And you shall place the table on the outer side of the dividing curtain and the menorah opposite the table, on the southern side of the Mishkan, and you shall place the table on the northern side.
If you’re like me (and I have every reason
to believe you are not) you don’t walk into a room
without rearranging the chairs
especially if you’re in charge of what happens
in that room. It’s not a demonstration of power
but rather a hidden knowledge, or at least
gut feeling that whatever is about to happen
in that room would be better if the chairs
were closer together and maybe curved.
You (probably not, but for sure I) put just as much
thought into how much light you allow to
pour out of the sockets in that room.
Again, not a control thing, but an innate
sensibility that your rearrangements will
allow the room’s impending occupants
to feel so holy, they’ll be talking about
it all the way until they write the next Torah.
They’ll be basing the success of any future event
solely on what they experienced in your room
half of which is because of the intimacy allowed
by your precise chair placement!
People should be as close together as possible.
(Pandemic sensibility be damned.)
If your holy experience isn’t informed by
your neighbor’s breath on the back of your neck
why even bother? Everything in the tabernacle
had its exact place. Where the curtains were hung,
what the colors were they used to weave
the entrance screen together were holy.
So move the chairs if you must.
I know I must.
Your efforts make a difference.
We’re saving souls out here.