Summary of the Parasha

The parasha opens with the pure olive oil for the eternal light of the Mishkan, then turns to its main subject: the garments of the Kohanim. Aaron and his four sons, Nadav, Avihu, Elazar and Itamar, are appointed to serve as priests.

The Kohen Gadol (High Priest) wears eight garments:

1. the Ketonet, a white linen tunic;
2. the Me’il, a blue robe whose hem is lined with golden bells alternating with pomegranates of colored wool;
3. the Ephod, a kind of apron woven of white, blue, purple, scarlet and gold, with two onyx stones on the shoulders, each engraved with the names of six tribes;
4. the Choshen Mishpat, the breastplate of judgment, set with twelve stones, one per tribe;
5. to 8. the trousers, the turban, the belt, and the Tzitz, a golden plate worn on the forehead.

An ordinary Kohen wears only four of these garments. And on Yom Kippur, the High Priest himself enters the Holy of Holies dressed in four garments of pure white.

The Torah also mentions the Urim and Tumim, through which God’s will could be known. The commentators debate what they were: according to Rashi, a writing bearing the Divine Name placed inside the Choshen; according to the Rambam, the stones of the Choshen themselves. Then come the seven days of inauguration of the Kohanim, and finally the building of the incense altar.

Summary of the Haftara

“Atah Ven Adam” (“You, son of man”)
Text in Ezekiel 43:10–27

Ezekiel prophesied around the destruction of the First Temple, some 900 years after the Exodus. God asks him to describe the Temple to come to the people, so that they feel ashamed of their sins and return. The prophet gives the measurements of the altar of the future Temple, then describes its seven-day inauguration, with offerings brought by the Kohanim descended from Tzadok.

Parasha-Haftara Connection

In the parasha, the Kohanim are inaugurated over seven days, and the parasha ends with the building of an altar. In the haftara, Ezekiel describes the altar of the Third Temple and its inauguration, also over seven days. The service begun in the desert is not just history: it is promised again for the future.

Special Shabbat: Zachor

The Shabbat before Purim, often Shabbat Tetzaveh, is called Shabbat Zachor (“Remember”). A second Torah scroll is taken out to read the command to remember what Amalek did to Israel after the Exodus, and the haftara (I Samuel 15) tells how King Saul spares Agag, king of Amalek, against God’s command, and loses his kingship. Some 500 years later, a descendant of Agag, Haman, would try to wipe out the Jews of Persia: the story of Purim. Amalek, Agag, Haman: three generations of the same hatred, and three reminders that the people of Israel endures through History.