B”H

Foundations of Judaism:
Lecture 2: Origin of Judaism
Part 2: Revelation at Sinai
© M. Zauderer 2012

Lecture Outline
1. Judaism: A G-d-based Religion
a. Confirming the Torah’s Divine Origin
b. Confirming Moses’ Prophetic Role

Judaism: A G-d-based Religion

We continue our study of the discussion that took place between the Khazar king and the
Jewish sage, on the subject of the origin of Judaism.

Book of the Kuzari (Section One, excerpts from chapters 80-87)

Khazar King: Please describe the development of the Jewish religion: how does Judaism
conform to the historical pattern followed by other religious movements? Other religions
were begun by one person or by a group of individuals who professed a given system of
religious beliefs. They taught these beliefs to other people, until gradually they
succeeded in attracting a large following of adherents. The leadership of this newly-
formed group would reconcile conflicting opinions and establish the dogmas of the
religion. The support for the religion derives from the strength of its followers, and at
times, from a king or ruler, who coerces his subjects to accept the religion.

Jewish Sage: The pattern you describe conforms to religious movements that are
formed through human initiative. When such movements succeed in attracting a large
enough following, they can claim to have been divinely supported in their establishment.
In contrast, Judaism did not develop gradually, nor was it formed through any human
initiative; rather it came about through a sudden revelation of G-d to the Jewish People.
Like G-d’s sudden creation of the universe, G-d brought Judaism into being with sudden
miraculous revelations in Egypt and at Sinai, which proved His existence and established
the fundamentals of Jewish belief.
As we mentioned in lecture one, the Torah does not refer to the teachings of the Patriarchs as
being the basis of our religious beliefs, for our religion is not based on the words of the few.
The Torah points only to the events that surrounded the Exodus, and to the Revelation at Sinai,
as being the foundations of Judaism. Abraham did take the initiative to search for G-d, and
eventually came to recognize Him, and G-d indeed responded to Abraham’s spiritual yearnings
by choosing to establish an eternal bond with his descendants; nevertheless, the formal
"contract" (i.e., the Torah) that established our responsibilities to G-d was instituted only at
Sinai.

Having summarized for the Khazar king the miraculous events that surrounded the Exodus, the
Jewish sage proceeds to an analysis of the Revelation at Sinai. Since the truth of G-d’s
existence, and of His absolute sovereignty over the world, had already been proven beyond any
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Lecture 2 (part 2): Origin of Judaism
Copyright © 2012 Moshe Zauderer, Jewish Interactive Studies www.jewishstudies.org
doubt in Egypt, what was the purpose of G-d’s Revelation at Sinai? What else needed to be
proven there? At that point, Moses could have served in his capacity as G-d’s representative in
order to give the Torah to the Jewish people – why did G-d choose to speak to the people
Himself when He gave them the Torah? The Jewish sage explains:

Sage: The miracles of the Exodus proved conclusively that Moses was a loyal servant of
G-d, and could be trusted to transmit faithfully G-d’s instructions to the Jewish people.
Yet although the miracles of the Exodus could have been attributed only to G-d, there
remained some uncertainty regarding Moses’ role. While it is true that the Exodus
proved that G-d supported Moses, some still thought that it was Moses, not G-d, who
had developed the system of laws and philosophies of the Jewish religion. Perhaps,
because Moses was so faithful and righteous, G-d allowed him to establish his own
religion; perhaps G-d was lending His support to Moses’ own formulation of Jewish belief
and practice.
The Sage explains what led people to suspect that Moses had injected his own creative input
into Judaism:
Sage: People were troubled by the notion of prophetic experience, for it is difficult to
believe that G-d actually communicates with man. Perhaps, they speculated, since G-d is
so exalted, He does not speak to man directly, but rather He limits His contact with man
to providing support through miracles for the efforts of very righteous people, allowing
them thereby to develop human-inspired religious movements.
The Sage was explaining that even after the miracles of the Exodus, some people thought that
there is no objective religious truth. What G-d wants of man, they thought, is that he act
righteously, and G-d will reward people for righteous behavior and will punish them for evil
behavior; however, they assumed, G-d is not concerned with determining a specific standard of
right and wrong. G-d allows man to define "right behavior" himself, based on his own sense of
what is good and what is moral. G-d plays merely a supporting role to such human decisions.
Therefore the sage continues:

Sage: In order to remove any lingering doubts concerning the divine origin of the entire
system of Jewish belief, G-d prepared the Jewish people for a personal encounter of
direct communication with G-d. At that time the entire Jewish people would be elevated
spiritually to a level of prophetic experience. After the Jews underwent three days of
intense spiritual and physical preparation for the event (Exodus 19:10-16), G-d
descended in a heavy cloud on Mount Sinai, amid thunder and lightning (ibid. 19:16).
The people witnessed G-d’s direct communication of Ten Pronouncements (the "Ten
Commandments") that encapsulate the foundations of Jewish belief and observance. In
addition to what they heard, they also saw Moses enter, and later exit, the area
enclosed within the thick cloud, from where G-d sent forth His words. From within this
cloud, the people heard G-d communicating with Moses.

Yet the Jewish people were incapable of maintaining the high spiritual level necessary to
experience more of this divine revelation. "Let G-d speak to us no more," they pleaded
to Moses, "lest we die" (Exodus 20:16). They asked Moses to act as an intermediary
between themselves and G-d from that moment on.

The Sinai revelation had proven to them that G-d – not Moses – was the sole Source of
all Jewish belief and practice. Moses was nothing more than G-d’s faithful agent; as
such, he had provided no personal input in the way of life that is Judaism.

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Lecture 2 (part 2): Origin of Judaism
Copyright © 2012 Moshe Zauderer, Jewish Interactive Studies www.jewishstudies.org
The sage explained to the Khazar king that the Sinai Revelation established beyond doubt two
facts that were essential to the foundation of Judaism:
• Divine Origin of Torah: The Sinai Revelation verified the divine source of Torah, as G-d’s
standard of morality.
• Moses’ Role as an Intermediary: Since Moses had played so prominent a role in the events
surrounding the Exodus, there were those who gave credence to the notion that Moses
might have initiated, or added his own ideas to the founding of Judaism. Miracles alone
were not sufficient to prove that G-d, and no one else, was the origin of Jewish belief and
practice. The Sinai Revelation verified Moses’ position as nothing more than a trusted agent
(i.e., contributing no input of his own) who transmitted G-d’s word to the Jewish people.

Let us examine the Torah verses that support the Jewish sage’s premises regarding the vital
role of the Sinai Revelation.
When the Jewish people encamped near Mount Sinai, G-d communicated to them, through
Moses, that He desired to give them the Torah (Exodus 19:1-8). Although the events of the
previous 400 years (from the time G-d promised Abraham that He would establish a covenant
with his descendants) had been progressing in an unalterable course toward this end,
nevertheless the final decision to accept the Torah lay with the generation of Jews who
experienced the Exodus. When the people enthusiastically consented to accept the Torah (ibid.
19:8), G-d instructed them to prepare themselves for a revelation of the Ten Pronouncements
(the "Ten Commandments"). G-d’s advance description of what the Revelation would be like, as
recorded in the Torah, reveals a dual objective:

Torah Text (Exodus 19:9)

G-d said to Moses, "I will come to you in a thick cloud, so that all the people will hear
when I speak to you. They will then believe in you forever."
Why does G-d’s discussion of the Revelation at Sinai focus on G-d’s communication with Moses
– rather than on the far more dramatic aspect of G-d’s public revelation to the entire Jewish
people? Nachmanides (1195-1270, Spain) explains:

Nachmanides (ibid.)

G-d told Moses that His Presence would descend upon Mount Sinai in the form of a thick
cloud. Moses would then enter the area of the cloud and G-d would speak to him from
within it. At the same time, G-d would elevate the Jewish people to a level of prophetic
experience which would enable them to witness and understand the reality of the divine
communication that was taking place, both with Moses and with them. G-d was telling
them that this experience would forever confirm “that I am G-d and that you have
reached the highest level of prophecy attainable.”
Nachmanides summarizes the lessons of the Revelation at Sinai:
It was important for G-d to stress the aspect of divine communication with Moses and
with the Jewish people for two reasons:

• To Confirm the Torah’s Divine Origin: By witnessing that G-d had spoken to Moses, the
Jewish people would recognize that G-d alone is the Source of the Torah, and the
Source of all information that Moses was to convey to them in G-d’s Name.

• To Confirm Moses’ Prophetic Role: Having witnessed firsthand that G-d granted Moses

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Lecture 2 (part 2): Origin of Judaism
Copyright © 2012 Moshe Zauderer, Jewish Interactive Studies www.jewishstudies.org
 the highest level of prophecy attainable, the Jewish people of all generations would be
able to flatly reject the words of anyone else who calls him/herself a prophet, that
conflict with the words of Moses.

We may ask why G-d decided to limit His revelation of the Torah’s commandments to the Ten
Pronouncements. Why did not G-d tell the nation the words of the Torah in its entirety at that
point, in a direct communication, as He had told them the Ten Pronouncements? Would not a
complete divine transmission of the Torah further strengthen the tradition of its divine origin?
The Torah records Moses’ description of the events immediately following the Sinai Revelation:
Torah Text (Deuteronomy 5:20-24)
When you heard the Voice from out of the darkness, with the mountain burning in fire,
all the heads of your tribes and your elders approached me. You said, "Indeed, G-d our
L-rd has shown us His glory and His greatness, and we have heard His Voice from out of
the fire. Today we have seen that G-d speaks to man, and man can survive it. But now,
why should we die, being consumed by this great fire? If we will hear any more of the
Voice of G-d our L-rd, we will die.

What mortal has heard the voice of the living G-d speaking out of the fire as we did and
has survived? You approach and hear all that G-d says. You convey to us whatever G-d
tells you, and we will listen, and we will do it.”
Nachmanides (Exodus 20:15; Deuteronomy 5:24)
When G-d told the Jewish People that He would reveal Himself to them, they assumed
that G-d intended to pronounce all of the 613 commandments that the Torah contains.
However, following the awesome prophetic experience of the Ten Pronouncements
alone – which caused them such uncontrollable shuddering that they felt all their joints
loosened because of it, and which sapped every ounce of their strength – the people
recognized that such an intense prophetic experience was beyond their human
limitations, and they knew that they could not endure it for an extended period of time.

Therefore, they asked Moses to act as intermediary from that point on in conveying G-
d’s words to them. They made their request with implicit trust in Moses and with
absolute confidence that he would accurately transmit G-d’s Will to them. They pledged
to accept Moses’ words in the name of G-d as though G-d had spoken to them directly.

A Glimpse of Prophetic Experience

Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzatto (1707-1747, Italy) offers us a glimpse of the awesomeness of
prophetic experience:
Derech Hashem ("The Way of G-d"; Section 3:3:6)
During a prophetic vision, the prophet is greatly overwhelmed. His body and all his limbs
immediately begin to tremble, and he feels as if he is being "turned inside out" (e.g.,
Daniel 10:8). The prophet loses his ability to command his own senses, and his mental
faculties can no longer function independently. They have all been superseded by the
experience of communication with G-d, to the exclusion of every other stimulus. The
prophet’s entire being is infused with the G-dly experience, and with the influx of Divine
inspiration that is encompassing him. This is the physical nature of a person: it cannot
tolerate the revelation of the spiritual, and cannot exert any control in the presence of
the spiritual, particularly where direct communication from G-d is involved.

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Lecture 2 (part 2): Origin of Judaism
Copyright © 2012 Moshe Zauderer, Jewish Interactive Studies www.jewishstudies.org
Judaism: A Public Creation
Forty years later, as they were preparing to end their wanderings in the Wilderness and enter
the land of Israel, Moses reminded the Jewish People of the significance of the Revelation at
Sinai and the lessons to be learned from it:
Torah Verses (Deuteronomy 4:32-35)
When you inquire about times long past, from the time that G-d created man on earth,
[exploring] one end of the heavens to the other. See if anything as great as this has
ever happened, or if the like has ever been heard.

Has any nation ever heard G-d speaking out of fire, as you have, and still survived? Has
G-d ever done miracles bringing one nation out of another with such tremendous
miracles, signs, wonders, war, a mighty hand and outstretched arm, and terrifying
phenomena, as G-d did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?

You are the ones who have been shown this, so that you will know that G-d is the
Supreme Being, and there is none besides Him.
Nachmanides (Deuteronomy 4:32)
That which G-d has done for you, He has never done for any other nation in history.
Only you heard the voice of G-d speaking to you, emanating from a fire on Mount Sinai.
Through the special level of prophetic vision that G-d granted you at that time, you were
able to see that G-d is One – there is no other Creator.
Rabbi Yosef Albo (1380-1444, Spain) emphasizes how much more reliable is a divine revelation
to an entire nation, as opposed to a private revelation to an individual or to a group of
individuals:
The Book of Fundamentals (Section 1:20)
In general, the more publicity that is associated with any event, the more believable it
will be to those who did not personally witness it.

Any claim that a prophet makes of divine revelation raises doubts as to its authenticity –
not only for future generations, but also during the prophet’s own times. Consider the
fact that Moses’ role as G-d’s prophet was not absolutely verified until the Jewish people
themselves witnessed G-d communicating with him. For this very reason, G-d did not
give the Torah to the righteous Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob). Had the
foundation of Judaism been built on the tradition of these few individuals, no matter
how righteous they were, later generations could have doubted its credibility.

Therefore, G-d chose to give the Torah through Moses in a public manner, before an
entire nation consisting of 600,000 army-eligible men (who had been registered in a
census), in addition to comparable numbers of women, children and elderly members of
the nation.
At Sinai, the people had witnessed Moses’ exalted level of prophecy. With their request that
Moses serve as their liaison with G-d, the Jewish people accepted and committed themselves to
rely upon Moses to accurately convey to them the Word of G-d.
In Part Three, we will explore the Torah’s approach to ensuring that the historical lessons of the
Exodus and Sinai Revelation would be preserved throughout all generations.
(See Part Three for questions on both parts of this lecture)

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Lecture 2 (part 2): Origin of Judaism
Copyright © 2012 Moshe Zauderer, Jewish Interactive Studies www.jewishstudies.org