The Sfas Emes sees this pasuk as being about more than architecture. On Shabbos and on Rosh Chodesh a special channel is opened to give us easier access to the world’s inner meaning, its spirituality and pnimiyus. Shabbos and Rosh Chodesh can be the keys to enable us to gain access to pnimiyus even on the weekdays. These special days are designed for us to leave the world of the mundane and enter the spiritual realm.
It is befitting that the very first mitzvah Klal Yisrael received involves a spiritual microcosm of new creation and beginning for each month – kiddush hachodesh.
The Jewish people do not usher in months like the rest of the world. There is the physical creation and formation of things and then there is the spiritual. Months come and go on their own by the cycle of the moon. But the task of spiritually transforming the world to accept a new month can only happen through Klal Yisrael, and specifically through beis din. Only our chachamim have the sacred strength and power to effect such great spiritual change, which is why only they can declare when a month begins. Kiddush hachodesh is not a mere ceremony of the calendar and the changing of the month. Rather, it is a sanctification of the month, giving it renewed holiness and spiritual potential.
We suggest that this is why people had such fervor (see Gemora Rosh Hashanah) in trying to become the first witnesses to testify as to the new moon’s appearance. It was a great zechus to be the harbingers of spiritual change and rejuvenation. In fact, this is why the Torah requires witnesses.
Sefer Bilvavi Mishkan Evneh points out that the word for witness is eid, spelled ayin daled, which is da, daled ayin spelled backwards – the testimony of the witnesses must come from a high level of daas, knowledge. When it comes to kiddush hachodesh, those people who want to passionately grow and become renewed would rush to beis din to establish the new moon, sanctifying and providing Klal Yisrael with opportunities for spiritual change that came with the new month’s appearance.
Expanding on this, based on the Maharal (Gevuros Hashem, Chapter 46), the Or Gedalyahu (Moadim page 59-60) describes the relationship between physical and seasonal changes and their spiritual parallels. When winter arrives and it’s cold outside, the plants and trees show little signs of life. The spiritual message is that it is time to “buckle down,” “get inside” and retain growth already achieved. When spring arrives and the trees begin to bud with fruits and leaves, Hashem is telling us that it is time for new spiritual development and progress.
Similarly, when we see the new moon at the start of each month, it is a sign from Hashem that we can renew ourselves spiritually and become new people. Rabbeinu Yona in Brachos explains that although the moon is not really new each month, the fact that it appears this way is cause for performing kiddush levana and making a bracha on its “rejuvenation.” Explains Rav Gedalya Schorr: the “newness” of the moon means that Hashem wants us to react with newness in our spirituality. The hischadshus of the levana is a time when a person can be mechadesh himself, especially on Parshas HaChodesh, when a potent emphasis on spiritual renewal occurs as a gift from Hashem.