192- Foundations

“If He brought us near Mt. Sinai and did not give us the Torah, we would be content.”

The interpreters asked, “Without the Torah, how can it be said that we would be content? After all, the Creator created the world for the Torah, as our sages said about the verse, ‘If My covenant were not day and night, I would not set the ordinances of heaven and earth’” (Avoda Zara 3a).

We should ask according to what our sages said, “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice” (Kiddushin 30b). If their filth was removed at the time of Mt. Sinai, meaning that the evil inclination was removed from them, then they no longer need the Torah.

The Torah that was given to them then was from a higher quality, as an essence, and not as a means. That is, they need the Torah not because the Torah is the goal. Rather, the Torah came to help us achieve something else, which cannot be obtained without the Torah.

However, in its higher quality, the Torah is a goal. It follows that the majority of the Torah is as a means for the evil inclination, but there are a chosen few in the generation who are rewarded with the Torah as an essence.

Concerning “Teach me the whole of the Torah on one leg,” he said, “That which you hate, do not do unto your neighbor” (Shabbat 33a). It is as Rabbi Akiva said, “Love your neighbor as yourself is the great rule of the Torah.” The people of Israel were rewarded with this love, as our sages said about the verse, “And the people camped … as one man with one heart.”

It follows that the giving of the Torah was as a gift, meaning an essence, and not as 613 Eitin [Aramaic: counsels], called Mitzvot [commandments].