Timeless Torah

I am going to make a guess. A stab in the dark if you will. You’ve been celebrating the festival of Simchat Torah for years and you still have no idea how the holiday originated. No, I am not Sherlock Holmes. I’m not even that astute. It’s just that I took a poll in my synagogue and drew blank stares. Pesach, they all knew, came because of the Exodus from Egyptian servitude. Chanukah, they remembered, we owed to the Macabbees, and on Purim, they assured me, they would not forget to toast Queen Esther and Mordechai; but Simchat Torah
Believe it or not, the hero responsible for the concept of this holiday is King Solomon. Before this famous monarch was dubbed “the Wise,” G-d had offered him fame, wealth, glory, etc. Displaying already then an uncanny sense of brilliance he requested that his reign be blessed with wisdom. Shortly thereafter, he was given “A wise and understanding heart.” You can imagine Solomon’s delight to discover that he now had the capacity to comprehend the language of all the birds and beasts. In response to this precious gift he threw a feast and a party, the likes of which had not been seen in a long time.
On this piece of Midrashic literature, the HaEshkol and Or Zarua comment that, “From this we derive that on the day - Simchat Torah - one completes the cycle of the reading of the Torah, which is all wisdom, one should make a feast and celebrate.”
The Previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchok Schneerson, was fond of saying that on Simchat Torah the Torah itself wishes to dance. However, since a Torah scroll has no feet, we Jews must function as its feet and carry it around the Bimah (center dais) in the synagogue.
Interestingly enough, Simchat Torah is not the only day devoted to deepening our appreciation of the Torah. Nonetheless, Shavuot, which marks the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai is not the scene of such joyous revelry. Perhaps the Torah on that day hesitates to dance, as it were, because it is still unsure how well it will be received. But on Simchat Torah when it perceives that we, burdened as we are with all of our day to day activities, found the time to pursue our studies and even complete the entire Torah, than the Torah itself wants to rejoice and join in the merrymaking.