I am G‑d, your G‑d who took you out of the land of Egypt to be your G‑d…Do not steal. Do not kill. Do not covet.
If Torah is divine wisdom, you would expect it to enter the world in a serene voice. You would expect to hear that voice speak of the mysteries of life and open wide paths of profound contemplation.
Instead, amidst thunder and lightning, we heard simple, obvious morals: don’t steal, don't kill, don't covet.
Because G‑d was telling us that from this point on, everything will be turned on its head.
Before Sinai, where did you find divine wisdom?
Within an enlightened soul sitting beneath a tamarisk in deep contemplation, communing with the oneness of the universe.
After Sinai, you can find Torah in a human being enslaved to a substance that kills, incapable of escape—until thrown this rope of divine wisdom and choosing of his own will to pull himself out with it and rewrite his entire journey.
For him, G‑d said, "I am G‑d who took you out of Egypt."
You can find Torah in the guy who is tempted to theft and murder, who sees these as convenient alternatives—but refrains because G‑d said, "Do not steal. Do not murder. Do not even covet."
And if you can’t find Torah there, because you haven’t sunk to that extreme, and you don't know anyone who has...
...then find Torah by changing the way you live day to day, the things you speak, the actions you take. By disrupting your everyday world. By leaving nothing as it is.
That is why Torah was given with lightning and thunder.
Because, post-Sinai, Torah is found in this busy, noisy world. Torah is where the action is.
Post-Sinai, everything has changed. Because Torah has to change everything.
This is because we humans had begun to identify with our bodies, and as the bodies were separate so became our identity. We had never not felt ego, because G-d, in everything, and who makes everything, is Actually the only Ego there is. But no longer were we able to identify with the One, and instead started to identify with our separate bodies. We were learning what “death” means in the sense of the eating of the forbidden fruit, or rather, identifying with pairs of knowledge of good/evil. Our nervous systems make the symbolic “tree”.
As we were given Torah “laws” and follow them, we steer our bodies (read ships) into the spiritual locks and are steered gracefully into holy dependency again. They may cause some rough seas as we quit the old ways and drop them. The One Ego is the only Self there is, the actuality of every detail. Our ideas and concepts are all fantasies, and spiritually worthless.