A similar version of this article was published in this week’s edition of the Jewish News.

Someone who unwittingly wanders into an Orthodox synagogue on Simchas Torah night may wonder what they have stumbled into. Men of every age dance in tight, sweaty circles around the Torah scrolls, singing the same few lines for hours, children riding on their shoulders. In yeshiva neighborhoods, the celebration spills into the streets past midnight. The occasion? Finishing the annual reading of a book, and starting it again from the beginning. It helps that this is obviously no ordinary book, but the degree and extent of the excitement and celebration still require explanation.

To the uninitiated, the fuss can seem baffling. Not every insider feels the joy of completing the annual reading of the Parsha either, or even Torah study in general. About ten years ago, a Reddit user called 321Kaboosh posted a painfully honest question about his challenging history and relationship with learning Torah:

“I grew up in the standard Orthodox system… I hated every minute of it because I found [studying Gemara and other Torah learning] to be intensely boring. The Rabbeim [teachers] were sure into it, telling me that if I study hard I’ll get a ‘geshmak’ [enjoyment] out of it. That never happened… I’m a strong believer in God, Torah, and even the importance of learning… Watching paint dry would be preferable… Can I do something to change it? SHOULD I do something to change it?”

Commenters offered sensible advice: see a counselor about any childhood baggage, lower expectations, study briefly each day, and try new subjects, settings, or study partners until something clicks.

Good advice for the first question. But what about the second: should he bother? Halacha answers with a prohibition that, when viewed objectively, is genuinely strange.

On Tisha B’Av, Halacha forbids studying Torah: not only the Talmud’s legal debates, but the Weekly Parsha, the Mishnah, and even the moral messages of the Midrash. The same applies to a mourner during shiva. The Gemara (Taanis 30a) cites a passuk in Tehilim: “The precepts of God are upright, gladdening the heart” (19:9). Learning Torah makes you happy, and on a day of grief, happiness is out of place.

Think about how unusual that is. Imagine Congress banning the reading of the tax code on Memorial Day because it is too enjoyable. No legal system I know of treats the study of its own statutes as a pleasure so intense that it must be suspended on days of sorrow. Judaism does, and it applies the rule to everyone, including the 321Kabooshes of the world. The Halacha does not ask whether you personally enjoy learning. It assumes that Torah, properly engaged, is a source of joy, and treats boredom or disinterest as a barrier to break through rather than a final verdict. If someone fails to appreciate learning a complicated Gemara topic or feels no joy when analyzing a passage in Chumash, the problem lies with the pilot, not the plane; the Torah itself is inherently joyous. Our ability to unlock and experience the joy of Torah requires repair; the Torah itself still “gladdens the heart,” it always has, and always will.  

Why assume that? Torah study is like watching Olympic diving. To the casual viewer, one dive looks much like the next. But the more you know about the sport, the more thrilling each dive becomes. For the initiated, a knotty passage of Gemara is not a chore; it is a puzzle with a breathtaking solution hiding in plain sight. Unusual phrasing in the parsha is not a boring grammar lesson; it is a springboard from which the Midrash uncovered a beautiful or inspiring insight into human nature.

That is what the Simchas Torah dancing is about. It is the Tisha B’Av prohibition turned inside out: if Torah study is too joyful for a day of mourning, it deserves a day devoted entirely to joy. Even if I personally might not be able to tap into it, that elated joy is there anyway, for all of us. This is the one day a year that we acknowledge, appreciate, and celebrate the only, uniquely Jewish text, even its legal and moral elements, that defines itself as a party.

Although I hope you join the dancing, you don’t have to in order to appreciate this. The next time you see all that over-the-top rejoicing, consider that you may be watching a crowd of connoisseurs cheering a dive whose beauty you haven’t yet learned to see, and that the invitation to learn is open to every Jew.