At the foot of a desert mountain, more than three thousand years ago, our People entered into an everlasting covenant. While Sinai smoked and flashed with lightening, God and Moses proclaimed laws to all the Israelites, who called back as one declaring "All that God commands, we will do." (Exodus 24:3). Our Sages teach that this moment was akin to a marriage ceremony, eternally binding God and the Jewish People in a partnership that encompasses all future generations.
Yet, there are some voices in our Tradition who question the validity of this quintessential moment of covenant. In a famous passage of the Talmud, Rav Avdimi states: "It was as though God had picked up the mountain and held it over their heads, saying: 'Accept My Torah or here I will bury you!'" Rav Aha boldly follows up, "If this is so, we have strong grounds for protesting against the Torah!" (Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 88a).
In Jewish law, one can only enter into a binding agreement when one has the freedom to accept or reject its terms. In this moment, the Israelites found themselves alone in a hostile wilderness, witnesses to an overwhelming display of God's power, and only barely recovered from the systematic decimation of the world's most powerful empire under ten plagues. Even the most chutzpah-filled among them would understand that they were in no position to negotiate a better deal for themselves. This moment may be compared to a marriage; but if so, it was done at the barrel of a shotgun. Put simply, a covenant made under such terms is, according to our Tradition, null and void.
While the Rabbis of the Talmud offer an answer to their challenge - namely that the Jews reaccept the terms of the covenant in the Book of Esther - it is their question that continues to speak to us today. If adherence to Judaism cannot be compelled, but rather must be freely chosen, then how are we to maintain our continuity? For centuries, the Jewish community could count on outside pressure to force each generation to maintain the covenant-living in a ghetto one has limited choice to stray. In more recent generations, the community thought it could compel Jewish identity with guilt, a demand that Jews continue to exist simply in order to deny Hitler a posthumous victory.
In our time, when Jews live (mostly) secure and the memory of the Shoah has begun to recede from the forefront of our collective consciousness, we must come up with new answers to Rav Avdimi and Rav Aha. If we cannot force the next generation to continue being Jewish, we must inspire them to be. Our contemporary challenge is to demonstrate with our words and our deeds that Judaism enriches life and gives it meaning, that it builds strong relationships and drives people to extraordinary acts of justice and compassion. We need to show that life is better lived within the restful rhythms of Shabbat, with the liberating ethic of Passover, with the spiritual uplift of joyful prayer and song, and with the constant opportunity for self-renewal and teshuvah. In our day and into the future, loyalty to Judaism will only come through genuine love, the kind that emerges not from outside threat or guilt, but from a deeply held conviction in its beauty and life-affirming power.
Most of all, we who care deeply about Judaism and its future need to become people of faith. We must have faith in Judaism - that its message is wise and deep enough to continue to speak to new ears and hearts. And we must have faith in Jews - that despite all the dire warnings, this generation is not actually so ruined by apathy and technology that we don't desire the meaning and connection that tradition offers. Today we are called to believe that even without holding the mountain over anybody's head, our ancient covenant still has a bright future.
Shabbat Shalom.