Shavuos And Matan Torah: Same Day?

Magen Avraham: We say in our t’fillah that Shavuos is “z’man matan torasenu”, the time of the giving of our Torah. Yet we calculate: The Jews took for themselves the Korbon Pessach four days before they actually sacrificed it. That was Shabbos, the Great Shabbos, for, as the Tur says in siman ?”?, a great miracle happened on that Shabbos. The Jews tied a sheep, the godhead of the Egyptians to their beds in preparation to slaughtering it. The Egyptians were so angry that they wished they could tear the Jews to little pieces, yet they couldn’t even touch them. Four days later, the sheep was slaughtered, and the day after that they left Egypt. So the Korbon Pessach / Yetzias Mitzrayim was Tuesday or Wednesday. The Torah was given on Shabbos, says the Gemarah. So the interval between the actual Exodus and Matan Torah was at least 51 days, not 50 as we do. Perhaps Shavuos is considered the “zman matan Torasenu” because it is on the 6 Sivan, as the Torah was given on that calendar date? Well, Shavuos is not necessarily celebrated on 6 Sivan, says the Gemarah in Rosh Hashanah. If often was on 5 or 7 Sivan. So why do we call Shavuos the time of the giving of the Torah?
There are two basic approaches to this issue;
One is that indeed the numbers do not work out. However, Shavuos nowadays, with our fixed calendar, happens to coincide with the date the Torah was given on, the sixth of Sivan (which in itself is a somewhat hazardous proposition, for we seem to accept R’ Yossi’s opinion that the Torah was given on the seventh of Sivan, not the opinion of the Chachomim that it was on the sixth – Magen Avraham) so we say that this day is the time of the giving of the Torah for so it happens to be. (Rivash) Another version is that the second day of Shavuos does come out on the 51st. Or that Matan Torah ought to have been on the 50th day but Moshe added a day on his own. (Rem”a M’panu and Magen Avraham). Or that we say “z’man matan Torasenu” because it is approximately the time of Matan Torah. We don’t sweat a day or two. (Rabbi Mordechai Bennet).
The second approach is that the numbers do work out. The Ritva explains that the one who maintains that Shavuos can come out on either the fifth, sixth or seventh day of Sivan holds that there was only 50 days until Matan Torah, and therefore it is the “z’man matan torasenu” by number of S’fira days, while we who keep Shavuos on the sixth of Sivan keep the calendar day of the giving of the Torah. The Minchas Chinuch/Chok Yaakov explain that the Seder Olam maintains that the Exodus was on Friday, so Matan Torah on Shabbos was only 50 days later.
We had an alternative approach; We know that the setup of Exodus-Matan Torah compares with the setup of Pessach-Shavuos. It is approximately the same times, and it also is the next festival. Furthermore, as Succos has a eighth day, an “Atzeres”, so does Pessach. Pessach’s “Atzeres” is Shavuos. So Shavuos is “z’man matan torasenu”, not because it’s the same calendar date, nor that it is the same number of days after going out of Egypt. It is the same festival that the Torah was given on. What makes it the same? The relationship between it and Pessach.
Now we have seen that to some of the poskim Matan Torah is not an integral part of Shavuos at all, rather a merely incidental concurrence. What then is its nature? Perhaps it is an “Atzeres” to Pessach as mentioned above, perhaps it is the “Chag Ha’bikkurim”, perhaps something else entirely. The point is, however, that it does have a nature of its own even without Matan Torah. Therefore it seems entirely proper to say that on this festival, on this special time, the Torah was given. As a result, the essential nature of this day is (also) celebrating the giving of the Torah!

Another approach: The “time” for Matan Torah was not a calendar date nor a number of days after leaving Egypt. The time actually was upon completion of the seven week course. The Zohar says that the Jews waited seven weeks until receiving the Torah. We too complete this course, through counting the Sefira. Although we today do not start at the same day the Jews back then did, the course is the same, and Matan Torah was given at “graduation”. And that’s why say “zman matan Toraseinu” at the completion of our seven week course.