the abode of God, and that is the gateway to heaven.”

A prayer of Moses, the man of God. O Lord, You have been our refuge in every generation.

(41) those recorded by name came in the days of King Hezekiah of Judah, and attacked their encampments and the Meunim who were found there, and wiped them out forever, and settled in their place, because there was pasture there for their flocks.

Look down from Your holy abode, from heaven, and bless Your people Israel and the soil You have given us, a land flowing with milk and honey, as You swore to our fathers.”

For the leader; on neḥiloth. A psalm of David. Give ear to my speech, O LORD; consider my utterance. Heed the sound of my cry, my king and God, for I pray to You. Hear my voice, O LORD, at daybreak; at daybreak I plead before You, and wait. For You are not a God who desires wickedness; evil cannot abide with You; wanton men cannot endure in Your sight. You detest all evildoers; You doom those who speak lies; murderous, deceitful men the LORD abhors. But I, through Your abundant love, enter Your house; I bow down in awe at Your holy temple. O LORD, lead me along Your righteous [path] because of my watchful foes; make Your way straight before me. For there is no sincerity on their lips; their heart is [filled with] malice; their throat is an open grave; their tongue slippery. Condemn them, O God; let them fall by their own devices; cast them out for their many crimes, for they defy You. But let all who take refuge in You rejoice, ever jubilant as You shelter them; and let those who love Your name exult in You. For You surely bless the righteous man, O LORD, encompassing him with favor like a shield.

(1) The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD: (2) Stand at the gate of the House of the LORD, and there proclaim this word: Hear the word of the LORD, all you of Judah who enter these gates to worship the LORD! (3) Thus said the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Mend your ways and your actions, and I will let you dwell in this place. (4) Don’t put your trust in illusions and say, “The Temple of the LORD, the Temple of the LORD, the Temple of the LORD are these [buildings].” (5) No, if you really mend your ways and your actions; if you execute justice between one man and another; (6) if you do not oppress the stranger, the orphan, and the widow; if you do not shed the blood of the innocent in this place; if you do not follow other gods, to your own hurt— (7) then only will I let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers for all time. (8) See, you are relying on illusions that are of no avail. (9) Will you steal and murder and commit adultery and swear falsely, and sacrifice to Baal, and follow other gods whom you have not experienced, (10) and then come and stand before Me in this House which bears My name and say, “We are safe”?—[Safe] to do all these abhorrent things! (11) Do you consider this House, which bears My name, to be a den of thieves? As for Me, I have been watching—declares the LORD. (12) Just go to My place at Shiloh, where I had established My name formerly, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel. (13) And now, because you do all these things—declares the LORD—and though I spoke to you persistently, you would not listen; and though I called to you, you would not respond— (14) therefore I will do to the House which bears My name, on which you rely, and to the place which I gave you and your fathers, just what I did to Shiloh.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I beheld my Lord seated on a high and lofty throne; and the skirts of His robe filled the Temple.