Today’s sugiya TB Shabbat 87 really began on yesterday’s daf
TB Shabbat 86 with a disagreement between the sages and Rabbi Yosei on what day
of the month the Torah was given. The sages say the Torah was given on the
sixth day of the month and Rabbi Yosei holds that it was given on the seventh
day of the month. Everybody agrees that Children of Israel arrived at the foot
of Mount Sinai on Rosh Hodesh, the first day of the month of, Sivan and the 10
Commandments was given on Shabbat. The rest of the daf tests the calculations
of each side.
For his calculation Rabbi Yosei says that the husbands and
wives separated themselves for three days before Revelation Mount Sinai. “The
Gemara raises an objection: Doesn’t the verse state: “And the Lord said to
Moses: Go to the people and sanctify them today and tomorrow and let
them wash their garments” (Exodus
19:10), indicating that the husbands and wives were separated for only two
days? This is difficult according to the opinion of Rabbi
Yosei, who said earlier that the separation was for three days.”
(Sefaria.org translation)
What I find fascinating is the explanation the Gemara gives to
uphold Rabbi Yosei’s position. “The Gemara answers: Rabbi Yosei could
have said to you: Moses added one day to the number of days that God
commanded based on his own perception, as it was taught in a baraita:
Moses did three things based on his own perception, and the
Holy One, Blessed be He, agreed with him. He added one day to the days of
separation before the revelation at Sinai based on his own perception.
(See continuation of the Gemara for
the other two things Moses did based on his own perception.”
(Sefaria.org translation)
This text leads me to ask what role did Moses play in the
Revelation on Mount Sinai? Was Moses a stenographer? A mediator? Or a
translator? According to the documentary hypothesis the Torah is made of four
different sources J, E, P, D.[1]
Benjamin Sommers posits in his brilliant book Revelation and Authority:
Sinai in Jewish Scripture and Tradition that the Children of Israel heard
the entire Decalogue in the D source. Moses is pictured as a stenographer
writing down the rest the Torah dictated by God. But that’s not how the E
source presents what happened on Mount Sinai. “The E source repeatedly
introduces ambiguities, five in number, leave the reader of our text to wonder:
Did the nation actually hear commands being proclaimed by God? Or did they
receive all the laws that resulted from the theophany to Moses? In other words,
the text of Exodus 19-20 forces us to reflect on the question of the law’s
origins and the extent to which they are and are not heavenly.” (Page 35) (The
P source tells a completely different story. All that Moses got at Mount Sinai
was the blueprints for the Tabernacle. Revelation continued for the rest of the
38 years wandering in the desert from inside the Tabernacle.)
Sommers describes the E source presentation of a possible
minimalist view of God’s verbal Revelation as participatory theology. How much
was mediated? “Rabbi Joshua said: Israel (only) heard two statements from the
mouth of the holy One, blessed be He… How, then, do we know that they heard
only the first two? Rabbi Azariah and Rabbi Judah Ben Simon support the
viewpoint of Rabbi Joshua Ben Levy by citing the verse, ‘Moses commanded us
Torah’ (Deuteronomy 33:4) The whole Torah contains 613 commandments. In
gematria, the numerical value of ‘Torah’ is 611 (and thus Deuteronomy 33:4 shows
that Moses relayed 611 commandments to Israel). However, Moses did not relay ‘I
am’ and ‘You shall not have’ (the First and second Statements) to us; we heard
them directly from the mouth of the Holy one, blessed be He.” (Shir Hashirim
Rabbah 1:13 in Revelation and Authority, Page 78) Here Moses is a
mediator between God and the people Israel. Even more radical is Moses
Maimonides in his book Guide to the Perplexed. Kalmon Bland focuses “on
the robust nature of Moses is intermediary role according to the Guide and
claims that for Maimonides the Law of Moses was not the law of God…’ According
to the logic of his arguments, Maimonides does not believe that God could have
transmitted the particulars of the law to Moses…. Maimonides considers Moses to
have been the direct author of the Law.’” (Ibid, Page 85) According to
Maimonides, Moses translates God’s will to the people of Israel.
I highly recommend that
you read Sommer’s book especially if you accept the documentary hypothesis and still
want to understand why the hiyuv, חיוב,
the obligation, to observe the mitzvot is fundamental. The how and what you
observe will depend upon your theology.
[1] The
clearest explanation of the documentary hypothesis can be found in Richard
Elliott Friedman's book Who W him rote the Bible?
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