The Mask That Reveals
Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer
Parashat Terumah
Puzzle: What is the connection between Purim + Sukkot?
Of all of the holidays, Purim is the one we will celebrate in the world to come, and in that world to come, the righteous will make a toast in a sukkah with walls made from the skin of the Leviaton.--the mythological sea monster of chaos.
But that’s not where we’re going tonight.: Purim + Sukkot are connected through a word: schach. Say it. It feels good.. ס כ כ. It’s the material for the roof of the sukkah (sukkah, also connected to the word schach). Schach, from the root סכך or נסך meaning: to weave. Schach is a roof woven together from organic material, that must protect us from the wind and provide some shade, but schach is only kosher if you can peer up and see the stars. It’s only schach if it conceals and protects, but also reveals. The nature of schach, and the nature of weaving (and I only know this because my mom’s loom took up half of our kitchen growing up), is a dance between twig, fiber, yarn, branch, and the space between--concealing and revealing. The Schach is this movement.
But what’s the connection to Purim? The central costume element of Purim is the masecha (מסכה), the mask. מסכה sprouts from the very same root ,סכך to weave. The Purim mask, unlike our newly-acquired full mouth/and nose coverings, is woven to not only conceal but reveal. With holes for our eyes to peer out of, with shapes to accentuate what is usually hidden, and to conceal what is normally revealed. Through the מסכה, we consciously frame + divulge elements of ourselves, our alter-egos. The מסכה, like the סכך, reveals more by obscuring.
This year, Purim coincides not only with sister מסכה/mask festivals Mardi Gras and Carnival, but with parashat Terumah, the episode in Torah where Moshe and God secret themselves behind a cloud for a 40 day, 40 night tete a tete, completely concealed from all of the people shivering at the bottom of the mountain. The intimate convo begins with God’s instruction manual for building the portable home, the mishkan, what the sages described as an in-law apartment where God will dwell amongst the people.
Central to the construction of the mishkan, is...schach! Wovennes. The weaving of tapestries, layers of textiles, spun yarn, of every vibrant dyed color, of goat hair and dolphin skin, of linen and wool. But even before the tapestries, schach appears in an unexpected place. Inside the Holy of Holies.
The Holy of Holies, the womb-like physical and spiritual center of the entire tabernacle enterprise. The inner sanctum. Where one person is allowed to enter (the High Priest) and only one day of the year (Yom Kippur). Inside this enclosure lives the original ark, made of gold and acacia wood, and inside the ark live the sacred tablets, the original Torah. Unlike our arks today, this one did not have a door, rather, because it was open at the top, it had a lid, Called a כפורת (kaporet). For it came to life ritually on Yom Kippur.
When you hear ‘lid’, don’t think ‘tupperware.’ For this lid/cover puts even the top of a faberge egg to shame. Made of solid gold, of one piece, and sculpted on either side of it were כרובים, cherubim. Don’t think sweet chubby babies, think fierce sphinx or gargoyle-like creatures. They are designed to protect and conceal our most precious cargo--the luchot, the Torah. They need to look tough. The description of their wings is where the schach comes in:
וְהָי֣וּ הַכְּרֻבִים֩ פֹּרְשֵׂ֨י כְנָפַ֜יִם לְמַ֗עְלָה
Their wings spread upward
סֹכְכִ֤ים בְּכַנְפֵיהֶם֙
Their wings sochech were woven like schach
עַל־הַכַּפֹּ֔רֶת וּפְנֵיהֶ֖ם אִ֣ישׁ אֶל־אָחִ֑יו
And their faces--one toward the other
These fierce protectors of עדות, of the Divine Word beneath them, aren’t so scary after all. They stand face to face, wing to wing, wings sochechim, in a loose weave, with sunlight filtering through. And in the space between wings and gaze, God’s Presence is revealed. It is here, between the wingtips of these two keruvim, that Divine communication and transmission and connection takes place. In the space between the schach.
The keruvim know that concealing and revealing are not opposites, they are 2 sides of the same tapestry. In order to reveal, something must be concealed, and vise versa. They know this resilient dance, Of where to protect, and where to let the outside in.
Unlike our communicative keruvim, In the Purim story, no one faces each other directly. Not Esther and Mordecai--who communicate through messengers. Not the King, who communicates only with the help of his scepter. No face to face, only hiddenness--it’s baked into the name of our heroine, Esther--hester, hiddenness, it’s baked into the hamentasch, whose soft gooey center is obscured by thick layers of dough.
The world of Esther is the world of concealment. Where God is totally eclipsed. Hester Panim, God’s face is hidden. Our Identity is hidden. And this world of concealment summons the force of Haman, and leads us to the brink of extinction.
The tikkun comes on Purim, when our job is to reveal what has been concealed--within ourselves, within the world around us. Through absurdity, through humor, through masechot, masks--the kind that both reveal and conceal, that protect against wind, but allow us to see the stars. When a מסכה a mask is opaque, when it only conceals what is behind it, when we confuse the mask with the thing itself, it takes on the other, more ominous definition of masecha -- an idol.
If the space between the wings of the כרובים were too close, obscuring the Divine Presence titrating through the schach, the keruvim themselves would become idols--masechot--as heretical as the golden calf. Key difference? The schach. Concealing for the sake of revealing.
Our masechot, for the time being, are of the opaque variety. Face to face encounters, hard to come by. Sometimes even with those we live with. We are in hester panim, the time of the hidden face...and we’ve gotten comfortable there. So comfortable, we have forgotten the dual art of conceal and reveal.
Which can be dangerous. Which can make an idol of hiddenness.
Which is why Purim is essential this year--to remind us of a mask’s potential. To remind us of the difference between a masecha, an opaque mask with stale air that we hide behind until hiddenness defines us, and a masecha--a schach mask that allows us to selectively reveal, play hide, and seek, dance, discover, and like the space between the כרובים wings, to come alive with authentic communication and connection.
