By Rabbi Yair Hoffman

Why is Shavuos called Shavuos?  What follows is an inspiring answer to this question given by one of my Rebbeim, Rav Dovid Kviat zichron tzaddik v’Kadosh livracha. Rav Kviat was an Alter Mirrer who lived through the most difficult times imaginable and demonstrated remarkable yegi’ah in Torah.  He lived in anti-Semitic Poland, survived German Nazis, Russian Communists, the Japanese, and the sweltering heat of Shnghai China.  His seforim have enlightened the Torah world for many decades and are called, “Sukkas Dovid.”  Rav Kviat was a long-time Magid Shiur in the Mirrer Yeshiva in Brooklyn and Morah D’asra of Agudas Yisroel of 18th Avenue in Boro Park. This essay on yegi’ah in Torah is better appreciated and most inspiring when one understands and reflects upon Rav Kviat’s personal history. On Yom Tov we are enjoined to visit our Rebbeim.  Learning his Torah is perhaps teh next best thing.

Shavuos – literally “weeks” is the Yom Tov in which we received the Torah – so why is it called “Shavuos – weeks?”  How does this name correlate with the fact that on this day we received the Torah?

Furthermore, the wording of the pasuk in BaMidbar (28:26) uses the possessive form for weeks – “On the day of the first fruits, when you offer up a new meal offering to Hashem, on your weeks..”  How exactly is it “their weeks?”

The reference is to the seven weeks you shall count for yourselves – that is that Klal Yisroel  prepares for Matan Torah in purifying themselves from their contamination and that they should prepare themselves o be a kli, a vessel, that is worthy of receiving the Torah.

This is the meaning of “your weeks” that you have fought valiantly and succeeded in purifying yourselves for Torah.  This is a praise of Klal Yisroel – that they struggled so much amd succeeded in achieving this self-purification to receive the Torah.  Hashem wished to publicize this remarkable praise of Klal Yisroel and therefore called it Shavuos – weeks.

We, however, call it “Matan Torah” to convey  the praise of Hashem who gave us the Torah. The term “weeks” also carries within it the idea that the underlying mechanism of meriting the Torah is through yegi’ah the effort made in Torah.  This is what they did – they immersed themselves in it and struggled and made the preparations for Matan Torah.

This is the requisite fee in order to acquire Torah, as Chazal tell us in Megillah 6a.  [If a person says:] “I struggled in Torah and I succeeded” – believe him.  “I did not struggle, but I succeeded” – do not believe him.  The effort and the yearning for Torah are the essence.  This is the meaning of the first bracha in Birchas HaTorah – to immerse in the study of Torah – immersion is with self-sacrifice just as one extends himself greatly for one’s personal needs.  Afterward we make the blessing, “Please Hashem sweeten the words of Your Torah in our mouths and in the mouths of all of Your people, the House of Israel..Blessed are You, Hashem, Who teaches Torah to His people, Israel” that is that the effect of the Torah lasts each and every day.

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