Na’aseh V’nishma – Making Torah Observance the Core or One’s Life

Rabbi Noson Weisz is one of the best at making spiritual concepts from the Ramban, the Maharal and Rabbi Dessler accessible.

In this essay, Rabbi Weisz explains:

Perhaps the best known passage in Jewish literature concerning the covenant at Sinai is the following passage of Talmud:

Rabbi Simai expounded, “When Israel uttered na’aseh before nishma, or “we will do” before “we will hear,” 600,000 ministering angels came to each and every Jew and tied two crowns to each Jew, one corresponding to na’aseh and one corresponding to nishma. (Talmud, Sabbos, 88a)

The statement “we will do, and we will hear,” amounts to a commitment to carry out God’s commandments even before hearing what the observance of those commandments actually involves. Only someone who is totally willing to shape his entire life around Torah observance would be willing to make such a commitment.

To the modern mind, isn’t this kind of blind acceptance irrational?

BLIND ACCEPTANCE OR COERCION?

Perhaps we can begin to glimpse the answer to this question by considering a neighboring Talmudic passage nearly as well known as the previous.

They stood at the foot of the mountain (Exodus 19:17) R’Avdimi bar Chama bar Chasa said, “This teaches us that the Holy One, blessed is He, covered them with the mountain as though it were an upturned vat and He said to them: ‘If you accept the Torah, well and good. But if not your burial will be right here!'” Rav Acha bar Yakov said, “From here stem strong grounds for a complaint of coercion regarding the acceptance of the Torah.” (Talmud, Shabos 88a)
This passage would appear to indicate the diametric opposite to the first; far from accepting the Torah willingly, the Jewish people had to be coerced to accept it.

Is there any way to reconcile a willingness to say na’aseh v’nishma with a need to coerce the Jews into accepting the Torah?

Give the article a read for an explanation according to the Maharal.