“Israel, and everything that he had, traveled and came to Beersheba, and he slaughtered feast-offerings to the God of his father Isaac” (Genesis 46:1). “Israel, and everything that he had, traveled and came to Beersheba” – where did he go? Rav Naḥman said: He went to cut down the cedars that his grandfather Abraham had planted in Beersheba, just as it says: “He planted…[in Beersheba]” (Genesis 21:33).
It is written: “And the central bar inside the boards” (Exodus 26:28). Rabbi Levi said: The central bar was thirty-two cubits long. Where did they find it at that time?3Where did they get such a long piece of wood in the wilderness, just when they needed it to build that part of the Tabernacle? It teaches that they were hidden with them from the days of Jacob our patriarch.
That is what is written: “And everyone with whom acacia wood was found” (Exodus 35:24). “With whom [acacia wood] could be found” is not written here, but rather, “with whom [acacia wood] was found.”4This implies that it was already in their possession. Rabbi Levi said: They chopped them down from Migdal Tzevaaya,5This is the name of a place in the Land of Israel. and they brought them with them to Egypt, and neither was a knot nor a crack was found in them.
There were acacia trees in Migdela, and they treated them as prohibited due to the sanctity of the Ark.6Even in the times of the Sages of the midrash, acacia trees grew in Migdela, but due to the tradition that the wood eventually used for the Ark and the rest of the Tabernacle had been cut from there, the people of Migdela would not make use of the acacia trees. They came and asked Rabbi Ḥanina, colleague of the Rabbis. He said to them: ‘Do not deviate from the custom of your fathers.’