Mt-Horeb-Encounters
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Throughout this site I
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three brilliant versions, although JPS-1917 is my preferred
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Colour coded details of our beloved TaNaKh:
1. Torah = History &
Law, 2. Nevi’im = The Prophets. 3. *Ketuvim = all other Writings.
*The Ketuvim - Includes, Poetical books -
Psalms, Proverbs, Job, the Megillot, or Scrolls - Song of Solomon, Ruth, Lamentations of
Jeremiah, Ecclesiastes, and Esther, prophecy of Daniel, and history
of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chronicles I & II.
Please Note: Some
alterations or (additions) have been made relating to ‘Names’ and ‘Attributes’
of אֱלֹהִים - Elohim,
having been corrected like it once was pre the “Masoretic Text”.
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Remember
the following truth from our beloved Torah!
“Ye shall NOT ADD TO THE WORD which I command you, NEITHER SHALL YE DIMINISH FROM IT, that ye may keep the commandments of יְהוָה
אֱלֹהֵיכֶם - the
LORD your Eloleichem, which I command you”. Davarim -
Deuteronomy 4:2. (JPS-1917).
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With Rabbi, Dr. Reuven Ben Avraham-Goossens, PhD.
In this study, I will
be covering the two sets of Tablets Moshe received up on *Mount
Horeb. The first was given earlier, the second after
the horrific sin regarding the ‘golden calf’.
Regarding the first
Tablets, let us read the following:
“And the tablets were
the work of אֱלֹהִים - Elohim (God), and the writing was the writing of אֱלֹהִים - Elohim, graven upon the tablets”. Shemot - Exodus
32:16. (JPS-1917 version of the Torah).
These were perhaps the
holiest objects in all history: from beginning to end, the work of אֱלֹהִים - Elohim. Yet within hours they lay shattered, broken
by Moshe when he saw that evil Golden Calf, and the Israelites dancing around
it. Of course he returned up Horeb where the second
set of Tablets came about, and Moshe brought them down on the tenth of Tishri,
and this only occurred due to his prolonged plea to אֱלֹהִים - Elohim to forgive the people. This is the historic
event that actually lies behind “Yom Kippur” (which falls each and every year
on the tenth of Tishri), the day marked in perpetuity as a time of favour, for forgiveness, and reconciliation between אֱלֹהִים - Elohim and the Hebrew people. The second Tablets
were different from the first in one respect. For they were not wholly the work
of אֱלֹהִים - Elohim, blessed be He.
“And יְהוָה -
the LORD said unto Moshe: ‘Hew thee
two tables of stone like unto the first; and I will write upon the tables the
words that were on the first tables, which thou didst break’”. Shemot - Exodus
34:1. (JPS).
Thus the paradox: the
first Tablets, were made by אֱלֹהִים - Elohim, yet they did not remain intact. The second
Tablets, being the joint work of אֱלֹהִים - Elohim and Moshe, did remain. Surely the opposite
should have been true: the greater the holiness, the more eternal. Why was the
more holy object broken while the less holy stayed whole? This is not, as it
might seem, a question specific to the Tablets. It is, in fact, a powerful
example of a fundamental principle in Hebraic spirituality.
We of course tend to
distinguish between two types of Divine-human encounter. We received it respectively
as “an awakening from above” and “an awakening from below”. The
first being wholy initiated by אֱלֹהִים - Elohim, the second by mankind.
An “awakening from above” is ‘spectacular’, ‘supernatural’, an event that
bursts through the chains of causality that at other times bind the natural
world. An “awakening from below” has no such grandeur. It is a gesture that is
human, all simply all too human.
Yet there is another
difference between them, in the opposite direction. An “awakening from above” may
change nature, but it does not, in and of itself, change human nature. In it,
no human effort has been expended. Those to whom it happens are passive. While
it lasts, it is overwhelming; but only while it lasts. Thereafter, people
revert to what they were. An “awakening from below”, by contrast, leaves a
permanent mark.
Because human beings
have taken the initiative, something in them changes. Their horizons of
possibility have been expanded. They now know they are capable of great things,
and because they did so once, they are aware that they can do so again. An
awakening from above temporarily transforms the external world; an awakening
from below permanently transforms our internal world. The first changes the
universe; the second changes us.
Two examples:
The first: Before and
after the division of the Red Sea, the Israelites were confronted by enemies,
by the Egyptians, after by the Amalekites. The
difference is total.
Before the Red Sea, the
Israelites were commanded to do nothing:
“Fear ye not, stand
still, and see the salvation of יְהוָה - the LORD,
which He will work for you to-day; for whereas ye have seen the Egyptians
to-day, ye shall see them again no more forever. יְהוָה - the LORD will
fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace’”. Shemot - Exodus 14:13-14. (JPS).
However, Facing the Amalekites, the Israelites needed themselves to fight the
battle:
“And Moshe said unto
Joshua: 'Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalekites”.
Shemot - Exodus 17:9. (JPS).
The first was an
“awakening from above”, the second an “awakening from below”. The difference
was palpable. Within three days after the division of the Sea, being one of the
greatest of all miracles, believe it or not the people, the Israelites began
complaining again (due to the lack of water, and food). But after the war
against the Amalekites, the Israelites never again
complained when facing conflict (the sole exception, being when the spies
returned and the people lost heart, was when they relied on hearsay testimony,
not on the immediate prospect of battle itself). The battles fought for us do
not change us; the battles we fight, do.
The second example:
Mount Horeb and the Tabernacle. The Torah speaks
about these two revelations of “אֱלֹהִים - Elohim’s glory” in almost identical terms:
“And the glory of יְהוָה - the LORD
abode upon mount Horeb, and the cloud covered it six
days; and the seventh day He called unto Moshe out of the midst of the cloud”.
Shemot – Exodus 24:16. (JPS).
“Then the Cloud covered
the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of יְהוָה - the LORD
filled the Tabernacle”. Shemot – Exodus 40:34. (JPS).
The difference between
them was that the sanctity of Mount Horeb was
momentary, while that of the “Tabernacle” was permanent (well, until the Temple
was built, centuries later).
The revelation at Horeb was an “awakening from above”. It was initiated by אֱלֹהִים - Elohim. So overwhelming was it that the people said
to Moshe, “Let not אֱלֹהִים - Elohim say any more to us, or we will die” (Exodus.
20:16). By contrast, the Tabernacle involved human labour.
The Israelites made it; they prepared the structured space the Divine Presence
would eventually fill. During the days of the revelation at Horeb,
the many Israelites had called for and made that Golden Calf. But after
constructing the Sanctuary they made no more idols, at least until they entered
the land of “Milk and Honey”. That is the difference between the things that
are done for us and the things we have a share in doing ourselves. The former
changed us for a moment, the latter for a lifetime!
And he wrote upon the
tables the words of the covenant, the ten words”. Shemot - Exodus 34:28w. (JPS).
The ideology of there
being both the Written Torah and a so-called “Oral Law” is ludicrous and the
whole idea came from far later wholly from rabbis with their own erroneous
ideas! The first is the word of אֱלֹהִים -
Elohim,
with no human contribution. The second is a partnership, the word of אֱלֹהִים -
Elohim
as interpreted by the mind of man. The following are two of several remarkable
passages to this effect:
It also helps us
understand why it was only after the second Tablets, not the first, that “when
Moshe came down from Mount Horeb with the two Tablets
of Testimony in his hand, he was unaware that the skin of his face shone with
light because he had been speaking with אֱלֹהִים - Elohim” (Shemot - Exodus 34:29). Receiving the first
Tablets, Moshe was passive. Therefore, nothing in him changed. For the second,
he was active. He had a share in the making. He carved the stone on which the
words were to be engraved. That is why he became a different person. His face
shone!
In our faith, the natural is greater than the supernatural in the sense that an “awakening from below” is more powerful in transforming us, and longer lasting in its effects, than is an “awakening from above”. That was why the second Tablets survived intact while the first did not. Divine intervention changes nature, but it is human initiative, our approach to אֱלֹהִים - Elohim which changes us for the better!
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*Please Note: In all earlier and later mentions of the “Mountain of Elohim” it is called ‘Mount Horeb’! Even in Devarim the final book of our Torah it is called Horeb! The simpe fact is as follows; there was never a Mt. Sinai, for the word Sinai simply means and always has meant “wilderness”. The truth is, there was never was a Mt. Sinai, this came about centuries later and was wholly introduced by rabbis, proving that they are not very smart! the fact is, I was also an ‘archeologist’, and have done a great deal of work in Israel and other locations.
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Remember
what אֱלֹהִים - Elohim, blessed be He, said the following via
several of our prophets...
“Return unto Me, and I will
return unto you, saith צְבָאוֹת- יְהוָה- the LORD of
hosts”. Mal’a’chi -
Malachi 3:7. (JPS).
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always uphold our blessed שַׁבָּת - Shabbat, as well as the מוֹעֲדִים - Mo’a’dim -
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שָׁלוֹם
עֲלֵיכֶם - Shalom Aleichem - Peace be with you!
Rabbi, Dr. Reuven Ben
Avraham-Goossens, PhD.
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