פירוש על שקלים 6:1

שלשה עשר שופרות – [thirteen] chests, narrow from the top and wide from the bottom curved like a Shofar because of the deceivers who would not be able to put in their hands into them to show themselves as if they are giving/putting into it, while they are taking from it, and further on, it will explain why there are thirteen chests and thirteen tables and in which location they are placed (see also Mishnah 5 in this chapter).

Introduction Our mishnah describes certain physical features of the Temple. Fans of the Raiders of the Lost Ark series will enjoy this mishnah, as well as tomorrow’s.

שלש עשרה השתחויות – and further on (Mishnah 3) it will explain where they were.

There were in the Temple thirteen chests, thirteen tables and thirteen prostrations. There were thirteen chests in the Temple to collect money for various items. These will be explained below in mishnah five. There were thirteen tables, which will be explained below in mishnah four. Finally, there were thirteen places in which people would prostrate themselves and these will be explained in mishnah three. Notice the chiastic order chests, tables and prostrations and below we will see prostrations, tables and chests.

כנגד דיר העצים – a chamber/compartment (see also Tractate Middot, Chapter 5, Mishnah 4) where they would store there all the wood of the pile of wood on the altar of the Temple and it was in the northeast corner of the Women’s Court.

[Members] of the household of Rabban Gamaliel and of Rabbi Hananiah the chief of the priests used would prostrate fourteen [times. And where was the additional [prostration]? In front of the wood storage yard, for they had a tradition from their forefathers that the Ark was hidden there. The people of the household of Rabban Gamaliel and Rabbi Hananiah the chief of the priests would do an extra prostration. They would do this extra prostration in front of the wood storage yard, the place where the wood that was used to fuel the altar was stored. They prostrated there because they had a tradition that that was where the Ark of the Covenant was buried. There are two main traditions concerning the fate of the Ark in rabbinic literature. The first holds that King Josaiah buried it in the Temple and the second holds that it was carried off to Babylonia when the Temple was destroyed. The third holds that it is sitting in a storehouse in Washington D.C. (just kidding).

ששם הארון נגנז – for King Josiah commanded that it be hidden below in the curved secret and tortuous path that Solomon built at the time when he built the Temple and knew that it would eventually be destroyed. And this is what is written in II Chronicles, chapter 35, verse 3: “He said to the Levites, consecrated to the LORD, who taught all Israel, ‘Put the Holy Ark in the House that Solomon [the son of David, king of Israel] built” (also compare Talmud Yoma 53b) and with it was hidden the staff of Aaron and the bottle of Manna (which was preserved) and the flask of anointing oil.