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Why did Moshe break the luchos instead of simply withholding them? The shiur develops a fundamental yesod that Klal Yisrael's mistake at the Golden Calf was thinking Moshe was merely an intermediary delivering Torah (תורה) from Hashem (ה׳) to them. In reality, Moshe's direct reception of Torah at Sinai was itself Klal Yisrael's kabbalas HaTorah—as their melech, Moshe unified all Jews within himself. The machatzit hashekel annually restores this unity by having each Jew give a kofer nafsho to be counted and included in Moshe Rabbeinu.
Rabbi Zweig opens by presenting a fundamental difficulty in the parsha of Ki Sisa: why did Moshe Rabbeinu break the luchos? If he didn't want to give them to Klal Yisrael, he could have simply not delivered them or returned them to Hashem (ה׳). If he did want to deliver them, why break them? What was the breaking meant to accomplish? Additionally, what was the entire negotiation between Hashem and Moshe about—Hashem offering to send a malach to lead them to Eretz Yisrael, and Moshe insisting that if Hashem Himself doesn't go, they shouldn't leave Sinai at all? The shiur also addresses a perplexing Rashi (רש"י) in Parshas Yisro on the words "Anochi Hashem Elokecha"—written in singular rather than plural. Rashi explains this gave Moshe an opening to defend Klal Yisrael at the time of the Golden Calf, saying "You only commanded me (singular), not them." But this seems absurd—if the entire nation stood at Har Sinai and received the Aseres HaDibros, how could anyone think only Moshe was commanded? If they truly weren't commanded, then they committed no sin, yet Hashem still threatened to destroy them entirely.
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Ki Sisa
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