Our Sages, of blessed memory, say that when Hashem came to give the Torah to the people of Israel, He imposed it upon them by coercion: "The Most High, Blessed be He, placed the mountain upon them like a basin and said to them, 'If you accept the Torah\u2014all the better, and if not, your grave will be there.'" That is to say, the Israelites were forced by Hashem to receive the Torah and did not receive it of their own free will. However, this description of the events does not agree, at first glance, with the account of the giving of the Torah in front of Mount Sinai, where the Jews are seen as accepting the Torah voluntarily, to the point that they proclaimed: "We will do and we will listen"\u2014they put "we will do" before "we will listen" (understand)! <\/p>\n
WE WILL DO AND WE WILL LISTEN<\/p>\n
It is here that the profound novelty of what took place at Mount Sinai finds its full expression. It is true that even before this, the Israelites were bound to God and accepted His Torah and His precepts, but at the moment they stood before Mount Sinai, something extraordinary occurred.<\/p>\n
Rashi explains that the declaration of "we will do and we will listen" was in relation to the commandments that Moses transmitted to the people of Israel before the Giving of the Torah. These are the Seven Laws of the Sons of Noah, the commandments that were ordained at Marah, and the special ordinances that God commanded as preparations for the Giving of the Torah. Regarding these, the Israelites declared "we will do and we will listen" and willingly accepted them. But this did not constitute acceptance of the commandments that the Most High would later give them at Mount Sinai.<\/p>\n
TRUE ACCEPTANCE<\/p>\n
Standing before Mount Sinai, the Israelites were transformed into converts. One of the conditions for conversion is the acceptance of fulfilling the commandments. Therefore, it was not possible to be content with merely accepting the commandments that existed before the Giving of the Torah, since the Torah had not yet been given at Sinai by the Almighty, and thus there could be no true acceptance of these commandments. These commandments were something that had not yet come into being, and the Israelites had no idea of their nature.<\/p>\n
The fundamental acceptance of the mitzvot, through which the Israelites entered into the covenant with God, took place at the time of the Giving of the Torah. At that moment, Hashem left them no option but to accept the Torah, in the spirit of "He placed the mountain upon them like a basin." Only in the time of Ahasuerus did the Jews again accept the Torah of their own free will.<\/p>\n
A NEW REALITY<\/p>\n
In other words, all the precepts and spiritual levels attained before the Giving of the Torah were not at all within the sphere of the precepts after the Giving of the Torah. Even with regard to Moses himself, the Revelation at the Giving of the Torah was of an infinitely higher level than the revelation at the burning bush.<\/p>\n
This is why the Giving of the Torah is considered the moment of conversion for the Jewish people, since the status of the convert is like that of "a newborn child,"3 a completely new reality. Likewise, the children of Israel became an entirely new entity. And when a Jew studies Torah and fulfills its commandments, he unites with the Almighty in His Essence and Magnificence, at a spiritually superior level than that attained through the mitzvot preceding the Giving of the Torah.<\/p>\n
(Likutei Sichot volume 39, page 26)<\/p>\n
NOTES: 1. Shabbat 88,a 2.Shemot 24:7 3.Yebamot 21,a<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nuestros Sabios ZL dicen que cuando Hashem vino a entregar la Tor\u00e1 al pueblo de Israel, la impuso sobre ellos por coerci\u00f3n1: \"el Alt\u00edsimo, Bendito Sea, puso sobre ellos a la monta\u00f1a cual una palangana y Les dijo, si ustedes aceptan la Tor\u00e1- mejor, y si no estar\u00e1 vuestra sepultura\". Es decir que los israelitas… Read More \u00bbA converted people<\/span><\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[950,952,967,954,993,976,942],"series":[],"class_list":["post-1212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shavuot","tag-di-s","tag-hashem","tag-israel","tag-judio","tag-precepto","tag-shabat","tag-tora"],"episode_featured_image":false,"episode_player_image":"https:\/\/tuviaserber.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/avatar1400.jpeg","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"light","subscribeUrls":{"castbox":{"key":"castbox","url":"","label":"CastBox","class":"castbox","icon":"castbox.png"},"rss":{"key":"rss","url":"","label":"RSS","class":"rss","icon":"rss.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/tuviaserber.com\/en\/feed\/podcast\/rabino-tuvia-serber","embedCode":"Un pueblo converso<\/a><\/blockquote>