Shema and Torah Study
This week's Torah portion, Deut. 27:9, Moses and the levitical priests spoke to all Israel, saying, Silence! Hear, O Israel.Today you have become  the people of the Lord your God..."
Berakot 63b:  "Listen! Hear..."  ... Make yourselves into groups to study the Torah, since the knowledge of the Torah can be acquired only in association with others...
Berakot 16a: When one recites the Shema, it is incumbent that he should concentrate his attention on it, since it says, "Hear O Israel..."  and in another place it says, "Listen. Hear, O Israel..." showing that just as in the latter 'hearing' must be accompanied by attention, so here it must be accompanied by attention.
Torah Temima to Deut. 6:4: Because the word "Hasket (Listen, be silent!) is clarified as discernment and focusing the thought and imagination, meaning that it be the intention of the heart to receive the yoke of heaven.  This is only in the first verse (of the Shema), but in remainder of the paragraphs the Shema requires only the intent to perform the mitzvah.

Both the recitation of the Shema and the study of Torah are included in this mitzvah, to be silent and listen. Reading the Shema is, in fact, Torah study, but Torah study in which we accept upon ourselves the obligation of the commandments. How much focus must we have? The Torah and commentaries imply to be silent in order to focus intently on the acceptance of the "yoke of heaven," meaning that we accept God as our Sovereign.  Whereas such focus is desirable in all Torah study, it is not absolutely incumbent, because having accepted with full consciousness the relationship with God, all else follows. The Rabbis and Torah recognize the different abilities of the community, thus requiring only the acceptance of our granting to God the authority to command us. Further, the mitzvah of listening implies that we study in groups, because "Torah is acquired only in association with others." There is no acquiring Torah alone and forming our own independent opinions without sharpening them against the debates of others. Only in community can we determine the meaning of Torah in our own lives.