When I call out the Name of Hashem, ascribe greatness to our G-d.[1]
Our pasuk is the gemara’s[2] source for birchos haTorah – reciting berachos each day before studying Torah.
I believe that the importance of these berachos is not just to ready ourselves for the mitzvah of learning, and to thank Hashem for this precious gift. I believe that it is a statement of the authenticity of the totality of Torah that we have in our possession. Moshe, having completed the writing of a full sefer Torah,[3] wished to ensure that the Jewish people for all time would understand that without exception, the Torah came directly from HKBH. Moshe’s sefer Torah was preserved either in the Ark with the luchos, or adjacent to them.[4] The juxtaposition was meant to impress the Bnei Yisrael that everything in the Torah was hinted at in the Aseres HaDibros, with the rest of the Torah amplifying the content in greater detail.
This theme allows us to solve a mystery about a mystery. The gemara[5] relates that the sages and prophets at the time of the destruction of the first beis hamikdosh were puzzled. Why had Hashem acted so harshly against the people? The mystery was solved only when Hashem Himself revealed the reason to them: the nation had forsaken the Torah. R. Yehudah takes that to mean that they failed to recite birchos haTorah before learning.
The solution of that mystery, however, leaves another in its place. Was this their greatest sin? Tanach is full of references to the terrible aveiros that the people of that generation had committed, including the three cardinal sins – forbidden relations, murder, and avodah zarah. Why were the sages and prophets befuddled about causes of the churban, when lots of those causes were fully evident?
To find an explanation, let’s first examine aveiros in general. We can divide transgressors roughly into two groups. One group violates the law because they are seized by their yetzer hora, and don’t manage to extricate themselves from its group. Their punishment varies from transgression, as is spelled out in the Torah.
Another group is far, far worse. They violate the law because they don’t believe that the Torah comes from Hashem, or they pervert the law to make it mean what they want it to mean. This attitude is a much more grievous sin.
The observer cannot discern to which group a transgressor belongs. That led to the confusion at the time of the churban. Of course the sages and prophets were aware of the numerous transgressions committed by the people. But when they witnessed the enormity of the catastrophe, they could not understand how all those transgressions could have led to the scale of destruction they saw. All the transgressions stemmed from weakness, not from disloyalty to Hashem or rejection of his Torah!
Or so they thought. The answer came from Heaven: the people were punished because they did not make a berachah before Torah study. People who would give in to their passions and desires, but still saw themselves committed in principle to the Torah, would have no problem reciting a berachah. But those who rejected the Divine authority of Torah – in whole or in part – would either skip it, or say it without any intention – without any real buy-in at all.
There is one more important point to make. R. Yehudah did not see that the generation of the churban failed to make a berachah on their Torah study. He specified that they did not make the berachah before reading from the Torah. There are, of course, two berachos, one before, and one after.
They differ greatly. The first berachah proclaims our belief that the Torah comes from Hashem. Although at Sinai we only heard Hashem deliver the Aseres HaDibros, we also heard Him instruct Moshe to receive the rest of it. Our berachah proclaims that we believe that the received Torah is every bit as Divine as the two tablets at Sinai. In fact, when Moshe finished writing his sefer Torah, he instructed[6] the Leviim – those who carry the Aron with the luchos – to safeguard the scroll by placing it close to the Aron. The message was that both were equally the word of Hashem.
In the course of time, however, there were those who argued that the Torah was indeed given by Hashem[7], but it must adapt to changing times and circumstances. After all, it is a guide for living, and conditions change with the passage of time.
If Torah were limited to describe how we should best live our physical lives, they would have a point. But it isn’t. And this is what we affirm in the berachah after a Torah reading: “You planted eternal life within it.” The nature of our souls does not change, and Torah addresses those eternal souls, nurturing and developing them. That does not change with time. The Torah is therefore immutable and unchangeable.
- Devarim 32:3 ↑
- Berachos 21a ↑
- Devarim 31:24 ↑
- Bava Basra 14a ↑
- Nedarim 81a ↑
- Devarim 31:24-26 ↑
- At least initially. After a short while, they repudiated that position ↑