Timeless Torah

Since the day on which the Voice of G-d overwhelmed us at Sinai, we have never been the same. That change was so fundamental and complete, that it became forever impossible for us to retreat into an age that predates that Revelation. Something unprecedented happened that day. He not only revealed His name to us, but we subsequently acquired His name…Historically, this would manifest itself in the two names we would be known by; Israel and Yehudi.

The last two letters of Israel mean G-d in Hebrew, while the first three letters of Yehudi parallel the first three letters of Hashem’s Ineffable Name.
The significance of this curiosity will become clearer when we understand the two matters upon which the Shavuos festival rests upon. On the one hand, we commemorate the Theophany, while on the other we celebrate the Season of the Harvest and the first ripe fruits. True, each of these affairs is important enough to merit a holiday in its own right. Binding them together, however, into one festival seems in many ways awkward, as they belong to such diverse areas of life as to be almost in opposition to each other.
The idea of Revelation belongs to the highest realm of religious dogma. Its concepts are totally spiritual. Its eternal truths point to an Absolute Ruler who mandates that all shall live in accordance with His will. Can there be any greater mountain or challenge for man to conquer than the one posited at Sinai? Can there be any loftier message, than to submit to a desire and law one cannot understand, or ever hope to?
How different is the picture of the wheat harvest and bikkurim (first fruits). Here we descend from our Father in Heaven to Mother earth, where we are surrounded by the sweating farmer placing his crops in the reed basket. On his sunburned face we see not spiritual inspiration but creased furrows lined with worry, wondering if he will realize the physical compensation for his hard labor.
What a contrast! Before we spoke of G-d, now we address the farmer. A moment ago we stretched our fingers as if we meant to scale the very heavens, now our hands are muddied with the soil of the earth. Earlier we thought of possessing the immortal Wisdom of the Creator, now all we wish for is a basket and two loaves representing the temporal gains of man’s meager efforts.
But it is precisely through the joining of these two disparate strands of life that the full message of Shavuos is made apparent. It is not sufficient we are informed, to acknowledge G-d, or to hail His Decalogue at Sinai. That by itself, would be meaningless unless such an affirmation guided our daily actions. Thus it is not in heaven that Judaism finds its greatest interest, but on earth; not in a promised World to Come but in the here and the now.
The concept of Revelation is inadequate without the idea of bikkurim. So too, is the farmer’s reward of little use in our religion without the ennobling ideas and values of G-d’s declaration. This principle is offered as a counterbalance to modern society’s idolization of science, technology and materialism.
Therefore Revelation which belongs to the world of religious truth must be made tangible by incorporating it as a guiding factor in our daily pursuits. Conversely, bikkurim which are part and parcel of man’s material world must be sanctified by contact with the sublime.
This concept is reflected in our two names. Israel is the title we received from a celestial being. It is the name G-d declares as His own when He descends upon Sinai. It is a name denoting victory and sovereignty. It represents the Jew’s familiarity and even mastery over the angels that inhabit the exalted heights of G-d’s heavenly abode.
In contrast, the name Yehudi doesn’t appear until our people have been exiled from their land. No longer do we reign; no longer are we kings over our castles. Instead we are subjects to a capricious tyrant in Persia. Most of our brethren have been lost, and only two of the twelve tribes remain. Now we are disparagingly called Yehudi after the fact that our most populous tribe is Judah (in Hebrew, Yehuda). Our task is not the sacrifices in a Holy Temple, but rather more prosaic; to discover holiness where G-d has for all intents disappeared.
In this way Shavuos, and all of Judaism, charges us with the awesome goal of an integrated life which then merits the blessing of G-d’s kingdom on earth.