Torah as gift after total toil

ויתן אל משה ככלותו במד' כל מ' יום למד ושכח כו'.

"And He gave to Moshe, when He had finished [speaking with him]" (Shmos 31:18) — in the Midrash: all forty days he learned and forgot…

The verse describes Hashem giving Moshe the Luchos "when He finished." The Midrash relates that throughout the forty days Moshe would learn the Torah and then forget it, until at the end it was given to him as a gift.

להודיע כי הכל הולך אחר החיתום.

To make known that everything follows the conclusion (ha-chisum).

The lesson is that what matters most is the ending — the culmination toward which all the effort is directed.

ובסוף היגיעה בא הישועה.

And at the end of the toil comes the salvation.

The repeated forgetting was not failure; the breakthrough and "salvation" arrive precisely at the end of sustained yegiah (toil and effort).

ובוודאי יגיעת מרע"ה ארבעים יום לא אכל ושתה כו' ונעשה כמלאכי השרת.

And surely the toil of Moshe Rabbeinu — forty days he did not eat or drink… and he became like the ministering angels.

Moshe's labor was total: forty days without food or drink, until he was so refined of physicality that he became like the malachei ha-shareis, the ministering angels.

וזהו ככלותו שהוא כלות הנפש ונתלבש בענן.

And this is "ke-chaloso" — which alludes to the longing of the soul (kelos ha-nefesh) — and he was enclothed in the cloud.

The Sefas Emes rereads "ke-chaloso" ("when He finished") as kelos ha-nefesh, the soul's yearning to expire toward Hashem. Through this Moshe was enveloped in the cloud, entering a state beyond the body.

לכך כתיב לדבר אתו.

This is why it is written "to speak with him."

Because Moshe had reached this transcendent, angelic state, the Torah describes Hashem speaking with him in a manner beyond ordinary speech.

מה שאין הפה יכול לדבר.

That which the mouth cannot speak.

This was a communication beyond what any physical mouth can articulate — a wordless, supernal speech.

ואח"כ נתן לו במתנה התורה:

And afterward He gave him the Torah as a gift.

Only after all this toil and self-nullification was the Torah finally given to Moshe as an outright gift — the salvation that crowns the end of the labor.

Summary: For forty days Moshe Rabbeinu learned the Torah and forgot it, to teach that "everything follows the conclusion" — the breakthrough comes only at the end of sustained toil. Through that total effort, fasting forty days until he became like the ministering angels, Moshe reached kelos ha-nefesh, the soul's yearning that enclothed him in the cloud and brought a speech beyond what any mouth can utter — and only then was the Torah given to him as a gift.