The giving of the Torah took place on the sixth day of Sivan, at Ma‘amad Har Sinai, the extraordinary event when the covenant between God and the people of Israel was forged. During the following forty days, Moses remained on Mount Sinai. Exodus 24:18 states: “Moses entered the cloud, went up on the mountain, and stayed there for forty days and forty nights.” Debarim 9:9 also describes this period: “I went up on the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant that the Lord had made with you, and I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I ate no bread and drank no water.”
According to the traditional chronology, this period began the day after the giving of the Torah, on the 7th of Sivan, and ended on the 16th of Tamuz. The following day, Moses descended from the mountain with the Tablets of the Covenant. Debarim 9:11 states: “At the end of the forty days and forty nights, HaShem gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant.” By that time, however, the people of Israel had already made the Golden Calf, which had been completed the day before, on the 16th of Tamuz.
Exodus 32:5 describes the moment: “When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it and proclaimed, ‘Tomorrow shall be a festival to HaShem.’” When Moses descended from the mountain on the 17th of Tamuz and saw the calf and the dancing, he broke the Tablets of the Covenant. This event is one of the reasons why we mourn this date every year.
After destroying and burning the Golden Calf, Moses prayed and pleaded before HaShem for forty days and forty nights on behalf of the people of Israel. This period began on the 18th of Tamuz and ended on the 28th of Av. Debarim 9:18 describes this time: “Then once again I fell prostrate before HaShem for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water, because of all the sin you had committed, doing what was evil in HaShem’s sight and so provoking His anger.”
Moses then ascended Mount Sinai once again to receive the second tablets of the Covenant. This third period began the day after the previous one—on the 29th of Av—and lasted forty days, until the 9th of Tishri, the day before Yom Kippur. This final ascent was a time of divine compassion and forgiveness, as described in Debarim chapter 10.
These dates are traditionally understood as a period of teshuva, a time of human repentance and divine forgiveness. For this reason, Jewish tradition associates this season with repentance, beginning in the month of Elul, when we begin reciting Selichot and listening to the shofar, calling us to return to God.
At the end of this period, Moses descended from Mount Sinai with the second Tablets of the Covenant on the 10th of Tishri—the day we commemorate as Yom Kippur, the day of forgiveness.
