The moving message of the weekly portion | Shabbat column

One hundred years before the destruction of the First Temple, King Josiah could have been satisfied; the Assyrian Empire that had destroyed the Kingdom of Israel had weakened significantly, and he had received an opportunity to expand the borders of his kingdom without fear.

Despite all this, the king was troubled. The verse from the Book of Deuteronomy: 'The Lord will bring you and your king whom you will set over you to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known' (Deuteronomy 28:36) gave him no rest. He was not afraid for himself, but for the holiest thing within his kingdom: the Ark of the Covenant, which stood in the Holy of Holies, and inside it, the Tablets of the Covenant and the fragments of the first Tablets.

Therefore, 'he stood and hid it,' as it is written: 'And he said to the Levites who understood all Israel, who were holy to the Lord: Put the holy Ark in the house which Solomon the son of David, king of Israel, built; you have no burden on your shoulders; now serve the Lord your God and His people Israel' (Chronicles). The hiding of the Ark was the swallow that heralded the end of the First Temple era one hundred years later. The consolation is that the Ark never fell into the hands of the enemies; it is hidden in the same place where our ancestors hid it, waiting for the moment when we will be worthy of it once again.

One can understand the concern for the safety of the Holy Ark, but when one thinks about its contents, it is slightly surprising: the second Tablets are fine, but the fragments of the first Tablets? Who needs fragments?

It is not about sentimental value; the Holy Ark is not a museum. On the contrary, from the weekly portion, Parshat Ekev, the Talmud learns that the merit of the Ark in the Holy of Holies stemmed also from the fact that the fragments of the Tablets were placed within it, as it is said:

'Which you broke, and put them in the Ark' — this teaches that both the Tablets and the fragments of the Tablets are placed in the Ark.

Hasidic teaching instructs us that just as the purpose of the Tablets was to show the way of Torah and morality to the world, so too is the purpose of the fragments of the Tablets. When a Jew is pushed into a situation where he is unable to keep the Ten Commandments despite the desire of his soul, due to the severe crises of the last two thousand years, a Jew might think that he himself is breaking the Tablets and thereby, God forbid, is lost.

It is precisely for this purpose that the fragments of the Tablets are intended: they remind us that sometimes it is the Almighty who stands behind the breaking, and a deep intention is hidden therein, one that is even more elevated than the Tablets themselves. Therefore, even if it seems that we have broken too much, sometimes it is part of the mission, a more preferred and elevated part.

This explains the Sages' interpretation of the verse 'The first Tablets which you broke, and put them in the Ark': they learn that the meaning of the word 'asher' (which) is approval, meaning 'well done' (yashar koach) for breaking them. This is the source of the instruction that sometimes breaking is part of the rules of the game, and therefore, even if the Tablets have been broken in our own lives, we must by no means let it break us.