Uncompelled Choice

18 Shevat 5782

“It came to pass on the third day” (Shemos 19:16)

“At the Torah’s conclusion of its account of the creation of the world, it is written (Bereishis 1:31): ‘There was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.’ What is the purpose of the additional ’the’ (hashishi)? (Regarding the other days of creation, the Torah simply says, ‘It was evening and it was morning, one day … a second day … a third day …’ and so forth; ’the sixth day’ implies that the verse is referring to a certain famous ‘sixth day’). This teaches that G‑d stipulated with the works of creation and said to them: ‘If Israel accepts the Torah (on the sixth of Sivan), you shall exist; but if not, I will turn you back into emptiness and formlessness.’” (Talmud, Shabbat 88a)

In fact, it is also written in Shabbat 88a that the Jew’s acceptance of the Torah was so important to G-d, that he overturned the mountain over them, threatening them, “If you accept the Torah, fine; if not, there shall be your burial.”

“Rabbi Acha bar Yaakov observed: This resulted in a strong legal contest against the Torah (since it was a contract entered into under duress). Said Rava: But they reaccepted it (out of their own, uncompelled choice) in the days of Ahasuerus, as it is written (Esther 9:27): ‘The Jews confirmed and accepted’—on that occasion they confirmed what they had accepted long before.”

“It follows that the performance and fulfillment of the mitzvos is the innermost garment for the innermost aspect of G-d’s will, since it is due to this performance of the mitzvos that the light and life of the worlds issues forth from the Divine will to be clothed in them” (Lessons in Tanya, Likutei Amarim, beginning of Chapter 23)

Tanya goes one level deeper. If Hashem threatened to destroy the entire world in case the Jews didn’t accept the Torah, isn’t it clear that the Torah and its mitzvos are the innermost will that made Hashem create the world in the first place? This is comparable to a “man who travels abroad on business. Naturally, he travels because he wishes to do so. But his ‘internal’ (i.e., ultimate) desire in the journey, his underlying motive, lies in the profit he expects to reap. When we probe still deeper, we find that the desire for profit is itself an external expression of an even more ‘internal’ desire—the desire for the things which he will be able to buy with the proceeds of his business … So, too, in the case of the worlds and the mitzvos. G-d’s external will, His desire that the worlds exist, is motivated by His desire for the true object of His pleasure—the mitzvos.” (Lessons in Tanya, as above)

“If his children forsake My Torah and do not walk in My ordinances; if they profane My statutes and do not observe My commandments, then I will punish their transgression with the rod and their misdeeds with plagues.” (Tehillim 89:31-33)

Knowing now that Hashem’s mitzvos are His greatest pleasure, and in fact the entire reason for the existence of the world, shouldn’t we be most diligent to fulfill them, even without the threats of destruction, strife, and plagues above? Accepting the Torah out of our own, uncompelled choice, like on Purim, is the highest level of service, the level of service of the times of Moshiach, as the Yalkut Shemoni states in Mishleiy 944 “All the holidays will be nullified in the future except for Purim.”