Danny Mechanic Discovery National Revelation at Sinai

you [Music] you okay you're an evening everybody so this is the part of the famous discovery seminar called transmission now for those of you have been following the discovery seminar is a very unique experience where rational evidence is provided in many different ways to kind of demonstrate the authenticity of the Torah the five books of Moses the Torah meaning that we have very powerful evidence that the worth of the Torah is Hashem is God and you know they say if Bill Gates tells you how to use a computer he knows what he's talking about so life which is very very complex and very complicated Hashem gave us a Torah which has real the instructions for living and with Discovery addresses is what evidence do we have for the authenticity of the Torah and it's very probing out to discuss I apologize yes we're having a little technical difficulty one second I apologize okay I hope that I'm being heard okay so it's very appropriate that now during severe as her own there during the period that we count down or counts up to shovel well to show us where the giving of the Torah took place very appropriate to talk about this and we're going to talk about the transmission process this Torah that we were given by ash and how was it transmitted it was 3,300 years ago how was it transmitted through generations to now to this day and age well we could be confident that it came from Hashem and then it's the same Torah that was given 3,300 years ago so I would like to start with a story a story that begins in Princeton University and just took place about 20 years ago where I was invited to speak in Princeton University and what was taking place there of course was being given call comparative religion and I'd like to give you the details there was a professor who had 50 students and what they did is they did research and five religions compared them and then had a final so that these are the the professor was it was it was a non-jewish man he has two PhDs in philosophy and he decided at the end of the semester instead of having a review he decided to invite a representative of each of the five religions that he was compared that this that the course was describing what were the five religions Judaism Christianity Islam Harry Krishna and the Mormons those were the five religions so semester he decided and he had these fifty students that he was who invited representatives so invited in a Muslim and a hairy someone following the Harry Krishna's and a Mormon and a Christian and we came to the Jews he was having difficulty so he went over to one of the students the only Jewish kid in the room a 19 year old boy named Stephen and he asked him you know do me a favor get from me yet for me a rabbi who knows had a had a talk and have explained the religion so this boy Stephen had a father named Joel and Joel was a very very wealthy man who had made a significant donation to my organization and I get a call from Joel right before Shabbat right before Shabbos he tells me where he calls me from his you know his yacht from a satellite phone on his yacht in the middle Pacific Ocean and he says to me you got a Princeton to teach some Torah now I was not interested really in doing this but this is my good friend and supporter so I went and it was in an Arab shop I remember you see the Muslims came Monday the Christians came Tuesday the Harry's were Wednesday the Mormons were Thursday and I came air shops I was supposed to speak for 65 minutes but the in the end they kept me there for well over two hours and I started to speak and they were very hostile they had already sat through a whole week most of these kids were really atheists and really didn't believe in anything in any of these religions and they were hostile and I asked him the following question I said all the religions that were here this week how did they begin who was there at their founding moment right every religion starts at some point April 2nd of 3 o'clock in the afternoon the Prophet come down and says hello the Lord spoke to me I'm the Messiah whatever with they claim so I asked him how did they will begin and they start laughing yeah they all began when one guy came along claimed that God spoke to him claimed that God took him up to heaven claimed that God gave him a a book and it's all nonsense it's all one person and they all cancel each other out you know this is what they were saying to me so at this point I I could have said to them you know and what about Judaism had a Judaism start but I said it a little differently I said what did the professor teach you about the beginning of Judaism why did I say it that way because I was pretty sure that they were going to give me the right and the wrong answer and when they give me the wrong answer you know I could look at the professor and go hey what's going on here he's kids are playing paying a lot of money for tuition so is what did the professor teach you about the beginning of Judaism so a very intelligent girl wrote in a raise her hand it was clear that she was um from China or Japan you know and and she raised her ham and she says well the professor taught us that the Jewish people the way they got their Bible was God gave it to Moses just like were the other religions God gave it to Moses so I looked at her and I looked at them and I was prepared I had an overhead projector and I had a large screen and I had these slides and I'm each slide at a puck from the Torah a verse with the English translation and all I did for the next seven eight minutes was read to them different verses in the Torah and I let them reach their own conclusion so for example I regret to them so the professor you know mentioned to you and taught you that Judaism is just like will the other religions in fact there have been 50 thousand recorded religions since Abraham and with they were taught is that all 15,000 began the same way where God gave it to one person and the Jews it was Moses so I read to them it says in the Torah in Hebrew kiba yo hash lishi on the third day when they reached Mount Sinai of the leading leaving Egypt and traveling through the desert URI Hashem God came down let a May in front of KO hum el her cine in front of the entire nation it doesn't say in front of Moses you see by the by Islam it says a front of it Muhammad and by the Christians it's in front of Jesus and the Mormons it's in front of Joseph Smith one person but by the Jews it says God appeared to the entire nation and then the next verse it says by Yetzirah to Allah um the entire nation was shaking the next verse says vaio say Moshe as hum Moshe took the entire nation Lacrosse hello came to meet Hashem and I showed them 40 different examples throughout the Torah where it's God who appeared through the entire nation now how many people was dead so the Torah tells us that there was six hundred thousand men between the ages of 20 and 60 they didn't have a of crisis in that day they didn't have difficulty getting married so I'm assuming there was 1.2 million young married couples between the ages of 20 and 60 the 1.2 million all had children four five six beautiful children obviously not as beautiful as mine but not bad and then you take all the grandparents the bubbies does eight he's above the age of six that you put it together it's approximately three million approximately so I showed this group of kids in Princeton fourteen thousand nine hundred ninety nine religions all came after Judaism and they all know about our claim in the Torah that God appeared through the entire nation a national revelation they all began with one person or you know maybe a few would begin with a few people but it was one or two people but the overwhelming majority was one person private we on the other hand are categorically different and utterly unique three million people experience God talking to them communicating with them giving them the Torah appearing before them in a way that obviously we cannot understand we weren't there I will never forget what happened this young lady very intelligent girl says whoa whoa rabbi wait a minute are you saying that God appeared the Jewish people believe that God appeared to a bunch of people I'm like every single religion in the world a whole group whole bunch of people so I looked there and I said well I wouldn't say a bunch I would say three million men women and children who happened to be my grandparents and they passed it down to me through a Passover Seder and then I repeated that statement and their room was silent I didn't look at the professor anymore I figured out at home he may have been turning many colors because he thought then that God gave it to Moses when in reality all over the Torah it's three million people it's another verse Allah the entire nation heard the sounds and the chauffeur here's another verse and God said to Moshe by Yamaha Jamel Moshe code tomorrow B'nai Israel tell the Jews optimism you saw Kim in a sham I'm Liberty Michelle and I spoke to you the entire nation I will never forget what happened at this moment this young lady she stands up and says rabbi does the world know about this she understood that this is the most unique incredible claim in history a claim of national revelation that God appeared to millions of people now you could ask so uh big deal what's the difference between one person telling you here's what happened to me and three million people saying here's what happened to us the difference is the first case where it's one person or two people or five people it's what's called a Suffolk its unverifiable that could have made up the story you have no way to verify by definition whether or not it's true three million people ten thousand people three million is vada is for sure it definitely took place that is the difference and that is why our claim the Jewish people's claim the Taurus claim is utterly unique we are the only nation in history to claim that God appeared to an entire nation and communicated to them the truth how they should live their lives what's correct what's right what's wrong all other religions of a definition unverifiable and therefore Judaism is not a religion we are what's called in Hebrew amos hora which really means an historical event a religion is based on faith it's a function of your emotions your desire to connect yourself to this prophet this is claimed prophet etc but you have no way to verify all the major religions that might have no way to verify the basic tenets of their faith Judaism on the other hand is a historical event not a religion just like any other historical event 100% sure that there was a civil war in America I am 100% sure we all are that there was a man named Abraham Lincoln who is the President of the United States how can we be sure and I would bet won every penny that I only have bet a hundred million dollars like that anything how could that be I wasn't there there are no witnesses alive today there's no videos there's no pictures of real pictures of George Washington the way we know these things it's true was because any piece in any historical event because the amount of people who are claimed to have witnessed it is so large that conspiracy is impossible how do I know there was a man named Abraham Lincoln was the President of the United States because at the time that he existed or was claimed to have existed at that time millions of people hundreds of thousands of people said we saw him we heard a speech and it went home and they told their children they passed it down same thing with the Civil War same thing with anything in history and that is the definition of history when the Clinton when the event is claimed to have happened to so many people that conspiracy is impossible and therefore Judaism is not a religion we are an historical event now how was that historical event passed down there are many ways we could talk about it for hours but I want to share with you something see we have something but a femme did on her see my it's as if he took a rope and he cast that rope of course 3,300 years of history and every Jew is holding on to that rope from Mount Sinai till today how it's called the Pesach Seder the Passover Seder the most fundamental point of educate in the Jewish people how many Passover sadaham have taken place in your family anyone everyone who's watching here right in your family how many Passover Seder 'z have taken place between your family and moshe rabbeinu and mount sinai and julie leaving egypt are you ready approximately 40 that's it see many people have difficulty connecting to an event that happened 3,300 years ago I don't even remember what I did with my children on column I'd and the grandchildren last year did I torture myself and go to the aquarium well did I torture myself a go to the bronze ooh I don't remember so how are we supposed to connect to an event that happened 3300 years ago so Hashem gave us many ways from the suka the mezuzah kiddush many ways but the main way is the Passover Seder and they were only approximately 40 of them how do I get 40 because we're talking generations see when I was four years old in 1964 you could all do the math how old I am so when I was four years old in 1964 I was at a Passover Seder in Long Island where I grew up with my parents my brothers and my Zadie my grandfather was 80 he was 91 years old it was his last Passover Seder with us Chris he passed away that year I was four he was 91 and during the time when I was trying to steal the afikomen and all the adults were outside the room I was left alone with my Zadie and here's exactly what happened without any you know drama or change of the facts I was four my Zadie walked over to me in 1964 he was 91 he grabbed the hold of my wrist my right hand and he said to me nitish the following words Donyell don't ever forget how could this borrow who God took us out of mitzrayim took us out of Egypt and with a big smile he said and he gave us a beautiful Torah and then my Zadie leaned down lowered his voice and with a big smile he said to me and when I was four years old and eighteen whatever it was 78 my 90 year olds 80 from 1793 did the same thing to me that I'm doing to you to zaydis to Saddam the cogs in 1792 and when that Zadie was four-years-old in 1705 his ad from 1610 did the same thing to him three of my Zaidi's time at 1610 just take it back it's about 40 41 which is really nothing and this is how we passed on this event this historical event that the Jewish people experienced now I would like to continue so there I was in Princeton I presented this and I showed them and I show them the verses and we are utterly unique so one of the kids raised his hands and he asked me you know rabbi this is very very interesting what you're saying they never heard of our claim of national revelation but rabbi there are two billion Muslims and 1 billion Christians and millions and tens of millions of other religions who leave 100 percent in their religion how many Jews are there that really believe he asked me so whatever 15 million 12 million 10 million he said game over they win there's billions of them and not only are there billions of people who believe in other religions who believe in their one-man store without a mass revelation but many things are very smart there are hundreds of millions of very very smart Christians and Moslems and Mormonism etc I was asked this question so here's what I answered I said like this I said first of all the fact that billions of people believe in the religion is really meaningless in terms of authenticating that religion and you know why because they're all mutually exclusive one billion Muslims believe that they have the truth and they're convinced of it and that the Christians do not have the truth and 1 billion Christians believe that their prophets the greatest prophet and Muhammad is not the greatest but that's what they believe can they both be accurate and correct at the same time it was a my said to them that we have a mutually exclusive claims either Muhammad was the greatest prophet of all time or Jesus was or Joseph Smith or whoever each one's claimed they were the greatest prophet of all time so what do we do from this they can't they can't all be the greatest prophet so we see from this it's really irrefutable logic that billions of people could believe a certain story took place a long time ago a God appeared to their prophet and it cannot be accurate because we have other claims that would mutually exclusive claims and therefore it doesn't matter this is the most important point it's written in many of the smart and many of the rabbi's have written about this for the last thousand years it doesn't matter how many people believe in the religion and believe in the story rather it's how many people witnessed the story the first believers when the religion started who was there how many people experienced it was at 1 and therefore unverifiable or was a three million historical event doesn't matter how many people believe in a story it's how many people witnessed it we the Jewish people in our torah our historical document three million people you know I shared with them and I shared with them the following muscle the following story imagine you're in a forest mat so they're asking so how could it be that all these people billions of people by believing in these one-man unverifiable stories and the answer is the following imagine you're in a forest and there are bears running after you thousands hundreds thousands of people trying to get out of this farce because of the pack of thirty grizzly bears running after them and you come to a fork in the road which way do you go right or left one road will lead you out of the forest one road to lead you deeper into the forest and you will not make it out of life so you look to the right you see five thousand people went to the right you look to the left only five people the Bears are about thirty seconds away you need to make a decision right now the problem is you don't know what is the correct which one's the correct one the right or the left well he knows five thousand went to the right five went to the world so logic dictates you go with the five thousand it's five thousand people made a decision merits only five so the great rabbi who wrote about this story says as you're about to take the road of the five thousand you suddenly realize who are these five thousand people there's a special school next door to the forest for people who are in that book unfortunately blind and all of them they went on a picnic they went on a you know an outing in the forest so four thousand nine hundred ninety nine of those people are never blind and they're holding hands because the first person that teacher had yelled out there are bears in the farmers grab hands we're getting out of here so what are the numbers now is it still five to five thousand no it's five to one one person made the decision to go to the right and he slipped along the other 4999 they just followers and if we turn around you take the road to the left and I believe all the religions in the world they all went to the right their followers so when it comes to Muslims and Christians and Mormons and all the different religions each person's following their father okay and that father's following their father and their father go all the way back to the beginning you come to one person so it's not billions of people it's one person that started it all off and that's unverifiable but by Jews it's not Moses who went to the left and brought the three million people after him it's three million of our grandparents went to the left followed by for Passover to them and then as millions of Jews today so we are millions of people following our Father or father or father back to the beginning which is three million people in historical events all the others go back to one person this simply followers they're followers because it's all about witnesses now I remember once I was coming back from a discovery seminar in California happens to be a some famous Hollywood stars we were presenting Jewish ones we were presenting this seminar to them and I'm my way back he was supposed to go to New York through Denver but there was a snowstorm in Denver supposed to be layover in Denver and we were redirected to Salt Lake City so there I was this as many years ago no cell phones you know stuck in Salt Lake City in an airport for seven hours till the next plane to New York and I remember seeing to my you know to my right you know were a group of Chabad Lubavitch young men holy men doing wonderful mitzvahs and helping Jews do mitzvahs to my that was to my right to my left were a group of Mormons really a couple of boy and a girl young man young lady giving out Mormon literature so I made a present I figured you know I already prayed today I already Dobbins so I'll go with the Mormons you know so I started talking to these Mormons very nice people and they believe very strongly in their religion and I brought up this what I've been told you until now and I showed them it makes so much sense how would God do this but he go to one person for three million and I explained to them you know I asked some simple questions you know you know they your claim they claim Moses was a great prophet and the Torah was true but then God kind of changed his mind redirected things and now there's a new way to serve Him through Joseph Smith in the Book of Mormon and many other religions say that - that's what they all say so I pointed out to them you know you believe in the five books of Moses right yeah and it says in the book 24 times Brit Olam bris olam the God's relationship with the Jews and the Torah is a covenant forever it's forever I also pointed out to them that you know they believe in the story of Mount Sinai and national revelation so I asked him you know if Hashem came back and decided that there's a new way to you know have a relationship with him why wouldn't he gather millions of people from this new way on a mountain and tell them do a mass revelation like you did for the Jews and my biggest question of will I ask them is if God changed his mind why didn't he come back to the Jews and tell us why did he do a second Mount Sinai revelation and inform us that the roles are changing and now there's a new way and a better way to have a relationship with him these are some of the things they brought up to them and I want to point out that there is a verse in the Torah and it's at the end of Moses his life emotion abejas life and he points at it it's in in devar man Deuteronomy the fourth Parekh verse 32 poster clémence base and it says there Keshia almoloya may be shown him Moshe Albania was telling the Jews then and if you look at the context he's really telling any Jew at any point in history and he says in me in the verse of the Torah take a look look back in history look on any area of this world or at any time in history has anyone ever made this claim of national revelation have you ever even heard of such a claim what the author of the Torah is telling us is nobody in history will ever make the claim that God spoke to an entire nation so I asked if the author of the Torah was a man number one he got it right he was a prophet here we are three thousand three hundred years later 15 thousand religions later and nobody dare to even try to convince people that there was a national revelation for their religion so he was a prophet number two if a man wrote the Torah that means he himself got away with the hoax of claiming that it was from God how could he then write in the tower that no one will ever tried us he just did it so these are all powerful pieces of evidence that the Torah was given as an assignment a historical event that took place on Mount Sinai three thousand three hundred thirty years ago and Hashem passed it down through a Passover Seder in many many other ways now I want to bring up the idea we're talking about transmission of the oral law and really you know this needs to be addressed perhaps in a separate class but we'll do it now quickly how do we know that's the written Torah how do we know there was an oral torah the whole townland all the rabbi so to say thousands of years but some people call rabbinical Judaism which is really not accurate at all how do you know there was an oral explanation maybe God on Mount Sinai for example said go keep Shabbat you know and Dome illaha don't do work what it means is you know chill if you feel sitting at the beach on Shabbat and drinking a martini and smoking a cigar and just chilling that's what Hashem God meant then that's what he meant it's subject to interpretation but that is impossible of course there had to have been an oral tradition and an oral torah an oral law i was once on a plane going to israel i sat down next to a very wonderful Israeli soldier I thanked him for you know all that he does for the Jewish people and you know after a while I pulled out you know a homage tour and I was learning I was studying and he started a conversation with me and he says to me you know this is really nonsense he said I gotta be honest with you this whole Torah thing and as I began to talk to him more I realized that his real problem wasn't so much the Torah but you know the oral law and the rabbi's say yes but I said to him so let me ask you the Torah was written by a very brilliant mind correct he goes there the most brilliant of all time greatest you know most great greatest book of all time change the world form the backbone of all Western morality I said so this person was brilliant I said that this person according to you who wrote the Torah this beam did he want the Jews to keep the Torah to keep the 613 commandments or not obviously the thorah the earth of the sort of boy did he want us to keep it there were different punishments or even death penalties all very serious stuff wants us to keep the Torah and then he said to this man or that an oral law isn't that one commandment whatsoever not one of his 613 that you can keep just based on the words of the Torah and I gave him dozens of examples I gave him dozens of examples I mean what Moshe Rabbeinu Moses came down from Mount Sinai and told all the men line up gold put on tefillin after all it says in the Torah tefillin phylacteries what's that the men would say what's that ma sure they know emotion would say sorry not telling guess how could they be how could you an act of putting on tefillin where doesn't say a single thing in the Torah what is drilling for another mr. go put on sea seat open on fringes without any explanation of what it is honor your mother and your father someone once said to me you don't need an oral law for that sure you do what if you're adopted are you obligated to honor your father and mother would have god forbid you're severely abused by them are you are you obligated to honor them you know it says antara go live in a Sukkah for a week what's the circle I have to go into something for a week what is it wasn't an NGO that can I go to work does my entire family moving do I have to bring it bringing my cars their washing machines for refrigerator what does it mean and I showed him command many of the commandments don't kill what does that mean what if someone's coming to kill you whatever the terrorist is about to kill you he just let him love Hashem acocella to love God would either how do you do that you know send him uh send him cards fire with like how do you love God you need an oral or to explain these things without an oral or the Torah makes absolutely no sense there's nothing you can do all these Commandments you have no idea and then we come to Shabbat imagine what sure better come down Jews I just received the most beautiful number-one mitzvah in the world from Hashem it's called sha this savate Kol keep the Shabbos you would say okay how do we do that God says don't do Malacca not work work the word for workers up ah don't do Mill aha oh and by the way if you do Milka serious serious consequences the judge will say okay what is Malacca what is it that we're not supposed to do and Mosher Boehner says not telling yes how could that be no acts whatsoever what is Malacca what can't you do what he did what he can do on Shabbat when you keep or it doesn't say you can't eat it says afflict your soul that's the way it says it in Hebrew course yourself pain afflict your soul what does that mean take a hammer and hit yourself in the head so Moshe Rana said oh you have to afflict your soul in Yom Kippur and if you don't afflict yourself properly severe punishments and as usual say okay so what what does it mean what I'm wanting me to flip my soul and Moshe is not telling how can that be of course there was an oral law and of course there was an explanation and then I'll conclude with you the you know the question that people ask how do we know that the Torah that we have today is the same tour from thousands of years ago how do we know that the oral or didn't changed you know the telephone game so there's much to say on this but I will say this when the Jewish when the State of Israel was proclaimed in 1948 millions of Jews arrived in Israel from all over the world of many different cultures from the north from the south stardom Ashkenazim came on in from Iran from Iraq from Belgium from from France from America from all over the world and he know what happened at that first Yom Kippur how did everybody afflict themselves every single one fasted like the oral law says even though it doesn't say to mr. was explicitly and when it said US coat to take out a beautiful fruit everyone took Adam s rogue they may have had different customs big ones small ones yellow green but they were all an aspirin no one pulled out a banana or a watermelon or a cantaloupe they recognized that they all had the same Torah chappal pet the same oral law and so too is the Torah in the early 1950s dr. brewer famous professor dr. brewer he did a study on thousands of Torahs that were brought to Israel from every different culture some of them a thousand years old eight hundred years old six hundred years old and he compared all these tourists and they all had 300 or 4805 letters they were the same Torah there was a slight difference between the sparda Torah and Ashkenazi of 8 letters and the 10 money was 9 letters but these were spelling variants like the word honor these both h2no are or the Eddie you but know different words or phrases so we saw did the Torah's it remain intact so I want to conclude this part of the discovery the transmission process how God gave us a tour amounts on I did it in a way that we don't have to have faith it's real real powerful evidence of an historical event passed down through the Passover Seder the mezuzah zona or other schmatta we say the kriya Sh'ma the kiddush so many other commandments of it's wrote that Hashem gave us so that we could perpetuate this historical event and we have a torch to bottle pet the oral law that explains everything in the Torah and how to do the 613 commandments and I want to leave you all leave off with you a very powerful question that I've had for maybe 40 years that's appropriate to ask it now and that question is the foundation of Judaism is har C night is the giving of the Torah on how see my when did that happen which how are they shrew Asst shalt yet we a single Mitzvah in the Torah surrounding the midst of the holiday we shall want but Passover we have the Passover Seder and so many Commandments why don't we have a Passover Seder from for shovel oats Luis we sit around and we discuss what happened on Mount Sinai into giving you the Torah etc many many answers have been given some of them satisfy me a little bit some more you tell me if you have an answer a really good answer to this question you can somehow track me down and send me that answer thank you very much for listening thank you for listening to the first parts of discovery and now comes I think it's going to be on Wednesday night the control I think the ribosome and I'm not a hundred percent sure but where they are the culmination of all of this evidence that we have to show the authenticity and the truth of the Torah thank you and good night