Kommentar zu Wajikra 27:34

compare what we quoted on this verse at the end of the previous chapter of the author’s commentary.

אלה המצות אשר צוה ה' את משה אל בני ישראל בהר סיני, “These are the commandments which the Lord commanded Moses for the Children of Israel at Mount Sinai.” In the Jerusalem Talmud Shabbat 13,3 Rabbi Ilah comments on the words אלה המצות in our verse that if the Israelites will perform these commandments in accordance with the rules applying to them, i.e. “as commandments,” then they are מצות, if not they are not accounted as מצות.
Our sages in Sifra Bechukotai 13,7 use these words as the basis for the principle that no prophet is allowed to add (permanently) another commandment to the Torah over and above the ones that have been recorded. They understand the words אשר צוה ה' את משה as a hint that G’d did not need any messenger beyond Moses to communicate His laws to the people. [In other words seeing that no prophet will attain the stature of Moses no other prophet would be entrusted with new and additional legislation. I suspect these are interpretations aimed at the Christians who see Jesus as superseding Moses and updating the Torah. Ed.] The words אל בני ישראל are understood as “as an opportunity for the Israelites to acquire merits by performing the commandments.” The words בהר סיני, are a reminder that all of these commandments were promulgated at Mount Sinai. Thus far Sifra. The point of that Midrash is that the headline אלה המצות was intended by the Torah to tell us that these commandments are of a permanent nature, effective throughout the generations. The word אלה has a connotation of pointing at something enduring indefinitely. One such example is the verse (Genesis 2,4) אלה תולדות השמים הארץ, “these are the developments of heaven and earth,” both phenomena which endure indefinitely. We find the word אלה applied also to the Jewish people in Numbers 2,32, indicating that they, just as heaven and earth, will endure indefinitely.
Basically, our verse tells us who commanded all these laws and who was the man who conveyed them to the Jewish people, to whom he conveyed them and where G’d had spoken to Moses “face to face.” First the Torah speaks about the commandments themselves to indicate that they rank highest in the matters discussed here, a reminder that the people had had a visual and aural revelation of an attribute of the Lord while they were at Mount Sinai. They saw manifestations which resulted from G’d’s descending on the mountain, the fire, the smoke, etc., and they heard G’d’s voice out of the fire. The purpose of these manifestations was primarily to make G’d’s messenger, Moses, believable beyond question when he related all these commandments. G’d did not want to rely only on the various miracles which Moses had performed and would still perform but He wanted the people to be eye witnesses to the source of all this legislation. The Torah added the words את משה to testify that the people had accepted the Torah, a Book which had preceded the existence of the universe, i.e. as Bereshit Rabbah 1,5 phrased it: “before any of the mountains had been born.” Both the concept of Torah and the concept of the Jewish people had preceded the creation of the universe. The words בהר סיני are a reminder of all the overpowering experiences the people had been privy to as mentioned again in Deut. 33,2 and Psalms 68,18.

These are the commandments. “No prophet is permitted to add anything new” (Shabbos 104a). However, he is able to bring back a law that was forgotten using the rules of derivation. Similarly, when we say that Eliyahu will clarify it is also by means of the way of the Torah and its foundations. We rely on a prophet for clarifying the reality, just not for the ruling in halachah.

אשר צוה ה' את משה בהר סיני, “which Hashem had commanded Moses at Mount Sinai. It was sufficient for G–d to entrust His messenger Moses with the task of instructing the Jewish people, seeing that the merits of the people of Israel were instrumental in his becoming such an outstanding intermediary

אלה המצות, “these are the commandments;” no future prophet has the authority to either add to them or to cancel any of them. (Sifra)

אל בני ישראל, “to the Children of Israel.” The word אל is to be understood as in Exodus 6,13: ויצום אל בני ישראל, “He commanded them to the Children of Israel.”Our author explains as a postscript that the reason that this Book is generally called: “Torat Kohanim,” the Torah for the priests, is that it deals mainly with the different laws that apply only to the priests and Levites. He points out that even the Christians called it: Leviticus, “Book of the Levites.’