KMTT - Special Shavuot Shiur, by Rav Ezra Bick
(There is no shiur on parshat hashavua this week)
KMTT - the Torah Podcast
KMTT - Special Shavuot Shiur
Thursday, Yom He, Hevis Yvonne, and this is KMTT, and today is Erev Kargashavuot. We've committed KMTT to every working day. I don't know how many people are working today, so I've been told, it's a long day. If you are working, I hope you come home early, it's important to get ready for Shavuot, not just technically taking a shower, cleaning the house, but mentally. The day of Kabbalah Tatarah, the Torah tells us that the Jews were enjoying to spend three days getting ready for Shavuot, three days we call Shloshit Jumei Ahag Balaah. But in an event, there will be a shortened broadcast today, instead of the usual Pashatasavuah, we actually prepared Pashatasavuah, but by Jonathan Snowbel, who was to give the Pashah, had unfortunately a death in his family, and was unable, was unable to prepare the shoe and give the shoe. We wish him and his family, his parents, Nihamah, Pitar Shah, Aveded Sionviyu Shahraim. So we're going to have a shortened Erev Kargashavuot program, and of course we will be back next week with the regular programming. Tonight is Kargashavuot. We all know that Kargashavuot is Mann-Mattantarah Taino. This isn't only something which we learned in school, but you say it in Tefilah, it's the way Khazal defined Kargashavuot. Every Karg in Tefilah has a definition. Pashah is Mann-Mattantarah Taino. In Shavuot is Mann-Mattantarah Taino. That's the definition, the day of the giving of the Torah. The Maguenah-Praham, in a famous question, pointed out that the Torah was not given on the first day of Shavuot. The Torah was given if one does the calculation in the Torah, especially the way Khazal understood. It turns out that according to Khazal, the Torah was given on Zai and Sivan, and Shavuot is on Vavsivan. Maguenah-Praham gives us a very strange answer. He says, well, okay, so it's the second day of Shavuot. It's a strange answer, because the second day of Shavuot is only in Khazal, so it's only in the Rabbanan, and the Torah doesn't know that it exists. It's very strange that because it turns out in Khazal, it's the two days of Shavuot, so Khazal calls the whole chag, Mann-Mattantarah Taino. The Maguenah-Praham suggests an answer. He suggests that it's possible that the Torah was given on Zai and Ira, but that's irrelevant for deciding the date of Shavuot, because Shavuot, unlike every other holiday in the Torah, doesn't have a date. The date of Shavuot is not Vavsivan, or Zai and Sivan. The date of Shavuot is the 50th day of the Omer, unlike Pesach, which is on the 15th day of the first month. And unlike Roshu Shannau, it's on the first day of the 7th month, Roshu Shrei, or Sukkot, which is on the 15th day of Roshu Shrei. But the holiday of Shavuot is not on the 6th day of the 3rd month. Roshu Shannau on the 7th day, nor in any day in Roshu Shrei, it's on the 50th day of the Omer. You say, "What do you mean does it make?" It's still the same day. That's not true, because unlike our count today, which is fixed, and therefore the 50th day of the Omer is always. Vavsivan, but the original calendar, the original Halakh calendar, was decided by the Sanhedrin each month. And any month could be either 29 or 30 days, depending on astronomical considerations, the visual testimony of two witnesses who saw the new moon, as well as other considerations which debate didn't take into effect. So that Nisan and Iah, the two months before Shavuot, could be either both 30 days, one 31 29, or both 29. In any event, Shavuot will be the 50th day after Pesach. But the calendar date of Shavuot could actually change. So therefore, it's possible that although it's clear in the Torah, that the Torah was given on Zion and Sibah. But that was the 50th day of the Omer, and we celebrate Shavuot on the 50th day of the Omer. However, again, Vavsivan points out the answer is not correct. Because Hazal, this is not explicit in the Torah, but Hazal had a Kabbalah, Hazal had a tradition that the Exodus from Mitsrayim, the Exodus from Egypt, was on a Thursday. And the Torah was given on a Shabbat. In other words, the Torah was given on the 51st day of the Omer, and not the 50th day of the Omer. Nonetheless, we observe Shavuot. On the 50th day of the Omer, the Torah was given on Zion and Sibah, which was the 51st day of the Omer, and we observe Shavuot on Vavsivan, which is the 50th day of the Omer. So it's clear that it's Nazmán Matanto Atenuit. Nor does the Torah say it's Man Matanto Atenuit. The Torah calls Shavuot, Hagabi, Kareem, the day when they brought the first foods to the Beethamikdash. It's a day which is celebrated specifically by a special mincha, a special koban. The minchaach day, Al-Dacham. The Torah never says that it's a day of Matanto Atenuit. This is Chazal's definition of the day, and it appears to be on the wrong day. What is the best answer I know to this question? If one reads the pasture and you draw carefully, God said to Mosheh to get ready for three days. For on the third day, I, God, will come and give us the Torah. Mosheh Urbana then tells the Jews to spend three days getting ready. Chazal understands that what took place was the Torah was given on the fourth day, even though God said he would do it on the third day. And Chazal said that Mosheh Urbana added a day. This is the first and one of the most extremely most dramatic examples of the power of Chazal, of the rabbis, of Mosheh Urbana, of Amisal, to change and create Torah. The Torah is done through a partnership of Torah, which is God's dictating Torah, which involves our sthavot and our power and our understanding of what the Torah is all about. One of the most extreme examples of this was Mosheh Urbana, on the day of giving the Torah, postponing it for one day. Whatever it is, we're not going to the reason why Mosheh Urbana did this. And so, therefore, I think it's very possible that it's true the Torah was given on Zion, Sivan, the 51st day of the Omer. That's the day when we received the Torah. But the day when the Torah was given, Matan Torah, Tainu, was the 50th day of the Omer, Vav Sivan. In other words, Mosheh Urbana postponed the acceptance of the Torah. He told the Jews not to come, and the Jews didn't get the Torah till Zion, Sivan, the 7th day of Sivan. But God said he was giving it on the 6th day. So to speak, the Torah was given on the 6th, but we received on the 7th. And we observed Shavu Urb, as Man, Matan, Torah, Tainu, the day the Torah was given, not the day the Torah was received. Now you say that's all very nice and clever, but what's the difference? Or, to put another way, why don't we celebrate and be civil with Torah? After all, that's what's really important. We're happy that we have the Torah. What do we care when God gave it, so to speak? We're celebrating the fact that we have Torah. But then I think it's really the important pointer. And this, I think, is the true understanding of why, in fact, we celebrate. Sivan, Matan, Torah, Tainu. Because having the Torah is not celebrated on a given day. Having the Torah is every day. And in fact, even having the Torah fresh and new and being happy that you have it is every day. But hold yom, as I'll say, every day it should be in your eyes new and fresh. The fact that Amisul exists because it has Torah, you can't celebrate that on one day a year. There's no reason, even. Not only not to celebrate, there's no reason to even say, "Well, let's let's reenact. Let's let's fear we're getting the Torah." You get the Torah every day. Every day you sit down and you open up a sofa, or for that matter, listen to this podcast. You're you're getting the Torah. The number of places there in Midrashim would say that this theoretically one should learn Torah exactly the way Amisul was and have seen it. With fear, with trembling, with trepidation, with anticipation, at one point, I was learned standing up for that reason. Before Khazal felt that it was too difficult, people were getting weak, and it was interfering with the intellectual understanding of the Torah they were learning. So, in terms of what the way we receive Torah, you don't celebrate once a year, you don't reenact it once a year, you don't re-create or re-experience it once a year. Khadah Shavuad is man-matan Torah-taino. The verb once said in a shear on Shavuad that "Why do we pay attention to Asserta de Berd?" After all, it's clear from Khazal, he didn't think that the Ten Commandments, the Ten De Berd, the Ten statements were intrinsically more important than any other mitzvah. In fact, there's a whole lack of question whether one should stand for Asserta de Berd because it shows you think this part of Torah is more important in other parts, and Khazal were opposed to that. So, we do stand, the minute goes to stand. People who are careful stand for the entire aliyah. So, it's to show that they're not standing only for Asserta de Berd. In any event, it's not true, the verb said, that these are the most important mitzvah in the Torah. For any halakhic standard, there are some important mitzvah out here, and there's some somewhat less important mitzvah out here. The mitzvah, which is very khamu, very, very strict and severe, we have a different list, the three cardinal sins, not ten. The verb said that the importance of the giving of the Torah, and Asserta de Berd was two things. One is that we began to receive the Torah. That's kabbalah, the Torah. And that truth is, that's in the seventh day. The other thing was the experience of having God come and come to us. As the Passuch in, Zephyrd Berim says, that we saw that God can come and speak to man. That was a world revolutionary idea. The man is not alone. That the heavens can come down to the earth, and something can come. The Torah can come from the heavens, from God's hand. God's voice can be zoned and reach man. So, if we accept the idea that mataan Torah was on the sixth day of Siva, even though kabbalah Torah was on the seventh day of Sivaan, then the holiday of Shiva world is not because we have or have received the Torah, but because God has given us the Torah. What you need to re-experience once a year, just as we experience and re-experience the freedom of Pesach once a year, and we re-experience the kingship of God on Musashana once a year, and we re-experience the kaparadari, the atonement of Yom Kippur once a year. On Shavarot, you re-experience once a year an event which, if it resounds in your hearts the whole time, changes your whole attitude towards Torah. Torah isn't something which you have, which belongs to you, it's something which belongs to the heavens, it belongs to a different realm altogether, it belongs to God. It's burst into your world because God has descended and burst into the world to speak to Amvisar Hausenai, and therefore the fact that God came down on the mountain on the sixth day, the fifties day, the moment, the sixth day of Sivan, that's something we have to get back to. Not because we're getting the Torah again, we have the Torah all the time, but we have to reconnect the Torah that we have, that we think is ours, we're having our pockets, we're having our bookshelves, we're having our hard disks, we're having our mp3 players, we have to make sure we reconnect that and realize that that's the voice of (speaks in foreign language) those words (speaks in foreign language) the wisdom and the speech of the king of the king of kings. That happened, or the principle, the root of that occurrence was God's coming to give the Torah to the Jews on the sixth day of Sivan. And if I think the significance of Shavuot is not to say, "Wow, we have the Torah." If you haven't said that all year, you're in big trouble. If there's a holiday in which we were happy, that we mind ourselves, we have a lot of Torah, it's in the Torah, you finish learning the Torah, and you're happy that you learned a lot of Torah, that's why you dance in the Torah. But in Shavuot, you take the Torah that you have, perhaps take it for granted, perhaps you don't take it for granted, you treasure it, but you begin to see it as something which belongs to you, something which belongs to the world, something which is similar and even relatively similar to other books you have, to other property you own, and you stand opposite the hand, the voice, the presence of God, (speaks in foreign language) your Father's sounding, the Kolotu book I came, lightning and thunder. God is coming to give this Torah which you've learned for so many years, for thousands of years, God is giving it to you, and that's something which is meant to change our whole attitude towards the Torah that we have learned until we haven't learned, and that has to, you have to re-root yourself in that experience, put yourself again at the foot of Mount Sinai once a year on Shavuot, is man matan Torah Tain. That's it for our somewhat abridged program for Eros Shavuot, a lot of things to do today, for instead of a halacha yomit, let me just remind you to do an Aroftab Shizin, since you want to present Friday, if I want to meet you by Shavat, so one prepares today, Thursday, Aroftab Shizin with the Baha. In fact, there aren't any halacha yomit of Shavuot. Shavuot is the holiday without any special, any special halacha yomit, any special aspect, and if you ask anything to read, it is what I explained before. Other holidays, we are re-experiencing and experiencing ourselves, on pessach, you re-experience freedom, aridu zeroyit matzi, it mara yu, you do the seder, you re-experiencing something you want to experience. Same with the other holidays, but on Shavuot, we re-experiencing something which God did, it's something you can do to make that experience, it's God's giving us the Torah. So there's no special halacha to recreate that situation, except for the tushatayam, the fact is that it's a yomit, it has kadusha, the prohibition on doing mu'lacha, tusha avyamtov, and you open yourself up for the experience of God coming, entering our lives, Shrinah and Torah. There are many minagim on Shavuot, probably because naturally, the Jewish people tend to fill in the void of not having special things to do, but the Roman hagim is staying up on night, in the late 16th, 17th century minag. All these things create certain halacha problems which are then discussed, but then they are actually the halacha of Shavuot. We finish counting sphirata omir, we've connected pessach to Shavuot, Shavuot has one halacha, but unfortunately because of our sins and sins of our fathers, we don't do it today. The way Shavuot is described in the Torah is the day of, the bringing of shtay halacha, minhfach had a shahla sham, a special koban who was brought in the Beitamikdash. Not the Musaf, it's brought on every holiday on Shavuot and our Shrosh. There's a special koban, brought in Shavuot, in fact Shavuot, in fact Shavuot says on the 50th day, bring a koban, and that's why you make a holiday. It's the real essence today was bringing this koban, but we don't have a Beitamikdash, and therefore the one mitzvah which would have defined Shavuot, the shtay halacha, the bringing of the first wheat, first wheat crab, as a meal offering, as a minhfach, in the Beitamikdash, is not practiced harachalamites, until the mashiach will come and we can rebuild the Beitamikdash. But what one does the one Shavuot is in the context of, kdushatayam, avyamtov, you reconnect to, as I said, find the place within your own experience, your own hearts, to realize and perceive koshbokul giving us the Torah. It's a good time to recommit ourselves to tamut Torah, to learn in Torah, kvai itonat Torah. For every naenu bitoratecha, learning Torah every day, hopefully you came to see it as a step in that direction, there are many other ways to learn, I don't think entity is the only way to learn, but this Shavuot, going back to the first second, when the jewish people were created, as the rasadrogon says, we are only an arm, only a people, because of the Torah. Receiving the Torah but sinai was what made us into jews, and therefore going back to that starting point, going back to that point when we were at somebody, right now we return to that point, and we should realize the essence, the essence of our connection to koshbokul, to ourselves, to our identity, is our connection to Torah. Wishing you a harak samayah, a good jantaf, also a good shabbos, this has been Ezra Bek, and this has been KMTT. We're back on Monday with the Sheer in the week when it's not a rabbina mintavari, and until then kaxamayah, kol tu, kimitzian tecei Torah, udvar ashem mirushadaim.