The fact that gold is described as good reminds us of a great principle from the Medieval sages, including the Maharsha and the Maharal, that there are three levels in the psyche known as, “good, pleasant, and useful.” Their initials spell the word “taste,” or “reason.” These three levels of connection that we have to things in the world correspond to the intellect, the emotions, and the habits.
The good corresponds to our intellect, and since we have associated gold with the good, it corresponds with gold as well. The acronym for the intellectual powers is chabad and so someone who is connected to Chabad is golden. In fact, the acronym Chabad also has the same value as “gold.”
Since gold corresponds to the good and to the intellectual powers, we can continue the parallel and state that someone who has an overflowing heart is associated with silver. In Hebrew, “silver” means longing, love, and attraction. Since the inner experiences of the emotional faculties—love, awe, and compassion—correspond to silver, they also correspond with that which is pleasant, which tells us that attraction in the heart is an attraction and longing to that which is pleasant.
Useful means something that is beneficial or pragmatic. Once again, continuing the parallel, we find that that which is “useful” corresponds with copper. Copper thus corresponds to the habitual faculties—victory, acknowledgment, and foundation. As we have seen, something that is useful (used in some sense) needs to be explicitly described as “useful for what....” It does not stand independently of the goal of its usefulness. Clearly then, the use of the copper brought for the Tabernacle needed to be accounted for. Otherwise, there is no justification for bringing copper to the Tabernacle and the Temple.
This is also true for silver which is “pleasant.” Being pleasant is not an intrinsic trait. Rather, we must indicate what is it pleasant to? To the tongue for instance, to our eyes, etc. Hence, silver too needed to be accounted for. But gold, from which the vessels in the inner Sanctuary were made—the Ark, the Table of Showbread, the Menorah—gold need not be mentioned at all. It is intrinsically good; it is the essence of the intellectual faculties.
The pleasant and the useful, which correspond to the emotional and habitual faculties, parallel the six days of Creation. Everything that God created, He also created “for His glory.” Until we reveal His glory in the world, however, much work is needed, a lot of world repair. But there is something that does not need repair. The Torah preceded the world by thousands of years. It is gold, “There is no good but Torah,” “For I have given you a good teaching.” Those thousands of years that the Torah, the intellectual faculties, preceded the world, need no detailed explanation their purpose. This is what it means to learn Torah for its own sake, the understanding that the Torah is for itself.
Certainly, we need to learn Torah to be able to fulfill the commandments. But learning Torah is, at its core, for its own sake. Torah is intrinsically good and needs nothing besides itself. This is the gold.
Unifying the People
From our learning in the past, we knew about these two models, the model of precious metals: gold, silver, and copper, and we knew the model of good, pleasant, and useful. But we did not know that they should be connected and the correspondence between them drawn. This idea was revealed in parashat Pekudei as an answer to the question of why the use made with gold is not specified.
Gold corresponds to the “good” and to the intellect (specifically to Torah) and therefore learning Torah does not need an additional motive, just as the good does not need to be pursued except for its own sake. This is what it means that the gold of the Land of Israel is good—the Torah of the Land of Israel is good for its own sake.
Silver corresponds to the pleasant and to our emotions. We should seek those emotions that are pleasant, to ourselves and to others. Most people in the world find silver pleasant. Some might ask: why do I love silver? And think the answer is: because it is beneficial. But it is not just that it's beneficial. Even before it is beneficial it is pleasant.
Finally, copper corresponds to habits and to the useful. Only habits that are useful are worthwhile. Copper should be strong enough to hold us together.
Diversity
Still, there is a lingering question: why was not everything made of gold? It seems appropriate that in the Temple, everything should have been gold, including the sockets and the altar of burnt offering. Why the need for additional materials?
The Temple is meant to unite us—to create a “Union of Israel” where all of Israel would serve God together. First, all the people of Israel, and then “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.” The silver-like people with an emotional persona are needed. All shades, the entire congregation is needed. People who are still in gestation are needed. The habitual/behavioral persona like copper is likened to the development stage of gestation; the silver-persona, is likened to the suckling phase of life. Gold represents intellect and the stage of intellectual maturity in life. A person who is at this stage is independent.
As we have discussed many times, especially in the teaching of the soul, there are dependent people. Someone at the level of silver, and certainly someone at the level of copper, is dependent. But someone at the level of gold is self-aligned and not dependent on anyone.
The leader who is like gold, dependent on no human is still entirely dependent on God. As we will read in the Torah portion of Vayikra, “When a king sins”—who is a leader? One whom, “Havayah is his God,” or as the sages state, “One who has none above him but Havayah his God.” Every Jew has a spark of the Mashiach, the true leader, and so this king includes everyone from those who are gold-like to those who are copper-like. The letters of “king” are the initials of “brain, heart, liver.” All the types are needed in the Tabernacle and all the types are part of the king.
The Nature of the Good
Everything, even silver, has a point of gold, and even copper has a point of gold. How do we see this? When we add the words in both models together, we have “gold-good,” “silver-pleasant,” and “copper-useful,” their sum comes to 1377, which is divisible by the value of “good”—everything is included in good. Specifically, 1377 is the product of “good” and 81, where 81 is the value of the exalted “I am,” the first word of the Ten Commandments, and thus, everything together amounts to “I am” times “good,” or, alternately, “I am” times “nature.”
Which nature is this referring to? Earlier we mentioned that God’s intrinsic nature is good. So this product is “good” times “nature” referring to the Almighty’s essential good essence. He has no other designation besides being the essence of good. And “the nature of the good is to do good,” as in the verse, “God is good to all, and His compassion is over all His actions.”
(from a class given on the 26th of First Adar, 5771)
