Not Rolled Over by a Barrel

Not taking yes as answer, Naomi

was teaching Ruth how to be Jewish. Jews

with strangers feel great solidarity,

but aren’t enthusiastic when they choose

to join a people who were so unwilling

to accept the Torah while God had

threatened that Mount Sinai would be killing

them all if they refused.  They were not glad

when offered Ten Commandments. “Far too many!”

they must have thought, an offer given with no choice,

to turn down and miscategorize as catchpenny,

compelled before receipt of them to voice

consent. Why then should strangers want to join

the Jews, considering that even those

genetically connected to Abe’s groin

were threatened by the mountain He’d bulldoze

on them unless they all converted?  He

demanded Jews’ conversion, treating “No”’ as

unacceptable, as Ruth did, she

who from left field became the wife of Boaz,

and ancestress of David who acquired

Jerusalem, establishing a dyn-

asty which till today has not yet sired

a messiah promised from his line,

though in his thirteenth principle Rambam,

Maimonides, said all Jews must believe

that one in God’s good time will surely  come,

just like the mountain God said He would heave

upon the Jews unless they all agreed

to follow all His rules before they heard

them, never Mirandized. He did not need

to roll the mountain, since they all concurred,

declaring willingness “to do” before

they heard from Moses each talmudic detail,

despite the Pentecostly metaphor,

not bargaining before the Sinai sale.

BShabbat 88a states:

״וַיִּתְיַצְּבוּ בְּתַחְתִּית הָהָר״, אָמַר רַב אַבְדִּימִי בַּר חָמָא בַּר חַסָּא: מְלַמֵּד שֶׁכָּפָה הַקָּדוֹשׁ בָּרוּךְ הוּא עֲלֵיהֶם אֶת הָהָר כְּגִיגִית, וְאָמַר לָהֶם: אִם אַתֶּם מְקַבְּלִים הַתּוֹרָה מוּטָב, וְאִם לָאו — שָׁם תְּהֵא קְבוּרַתְכֶם. אָמַר רַב אַחָא בַּר יַעֲקֹב: מִכָּאן מוֹדָעָא רַבָּה לְאוֹרָיְיתָא. אָמַר רָבָא: אַף עַל פִּי כֵן הֲדוּר קַבְּלוּהָ בִּימֵי אֲחַשְׁוֵרוֹשׁ, דִּכְתִיב: ״קִיְּמוּ וְקִבְּלוּ הַיְּהוּדִים״ — קִיְּימוּ מַה שֶּׁקִּיבְּלוּ כְּבָר.

The Gemara cites additional homiletic interpretations on the topic of the revelation at Sinai. The Torah says, “And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet God; and they stood at the lowermost part of the mount” (Exodus 19:17). Rabbi Avdimi bar Ḥama bar Ḥasa said: the Jewish people actually stood beneath the mountain, and the verse teaches that the Holy One, Blessed be He, overturned the mountain above the Jews like a barrel, and said to them: If you accept the Torah, excellent, and if not, there will be your burial. Rav Aḥa bar Ya’akov said: From here there is a substantial caveat to the obligation to fulfill the Torah. The Jewish people can claim that they were coerced into accepting the Torah, and it is therefore not binding. Rava said: Even so, they again accepted it willingly in the time of Ahasuerus, as it is written: “The Jews ordained, and took upon them, and upon their seed, and upon all such as joined themselves unto them” (Esther 9:27), and he taught: The Jews ordained what they had already taken upon themselves through coercion at Sinai.

Exod. 24:7 states:

ז  וַיִּקַּח סֵפֶר הַבְּרִית, וַיִּקְרָא בְּאָזְנֵי הָעָם; וַיֹּאמְרוּ, כֹּל אֲשֶׁר-דִּבֶּר יְהוָה נַעֲשֶׂה וְנִשְׁמָע. 7 And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the hearing of the people; and they said: ‘All that the LORD hath spoken will we do, and hear.’

The word “catchpenny” alludes to Henny Penny in “The Sky is Falling,” an iconic European folk tale about a chicken who believes that the world is coming to an end. The phrase “The sky is falling!” voices a misconceived threat in the story, and inspired a common idiom indicating a mistaken belief that disaster is imminent.