Why the Jews Said “We Will Do” Before “We Will Understand”

There is a scene in Exodus that modern exegesis often passes over too quickly. At the moment when the people of Israel receive the Torah at Sinai, they answer with a phrase that has unsettled commentators for centuries: Na’aseh ve-Nishma — “we will do and we will hear”. First commitment, then understanding. First the yes, then the question. To modern ears, it can sound naïve, or worse: fanatical.

That is a mistake. It is one of the boldest philosophical declarations in Jewish thought.

Modernity has built its house on the opposite principle. Before committing to anything — an idea, a person, a tradition — modern man demands to understand. He evaluates, compares, weighs. He signs the contract only after reading every clause. He commits himself only after having lived beside the other. He adopts a faith only after subjecting it to rational scrutiny. The motto might be: Nishma ve-Na’aseh — “first we understand, then we decide”.

There is something apparently sensible in that. And yet life — real life, not the one we plan on paper — works in precisely the opposite way. The great human commitments are not born from prior understanding. They are born from the leap. A child is not the result of having fully understood fatherhood. A marriage is not the logical conclusion of an exhaustive analysis. A vocation is not chosen after one has exhausted every alternative.........

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