The giving of the Torah took place in the month of Sivan - the third month. Since this was clearly part of the Divine plan, there must be a significant connection between the event and the date, between Torah and the third month.The point is made explicitly in the Talmud: "Blessed be the Merciful One who gave a threefold Torah to a threefold people through a third - born on the third day in the third month."

The figure three is the constant motif. The Torah is in three parts: Pentateuch, Prophets and Hagiographa (Torah, Neviim, Ketubim). Israel consists of three kinds of Jew: Kohen, Levite and Israelite. Moses was born third, after Miriam and Aaron. The Torah was given in the third month, on the third day of the Israelites' separation from their wives. Why, then, the figure three? Surely the Torah was intended to be unique and to reveal the oneness of G-d. The number one is what we would have expected.

To take the point further. The principal event of the third month was the giving of the Torah in itself. The commandments, as such, were not an entirely new disclosure. There had been commandments before: The seven Noachide Laws, circumcision, and the things that were commanded at Marah. Sinai certainly changed the nature of a Mitzvah, but the idea of a Mitzvah was not new. But the Torah was. And the difference between Torah and the commandments is this: through a Mitzvah one becomes nullified in the face of G-d's will, as a "chariot to its rider." But through Torah we become one with G-d. The two things are not the same. A chariot has no will other than that of its rider, but chariot and rider are not one. The innovation at Sinai was radical - now the Jew could become at one with G-d.

And if so we must ask again: Why is three, not one, its symbol? The purpose of the giving of the Torah was indeed unity. But what is a true unity? When a person recognizes the One in the many, then he perceives unity in the midst of diversity. If he knows only one kind of existence, we do not know what his response will be when he discovers another kind. Perhaps he will then say: There are two realities, G-d and the world. It is only when he has encountered more than one form of existence and still maintains that G-d is the only reality that he has seen the true Oneness of G-d.

There is a traditional analogy. If we want to know how close is the bond between a prince and his father, the king, we will not discover it in the palace but only by taking him from it and setting him amongst ordinary men. If he still behaves like a prince, he is a true son of his father. So with a Jew, it is not within the Sanctuary but within the diversity of the world that his sense of G-d's unity is proved. And he can preserve it in two ways. He can suppress his awareness of other things besides G-d. Or he can be fully aware of other things of the world and in them discover G-d. It is the latter which is the deeper response. The person who suppresses his senses and closes his eyes to the ways of the world, believes that they form something apart from and in opposition to G-d, and must be kept at a distance. The unity of his religious life is neither deep nor secure.

There are, as we can see, three phases in the growth towards the sense of the unity of G-d. And they correspond to the three months from Pesach to Shavuot. Nissan is the month of the Exodus itself, when G-d was revealed to the Israelites. They "fled" from Egypt, both literally and metaphorically - fled from the knowledge of the world and were filled only with the revelation from above. Their unity was of the world-denying kind. G-d was One because they knew only one thing, because the world had ceased to have being in their eyes. Iyar, the second month, is the month wholly taken up with the Counting of the Omer, and preparing ourselves for the coming events at Sinai. We are aware of ourselves and our world as something apart from G-d which had to be suppressed. Like the chariot and its rider, G-d and the world were one will but two things. Sivan, the third month, was the time when the Torah was given, when G-d and the world became one thing. This

-The Hebrew word for milk is "chalav" and it has the numerical value of 40. Eating a dairy meal recalls the 40 days Moshe was up in heaven to receive the Torah.

Why do we stay awake all night? Sleep is the taste of death. In fact, the Talmud tells us that sleep is 1/60th part of death. One part in 60 is the threshold of perception. Similarly, Shabbat is a 'taste' of the World-to Come. It's precisely 1/60th of the World-to-Come.

Sleep is the taste of death in this world. King David died on Shavuot. But before he died, he never even tasted the taste of death, because he never fell into a deep sleep. Thus on the occasion of his yahrtzeit (the anniversary of his death) we avoid the 'taste of death' by staying up all night.

The angel of death came to King David to try and take his life. But it had no power over him for he was immersed in learning Torah and Torah is the essence of the life-force in this world. The only way that the angel of death could take King David's life from him was through cunning: He managed to distract King David from his learning, and in that split second, he was able to take his life from him. So on this night of Shavuot, which is both the anniversary of the giving of the Torah and the end of King David's life, we stay awake all night and immerse ourselves in Torah study.

Torah breathes life into Man. But it was not always this way. When Hashem first created Man, he was animated by God's utterance: 'Let Us make Man.' The power of these words, spoken by the Creator, gave Man the ability to live, breath, think and act. However, this was only until the Jewish People stood at the foot of Sinai. When Hashem said "I am Hashem, your God...." - the first commandment - the life-force that animated Man parted from the body and the entire Jewish People died. Miraculously, their souls were put back into their bodies; but what animated them now was a different utterance. No longer did their life-force derive from "Let Us make Man." Now they were like new creations. Their inner essence was powered by "I am Hashem, your God...." From this moment, the Torah became the animating dynamic of the Jewish Soul.

SHAVUOT IS AN OPPORTUNE TIME TO ACHIEVE EVERYTHING IN IMPROVING TORAH STUDY AND AVODA MARKED BY FEAR OF G-D, AND ALSO TO STRIVE IN TESHUVA CONCERNING TORAH-STUDY, WITHOUT INTERFERENCE BY THE ACCUSING SATAN -- JUST LIKE THE TIME OF SHOFAR SOUNDING ON ROSH HASHANA AND THE HOLY DAY OF THE FAST OF YOM KIPPUR.(From Rebbe's Hayom Yom, SIVAN -4).