WHY WAS THE COMMAND REGARDING THE MISHKAN WRITTEN BEFORE THE SIN OF THE GOLDEN CALF?
According to the view that the command regarding the building of the Mishkan was only issued after the sin of the golden calf, a question arises: Why does the Torah record that command before the account of the sin? One might suggest that the order in which events are recorded in the Torah is not chronological and factual, but rather spiritual, conceptual and educational. This order emphasizes what we saw earlier; even according to Rashi, God’s rested His Shekhina in the Mishkan le-khatchila, independent of the sin of the golden calf. Moreover, through this sequence, the command regarding the Mishkan is preceded by the revelation at Mount Sinai, the connection between it and the Mishkan having been noted in one of the earlier lectures, and it is followed by the sin of the golden calf, which profoundly impacted on the Mishkan’s final character. A question remains: How does the Seforno who maintains that the sin involving the golden calf not only impacted on the command regarding the Mis
