To Stand or Not to Stand

...that is PART of the question. It comes up three times a year: Parshat Yitro, Shavuot morning, and Parshat Va'etchanan. Everytime we read the Aseret HaDibrot, the issue comes up. There is a time-honored custom in Ashkenazi communities (and elsewhere) for the congregation to stand when the portion of the 10 Commandments is read. Most people are aware that there is a long term controversy as to whether it is the proper thing to do... or not.

On the one hand, when we read in the Torah about the receiving of the Torah at Sinai, we are (or should be) overwhelmed with the awe of that experience and we yearn to relive it. It probably seem quite natural to rise to one's feet when we hear ANOCHI HASHEM ELOKECHA. How can you not stand, in respect and excitement?

On the other hand, the Gemara and other sources tell us of a problem of old, which persists throughout the generations, until our own time. Many people – non-Jew and, sadly, some fellow Jews as well – are under the mistaken notion that the Aseret HaDibrot is the sum total of Divine Revelation, and that the rest of the Torah (the Written Torah, and certainly, the Oral Torah) are of human origin.

Early on, whenever people started to push that idea, our Sages reacted by downplaying the 10 Commandments and by emphasizing that all of Torah comes from G-d. The suggestion to include the reading of the Aseret HaDibrot as part of our daily davening (as we do with the Song of the Sea, the Sh'ma, and other passages) was rejected. Let us not lend a hand to those who limit the Divinity of the Torah. There have been some authorities who banned the image of the Luchot from synagogue decoration.

And there are those who strongly opposed the practice of standing for this Torah reading, and not others. 

On the other hand, the Aseret HaDibrot are special. They were the words we first heard at Sinai. They are an integral part of the Sinai Experience. They were the down-payment (so to speak) that we received, pending Moshe's teaching us the rest of what G-d commands us.

The two issues that were lumped together above — Aseret HaDibrot vs. the whole Written Torah and the Written Torah vs. the Oral Law — are different. But their common features are important to keep in mind. Traditional Torah Judaism acknowledges the truth that G-d revealed the entire Torah to Moshe, for him to transmit it to us, generation after generation. When we here the events of Sh'mot 19-20 this Shabbat, we should recommit ourselves to G-d and all of His Torah.