And you shall speak to the rock (20:8).
The Medrash says (Yalkut 763) that when a young child misbehaves, his father hits him. When he gets older, his father uses words to discipline him. Similarly, Hashem told Moshe Rabbeinu, “When this rock was ‘small’ (the Jewish people were at an earlier stage; see Shemos 17:8), you hit the rock. However, now, you should speak to the rock.”
The Zera Shimshon explains this Medrash in the following manner:
As is well known, the Torah is compared to water. The Zera Shimshon understands that the story of the hitting of the rock holds within it a lesson about learning Torah.
Hashem made a covenant with us over the Oral Torah (Gittin 60b). The Yerushalmi (Pe’ah 2:4) says that the oral words (of Torah) are more beloved than the written ones. However, in other places, it seems the covenant is one rooted in a promise of punishment (if we veer from the Torah), not one based only on love. This is represented by the way the Torah was given – with fire and thunder. And yet, in many pesukim and Talmudic teachings, there is a clear implication of the great love through which Hashem gave us the Torah.
To explain this, the Zera Shimshon cites the Gemara (Pesachim 68b) in which R’ Sheshes said, “Rejoice, my soul, for your sake I learn.” The Gemara asks how R’ Sheshes can say this. Don’t we know that if not for Torah learning, the world would cease to exist? (Thus, R’ Sheshes’s learning wasn’t for himself.) The Gemara explains that in the beginning of one’s learning, he does it for himself, and later, he comes to do it for the sake of Hashem.
Therefore, the covenant binding the Jewish people to the Torah, which seems to be one of judgment, is only for the individual who is learning for his own sake. However, when one learns for the sake of Hashem, his covenant is one of love.
The whole episode of Moshe Rabbeinu hitting the stone to bring out its water is a hint to the Torah. In fact, the Medrash says that the words that Hashem commanded Moshe Rabbeinu to say to the rock to bring forth its water were words of Mishna! As well, the Megaleh Amukos writes (74) that had Moshe Rabbeinu spoken to the rock as opposed to hitting it, there would not have been any of the subsequent arguments in halacha that exist today.
This is why Hashem told Moshe Rabbeinu that this scenario of the lack of water is different than the one earlier in the Jewish people’s history. Since at this point, the Jewish people had grown in their attachment to Torah, and hitting the rock to bring out its water (which represents Torah) symbolizes the beginner’s way of rebuke, Hashem wanted Moshe Rabbeinu to speak to the rock since that is the stage that the Jewish people were at – their covenant was one of love.
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