출애굽기 28:5의 인용 해설

ואין עושין שררה פחות משנים – as it is written (Exodus 28:5): “they, therefore shall receive the gold, [the blue, purple, and crimson yarns and the fine linen]”; the least of many is two.

This verse may also be explained in consonance with Baba Batra 8, according to which monies for charities may be collected by no fewer than two collectors, whereas distribution of such monies requires the presence of three people. This is in order not to allow arbitrary decisions of an a individual as to who should get part of this money and how much. The second person's presence when collecting the funds is in order that the collectors not be suspected of pocketing some of these funds for their own purposes. The Talmud derives this rule from the words: "and they shall take the gift, etc." Interestingly, both Tossaphot and the Ran claim that the presence of two collectors is mandatory when the amounts are fixed, such as a head tax levied for the poor, whereas when the amounts collected are subject to variation, i.e. each donor decides how much to contribute, three people are required to be present during the collection. Actually, according to halachah, even a single expert is empowered to collect a mandatory levy from people as we know from Sanhedrin 5 where the Talmud empowers an expert judge to pronounce judgment. Rabbi Nachman cites himself as an example of a solitary judge handing down decisions in monetary disputes. [Naturally, the litigants had first agreed to submit to the decision of the single expert judge. Ed.] Tossaphot there write that such a single judge can impose his decision on the litigant. If that is so in matters of litigation, it is obviously the case also where only a mere assertion of authority is involved such as in collecting donations, etc. If a situation normally requiring three judges may be handled by a single expert judge, how much more so can a single expert judge deal with matters which even under normal circumstances only require two laymen. This helps us to understand the words: "speak to the children of Israel" in the sense of "exercise authority." G'd empowered Moses to single-handedly exercise authority when it came to collecting funds for the building of the Tabernacle. Moses was empowered to both distribute the funds and the materials to the respective artisans without having to give an accounting and he was also empowered to collect these funds without anyone supervising what he did. This extraordinary power was restricted to Moses. Whenever anyone else engaged in a similar activity, the rule of "they shall take the contribution" applied. When you will examine the Torah's report of what actually happened (Exodus 36,3), you will find that the people took the various materials from Moses (only), seeing he alone had collected same. Moses did so both with the contributions which were of fixed amounts (the shekel "levy") as well as with the free-willed donations which varied in size and value. We now understand the letter ו which preceded the word יקחו as contrasting the extra-ordinary authority G'd had granted Moses at the outset of this portion with the normal procedures..