What are you building?

Parashat Ki Tissa, 2026

What we have just heard in the Torah is, on the surface, a story about the creation of a so-called false god. The people, anxious and afraid in Moses’ absence, gather around Aaron and demand something they can see, something they can point to, something tangible to stand before them. Traditionally, we call this idolatry, and certainly the Torah treats it as a grave failure - but I do not think the deepest lesson here is simply that the people wanted a “false god,” as though they had suddenly abandoned the Holy One altogether.

I think that the human impulse underneath the story is more familiar, and, perhaps, more uncomfortable than that. Human beings often long for a physical representation of what otherwise feels distant, abstract, or uncertain. We want something we can touch, something visible, something immediate.

And that longing, in itself, is not hard to understand. We are embodied creatures who live in a world of matter, of sight and sound, of objects and places. We mark holiness with candles, with kiddush cups, with Torah scrolls, with sanctuaries, with melodies. We do not live by abstractions alone - but the danger comes when the representation becomes the thing itself, when the symbol replaces the mystery it was meant to serve, when our need for tangibility causes us to lose focus on what is ultimate and what is only a vessel.

This morning, I want to place less emphasis on the golden calf though, and more on something else in Ki Tissa: the idea, near the start of the portion, that everyone is liable to contribute something toward the sacred life of the people, toward the making of the Mishkan, the Tent of Meeting, the Ohel Moed. The sanctuary does not simply descend whole from heaven. It is built from offerings. It is built from contributions. It is built because each person gives.

That is a powerful idea. Community is not somebody else’s job. Holiness is not somebody else’s task. The sacred space in which revelation can occur is made possible only because each of us accepts responsibility for it. The Ohel Moed is not merely a structure in the wilderness. It is a statement about covenantal life: that the meeting place between God and Israel depends on the willingness of the people to build it together.

I think that that message is profoundly relevant for two reasons: firstly because it teaches us that we CAN build something that doesn’t necessarily cross lines into idolatry, and secondly that just like our ancestors, we all want a meaningful Jewish life. We want prayer that matters. We want learning that deepens us. We want communities full of caring, of welcoming, of courage, and of dignity. We want places where people can bring grief, joy, doubt, gratitude, and hope - and yet, such a community does not appear by magic. It is made. It is sustained. It asks something of us.

Each person brings a half-shekel. Each person brings skill, energy, generosity, patience, and presence. Some build with resources. Some build with leadership. Some build with song. Some build with study. Some build with quiet acts of kindness that few people ever see - but all are called to build. The Torah’s vision is not one of spectators, it is one of participants. Not consumers of holiness, but makers of holiness.

And perhaps that is one way to read the contrast between the calf and the Tent of Meeting. The calf is also something the people make, but it is made out of panic, impatience, and confusion. It is a human construction detached from sacred purpose. The Mishkan is of course also made by human hands, but it is made with intention, discipline, commandment, contribution, and with a shared sense of serving something greater than ourselves. Both are tangible, physical - but one narrows the spiritual life into something controllable, while the other opens a space in which the people can truly encounter the Divine – whatever that means to the person encountering it.

Ki Tissa also includes a specific instruction about the anointing oil, that it is not to be used for ordinary, non-sacred purposes. It is reserved. Set apart. Protected from becoming common. That too is a lesson we need - what we create for special purposes must remain special. We must know how to distinguish between the sacred and the mundane.

That distinction matters deeply in Jewish life. If everything is treated the same, then eventually nothing feels holy. If sacred language becomes casual, if sacred rituals become merely functional, if sacred time becomes just another appointment in the calendar, then we slowly lose our ability to recognise sanctity at all. The Torah insists that there are things, times, acts, and spaces that must not be flattened into the ordinary, and that is not because the ordinary has no value, but because human beings need markers of transcendence. We need reminders that not all moments are equal, that not every object serves the same purpose, that holiness requires, in some ways, boundaries.

In a world that often blurs every line, that treats everything as available, interchangeable, and immediate, this teaching is countercultural and necessary. Shabbat must feel different from Tuesday afternoon. Prayer and meditation must feel different from casual speech. The sanctuary must feel different from the supermarket. The oil for anointing must not be reduced to everyday use, because the sacred must remain recognisable as sacred.

And that may be part of the deeper challenge of our own lives. We do not usually build golden calves, but we do risk losing our sense of proportion. We do risk confusing what is useful with what is ultimate. We do risk making everything equally casual, equally instrumental, equally ordinary. Ki Tissa asks us whether we are building a calf or building a sanctuary. Whether we are creating objects and habits that merely soothe our anxiety, or creating a community in which the Divine might genuinely be met.

Now, if you have read the whole portion you will know that I am choosing purposely not to focus this morning on the Levites’ slaughter of the alleged sinners. It is a difficult and troubling passage, and it deserves real attention, serious wrestling, and careful theological honesty, but there is simply too much there to unpack responsibly in one Shabbat morning sermon. Rather than rush past it or pretend to resolve it neatly, I would rather leave that for another time, and stay with the themes that are immediately before us now: responsibility, sanctity, contribution, and focus.

I think the first message of Ki Tissa is this: the life of holiness is not built automatically, and it is not built alone. It is built when each of us brings what we can to the shared work of creating sacred community. It is built when we resist the urge to settle for easy substitutes. It is built when we remember that tangible things can help us meet God, but they must never replace God. And it is built when we learn to preserve what is holy as holy, refusing to let everything dissolve into the commonplace.

The question this parashah asks of us is not only, “What do you worship?” It is also, “What are you building?” Are we building a Jewish life shaped by fear, impulse, and distraction? Or are we building an Ohel Moed, a tent of meeting, a place where human beings show up for one another and make room for the Divine Presence?

This isn’t just a question for within our community, it’s a question for how our community goes our into the world and puts Jewish values into practise. I’d like to think that we are a community that accepts that responsibility gladly, and that each of us is happy to bring our half-shekel, our gifts, our care, our courage, and our presence.

The world is a confused and confusing place, if we set ourselves one goal this week, let it be to give others faith that there is still a lot of good out there.

Shabbat shalom.