Day #3 Har Sinai: Climbing the Mountain
Torah To Grow
Today’s Growth Challenge: Set an ambitious goal in Torah learning, one that is challenging enough that would appear like you are climbing a steep mountain, but when broken down into small daily steps becomes achievable
Potluck Learning: A Shavuot Night Learning Activity
Prepared by Aliza Abrams Konig and Rabbi Joshua Flug
Potluck learning is a fun, interactive way for everyone to have a voice in group learning. Each participant is able to contribute by bringing and teaching sources that they have chosen. For this program, we have included sources and questions to help facilitate the conversation. The theme of the learning is Matan Torah. For this broad theme, we purposely chose different types of sources. This enables participants to interpret the topic however they wish, and then bring in sources that they feel relate. These sources do not need to be presented in any particular order
Consent and Coercion at Sinai
Rabbi Dr. Jacob J. Schacter
The most iconic image associated with matan Torah is surely the one described in the Gemara (Shabbat 88a):
“And they stood bi-tahtit of the mountain” (Shemot 19:17). Rav Avdimi son of Hama son of Hasa said, “This teaches us that The Holy One, Blessed be He, suspended the mountain over them as a vat (gigit) and said to them, ‘If you accept the Torah, good. But if not, there will be your burial place.”
Rav Avdimi interprets the unusual word tahtit as if it were tahat, meaning “under,” probably influenced by a verse later in the Torah where that image is explicitly indicated, “And you approached and stood under (tahat) the mountain” (Devarim 4:11). In this view, at matan Torah, the Jews stood, literally, under Har Sinai and were presented with an ultimatum: either you accept the Torah or you will die.
Table Talk: Quotes and Questions for Family Discussions
Prepared by David Rubin
Why is the unity of the Jewish people emphasized before the giving and reception of the Torah? Is national unification necessary or meritorious for a complete relationship with God? In present times, how can unity among the Jewish people be enhanced?