I heard during a meal on the eve of Shavuot [Feast of Weeks], 1948
The matter of the giving of the Torah that occurred on Mount Sinai does not mean that the Torah was given once and then the giving stopped. Rather, there is no absence in spirituality, since spirituality is an eternal matter, unending. But since, from the perspective of the Giver, we are unfit to receive the Torah, we say that the cessation is by the upper one.
However, then, at the foot of Mount Sinai, the whole of Israel were ready to receive the Torah, as it is written, “And the people camped at the bottom of the mount, as one man in one heart.” At that time, the public was prepared; they had but one intention, which is a single thought about the reception of the Torah.
However, there are no changes from the perspective of the Giver—He always gives, as it is written in the name of the Baal Shem Tov that each day one must hear the ten commandments on Mount Sinai.
The Torah is called the “potion of life” and the “potion of death.” We must understand how two opposites can be said about a single subject.
We must know that we cannot attain any reality as it is in itself. Rather, we attain everything only according to our sensations. And reality, as it is in itself, is of no interest to us at all. Hence, we do not attain the Torah as it is in itself; we attain only our sensations. Thus, all of our impressions follow only our sensations.
Therefore, when a person learns Torah, and the Torah removes him from the love of the Creator, this Torah is certainly considered the “potion of death.” Conversely, if this Torah that he is learning brings him closer to the love of the Creator, it is certainly considered the “potion of life.”
But the Torah itself, the existence of the Torah in and of itself, without consideration of the lower one who must attain it, is considered “a light without a Kli [vessel],” where there is no attainment whatsoever. Hence, when we speak of the Torah, it refers to the sensations that a person receives from the Torah, and only they determine the reality for the creatures.
When one works for oneself, it is called Lo Lishma [not for Her sake]. But from Lo Lishma we come to Lishma [for Her sake]. Hence, if one has not yet been rewarded with the reception of the Torah, he hopes to be rewarded with the reception of the Torah in the following year. But when one has been awarded the wholeness of Lishma, he has nothing more to do in this world, since he has already corrected everything to be in the wholeness of Lishma.
For this reason, each and every year there is the time of reception of the Torah, since that time is ready for an awakening from below. This is because it is the awakening of the time when the light of the giving of the Torah was revealed in the lower ones. Hence, there is an awakening from above, which gives strength to the lower ones to be able to perform the qualifying act to receive the Torah, as then, when they were ready to receive the Torah.
Therefore, if one marches on a path where the Lo Lishma brings him the Lishma, then he is marching on the path of truth. One should hope that he will eventually be rewarded with achieving Lishma and with the reception of the Torah.
Yet, caution is required to constantly keep the goal before his eyes or he will march on an opposite line, since the root of the body is reception for itself. Thus, it always draws to its root, which is the aim to receive, the opposite of the Torah, called “the tree of life.” This is why the body considers the Torah the “potion of death.”