This year my parents wanted to virtually rebuild our house, starting with my bathroom. They called professionals and asked for guidance. They talked, they planned, and they visioned, trying to think about what they wanted the finished product to look like. Having an interest in architecture, I thought it would be interesting to create my own vision based on what I wanted my bathroom to look like, not to mention the rest of the house. So I did; I drew floor plans on the computer and I started to get a sense of how things would come together. What I learned though is that floor planning is really hard. It’s not enough to just want to do a project. You really need to have a vision, a picture of what you want to create, and most importantly, you need to pay attention to every single detail, not only when drawing out the blueprints, but in order to help your vision become a reality.

My portion, Tetzaveh, describes the building of the Mishkan, the portable temple that was to help the Jewish people, who were at the time wandering in the wilderness, have a sacred place to pray and connect to God and community. Last week’s portion, Terumah talked about building the physical features of the Mishkan: the altar, the walls, the Holy of Holies and more. This week’s reading is about continuing the project and building the menorah, designing the clothing that the Priests will wear when working in the Mishkan, and how the temple will run. This portion has details going on and on and on…but why are these details so important?

One reason is that details help us realize our vision. Details help us picture the final product of what you are making before you even begin, and it helps us understand what we are creating as we do it. By this I mean it helps us realize a trajectory so that the path, our roadmap, becomes clearer as we try to reach our goals. As we walk along the path, details help us realize not only the finished product, but what may or may not be missing along the way. Most importantly, details help us continue the project with certain flexibility, so that we can adapt when bumps come up along the road.

Another way of thinking about why details are so necessary, is because they help us, as I like to say, do the triple R: reproduce, re-create, and replicate. It kind of reminds me of building with Legos. As a Lego aficionado, I’ve learned that before the company sells a product, they have someone build a prototype in a staging area and then have another person disassemble it while writing the instructions for building the Legos in reverse order. This way, once you go from finished product to pieces, the next person can have a detailed plan of how reproduce, re-create and replicate, hence the triple R. Best of all, when you buy the Lego set in the store, not only can you follow the directions for building, but just in case it gets destroyed, you have a manual to be able to put it back together again, perhaps adding your own modifications.

One final reason why I think details are so important is because they can help us realize just how complex things are, which helps us better appreciate the world we live in. When you know just how complicated or detailed things are, you get a deeper understanding to what you are experiencing, whether through listening, reading, building, or feeling. As a seemingly simple example, it would appear that our watches are quite basic, but really they are very intricate. You don’t really appreciate what goes into making a watch or a clock tick, until you open them up and see the fine details: the springs, the gears, the mechanisms, the watch hands, the LED screens, wheels, screws, and more. And that’s just for watches. Could you imagine if you were think about the details that go into building a computer, or breathing, or flying a plane? If it wasn’t for details, we wouldn’t truly understand how the world works, and how amazing it is that each individual detail plays an important role in creating a remarkable finished product.

I think that detail is one of the most important parts of our lives. Without details, we wouldn’t be able to truly appreciate just how complex and cool it is to live and function. In a way, detail is the seed of all life and matter. Do you ever stop and think about all of the details that go into our day? When I pause and reflect, it’s amazing to think about all of the detail that God put into making the world. Our very existence wouldn’t be what it is without all of these details. The Torah emphasize detail perhaps because God wants us to appreciate what was built in the past as a way of becoming closer to God through those finer points, or maybe God wants to help us create our own vision for the future when pay close attention to what we can build with the details.

I want to thank my godmother, Doda Daphna, for helping with my prayer studies. I want to thank my parents for caring for me and pushing me to go through with this. A special thank you to the rabbi and the cantor for preparing me for my Bar Mitzvah and helping me write the speech. Lastly, I want to thank all my family that came from near and far as well as my community for supporting me. Shabbat Shalom!