What Happened at Sinai?

(1) Moshe received [the] Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Yehoshua, and Yehoshua to the Elders, and the Elders to the Prophets, and the Prophets transmitted it to the Men of the Great Assembly. They said three things: Be deliberate in judgment, raise up many disciples and make a fence for the Torah.

(1) There was one man. This is the order: Moshe transmitted the Torah to Joshua and from Joshua to the elders, and the elders to the judges, until Eli. And from there to Samuel like it says (Avot 1:1) "And the elders to the prophets."

(1) from Sinai: From the One who was revealed at Sinai.

(1) Moshe received the Torah from Sinai: I say: Since this tractate is not founded on the exegesis of commandments from among the Torah’s commandments, like the rest of the tractates which are in the Mishna, but is rather wholly morals and principles, and whereas the sages of the (other) nations of the world have also composed books according to the fabrication of their hearts, concerning moral paths, how a person should behave with his fellow; therefore, in this tractate the tanna began "Moshe received Torah from Sinai," to tell you that the principles and morals which are in this tractate were not fabricated by the hearts of the Mishna’s sages; rather, they too were stated at Sinai.

(1) When [the Torah] was revealed at Sinai, he received it with its general principles, its particulars and its inferences and there was no law that was to be innovated [later]....

ותורתי AND MY LAWS — The plural serves to include the Oral Law as halakhah lemoshe misinai.

(1) Know that each commandment that the Holy One, blessed be He, gave to Moshe, our teacher – peace be upon him – was given to him with its explanation. He would say to him the commandment and afterward tell him its explanation and content; and [so too with] everything that is included in the Book of the Torah....

(13) And so [too] did our rabbis, may their memory be blessed, say in a baraita (Sifra, Behar), "And God said to Moshe at Mount Sinai [with regards to the sabbatical year]' – and was not the whole entire Torah said from Sinai? Rather it is to tell you [that] just like [the law of] the sabbatical year was stated with its general principles and its details and its inferences from Sinai, so too were all the commandments, with their general principles and their details and their inferences, from Sinai."

Moses received Torah from Sinai...It says in Avot de Rabbi Natan that he received it directly from God [mipi hagevurah], and not from an angel....When Moses went up to Mt. Sinai, the Holy One gave him the Torah with its commentary [beferushah], as it says, "Come up to Me on the mountain and I will give you the stone tablets and the Torah and the commandment...", and our sages explained in Tractate Berakhot that the Torah means the written Torah, the commandment means the Mishnah, "that I wrote" means the prophets and the writings, and "to teach them" means the Talmud. And thus we learn that they were all given to Moses at Sinai.

In the midrash on Kohelet [Ecclesiastes], it says, "God gave me the two tablets written by the finger of God," and on them were all the words on the first set....Scripture, Mishnah, Halakhah, Talmud, Tosefot, midrash, and even what a good student will say in the future to his teacher - all of these were given to Moses at Sinai [halakhah lemoshe misinai]....

So, too, the scribal traditions and what the sages would innovate in the future, such as [the mitzvah of] reading the megillah.

Talmud means the Oral Torah, which is an explanation of the Written Torah, for without the explanation that Moses received from God, we wouldn't know how to interpret Torah. Hence, there is an entire tractate of Talmud, Shabbat, to explain what constitutes work that the Torah forbids on Shabbat. And there is an entire tractate, Yevamot, to explain the commandments of yibum and halitzah, and there is a tractate, Nezikin, to explain the "not" in "do not steal". And so, too, in the rest of the Torah, there is a need for the received tradition....

(14) And here is an example for you: When the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moshe, "You shall live in booths seven days" (Leviticus 23:42); (15) afterward, He made known that this booth is an obligation on males [and] not on females, and that sick people are not obligated in it, nor are wayfarers; (16) and that it only be covered with that which grows from the ground, and that he should not cover it with wool or silk or vessels – even from that which grows from the ground – for example, comforters and pillows and clothes. (17) And he made known that eating and drinking and sleeping in it is all an obligation; and that its space should not be less than seven finger-breadths long on seven finger-breadths wide, and that the height of the booth not be less than ten finger-breadths. (18) And when the prophet, peace be upon him, came, this commandment and its explanation was given to him. And so [too, with all of] the six hundred and thirteen commandments – they and their explanations – the commandment in writing, and the explanation orally.

Moses received, etc. As it says in Lev. 26, "These are the laws and the statutes and the instructions [torot] that the Lord gave between Him and the people of Israel at Mt. Sinai, by the hand of Moses...."

These include them all; both the general principles and the specifics were from Sinai....

In the Jerusalem Talmud, tractate Peah, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said [...] Bible, Mishnah, Talmud, and Aggadah, and even what a good student will recite to his teacher in the future were all said to Moses from Sinai....

When God came to give the Torah, He said to Moshe regarding the order of the Bible, and the Mishnah, and the Aggada, and the Talmud, as it says, "God spoke all of these words" - even what a seasoned student will ask his master.

Did Moshe learn the whole Torah? It is written about Torah: “It is longer than the land and wider than the sea” (Job 11), and within forty days Moshe learned it all?! Rather, the Holy One taught Moshe general principles.

Rabbi Yehudah said, "Rav said, "When Moshe ascended to the heavens, he found the Holy One sitting and attaching crowns to the letters. He said before Him, "Master of the Universe! Who is staying your hand?" He said to him, "There is one man who will exist after several generations, and Akiva the son of Yosef is his name, who will in the future expound on every crown and crown piles and piles of laws." He said before Him, "Master of the Universe! Show him to me." He said to him, "Turn backwards." He went and sat at the end of eight rows [of students in Rabbi Akiva's Beit Midrash], and he did not know what they were talking about. He got upset. When [Rabbi Akiva] got to another topic, his students said to him, "Our teacher, from where do you learn this?" He said to them, "It is a law [that was taught] to Moshe at Sinai." His mind was set at ease.

A non-Jew came before Shammai and asked him, "How many Torahs do you have?" Shammai responded, "Two, the Written Torah and the Oral Torah." The non-Jew said, "I believe in the Written Torah, but not in the Oral Torah. Convert me and teach me only the Written Torah." Shammai berated the non-Jew and chased him out. The non-Jew came before Hillel and Hillel converted him. One day Hillel taught him the alef-bet, and the next day he switched the names of the letters. He said to Hillel, "Didn't you teach me the opposite yesterday?" Hillel responded, "Just as you trust me in the instruction of letters, so too you must trust me in the instruction of the oral Torah."