Yesterday’s Torah portion detailed a number of activities, such as lighting the menorah and offering the daily sacrifices, with which the daily Mishkan workload was scheduled to start and conclude. Several of these activities attract the description 'tamid', which means ‘constant’, a term which sits uncomfortably with the reality that these activities were performed only once or twice a day, in the morning and evening. This difficulty is highlighted by the observation of Rashi, at the start of our parashah, that regular daily events can attract the term tamid even if they are not continuous. Why should this be?
The importance attached to how a unit of time is commenced and concluded does not just apply to the Mishkan procedures. As part of the Gemara’s discussion of the lechem hapanimprocedure, a comparison is drawn between the use of the word 'tamid' to describe the lechem hapanim, and the requirement that Torah never be absent from one’s mouth. The Gemara concludes that this commandment can be fulfilled even by studying a minimal amount of Torah each morning and evening.
This obligation to fix a regular time for Torah learning each morning and evening, is codified by Rambam and the Shulchan Aruch; it exists in addition to the general obligation to study Torah during any available time. The added dimension of these fixed study times is that they encase a person's mundane activities, imbuing them with the spirit of Torah study and thereby ensure "lo yamush" — that the Torah is never entirely removed from his mouth.
Talmud Reclaimed develops this idea further in a central case study which explores the origins of the commandment to recite Shema twice-daily. Building upon Rambam’s principle, that matters which are disputed among the sages do not belong to the body of transmitted laws received from Sinai, we note that there is a Talmudic argument (Berachot21a) as to whether the mitzvah of Shema is biblical or rabbinic in nature. This would seem to indicate that the commandment was not transmitted immutably from Moshe. On the other hand it does seem to be unanimously accepted in the Talmud that some passage of Torah must be recited, at the very least, each morning and evening.
The suggested resolution, which draws some support from the Pnei Yehoshua and Sha’agat Aryeh, is that the original Sinaitic requirement was that each person commence and conclude their day with the study of some passage of Torah. As seen above, by encasing one’s more mundane daily activities in between sessions of Torah study, this imbues religious and spiritual meaning to all of what one does in the interim period.
At some point, however, the Sinaitic tradition of a biblical commandment to recite words from the Torah twice daily would have been fixed by the Court so as to apply specifically to the first sentence (or perhaps the first paragraph) of the Shema, the second paragraph being added as a purely rabbinic commandment. As suggested by the Pnei Yehoshua, this is likely to be because of the passage of Shema containing a declaration of the unity of God and an acceptance of the yoke of heaven. Matters which the Sanhedrin of the day is likely to have wanted to inculcate further into the hearts and minds of the nation undergoing particular challenges.
While the sages and Sanhedrin enacted this decree to narrow down the previously undefined obligation to study Torah (at least) twice-daily, the blessings recited over Shema may reflect the commandment in its initial undefined form – focusing on the importance of Torah study rather than mentioning the unity of God and accepting His authority and mitzvot.
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