Chasidut su Deuteronomio 9:9
בַּעֲלֹתִ֣י הָהָ֗רָה לָקַ֜חַת לוּחֹ֤ת הָֽאֲבָנִים֙ לוּחֹ֣ת הַבְּרִ֔ית אֲשֶׁר־כָּרַ֥ת יְהוָ֖ה עִמָּכֶ֑ם וָאֵשֵׁ֣ב בָּהָ֗ר אַרְבָּעִ֥ים יוֹם֙ וְאַרְבָּעִ֣ים לַ֔יְלָה לֶ֚חֶם לֹ֣א אָכַ֔לְתִּי וּמַ֖יִם לֹ֥א שָׁתִֽיתִי׃
Quando salii sul monte per ricevere i tavoli di pietra, perfino i tavoli dell'alleanza che l'Eterno fece con te, allora rimasi sul monte per quaranta giorni e quaranta notti; Non ho mangiato né pane né acqua.
Kedushat Levi
(Compare Shabbat 87) In the event, G’d agreed with Moses, i.e. approved of his initiative after the event. One of the three things was that he added an additional day for the people to prepare themselves mentally, (spiritually) for the Revelation and the receiving of the Torah. The second was that he smashed the first set of the Tablets containing the Ten Commandments. He applied logic when doing this, reasoning that if a Jew who has not been circumcised is forbidden to partake of the Passover due to his status, and this is only one commandment, how much less do they deserve the entire Torah, having just been guilty of idolatry? This logic is flawed, as in the case of the Passover, the Torah forbids participation in a ritual which provides the participant with pleasure, i.e. the eating of the lamb, something not applicable to most other commandments of the Torah. We have a general rule that the commandments of the Torah have not been given to us for whatever physical pleasure performance of it would yield.
Tossaphot on that folio query how the sages could describe this decision of Moses as being made by himself when he had used the Torah as the yardstick by which he had arrived at this decision? They answer that since Moses’ logic in that instance was flawed, the decision must be viewed as his and not as inspired by his study of the Torah. The third example of Moses making a high-handed decision without consulting G’d is his separation from his wife, the subject for which Miriam criticized him in Numbers 12,1-2. On that occasion also, according to the Talmud, he used logic, a valid tool of interpreting the Torah, saying that if the people who heard G’d speak for only a few minutes had to separate from their wives for three days prior to that, he, to whom G’d spoke almost on a daily basis, [prior to the sin of the spies, Ed.] surely had to separate from his wife permanently.
Concerning that logic the Talmud points out that seeing that G’d had told Moses to send the Israelites home to their wives, whereas at the same time He commanded him to remain at the site of the revelation, surely in light of this Moses’ decision could not be construed as being arrived at on his own? Here too, the Talmud says that whereas Moses considered his logic as unassailable and therefore based on the Torah, in fact his logic can be challenged.
Moses was in a category by himself, having stated that during 40 days in the celestial regions (on top of Mt. Sinai) he had neither eaten bread nor had drunk water. (Deut. 9,9) His nourishment had consisted of the זיו השכינה, “enjoying the splendour of the Divine Presence.” Due to his extreme humility, Moses presumed that the entire Jewish nation was entitled to a similar experience, i.e. the ability to satisfy the body’s requirements through infusions of spirituality from a celestial source. This is what he built his logic (קל וחומר) on when drawing conclusions from the three day period of the abstaining from marital intercourse during the preparations for the Revelation at Mount Sinai, as well as from the laws concerning who may partake of the Passover. He reasoned that the Torah most certainly did not address nitwits, but a people on the highest spiritual level, else how could they be able to hear G’d speak to them directly on that occasion. He considered it as certain that at that time everything the people did was only for the loftiest motives, i.e. לשם שמים, why else would they keep their distance from their spouses? He erred by comparing the whole people to himself, so that the logic which formed the premise of his decision was flawed. In other words, his decisions were not based on correct interpretations of precedents in the Torah, so that the sages in the Talmud were correct in describing his three decisions as “homegrown.”
Tossaphot on that folio query how the sages could describe this decision of Moses as being made by himself when he had used the Torah as the yardstick by which he had arrived at this decision? They answer that since Moses’ logic in that instance was flawed, the decision must be viewed as his and not as inspired by his study of the Torah. The third example of Moses making a high-handed decision without consulting G’d is his separation from his wife, the subject for which Miriam criticized him in Numbers 12,1-2. On that occasion also, according to the Talmud, he used logic, a valid tool of interpreting the Torah, saying that if the people who heard G’d speak for only a few minutes had to separate from their wives for three days prior to that, he, to whom G’d spoke almost on a daily basis, [prior to the sin of the spies, Ed.] surely had to separate from his wife permanently.
Concerning that logic the Talmud points out that seeing that G’d had told Moses to send the Israelites home to their wives, whereas at the same time He commanded him to remain at the site of the revelation, surely in light of this Moses’ decision could not be construed as being arrived at on his own? Here too, the Talmud says that whereas Moses considered his logic as unassailable and therefore based on the Torah, in fact his logic can be challenged.
Moses was in a category by himself, having stated that during 40 days in the celestial regions (on top of Mt. Sinai) he had neither eaten bread nor had drunk water. (Deut. 9,9) His nourishment had consisted of the זיו השכינה, “enjoying the splendour of the Divine Presence.” Due to his extreme humility, Moses presumed that the entire Jewish nation was entitled to a similar experience, i.e. the ability to satisfy the body’s requirements through infusions of spirituality from a celestial source. This is what he built his logic (קל וחומר) on when drawing conclusions from the three day period of the abstaining from marital intercourse during the preparations for the Revelation at Mount Sinai, as well as from the laws concerning who may partake of the Passover. He reasoned that the Torah most certainly did not address nitwits, but a people on the highest spiritual level, else how could they be able to hear G’d speak to them directly on that occasion. He considered it as certain that at that time everything the people did was only for the loftiest motives, i.e. לשם שמים, why else would they keep their distance from their spouses? He erred by comparing the whole people to himself, so that the logic which formed the premise of his decision was flawed. In other words, his decisions were not based on correct interpretations of precedents in the Torah, so that the sages in the Talmud were correct in describing his three decisions as “homegrown.”
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