After eleven chapters of narration of directions for the components and vestments of the Mishkan (Tabernacle), the construction finally began. “From Moshe’s presence they took the entire gift that the Children of Israel had brought for the work for the labor of the Sanctuary, to do it...All the wise people came, those performing all the sacred work, each of them from their work that they were doing.” (Shemos 36:3-4) The mitzvah (Divine command) to build a Mishkan was given, according to Sforno and other commentaries, as a vehicle to restore G-d’s presence amongst the Jewish people following its removal due to the sin of the Golden Calf. Thus, the design instruction and construction process occupied the eight and one half months from the sin of the Golden Calf – on the seventeenth of Tammuz, three months after the departure from Egypt – until the assembly and dedication of the Mishkan – on the first of Nissan, just before the first anniversary of the Exodus (see Bamidbar 7:1).
A mere four months and eight days after its dedication, on the ninth of Av, the Children of Israel were already poised to enter the Land of Israel (see Devarim 1:21), at which time they would have entered Israel under Moshe’s leadership, the Messiah would have come, and the one and only Bais HaMikdash (Holy Temple) would have been built immediately. But that day was the original “Tisha B’Av”: the spies had just returned from the Land of Israel and the Jewish nation had just accepted the slanderous report offered by ten of the twelve messengers (see Bamidbar 13 & 14). In the end, the Jews were punished with another 39 years of wandering throughout the wilderness, and they would spend 440 years in Israel before Shlomo HaMelech would finally build the Bais HaMikdash.
But they did not know that when they built the Mishkan. The Mishkan was built
