Erasure is easier than repair.
Starting over is easier than staying.
Ki Tisa is about the moment we decide which one we will choose.
The Mediator (oil pastel)
Healer of the brokenhearted, binder of our wounds, counter of uncountable stars, you know who we are.
Psalm 51 Adapted.
Dedicated
To the One I choose again and again.
To the covenant that outlives anger.
To love that does not collapse under shame.
To the bond I move toward even when I am uncertain.
To those who remain inside anger without turning it into erasure.
To those who intervene when something fragile is at risk.
To those who know what it means to count, and what it means to be treated as if they do not.
To those who see light even in the absence of certainty.
Where We Have Been
We have traveled from bondage into freedom. Through water. Through revelation. Into covenant.
Instruction has been given for the Mishkan, a dwelling place where presence can remain with human beings across time.
The work until now has been construction.
Structure. Preparation. A container sturdy enough to hold what is holy without collapsing under it.
The Mishkan is not architecture.
It is love trying to stay.
Whenever love tries to stay, it must reckon with what will erode it: fear that hardens, shame that hides, anger that scorches, neglect that empties a room without anyone noticing.
Covenant is not tested in revelation. It is tested in absence.
When presence thins, the body does not debate theology. It reacts. It searches for signs of return. If return has not been reliable, the nervous system tightens, the body braces, and fear edges toward panic.
Ki Tisa interrupts construction with rupture.
Love does not fail because it is flawed. It strains because it is alive. Every covenant reaches the moment when presence withdraws, certainty thins, and the question emerges: Will this bond survive disappointment?
Ki Tisa is that moment.
Before rupture, a census is taken.
Each person gives half a shekel. Not more. Not less.
The rich cannot give more. The poor cannot give less.
Each person counts equally.
But each gives only half.
No one is whole alone.
Wholeness happens between us.
To count someone is to make their presence structural. Their absence alters the whole. It means disappearance would matter.
A census is sacred. It is the tangible recognition of every life. It structures belonging. It protects against erasure. It honors presence as unearned but essential. It reminds the nervous system, the heart, and the soul: you matter. You are part of the whole.
I think of the little girl who learned early that some rooms were not built with her in mind. The girl who measured every doorway before entering. The girl who dragged her brother on a blanket because she would not leave him behind, even when her own body was small and fragile.
Is she counted?
Ki Tisa insists she is.
She does not give more to earn her place. She does not give less because the ground was uneven. She brings her half shekel like everyone else. Not as inspiration. Not as burden. As part of the whole.
Belonging precedes performance. Dignity precedes contribution. Counting is protection against erasure.
Each of us arrives incomplete. Covenant is what makes us whole.
Covenant is not enmeshment. It is not distance. It is secure.
Secure means we can disagree and not disappear. We can name harm without dissolving the bond. We can be distinct and still belong. Rupture is not the end. Repair is part of the design. Return is possible.
Worth cannot be purchased. Belonging cannot be negotiated. Love counts first. Correction comes later.
Where We Are Now
Immediately after this act of counting, continuity destabilizes.
Moses ascends the mountain and does not return when expected.
The one who held the connection becomes absent.
Absence tests covenant.
Without reliable return, absence begins to feel like abandonment. The body tightens. Fear looks for something solid.
The people gather their gold and melt it.
When Moses does not return, the space he leaves feels unheld. Longing has nowhere to land. Instead of remaining inside uncertainty, they pour their fear into something they can touch. Molten longing cools into metal.
The calf is not cartoon villainy. It is longing that could not tolerate waiting.
The golden calf becomes premature certainty.
It does not disappear.
But it cannot see.
It cannot mirror.
It cannot intervene.
It cannot set us right.
It cannot remind us of our better nature.
It cannot carry the weight of covenant.
Gold built the Mishkan. Gold lined the Ark. Gold becomes holy when it is shaped toward presence. The same gold becomes an idol when it replaces relationship.
We reshape what was meant for encounter into something that will not answer.
We can hold it. We can give it away. We can stash it for a rainy day. We can trade it. We can spend its value. We can control it.
We can even let it gather dust.
I know how quickly we do this.
A few nights ago, at the musical Once, I heard the lyric: “And I love her so, I wouldn’t trade her for gold.”
The line settled into me like a question.
Living in a disabled body, access is never decorative. It is structural. It is what allows a person to remain intact inside covenant.
In Ki Tisa, each person gives half a shekel. Not more. Not less. No one funds the Mishkan alone. Holiness is built through mutual contribution. Shared weight. Shared will.
When safety is delayed, something subtle can begin to tilt. One half may start carrying more than it was designed to carry. Old instincts surface. Adjust. Minimize. Need less. Make yourself easier so the bond does not fracture.
I recognize that instinct in myself.
The part that believes love survives better if I am low-maintenance.
The part that confuses endurance with devotion.
The part that would rather shrink than risk tension.
That instinct is my golden calf.
But covenant does not ask one half to disappear so the structure feels stable. Covenant asks both halves to build.
The first tablets were given.
The second were carved.
Repair requires hands.
Repair requires effort.
Repair requires shared will.
Gold built the Mishkan when it safeguarded presence. Gold became an idol when it replaced relationship.
Anything we trade for the illusion of stability becomes a calf.
Anything we refuse to trade becomes covenant.
I am learning that refusing self-erasure is part of covenantal courage.
Not indulgence.
Not excess.
Structure.
Because love worthy of covenant builds what protects the vulnerable body.
And love that endures does not require disappearance in order to survive.
But Moses does not shrink.
When destruction is threatened, he does not disappear to preserve his own intimacy with the Divine. He binds his fate to the people. He refuses erasure. He refuses the fantasy of starting over with something simpler.
That is covenantal courage.
And I am beginning to understand that refusing self-erasure is part of that courage too.
Covenant is not martyrdom.
Covenant is not one half carrying the structure.
Covenant is not postponing what protects the vulnerable body.
The first tablets were given.
The second were carved.
Repair requires hands.
Repair requires effort.
Repair requires shared will.
Gold built the Mishkan when it safeguarded presence.
Gold became an idol when it replaced relationship.
When resources exist but protection is deferred, gold is no longer sacred.
Anything we trade for certainty becomes a calf.
Anything we refuse to trade becomes covenant.
I do not want to be the partner who shrinks to preserve peace.
I do not want to disappear so the relationship feels easier.
I want to bring my half fully — and expect the same.
Not indulgence.
Not excess.
Structure.
Because love that would not trade me for gold would build what keeps me safe.
And love that is worthy of covenant does not ask me to erase myself in order to remain.
And I am no longer willing to trade safety for quiet.
I am no longer willing to shrink so that love feels affordable.
I am no longer willing to call postponement peace.
Gold is stable. Gold does not argue. Gold does not require vulnerability.
But gold cannot love.
Love is the only true alchemy. It does not turn metal into something else. It turns fear into presence. It turns reaction into return.
Anger rises in response to rupture.
Anger is not the opposite of love. It is attachment protesting separation. It is longing that refuses to let the bond dissolve quietly.
We argue because we want contact. Distance feels unbearable.
God turns toward erasure.
Erasure says: I will begin again without you.
Erasure is the fantasy that starting over will hurt less than staying.
But erasure is not repair. It is the refusal to feel grief.
When love does not intervene, we fragment.
When presence is absent, the nervous system hardens.
Attachment contracts. Splitting arises. Projection distorts perception. Defensive withdrawal becomes habitual.
Relational bonds weaken. Trust erodes. The covenant begins to feel optional, not structural.
Human beings suffer inside absence. The soul remembers what it feels like to be unseen.
Love is preserved, but it migrates. It migrates inward, it migrates toward another, it migrates to the One who is willing and able to receive it.
Harm in covenant is rarely dramatic. It is quieter. It looks like withholding help because we are angry. It looks like refusing to fix what protects the other because we want them to feel our frustration. It looks like delaying maintenance as punishment. It looks like ignoring what we know matters. It looks like silence used as leverage. It looks like pretending we did not hear the request. It looks like saying, “I’ll do it when I feel like it.” It looks like tending our pride more carefully than we tend the bond. It looks like refusing to assist someone who depends on us because we want them to understand our pain.
Moses: The Mediator
Moses has lived between annihilation and belonging from the beginning.
A child in a basket among reeds, suspended between death and survival.
Women intervened before he could speak. His mother hid him. His sister watched him. Pharaoh’s daughter lifted him from the water.
Before he could preserve covenant for a nation, covenant preserved him.
He was counted before he could count.
Held before he could hold.
Saved before he could prove anything.
Later, as a shepherd, he protected what was vulnerable. He moved toward what could be harmed and placed himself between danger and the defenseless.
That becomes internal structure.
When fury rises, he does not disappear.
When annihilation is threatened, he does not collapse.
He knows continuity can survive rupture.
Moses does something astonishing.
He remains inside anger and speaks:
“Turn from Your fierce anger. Relent from destroying Your people.”
He refuses erasure.
He binds his fate to theirs. If You erase them, erase me.
Mediation is dangerous. To intervene is to risk being rejected by both sides.
But he preserves continuity when continuity is fragile.
Moses embodies ahava, the love that chooses presence even when it costs everything. This is what makes him extraordinary: he loved the people. He loved God. And it is this love that allowed the covenant to endure.
If God said to him, “Let us begin again together,” he could have surrendered. He could have returned to intimacy with the Divine. Instead, he intervened. Because he loved.
I imagine if I had been offered a one-on-one relationship with the Divine, I do not know that I would have had the courage to choose the people. That is how astonishing Moses is. He refuses to reduce the people to their worst moments. He threads connection through the chaos, reminding us that in any relationship we are called to help our beloved find the thread between us again, to re-center them rather than freeze them in their failure.
Archetypes Among Us
These archetypes live inside us:
The Idol Maker who reaches for certainty when fear spikes.
The Eraser who would rather start over than stay disappointed.
The Mediator who remembers shared history when anger narrows the field.
The Shepherd who protects what is vulnerable.
The Little Girl who insists on being counted.
The Woman in White who over-functions to preserve structure.
The Woman in Blue who mediates, threads mercy and accountability, and allows intensity and desire to coexist.
All of them appear in committed relationship, in friendship, in community.
Repair and Teshuvah
Smashing tablets is easy, carving them is hard.
The first tablets were given. The second were carved.
This is teshuvah.
Not pretending nothing happened.
Not erasing rupture.
Teshuvah is return through participation.
Return through effort.
Return through carving with our own hands.
Light follows those who remain inside rupture without abandoning covenant.
It is easy to smash a vessel. It takes seconds.
It is much harder to build one. It takes repetition.
Humility. Courage. Softness. Confrontation. Effort.
Repair is what allows love to continue to dwell between people. Repair restores continuity after rupture.
Repair cannot occur unilaterally. It requires willingness from both parties.
Repair sounds like this:
“I see that hurt you. I was wrong. I will do that differently next time.”
Repair looks like: altering structures so safety increases, making spaces accessible, ensuring maintenance is timely, creating continuity in the vessel of care.
Couch Upstairs / Clinical Reflection
Upstairs on the couch, I watch this every week: rigidity, bracing, defensiveness, arguing. They think they are arguing about money, or sex, or time together. But beneath it, they are arguing to count. They are arguing to matter.
“I just want to feel appreciated.”
“I want you to want me.”
“You never notice what I do around here.”
“I feel invisible when we’re together.”
“It’s like what I want or need doesn’t matter.”
“Nothing I say seems to make a difference.”
“Does anything I do count for you?”
“I feel like I’m always reaching, and you’re not noticing.”
Then someone risks softness. The current shifts.
That is teshuvah. Not submission. Return.
“I didn’t realize how much I was shutting you out.”
“I don’t want to keep hurting you. I want us to be able to speak without fear.”
“I hear you. I’m still here. We can try again.”
“You matter to me. I don’t want to lose what we have.”
“And you matter to me. I don’t want to lose us.”
Repair restores trust. Trust allows light to land. Presence becomes durable.
Blue Among Us
Blue links below and above.
Moses’ radiant face as he descends Sinai is not heat, it is light. It is continuity.
It is earned radiance.
Each beam is forged in negotiation, in confrontation, in surrender, in persistence. It is the glow of one who has held presence in the midst of absence, who has remained faithful to covenant when destruction whispered, who has threaded mercy and accountability through the cracks of failure.
It is radiance born not of perfection, but of resilience. Not of escaping anger, but of moving through it without collapse. Not of accumulating power, but of carrying responsibility for the vulnerable and the faltering.
It is the light of a mediator who refused to let destruction be the final word.
It is the glow of ahava made visible, the love that chooses to endure, to intercede, to repair and to return.
It is the reflection of covenant preserved.
His face shines because he has navigated annihilation and returned intact.
Because he has threaded continuity through rupture.
Because he has made repair visible and possible.
Because he is whole, not in the absence of struggle, but in the fidelity of his presence.
This is the radiance we are invited to seek. Not to dazzle or dominate, but to hold, to witness, to persist, to care.
Collapsing says, I will disappear so you do not leave.
Erupting says, I will overpower you so you cannot wound me.
Blue says, I can remain and I can soften.
Moses is blue.
Shema.
Not split.
One.
The girl.
The woman in white.
The mediator.
The thread.
Not metal and water at war.
Woven.
Mirror Turn
When fear rises in you, what do you build?
Metal or covenant?
Certainty or relationship?
Will you cling to the calf, or thread mercy and repair through what is broken?
Where have you hardened instead of carving again?
Where have you mistaken stability for intimacy?
Where are you being invited to return instead of retreat?
Where are you being asked to carve instead of smash?
If there is one concrete change that would increase safety this week, make it.
Covenant lives in action.
The Vow
This week, I will not trade living covenant for the comfort of being right.
If I am hurt, I will name it clearly and specifically.
If I have caused harm, I will return with honesty and changed behavior.
If a bond is alive, I will protect it.
I will count before I correct.
Blessings
May you remember the water that held you before you had words.
May rupture not harden you into metal.
May you risk love even when it costs you certainty.
May you protect the love you have and would not trade for gold.
May you see that love migrates and preserves itself when we fail.
May you recognize your capacity to dwell within continuity.
May your eyes remain open to mirrors that reflect your sacredness.
May your heart remember that counting precedes correction.
May blue thread remind you who you belong to.
I see you. I bless you.
Shabbat Shalom!
Love, Jenny