[Apologies – this is much squishier than my usual work. Might appeal to some]
I was noodling on the idea of our physical and spiritual existences as analogous to earth and heaven and matter and energy in the empirical world. Think, for example, of the burning bush: G-d exists where matter and energy are concentrated together, but the spiritual fire does not destroy the bush. Nevertheless, it still looks like fire.
Shabbos candles, lit by women when Shabbos comes in, are the very same way. They are physical light, but they bring spiritual warmth into a home. Similarly the Menorah symbolized all kinds of spiritual and symbolic things – but it was, at the very same time, a physical fire burning oil.
This is meant to be understood as a feature and not a bug. Our bodies and our souls, for as long as we live, are intertwined. And we can understand and appreciate anything we can see or hear or touch on both a physical and a spiritual/symbolic level; we are equipped with sensors that meld, for example, spiritual attraction and physical desire together. We are not meant to try to separate them, but instead to appreciate the combination.
The analogy can be extended beyond this. Consider for example that we have energies in our bodies (nerves spark millivolts of electrical impulses, the electrical activity of the brain, etc). If electricity is enmeshed with our souls, then it explains why our lives are threatened if we overwhelm our electrical system with high voltage.
We have an understanding that the people at Sinai were simply unable to be too close to the divine presence. But we are cautioned that we cannot survive rapid and direct exposure to the divine presence: our souls would leave our bodies. Perhaps we could consider that the mountain was at a very high energy (because of the divine presence), and the matter/energy blend that comprises each person could not take the inrush current/energies and remain human. So instead of short-circuiting, the Torah commands us to find ways to bridge the connection to heaven.
At the risk of overextending the idea… the Torah’s commandments are about investing in relationships (with each other and with G-d). The end result of doing commandments is that we produce holiness – a spiritual energy that comes from converting our physical energies. E=MC2.
That is part of the potency of mankind: our ideas, combined with force of will, can transform and elevate everything around us. We see it in loving families, in how acts of kindness propagate and spread, in the power that ideas have to move and change our world. Each of us, with the right choices, can be our own burning bush: a physical body, paired with a spiritual fire.