Ilu Kervanu lifnai har sinai v'lo natan lanu et ha Torah, Dayenu.
Oh, sorry, it's not Pesach...we still have approximately 8 weeks before we'll be singing those words about " Had G-d brought us to Mount Sinai and not given us the Torah, it would have been enough for us!"
Today, is parshat Yitro, and we have just read about coming to Mount Sinai and receiving the Torah. It was at Sinai that the children of Israel met G-d "face to face" and were forged into a nation. The experience at Sinai was so powerful that the entire nation prepared for it for three days. Clothing was washed, bodies were purified, and men and women did not have sexual relations. The preparation for the meeting actually took longer than the meeting itself. Think of it this way: Suppose you were going to meet a high government official, face to face, how would you prepare for that moment? Wouldn't you plan out what you would wear, what you would say, and think about the importance of the upcoming meeting? Although meeting G-d at Sinai, was not just about meeting a high government official, the experience was the same for our ancestors. Coming to Sinai and preparing for the meeting with G-d was life-changing. In fact, that's why the verse I just sang in Dayenu was written. Just standing at Sinai and personally meeting G-d as an entire nation, had an incredible effect on the people. "This meeting with G-d was so tangible and inspiring that the Torah tells us that ' the whole nation saw the voices' (v'chol ha am roeem et ha kolot (20:15) Rav Kook explained it further when he wrote, "Sight is a much more reliable sense than hearing; in order to ensure that one is perceiving the truth, one has to see it for themselves. The people really saw the voice of G-d."
It was that encounter that made the receiving of Torah so meaningful. When G-d addressed the nation at Sinai, G-d announced "I am HaShem, your G-d, who took you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of slaves. " From a Torah perspective, receiving the laws would have been meaningless without the establishment of the relationship between the people and HaShem.
There's a wonderful book called Mitzvah by Jacob Neusner that was written for children who are about to enter the age of Bar/Bat Mitzvah. It discusses the reading we did today and divides the Aseret Ha Dibrot, the 10 commandments into three categories, not two as is typically done. The first category is about our relationship to G-d. It includes the statements that Hashem is our G-d, that we are to have no other gods before us, and that we are not to take G-d's name in vain. The statement about not taking false oaths using G-d's name as proof is a link to the second group of commandments. The second category involves our relationship to the world. It is covered by one statement, namely, "remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Work for six days, rest on the seventh day- you and your animals. G-d worked six days and rested on the seventh, so you shall make things for six days, then make the seventh day holy." How can a statement about Shabbat talk about our relationship to the world? Simple. It deals with how we spend our time, making things and enjoy things. It talks about how we are permitted to change things for 6 days and how we shouldn't change things for one day. We are commanded to simply enjoy the world as it is. This commandment teaches us about nature and our place in it. And then there is the third category that involves our relationship to other people. We are supposed to honor our parents, not murder, not commit adultery, not steal, not bear false witness against others, nor be envious of others. This third group of commandments would probably be the ones that many individuals would establish for themselves if they were asked to originate a code of laws or ethics by which to live.
The 10 commandments we read today do not come with a rating system, yet they do come with a world view that states that having a relationship with G-d is the basis for accepting the yoke of these commandments. They are not just a reflection of what an individual feels is right, but a reflection of what we perceive we are commanded to do by G-d. Of course, we also know that although we have a responsibility to try to live by these standards, we also have the choice of not doing them. When you think about the world in which we live, it is obvious that not everyone defines him/herself by the acceptance of these mitzvot.
The act of kabbalat ol mitzvot, accepting the yoke of the commandments, becomes the responsibility of every adult Jew. It is designed to help shape us into the kinds of individuals that we are supposed to be and that we wish to be. The mitzvot represent the highest ideals given to us as a people. Yet, even though there were 613 commandments given, there were only three commandments given that can never be negated, according to the Rabbis, no matter what the cost. We are never to commit idolatry, have sexual relations with near of kin, nor murder. And when Jews are persecuted, there is no commandment that is considered too small to obey. Performing a mitzvah is not only about how it changes the individual, but what it does for all of Israel, all of the Jewish people. The bottom line is that the mitzvot are designed to make us holy, They provide us with a way to express our love of G-d and to acknowledge the very relationship that was forged at Sinai so long ago.
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