Vayakhel begins on a confusing note:
Now Moses assembled
the entire community of the Children of Israel and said to them: These are the
things that the Lord has commanded you to do. For six days work is to be done,
but on the seventh day, it will be holy for you, a Sabbath of complete rest for
the Lord; all who do work on it shall be put to death. Do not kindle any fire
throughout your settlements on the day of the Sabbath. (Exodus 35:1-3)
Anything
here strike you as peculiar? More than one commentator has pointed out that
Moses tells the Israelites, “These are the things that the Lord has commanded
you to do…” and then proceeds with the mitzvah of shabbat, whose primary observance
is not doing: shabbat menuchah (sabbath rest) is the crux of
keeping shabbat. We are we commanded to not
do. (This reminds me of the irony of the commandment to remember to wipe out the name of Amalek.)
It’s
no longer news that we live in a 24/7 world, continuously plugged in via cell
phones, iPads, and laptops. The boundary between work and home life is obscured
by our connectivity, and email follows us on our smart phones. I recently heard
about a group of 20-something friends who meet regularly at a restaurant for
dinner. They put their cell phones in the middle of the table and the first to
touch his or her phone picks up the tab for everyone at the table. I wondered:
why not just put the phone away for two hours? The answer is obvious: if they
feel it vibrate, it’s hard to resist checking for a call or a text. How many of
us can’t unplug?
We
are workaholics. We’re often exhausted, but we are imbued with the sense that
all our emails, texts, postings, writings, reports, reviews and all the rest
are critically important.
Are all the things we do of earth-shattering
importance? The answer is both yes and no. Rabbi Simcha Bunem of Pshishke (19th
century) told his disciples: Everyone must have two pockets, with a note in
each pocket, so that he or she can reach into the one or the other, depending
on the need. When feeling lowly and depressed, discouraged or disconsolate, one
should reach into the right pocket, and, there, find the words: “Bishvili nivra ha'olam / For my sake was
the world created." But when feeling high and mighty one should reach into
the left pocket, and find the words: "Ani
eifer v'afar / I am but dust and ashes." Rabbi Simcha Bunem’s
prescription for emotional balance works well for our efforts to achieve
balance between work and rest: In the one pocket is the message that says that
our work is very important and we do make a difference in the world. In
the other pocket is a message that says the world will keep spinning if we let
email and projects sit for a day, and take time away from our gadgets to spend
with our loved ones, with God, and with our own thoughts.
Albert
Einstein said: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is
limited.” Imagination is rooted in the soul and rest nourishes the soul. Every athlete knows that you
have to take rest days to allow your muscles — broken down by strenuous
exercise — to rebuild. The soul is no different. Perhaps that is what the
Rabbis had in mind when they taught that we are given a neshamah yeteirah / an additional soul on shabbat (B.Beitzah 16a, B.Ta’anit
27b). It’s tough to focus on that part of our being during the week; we need to
take time off to appreciate our innermost selves.
The
Sages taught that there are five different names for the soul: nefesh, ruach,
neshama, chaya, and yechida. Rav Sadya Gaon, living in the tenth
century, understood this at face value: there are five different terms that
refer to the soul. But the Kabbalists understood the five terms to allude to
five levels of self-awareness that a person can achieve, the highest being yechida
(union, or communion). This is the highest level of self-awareness. To achieve
that we need to turn off the gadgets and white noise and dig deep within.
The
Kiddush we recite on Friday evening tells us that Shabbat is a commemoration of
creation, which culminated with the first shabbat (Genesis chapter 1), and the
Exodus from slavery in Egypt where we had no rest. The Kiddush for Shabbat
morning includes these words from Torah:
Remember to make the day of Shabbat
holy. Six days shall you labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a
Sabbath of Adonai your God; on it you shall not do any work — you, your son and
your daughter, your male and female servant, your cattle, or the stranger who
is among you — for in six days Adonai made the heavens, the earth and the sea,
and all they contain, and rested on the seventh day.” (Exodus 20:8-11)
In
the ancient world, Greeks and Romans scoffed at Jews for being lazy and slothful
because their religion decreed that they were forbidden from working and
required to rest. But note that the prohibition is not for us alone; it’s for
everyone: children, servants, strangers in our midst, and even animals! What a
gloriously civilized idea: no one should be a slave; everyone is entitled to
rest and to renew themselves. What a wonderful expression of respect for human
and animal life this is!
Shabbat
can be magic time when we attune ourselves to its rhythm. Shabbat happens
according to the clock of the world, not our mechanical timepieces. The sun
sets; the stars appear. Rather than creating and changing the world, we step
back and appreciate the world and our blessings. We make time for self-review:
what are we doing with our time, with our lives, with our energy? We take time
to think our own thoughts, unprompted by TV, newspapers, and commentators. We can
enjoy the unencumbered company of family and friends, with no other agenda
beyond love and joy. Our souls hunger for this.
Do
we really need to be commanded to rest? The answer to the irony that what we
are commanded to do is not do is that it’s very difficult for
us to slow down, let alone stop and rest. We don’t know how to do it. What is
more, as Judith Shulevit, author of The
Sabbath World: Glimpses of a Different Order of Time, suggests, imposing
some structure helps:
Most people mistakenly believe that all
you have to do to stop working is not work. The inventors of the Sabbath
understood that it was a much more complicated undertaking. You cannot
downshift casually and easily. This is why the Puritan and Jewish Sabbaths were
so exactingly intentional. The rules did not exist to torture the faithful.
They were meant to communicate the insight that interrupting the ceaseless
round of striving requires a surprisingly strenuous act of will, one that has
to be bolstered by habit as well as by social sanction.[1]
There is a nice
forum in The Chronicle for HigherEducation in which a number of university professors — Jewish and Christian
— share their struggles and views on the notion of a day of rest.
There are many ways to create shabbat for yourself
and your family and friends. Here
are more approaches. Find what works for you.
- Agentle and encouraging approach.
- For families.
- Ideas for family discussions (check the archives).
The
internet is rife with commentaries that can spark great table conversation.
Rabbi
Abraham Joshua Heschel likened shabbat to a cathedral in time, an
indestructible Holy of Holies. As much as our actions can be sacred, so too our
rest.
© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman
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