Go Long! - How To Be a Great Receiver

(3) Moses went and repeated to the people all the commands of Hashem and all the rules; and all the people answered with one voice, saying, “All the things that Hashem has said we will do!” (4): And Moses wrote down all of Hashem's words, and he rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain with twelve pillars for the tribes of Israel... (7) Then [Moses] took the book containing the Covenant (i.e. the Torah) and read it to the ears of the people. And they said, “All that Hashem has spoken - we will do it, and we will listen to it!"

There was a human king who had two servants, and he loved them with a great love. And he gave to one a kab (a measure) of wheat and to the other as well a kab of wheat. And he also gave to each one of them a bundle of flax. The wise one of them took the flax and wove a beautiful cloth, and took the wheat and made it into fine flour, and sifted it, and ground it, and kneaded it, and baked it, and set it on the table, and spread the beautiful cloth over it, and left it there until the king should come. And the fool of them did nothing. After some time the king came into his house, and said to them, to his two servants, "My sons, bring to me what I gave you." One of them brought out the bread of fine flour, on the table, with the beautiful cloth spread over it. And the other of them brought out the wheat in a pile and the bundle of flax upon it. Woe for that shameful misunderstanding! Woe for that disgrace! Which one is more favored? You must admit it is the one who brought out the bread on the table with the beautiful cloth spread over it... This is just like when the Holy One Blessed Be God gave the Torah to Israel, it was only given to them as wheat from which to bring forth fine flour [rather than wheat to be left as just wheat], and as flax from which to weave a garment.

Torah is acquired by forty-eight things. By study, Attentive listening, Proper speech, By an understanding heart, By an intelligent heart, By awe, By fear, By humility, By joy, By attending to the sages, By critical give and take with friends, By fine argumentation with disciples, By clear thinking, By study of Tanach, By study of mishnah, By a minimum of sleep, By a minimum of chatter, By a minimum of pleasure, By a minimum of frivolity, By a minimum of preoccupation with worldly matters, By long-suffering, By generosity, By faith in the sages, By acceptance of suffering. One also acquires Torah by one who recognizes one's place, Who rejoices in their portion, Who makes a fence about their words, Who takes no credit for oneself, Who is loved, Who loves God, Who loves fellow creatures, Who loves righteous ways, Who loves reproof, Who loves uprightness, Who keeps oneself far from honors, Who does not let their heart become swelled on account of their learning, Who does not delight in giving legal decisions, Who shares in the bearing of a responsibility with their peers, Who judges with the scales weighted favorably, Who leads people on to truth, Who leads people on to peace, Who composes oneself at one's study, Who asks and answers, Who listens to others, Who adds to their own knowledge, Who learns in order to teach, Who learns in order to practice, Who makes their teacher wiser, Who is exact in what they have learned, And who, when they share something they learned, give credit to the name of the person who said it.

(1) Moses received the Torah at Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, and the elders to the prophets, and the prophets to the Men of the Great Assembly.