Chumash In Depth - Exodus 19:20-22 - Ascending the Mountain of God

(1) AND THE LORD CAME DOWN. I will now convey a general principle that will satisfy you until, with God’s help, I will come to the Torah portion Ki Tissa, where I will explain extremely deep things to you very clearly.

Know that man’s soul is extolled and glorious. It comes from the middle world. However, man’s body comes from the inferior world. The only one in this inferior world who has the ability to speak is man. Likewise the hearer, that is, the person to whom the speaker wants to convey what is in the speaker’s heart. An intelligent person cannot invent speech. He must employ the language that is known and used.

All languages are built upon the arrangement of the human form, which is made up of an incorporeal soul and a body made out of four elements. Now when a person speaks to a fellow human being in a language that the latter knows, he understands the speaker’s words and their forms in their arrangements. If one wants to speak of things that are on a lower level than human beings, he has to raise their level and give them human form so that anyone who hears him will understand his words.

Similarly, when a person wants to speak of things more important than he, namely, of things from the upper world, he brings them down to his level and anthropomorphizes them, speaking of them as if they had human form. All this is done so that the hearer can be understood.

This is the way to understand And the Lord came down (Gen. 11:5) and, and God went up (Gen. 17:22), for everything is full of His glory. I will present a parable in the Torah portion Ki Tissa through which you will be able to understand what Scripture means by God ascending and descending.

(2) [AND THE LORD CALLED MOSES TO THE TOP OF THE MOUNT.] The reason the Lord called Moses was so that Israel would see Moses’ greatly elevated state, namely, that he reached the top of the mountain where there was the glory of God, whose words the people would hear from the fire that was there.

(1) GO DOWN, CHARGE THE PEOPLE, LEST THEY BREAK THROUGH. Each one from the place where he stands, thinking that they are rendering Me honor because of their great desire to gaze at My glory. Moses therefore said, to gaze.

(1) AND LET THE PRIESTS ALSO. The reference is to the first-born. Though the first-born are holy, as it is written, sanctify unto Me all the first-born (Ex. 13:2) nevertheless, let them add to their holiness by sanctifying themselves through their thoughts.

(1) AND THE ETERNAL CAME DOWN UPON MOUNT SINAI. If you will succeed in having insight into this section [of the Torah], you will understand that His Great Name, [i.e., the Tetragrammaton], came down upon Mount Sinai, and that He abode thereon in fire and spoke to Moses.

The communication to Moses in the entire section was by this Proper Name of the Eternal. However, the ascent [of Moses — as mentioned in Verse 3: And Moses went up unto G-d] — and his bringing forth [the people out of the camp — as mentioned in Verse 17] — were towards the place of the Glory, as I have explained.

And He warned, lest they break through unto the Eternal to gaze, because even the nobles of the children of Israel did not see Him, and all Israel heard the Voice of G-d out of the midst of the fire. It is this which Scripture says, And ‘Elokim’ (G-d) spoke all these words, just as our Rabbis have said: “Elokim designates the Judge.” And they have also said [with reference to the first two commandments]: “We have heard them from Hagvurah (the Almighty Himself).”

In Deuteronomy it is written: These words the Eternal spoke unto all your assembly. That is because Scripture explains there [in the same verse] that He spoke out of the midst of the fire. And this is the sense of the verse, The Eternal spoke with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire. And this is why it is said, I am the Eternal thy G-d.

Now do not find a difficulty in what the people said to Moses, For who is there of all living flesh, that hath heard the Voice of the living G-d speaking out of the midst of the fire? They did not say “that they heard G-d speaking out of the midst of the fire,” but they said the Voice of G-d, referring to what they perceived. This is why they said, Go thou near, and hear all that the Eternal our G-d may say. And so did Moses say to them, Did ever a people hear the Voice of G-d speaking out of the midst of the fire? The word “speaking” here is referring to “the Voice,” something like the verse, and he heard the Voice speaking unto him.

From this you will understand what the Rabbis have always said in Midrashic homilies, i.e., that the Torah was given in seven voices. They are the ones to which David alluded in the psalm: Ascribe unto the Eternal, O ye sons of might. This is also the number of times [that the Voice] is alluded to in this section of the Torah. The verse, And there were ‘koloth’ and lightnings, is written defectively and therefore counted as one; likewise, the verse, And all the people perceived ‘hakoloth,’ is missing the vav which signifies the plural, [and thus refers to only one voice]. Thus there are six [‘voices’ mentioned here in the section], and [in addition] it clearly says, And G-d spoke.

In Deuteronomy, Scripture likewise mentions seven ‘voices’ in connection with the Giving of the Torah. In Tractate Berachoth, however, the Rabbis have said in the Gemara that the Torah was given in five ‘voices.’ That is because they counted only the voices which are concealed, while the two — i.e., I am the Eternal thy G-d and Thou shalt have no other gods before Me] — are explained in Scripture.

The purport of this is that Moses our teacher was given the Torah in seven ‘voices,’ and he was the one who heard them and contemplated them. The Israelites, however, heard one voice, as it is said, a great voice, and it went on no more, and it is said again, Ye heard the voice of words, but ye saw no form; only a voice. Here also Scripture alluded thereto in saying, And all the people perceived ‘hakoloth,’ with one vav missing, [thus making it singular, ‘the voice’], for all voices appeared as one.

By way of the Truth, [the mystic lore of the Cabala], this is Scripture’s intent in saying, G-d hath spoken once, twice we have heard this. The sections of the Torah are thus explained, without anything being changed with another.

(3) Another version of what happened is expressed in the Mechilta according to which G'd lowered the upper heavens on to the top of the Mountain. According to this explanation G'd Himself did not descend at all. The word על would refer only to the fact that G'd's position on top of these upper heavens would be lower than it had been previously when speaking in terms of the distance of the heavens from earth.

(4) Another meaning of the verse is that as G'd began to lower His presence onto the Mountain, the Mountain began to shake and rise towards G'd much as a servant runs toward his master when the master approaches. The Torah here did not really tell us to what place exactly G'd descended; the verse was more concerned with informing us that though the Mountain is basically inert matter, in this instance it was transformed into a living creature so that it could rise before G'd would descend to what used to be its top. Afterwards the Torah describes the target of G'd's descent as "the top of the Mountain." The major message of the verse is that the Mountain rose towards G'd before G'd had reached the top of the Mountain during His descent.

(1) פן יהרסו אל ה׳ לראות, "lest they break through unto the Lord to gaze;" The Torah means that people should not think that they would catch a glimpse of G'd though they would die in the process; Psalms 63,4 expresses this thought succinctly when David says: "it is better to experience Your faithfulness than life itself." The people would consider their death under such circumstances as the beginning of their true life.

The expression פן יהרסו is to be understood as the people's willingness to lose their lives in order to become part of such an experience as gazing at the glory of G'd. ונפל ממנו רב, "and many of them would fall;" G'd warns that in such a scenario the people would experience a much greater "fall" than they had bargained for.

Alternatively, G'd merely warns that if the people would approach to an area out of bounds to them, He would have to reduce the blinding light accompanying the revelation as otherwise they would die from exposure to this light. This then would be the meaning of פן יהרסו אל השם, they would break through towards His light in order to gain a glimpse. This also tells us that the people would not achieve their aim to gaze upon G'd even if they would break through the barrier. It is part of the meaning of the word פן in our verse.

In the event that we would have thought that the people's endeavour to gaze upon something they could not see anyway would have neither positive nor negative consequences, the Torah writes ונפל ממנו רב, that it would have very negative consequences for those concerned. The word רב may refer to the leading members of the people. The Torah would then tell us that even the most spiritually advanced of the people would not be allowed to gaze upon the spectacle but they would be punished severely if they tried.

(1) וירד ה’ על הר סיני, “G’d descended on Mount Sinai.” Whenever the Torah mentions the term “descent or descending” in connection with G’d, the meaning is that He revealed Himself in some form which could be assimilated by one’s mind.

The term is similar to וירא אליו ה’ which the Torah (Genesis 18,1) writes when it describes G’d revealing Himself to Avraham. This is also the way Onkelos translates the words וירד ה’ here; in Genesis 18,1 Onkelos uses the very same words for וירא אליו ה’ i.e. ואתגלי השם, “G’d revealed Himself,” except that he uses a different attribute for G’d. Why then did the Torah choose to express a form of גלוי שכינה here as a “descent” instead of as a “vision?”

The reason the Torah used the term “descent” here is to remind us that whenever G’d makes Himself perceivable by any of the 5 senses we have been equipped with this could only have been preceded by His “lowering” Himself to the parameters of the terrestrial part of the universe. In this instance, He became “visible” to the entire nation.

It had already been announced in verse 11 that on the third day G’d would “descend” before the eyes of the whole people. They had been made aware that when they would observe the glory of G’d in the form of a consuming fire, that behind that “consuming fire” there would be G’d Himself. It did not mean that human eyes would behold an image purporting to be G’d. G’d had told Moses clearly that even he could not have a visual perception of the Essence of G’d while alive (compare Exodus 33,20).

What is meant here is simply that the manifestations that the Israelites would experience at the Mountain would convince them that none other than G’d Himself had orchestrated all these phenomena, i.e. that they had “seen” G’d (at work). What happened to the individual Avraham in Genesis 18,1 was similar. Moreover, it is well known that the level of revelation which the patriarchs experienced was not that of the attribute represented by the tetragram but that of שדי, a level which may be compared to שער לה’, the gateway to the attribute י-ה-ו-ה.

This is why the Torah added there “he was sitting at the entrance to he tent;” these words were an amplification of the words וירא אליו, “He appeared to him.” The Torah teaches that the level of revelation Avraham enjoyed at the time was one that emanated from the “entrance of the gate,” not from the innermost part of the Sanctuary of G’d. The Torah was at pains to alert us to the fact that the level of revelation the Israelites had at מתן תורה was superior to the revelation Avraham enjoyed in Parshat Vayera.

(1) ונפל ממנו רב, “and many of them would fall.” The choice by the Torah of the word נפל, singular, in connection with רב, many, teaches that even if a single Israelite were to “fall,” i.e. to die or be executed, it would be equivalent to a whole world dying.

(1) וגם הכהנים הנגשים אל ה’, “and also the priests who approach G’d.” The “priests” mentioned here are either the firstborn who would perform the priestly functions in those days, i.e. offer the sacrifices, or it may refer to the sons of Aaron who would be consecrated as priests some time later. This is not so strange as in Genesis 2,14 we read about a river flowing from Gan Eden in the direction of Ashur, a city that would not exist until some 1700 years later.