Eric Rosin
Temple Beth-El, Richmond, Virginia
June 6, 2003

Have you ever noticed that there is usually more than one version of the really big events in our lives? Here's an experiment. Sit across from a married couple and ask them about their first meeting. See if they both have the same recollection. Even if they outwardly agree on a story, as one spouse begins to answer pretend to listen, but focus on the face of the other spouse. See if the non-speaking spouse interrupts with corrections, or if it looks like he or she wants to. Even if the speaking spouse is allowed to finish uninterrupted, watch for signs that the non-speaking spouse has at least a slightly different version of the story. Try the same thing asking them about their wedding day.

On second thought, perhaps you shouldn't perform this experiment. I don't want to be known as the rabbi who instigates dissention between married couples in his congregation. I'm supposed to be working to increase the shalom bayit, the marital harmony, in the community, not diminishing it.

But the point is still valid; there is never just one account of the big events. Part of being human is the way that we filter these events through our own perception. That's why rules about witnesses and testimony in Jewish law are even more complicated than the rules of civil procedure and criminal procedure in American law. Tonight we gather to remember a single event, arguably the high point in all of Jewish history. Tonight we remember the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai, and even more importantly, we reenact the acceptance of the Torah from Mount Sinai.

Our tradition tells us that all of us were present to witness this miraculous event the first time around. During the morning services on the first day of Shavuot, we read from the book of Shmot, or Exodus, and we refresh our memories, recalling that, at a certain point in our wanderings between Egypt and the Land of Israel, we set up camp at the foot of Mount Sinai and that Moses went up the mountain to communicate with God.

After a brief conference with the Almighty, Moses returned to us at the foot of the mountain and reported that God had promised us that, if we will observe the mitzvot, then we will become God's treasured people, a nation of priests and a holy nation. Upon hearing Moshe's words, we responded enthusiastically, "Kol asher diber Adonai Na'aseh, We will do all of these things which God has said." Upon hearing our affirmation of the Covenant, God decided to appear for the closing of the agreement, and to appear not only to Moshe, but to appear to all of us.

God gave us three days to prepare and then God, God's self appeared before us, cloaked in heavy clouds and amid the blasts of horns, thunder and lightning, smoke and majesty, and we were filled with Yirat Shamayim, the fear of God as God delivered the Ten Commandments to each of us.

. . . At least that's one version of the story, and remember, each of us was there to personally witness this literally miraculous turn of events!

But anyone who's taken a course in criminal law or watched an episode of Law and Order will tell you that eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable. In fact, even within our own sacred texts there are other versions of what happened.

The rabbis in the Talmud read the verse that we translated as saying that we gathered at the foot of Mount Sinai and they notice that the language doesn't exactly say, "At the foot of the mountain" but more precisely, it says, B'Tachtit HaHar, or, at the bottom, of the mountain. This language is echoed when this story is retold in the Book of Devarim, or Deuteronomy. There, the text says that the People of Israel made camp, Tachat HaHar, underneath the mountain. And from these different wordings, the rabbis spin a very different account of the giving of the Ten Commandments. In Masechtot Avodah Zarah and Shabbat in the Talmud, the rabbis tell us that as we gathered, God literally suspended Mount Sinai over our heads, and that we were literally under the mountain, and in this setting God said to us very matter of factly, that if we accept God's commandments as embodied in the Torah, then everything would be well, but that if we did not, God would drop the mountain, killing us all.

That's different from the version we read in the Torah, and to tell you the truth, since I was there at Sinai with all of you, I don't remember it that way. The version in the Talmud changes everything. All of the sudden, our noble and enthusiastic "Kol asher diber Adonai na'aseh" affirming that we'll adopt and follow God's laws even before we understand them, has been transformed from a declaration of love and appreciation for the divine truth which was revealed to us becomes something else. It becomes the exclamation of a people who are being bullied into a contract of adhesion and terrorized into acquiescence. And what's more, we become a people who are so immature and unwise that we need to be bullied into accepting the word of God!

Even under Jewish law, such a forced agreement is not binding. So, according to the rabbis, why are we obligated to adhere to the mitzvot, even if we agreed to God's proposal with less then equal bargaining power? Well, it turns out that even if our acceptance under the shadow of the suspended Mount Sinai isn't binding, our acceptance during the time of Ezra and Nehemiah is binding. After our return to Jerusalem, and after the exile that followed the destruction of the First Temple, Ezra and Nehemiah presided over the rebuilding of the Temple and the restoration of our Jewish identities. We learn that they orchestrated a second giving of the Torah. They arranged for a second public gathering in which the entire Torah was read to the entire people of Israel, and at that time, we as a people once again ratified the covenant and agreed to be bound to it.

Therefore, even if the circumstances surrounding our first agreement were suspect, this second time around our agreement to be bound by God's word is beyond reproach. What's more, it establishes a tradition of continually affirming that we are parties to the covenant between God and the Jewish people.

So, just like the couple in our experiment who had two stories about how they met, so far we've uncovered at least three stories about revelation, about the first time that we as a Jewish people told God that about our love for the Divine. But if we stop there, we miss the most beautiful story of all. We miss the story of Ruth.

For some reason, the rabbis have decreed that we read the Book of Ruth every Shavuout. At first blush, this is a strange choice. On this day in which we celebrate the giving of the Torah to the Jews we read a story that does not mention the Torah and a story named after and essentially about a woman who is not even born a Jew. In summary, the Book of Ruth tells the story of Ruth and Naomi. Naomi a Jewish woman from Bethlehem is married with two married sons. The entire extended family leaves Bethlehem and moves to Moab to find relief from a famine in the land of Judah. While in Moab, Naomi's husband, Elimelech, and her sons Machlon and Chilyon all die, leaving her and her daughters- in-law destitute in a strange land.

Naomi returns to Bethlehem and implores her daughters-in-law to return to their homes, one daughter in law, Orpah does return to her home, but Ruth refuses, uttering the immortal words, "Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people and your God, my God."

Upon their return to Bethlehem, Ruth sets out to feed herself and Naomi by gleaning some grain from the cultivated fields of Boaz, a landowner related to her deceased father in law. Boaz hears of Ruth's kindness to her mother-in-law and he instructs his farm hands to honor Ruth as she gathers grain to feed Naomi and herself and not to hinder her efforts in any way. Ultimately, Ruth and Boaz fall in love and marry and the last line of the Book of the Ruth tells us their union is the start of great line of Jewish leaders which will include their great grandson, King David, the unifier or the Jewish people.

To me, Megilat Rut, the Book of Ruth is the most convincing story that we have of the revelation of Torah to the Jewish people. Through, the use of metaphor, it tells us that the ultimate expression of God's presence in our lives is the experience of Hesed, of mercy, of grace. Ruth teaches us that you don't have be born Jewish to have been present at Sinai, that a sacred Jewish soul can be born into a non-Jewish body and can reclaim its heritage at any point. Boaz shows us that the ultimate reason for seemingly random laws, like the law that prohibits a Jewish farmer from harvesting the corners of his or her field, is to allow God's presence into our lives in the form of charity and compassion as exemplified though allowing the poor to find sustenance by gleaning the remnants of the crops after they have been harvested. And finally, the entire book shows us that the most immediate way that God is revealed to us is through our love for one another: through the romantic love that Boaz felt for Ruth, through the parental and filial love that Ruth shared with Naomi and which Boaz showed to Naomi, and through the communal love and support that dictated that the community treat Naomi and Ruth with respect even in their diminished circumstances.

The account of revelation in Exodus is a great one. It's the one with lightning and thunder and fireworks and loud noises. It's the one in which we receive the Ten Commandments. It's the one that demands the acting of Charleton Heston and the story telling of Cecil B. DeMille. It plays well to children and grown-ups alike. It's the one in our Holy Torah.

The account of revelation in the Talmud is also a great one. It's one that makes us think. It's one that teaches us that we can't take our relationship with God for granted and that, as human beings with human fears and weaknesses, we need to work every day to deserve the Torah and to overcome the ignoble way that God was forced to present it to us.

But the story of revelation in the Book of Ruth which we read on Shavuout is the one that I prefer. The Book of Ruth tells us that God reveals God's self every time that human compassion is present in the world. I think that if I think and study and pray hard enough I can remember standing at Sinai, but I know that I can remember the meals to which I have been invited, the generosity that others have shown to me and the love that others have shared with me, and it is after these revelations of God's presence in my life that I can happily and gratefully accept the Torah and look towards God and declare, Kol asher diber Adonai E'esah, Even before I understand all of God's laws, I will do them.

Hag Sameach.