Q. Since remembering Kabbolas Hatorah is a mitzva every day and not doing so is a negative prohibition (Ramban), Why don’t we actually read that parsha every day as we do with Yetzias Mitzraim?
A. Rambam and Ramban (mitzvah 2) indeed disagree in the interpretation of the posuk (Devarim (4: 9, 10) Only take heed and guard your soul exceedingly, so that you do not forget the facts that your own eyes have seen, and so that they do not depart from your heart all the days of your life, and make them known to your children… the day that you stood before Hashem your G-d at Chorev. Ramban understands the above to be a negative commandment regarding the particular instance and historical occasion of the giving of the Torah. The Rambam however, sees this as a part of the general mitzvah of learning Torah and it invokes the singular prohibition of forgetting the Torah one has learned (Megilas Esther ibid.). The above is reflected in the Mishna (Avos 3: 8), that uses this same verse to teach that: Whoever forgets something of his learning is tantamount to losing one’s soul, or transgresses a negative commandment (Menachos 99b).
Horav Shlomo Miller’s Shlit’a opinion is that according to the Rambam you would comply with this mitzvah every occasion that you learn Torah. However even, following Ramban’s understanding, unlike the positive mitzvah of remembering every day Yetzias Mitzraim, this is basically a negative decree of not forgetting our historical culminating moment.
The Rov added that the Mogen Avrohom (60: 2) quotes in the name of Mekubalin that when one mentions in the brocho of Ahavas Olam, “Vekeravtonu Malkenu Leshimcha Hagadol,” it is a reference to the receiving of the Torah at Har Sinai.
Rav Aharon Kotler zt”l would ask why is it that we have so many daily mitzvos and Yomim Tovim, not to mention Pesach and the sedorim, all of them as Zecher Leyitzias Mitzroim, and we have none in remembrance of Kabolas Hatorah. He would explain that “Zecher” implies something that was and is not extant anymore. That is not the case with Kabolas Hatorah, he would assert, as the Yerushalmi (Chagiga 2: 1) relates on the Torah learning of Rabi Eliezer and Rabi Yehoshua, that as in Har Sinai fire came and covered them. A phenomena similar occurred to the learning of Yonassan ben Uziel (Suka 28: 1), all explained by the Zohar (Chukas) that there is no number to the instances of Kabolas Hatora, since it repeats itself endlessly when people engage and learn Torah with ahava and devotion, constantly and properly. Therefore, no zecher is required, since it never ended (Kuntres Derech Eliezer 2 p. 185).
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as advised by Horav Shlomo Miller Shlit’a
Important Numbers
