by Dovid Chechik

On February 3, 1986, Dovid Chechik of AT&T Information Systems in Holmdel, New Jersey, posted his weekly Torah commentary to net.religion.jewish. This installment addresses the most celebrated moment in the covenant between Israel and God: at Sinai, before Moses read them the Torah, the entire people responded — na'ase v'nishma, "we will do and we will hear." The order is paradoxical. Why pledge to act before you know what the act requires? Chechik draws on the Bais Halevi and the Talmud in Tractate Shabbos to reveal what the angels recognized in that pledge — and why the loss of that spirit destroyed the First Temple.

The end of this week's parasha contains some of the events leading up to the giving of the Torah. The passuk says: "Vayikach sefer habris, vayikrah b'aznai ha'am, vayomru: kol asher diber Hashem na'ase venishma" — "And Moses took the book of the covenant, and spoke it to the ears of the people, and they answered: all that Hashem said, we will do (na'ase) and we will hear (nishma)." Rashi tells us that what was read to the Jews was the Torah up to the point that they received the Torah, and the laws that they received before the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai.

One question that can be asked is: why did the Jews answer na'ase before they answered nishma? Isn't the normal course to hear before doing?

The Talmud in Tractate Shabbos states: "Rabbi Simai explained: when the Jews prefaced na'ase (we will do) to nishma (we will hear), 600,000 angels descended and gave each Jew two crowns — one for na'ase and one for nishma." The Talmud appears to say that the fact that the Jews said both na'ase and nishma would not have been sufficient for them to get the crowns — the order was important. Why?

One answer given by the Bais Halevi is as follows. There are two reasons one can learn Torah. One is so that one will know how to perform the mitzvot: all Jews, men or women, are obligated to learn enough to be able to perform their responsibilities. Men have an additional obligation in learning Torah — learning for the fulfillment of the mitzvah to learn Torah itself. Had the Jews answered nishma v'na'ase, it would have seemed that they were only agreeing to learn in order to know what to do. Since they answered na'ase v'nishma, they were making a pledge to learn for both purposes — and so were worthy of two crowns: one for learning for the sake of practice, and the other for learning for its own sake.

The Talmud in Tractate Nedarim discusses the reason for the destruction of the First Temple. The navi (Yirmiyahu) asks: why was the land destroyed? And Hashem answers: Al azvam es torasi — because my Torah was abandoned. The Talmud says that the Jews of the First Temple era did in fact learn Torah. However, they did not make a beracha (blessing) on the Torah first. What is the Talmud trying to tell us about blessings before learning? Is the birchas hatorah, said every morning, so stringent that if not said, it can bring about the destruction of the Temple and the exile of the Jewish people?

The Bais Halevi explains that the Talmud is relating the difference between the two types of learning. Why didn't the scholars of the Temple era make a blessing? The Talmud in Menachos tells us that blessings are recited only on mitzvot which are whole mitzvot in themselves — for example, circumcision, blowing the shofar, and other actions that are complete in themselves. Actions which are merely preparation for the completion of a mitzvah do not require a blessing — for example, building a sukkah. The people of the First Temple did not learn in order to accomplish the mitzvah of learning, so their learning was only preparation for a mitzvah, and they therefore did not recite a blessing. The Talmud tells us that it was for the sin of not learning for its own sake that the Jews were exiled.

The Talmud there (in Nedarim) also asks: why are the children of talmidei chachamim (scholars) often not talmidei chachamim — and quite the reverse? The answer given is that these scholars do not make a beracha before they learn. Given our explanation of not making birchas hatorah, we can very easily understand the mida keneged mida — measure for measure — with which Hashem addresses the scholars who do not learn for its own sake. Mankind studies various topics in order to know what to do. Since these scholars study Torah with the same objective, they show no more respect for Torah than for any other profession, and their children are no more likely to follow in their footsteps than if they worked at something else.

(To find out what happened to the crowns — tune in next week for Ki Sisa.)

Colophon

Written by Dovid Chechik, AT&T Information Systems Labs, Holmdel, New Jersey. Posted to net.religion.jewish, February 3, 1986. This is the third in Chechik's weekly D'var Torah series for net.religion.jewish — following Parshat Toldos and Parshat Bechukotai. The "two crowns" he mentions — given at Sinai, taken back at the Golden Calf (Ki Sisa) — form a narrative arc he invites readers to follow across weeks. The Bais Halevi is Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik of Brisk (1820–1892), a foundational figure in Lithuanian Orthodox thought.

Preserved from the UTZOO Usenet Archive (news038f1.tgz, batch b58) for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026. Original Message-ID: [email protected].

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