Sforno on Exodus 35/ספורנו על שמות ל״ה

1ויקהל משה אלה הדברים אשר צוה, the matters I told you about earlier when I commanded you what to do during the weekdays, things G’d had told me when I was on Mount Sinai.

1וביום השביעי יהיה לכם קדש, and you may not violate the Sabbath even in order to complete the Tabernacle sooner, although the work on the Tabernacle is also a sacred task.

1לא תבערו אש, even though generally speaking, lighting a fire is not a productive but a destructive activity, seeing that it is an almost indispensable ingredient in most activities the Torah prohibited it as unsuitable for the Sabbath.

1קחו מאתכם, you shall select from amongst yourselves men to collect the donations for G’d.

2כל נדיב לבו, the donations must not be forced contributions.

3'יביאה את תרומת ה, he shall bring the voluntary donation together with the terumat Hashem which is mandatory (the half shekel). The latter is known as beka lagulgolet.

1את המשכן את אהלו, the materials which Moses had already told the people about in 34,32.

1ויבואו האנשים על הנשים, together with the women who were contributing voluntarily. The men accompanied the women to indicate that the women had their approval.

2וכל איש אשר הניף תנופת זהב, together with the women who had donated golden jewelry also every male who donated such golden offerings. The Torah states simply that donations of different materials were not all lumped together but that all silver donations irrespective of by whom, as well as all donations of gold whether by men or by women, were kept together based on the raw material they consisted of.

1טוו את העזים, while the wool was still on the goats, as per Shabbat 99. The reason was to lend an additional sheen to the yarn spun from this hair. There are many materials which suffer a reduction in appearance once they are separated from their original habitat. We all are aware of this phenomenon with bees’ honey. [The author cites other examples of a similar nature occurring with products that I am not familiar with. Ed.]