Published June 2024
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MOSES – THE DIVINE GENIUS
This month we celebrate the Jewish holiday of Shavuot which commemorates the high point of Jewish history – the revelation of the Ten Commandments to Moses on the top of Mount Sinai . What was the role of Moses in this worldshaking event? What kind of man was this whom Providence chose to be the midwife of the most important truth possessed by humanity?
The power, the passion and the pain of Moses is as fascinating a study in its own right as is the Ten Commandments. Moses is at once man and superman, lawgiver and benevolent despot, highly emotional and keenly shrewd. He is many things that are contradictory.
The finest study in literature of Moses was done by Thomas Mann in a thin little book that is now unfortunately out of print. Outside of the Biblical narrative he alone has understood Moses. Mann drew a superb sketch of this divine genius in the climax of his life, standing on the volcanic ash of Mt. Sinai.
With powerful arms he rips two huge irregular pieces of stone from the mountainside. Then he seizes a sharp, pointed stone and begins the hard, tedious job of carving and chiseling the 172 Hebrew words on two stones. In a primitive setting the task takes thirty-nine days. On the fortieth day, as he is about to descend with the two tablets of the law, he pauses to survey the commandments. He examines his work and, much to his dismay, he notices that the impressions and indentations on the rock are hardly noticeable at a distance. But where in that dry, barren area will he find color to highlight the writings?
Without hesitation he takes a jagged rock and slashes his hand and smears his blood on the writing. Having accomplished his task, he descends from the mountain to give the tablets, through his people, to all humanity.
This is the crux of the Ten Commandments. They are to be written with a person’s blood or they are of little value. A good Jew does not worship the Ten Commandments but lives them. A Jew does not pay them lip service but gives them service of the heart.
Happy Shavuot!
Rabbi Alvin Kass
Chief Chaplain of the NYPD