What Did the People Hear at Mount Sinai?

As one might suspect, this discrepancy has been offered as evidence that more than one hand was at work in crafting this passage. See Baruch J. Schwartz, “What Really Happened at Mount Sinai?” TheTorah (2013). Ramban (R. Moses Nahmanides, 1194–1270), however, solves the problem by reading the verse in Exodus in line with Deuteronomy (gloss on Exod 20:14):

במשנה תורה (דברים ה':כ') הזכיר משה כי אחרי הדברות קרבו אליו כל ראשי שבטיהם וזקניהם ואמרו לו אם יוספים אנחנו לשמוע את קול י"י אלהינו עוד ומתנו, כי שערנו בנפשותינו שלא נוכל עוד לסבול משא דבר י"י אלהים, כי חשבו שירצה האלהים לדבר אליהם כל המצוות.

In Deuteronomy (5:20), Moses mentions that after the Decalogue, the leaders of the tribes and the elders approached Moses, and said to him “if we continue to hear the voice of the LORD our God any more we will die,” [meaning] for we have evaluated that our souls cannot stand the burden of the LORD God’s words any more, for they thought that God wished to communicate all of the commandments directly.

Clearly, the Masoretes did not read it this way, since there is a paragraph break (parashah setuma) between the verses. Similarly, Stephen Langton (1150–1228), the Archbishop of Canterbury responsible for the chapter divisions, also did not read the text this way.

See discussion of this source in Gershom Scholem, “Religious Authority and Mysticism,” On the Kabbalah and its Symbolism (New York: Schocken Books, 1965), 10; Yoel S., “A Hasidic Matan Torah: The Revelation of the Divine Voice Within,” TheTorah (2014).

This latter phrase, presented as a parenthetical, may be a later supplement to bring the Deuteronomy text in line with Exodus 20:15. See discussion in Moshe Weinfeld, Deuteronomy 1–11, Anchor Bible 5 (New York: Doubleday, 1991), 240–241.

Some critical scholars believe the entire depiction of the Decalogue in Deuteronomy is a later addition to the text. See David Frankel, “The Covenant in Moab: Deuteronomy without Horeb,” TheTorah (2018).

I refer here to “I YHWH am your God . . .” as the first commandment even though comparisons with ancient Near East suzerain treaties suggest that it is a preamble rather than a command, since this is the standard enumeration in Jewish tradition. Maimonides took it as a command the believe in the existence of God.

The context of the statement is in a discussion of the idea that the Torah contains 613 commandments (b. Makkot 23b–24a):

אמר רב המנונא מאי קרא תורה צוה לנו משה... תורה בגימטריא שית מאה וחד סרי הוי אנכי ולא יהיה לך מפי הגבורה שמענום

Rav Hamnuna said: “What does the verse (Deut 33:4) “Moses commanded the Torah to us”? Torah in gematria [=adding up Hebrew letters with numerical values] is (only) 611! “I am the LORD” and “Do not have other gods” we heard directly from God [and not from Moses].

Rashi, (R. Solomon Yitzhaki, ca. 1040–1105), who felt that the Talmud’s solution did not do justice to the simple reading of Exodus 20:1, said that God spoke the entire Decalogue out loud first, but in a miraculous jumble of words, requiring prophetic powers to understand (Exod 20:1):

את כל הדברים האלה – מלמד שאמר הקב"ה עשרת הדברות בדבור אחד, מה שאי איפשר לאדם לומר כן. אם כן מה תלמוד לומר עוד: אנכי ולא יהיה לך, שחזר ופירש כל דבור ודבור בפני עצמו.

“All of these words”—this teaches that the Holy One, blessed be He, said all ten commandments in one statement, what is impossible for any person to say. If so, what do we learn from the first two commandments being written in the first-person plural (lit. “from ‘I’ and ‘You shall not have’”)? That [God] went back and recited each of the commandments on its own (the first two to Israel and the last eight to Moses).

The supercommentary on Rashi by Shabbethai ben Joseph Bass (1641–1718) called Siftei Chakhamim explains that Rashi was inspired to suggest this solution by the Psalm 62:12:

כלומר, הואיל וכולן בדיבור אחד נאמרו, למה כתיב במקום אחר (תהלים סב, יב) אחת דבר אלקים שתים זו שמעתי, דמשמע דוקא אנכי ולא יהי' לך נאמרו בדבור אחד, והא כולן בדברו אחד נאמרו. ומתרץ שחזר ופי' כו', כלומר, דודאי כולן בדבור אחד נאמרו, ובפרישה שפירש לנו הקב"ה, לא שמענו מפי הקב"ה כי אם שתים, והשאר משה פרשן:

Meaning to say, since all of them were recited as part of one statement, why does it say elsewhere [in reference to the Decalogue] (Ps 62:12): “God said one thing, I heard two,” which implies that the first two commandments (= the “two” from the verse) were said in one statement—weren’t they all recited in one statement? He answers that [God] went back, etc., meaning to say, certainly they were recited in one statement, but in the subsequent explanation the Holy One, blessed be He, gave us, we only heard from God’s mouth the first two; the rest we heard from Moses.

This does not mean that all the people came to know the existence and unity of God. Rather it was only those who were fit for it who achieved a level equal to that of a prophet, and they achieved it in varying degrees. Guide of the Perplexed, 2.32. For more on Maimonides views of prophecy, see Haim (Howard) Kreisel, “What Is Prophecy?” TheTorah (2014); Kenneth Seeskin, “Prophecy and Legislation after Moses,” TheTorah (2020).

Maimonides’ reasoning is problematic. If reason unassisted by revelation can discern the truth of the first two commandments, why can it not discern the necessity of prohibiting theft and murder?

Note that even in his Eight Principle in Pereq Helek, Maimonides says that no one but Moses knows exactly what God’s “speech” to Moses consisted of. For further discussion, see Baruch J. Schwartz, “The LORD Spoke to Moses”– Does God Speak?” TheTorah (2014). For more on the pitfalls of literal interpretation of revelation see Sam Fleischacker, “Hearing God's Voice: Two Models for Accepting the Torah,” TheTorah (2013).

Guide of the Perplexed, 2.36, 38­–39.

Even though Maimonides did not think God spoke actual words, he still believed that revelation contains propositional content. This is denied by Martin Buber, who wrote; “Man receives and what he receives is not a ‘content’ but a presence, a presence as strength.” (Martin Buber, I and Thou, translated by Walter Kaufmann [New York: Simon and Schuster, 1970], 158.) Rather than God’s passing on propositions in the form of doctrines or commandments, for Buber revelation is the experience of encountering God. The propositions are our (or Moses’) reaction to or reflection on that encounter. For a critique of contentless revelation, see Sam Fleischacker, “Authority Needs Language,” TheTorah (2017).

See David Frankel, “Moses’ Commandments: The Secret of R. Nissim of Marseilles,” TheTorah (2016), who takes this as Rabbi Nissim’s view as well. Classical philosophers dispute to what extent a purely intellectual prophecy would be limited to eternal truths. This problem is especially difficult when it comes to explaining the historical narratives that occupy so much of the Torah, and also how intellectual prophecy could include the many parables and metaphors that make the Torah intelligible to the average reader, for not only do these forms of communication bespeak an imagination, they offer evidence of a particularly lively one. See Charles H. Manekin, “Is the Divine Origin of the Torah Really Incompatible with Maimonides’ Philosophical Principles?” TheTorah (2019). Manekin is right to point out that there are passages where Maimonides says or implies that God is aware of particular things. But the Aristotelian side of Maimonides compelled him to introduce an important qualification: particular things insofar as they perfect their intellect or embody universal truths (Guide 3.17). Behind this is Aristotle’s insistence that particular things are unknowable in their particularity. If this is true, it is unclear how God could have revealed the histories of people like Laban, Korach, or Zimri.

Guide, Book 2, Introduction and ch. 1.