Parshas KiTisa

This week's portion is Parshas KiTisa, which literally means, "When you will take", referring to the half-silver-sheckle tax taken for the the Tabernacle in the Wilderness. The portion deals primarilly with the communal sin of the Golden Calf, and Moshe's (eventually successfull) attempts to gain forgiveness from G-d Almighty on behalf of the Children of Israel. Because this portion deals with such uncomfortable subject matter (the worship of idols just a short while after the receiving of the Torah on Mt. Sinai), and the more uplifting portions are in fact very cryptic, I'll share a simple concept in Hassidic philosophy that I believe relates to returning from a trip to Israel.
Because, in Judaism, we conceive of G-d as a "transcendent" figure, traditional concepts of "Holy" and "Mundane" do not necessarily correspond to "Better" and "Worse" as one might otherwise assume. Similarly, we say that G-d is finite just as he is infinite; that he incompasses, equally, two opposites. The concrete example, is of course, the difference between the Holy Land, Israel, and the rest of the mundane world. In Israel, spirituality is very present, as many religions trace their roots here. In America, however, secularism rules, and G-dliness, so to speak, is hidden. This dichotomy, however, belies the true nature of G-d; He is equally "present" on the Temple Mount as in Walmart. Therefore, the way to have a genuine spiritual experience, to connect with G-dliness, would be to somehow connect to the transcendental essence which equally pervades the Holy and the Mundane. Therefore, if we hang a mezuzah which we purchased in Yerushalayim in our apartment in New York, or share the shabbos experience with the uninitiated, then we are truly connected with G-dliness, on an even higher level that when these things seemed so present; when every door had a mezuzah, or every street was empty for the Sabbath. This, for me, is the real meaning of the Land of Israel and of Jerusalem, that G-d should have a dwelling place in this simple world.