Kabbalah Library

400. When the Creator wanted to give the Torah to Israel, He took the written Torah and the oral Torah and went to the other nations, and they did not want to accept them until He brought them down to Israel on Mount Sinai.

401. The ministering angles said, “To whom does the Creator wish to give these two laws [Torot, pl. of Torah]?” The Creator said, “To Israel, who are My lot and My portion, as it is written, ‘For the Lord’s portion is His people; Jacob, the portion of His inheritance.’ Thus, they are two, My portion and My inheritance. Correspondingly, I give them two Torot. And also, that babies and infants have become a collateral, and for them, these two Torot will awaken, as it is written, ‘From the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength.’”

402. It is written, “Whom will He teach knowledge? And whom will He make to understand the word? Those who are weaned from the milk, those taken from the breast?” “Whom will He teach knowledge” is the Written Torah. “And whom will He make to understand the word” is the Oral Torah. “Those who are weaned from the milk, those taken from the breast” are the ones for whom the Torah came down to Israel on Mount Sinai.

403. “And they two walked until they came to Bethlehem.” Where did they go? The two Torot went to the other nations before Israel stood on Mount Sinai.

When the Written Torah and the Oral Torah came down on Mount Sinai, promptly, “the whole city was excited because of them, and they [women] said, ‘Is this Naomi?” for the whole world was shaken and said, “This is the Torah, desirable, concealed.” Promptly, “And the whole people were seeing the sounds and the torches.” At that time, they said, “this is Naomi,” simply, for this is truly the pleasantness of the Torah, since after they saw the sounds, they recognized the pleasantness of the Torah.

404. Isael did not know the punishments in the Torah until they came to Marah, as it is written, “And they came to Marah,” and it is written, “There He made for it a statute and a rule, and there He tested it.” At that time, the Torah said, “Call me Marah.”

405. The donkey driver rode him three parasangs, and he engaged with them in these secrets. They declared about him, “Your Temple is as a slice of lemon, even the empty ones in Israel are filled with Torah and commandments like a pomegranate.

406. Then, when the Torah was given in Mount Sinai, Israel were crowned in the Torah, and crowned themselves with the high, engraved names. When Israel made the calf and sinned, and Moses was bringing the Torah written on the upper stone tablets, filled with abundance, freedom from the angel of death and enslavements of Malchuts, and from all the bad illnesses in the world.

407. When Moses saw the calf, the letters all fled and went up. At that time, the Torah cried out and said, “I went full” of abundance for Israel, “and now I have become empty and futile,” for I am of no help to them. At that time, the upper ones cried out and said, “Woe for them, for they have wandered off from Me.” “Woe for them,” for they did not persist with faith in their master.