{"id":12126,"date":"2008-10-23T10:15:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-23T10:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/production.ou.org\/life\/other\/reflections_bereishit_5768_the_rest_of_shabbat\/"},"modified":"2015-10-29T11:42:14","modified_gmt":"2015-10-29T16:42:14","slug":"reflections_bereishit_5768_the_rest_of_shabbat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/torah\/reflections_bereishit_5768_the_rest_of_shabbat\/","title":{"rendered":"Bereishit: The Rest of Shabbat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It might sound like a strange question \u2013 but does <b>God (as it were) abide by His laws of Shabbos?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The opening paragraph of Friday night <i>Kiddush<\/i>, (also chapter 2 of our parsha) may be instructive:<\/p>\n<p><i>Va&#8217;yichal Elokim ba&#8217;yom ha&#8217;shivii, melachto asher osoh, Va&#8217;yishbos ba&#8217;yom ha&#8217;shivii, me&#8217;kol melachto asher osoh<\/i>. Elokim completed on the seventh day His work which He had made, and He abstained on the seventh day from all His work which He had made.<\/p>\n<p>Note the tension in the verse. First, God concluded His <i>melacha<\/i> (work) <b><u>on<\/u><\/b> Shabbos \u2013 thus implying that He \u201cworked\u201d on Shabbos (Him and Synagogue Rabbis!). Later in the pasuk, we find that God \u201crested\u201d on Shabbos \u201cfrom all His work\u201d, implying no work was done on Shabbos. Leaving aside the philosophical (\u201cGod-work, God-rest\u201d) challenges, how do we reconcile the two halves of the verse? Much Torah exists to reconcile the tension.<\/p>\n<p>Rashi, in his second approach offers us the following <i>midrashic<\/i> gem<\/p>\n<p><i>What was the world still lacking? Rest. With the coming of Shabbos came menucha, (rest), and thus the work was completed and finished. <\/i><\/p>\n<p>Thus, Hashem didn\u2019t actually work (the verb) <i>on<\/i> Shabbos. Rather, He ushered in <i>menucha<\/i>, which served as the completion of Creation. Insofar as <i>menucha<\/i> was a part of creation, he thus completed His work (the noun).<\/p>\n<p>What emerges from Rashi is the paradoxical notion that while <i>menucha<\/i> requires no effort, on some level, it is categorized as <i>melacha<\/i> (work); an idea that is certainly foreign to the halachic and pragmatic mindset. We are used to thinking that one is precisely what the other is not. In Rashi\u2019s midrash however, we encounter a subtle, yet startlingly new notion of <i>menucha<\/i> \u2013 not as the absence of <i>melacha<\/i> \u2013 but rather as it\u2019s completion! How shall we consider <i>menucha<\/i> as <i>melacha<\/i>?<\/p>\n<p>Chazal have often expressed Shabbos as a metaphor. In different contexts, the Rabbis have taught<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>a. Shabbos is a piece of the next world &#8211; <i>me\u2019ein olam haba<\/i><\/li>\n<li>b. Olam Haba (the next world) is a complete Shabbos existence &#8211; <i>yom shekulo shabbos<\/i><\/li>\n<li>c. Our present world is a Friday &#8211; an <i>erev Shabbos<\/i><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>A running joke I have with my students is &#8211; sans preparation, one can always pull out a can of Tuna. Preparation for the next world is a must, exclaim the Rabbis: <i>Mi shetarach b&#8217;erev shabbos yochal b&#8217;shabbos <\/i>\u2013 Only one who labors on Friday shall eat on Shabbos! &#8211; because nobody wants to eat tuna for eternity.<\/p>\n<p>The Rabbinic metaphor teaches the core idea that Shabbos is the goal and must provide the framework for the rest of our week. A holistic life must somehow utilize work in a manner that enhances our appreciation of <i>menuchas<\/i> Shabbos. Other than the obvious rest motif, how is this done?<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps the notion is that Shabbos as a goal teaches that we must work to find Hashem (and find Hashem at work) so that when we rest, we can bask in His glow. If we appreciate Hashem in the craziness of 24-6, then the extended Shabbos time to pray, learn, eat, <i>schmooze<\/i> or simply reflect and enjoy our families becomes an elevated, exquisite high.<\/p>\n<p>In considering this notion, I find it ironic that for some, Shabbos is a big disconnect \u2013 a long snooze button or a mind numbing experience climaxing in chulent, sleep or both. Shabbos the anesthetic, dulls a week of pain. Rather than an oasis, shabbos serves as an island \u2013 neatly tucked away from the rest of the week.<\/p>\n<p><i>What is true in our micro existence is no less true in the macrosphere<\/i>. This whole world is one Erev Shabbos! And if we miss the micro point, we run the risk of missing the BIG point &#8211; leading compartmentalized lives that may contain both spiritual and mundane elements, while tragically the twain never meet.<\/p>\n<p>Just as the <i>menucha<\/i> of Shabbos is the final <i>melacha<\/i>, the capstone that orients all our labor, so must the sense of ultimate Shabbos be able to direct our lives. Even as we immerse ourselves within our frenetic world, we must be wholly conscious that the goal of that <i>melacha<\/i> is to find Hashem in every nook and cranny of our existence.<\/p>\n<p>In that sense, good (micro) <u>s<\/u>habbos and Good (macro) <u>S<\/u>habbos.<\/p>\n<p>Asher Brander<\/p>\n<p>________________________________________<br \/>\n<em>We may now understand why many rishonim learnt that there is a mitzvah of remembering Shabbos during the week as well. Similarly, Rav Saadia Gaon claims that \u201cSix days you shall work\u201d is a mitzvah! The notion being, that one\u2019s everyday life, <b>when focused on Shabbos<\/b>, becomes a part of Shabbos itself.<\/em><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><i>Rabbi Asher Brander is the Rabbi of the Westwood Kehilla, Founder\/Dean of LINK (Los Angeles Intercommunity Kollel) and is a Rebbe at Yeshiva University High Schools of Los Angeles<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It might sound like a strange question \u2013 but does God (as it were) abide by His laws of Shabbos? The opening paragraph of Friday night Kiddush, (also chapter 2 of our parsha) may be instructive: Va&#8217;yichal Elokim ba&#8217;yom ha&#8217;shivii, melachto asher osoh, Va&#8217;yishbos ba&#8217;yom ha&#8217;shivii, me&#8217;kol melachto asher osoh. Elokim completed on the seventh<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":223,"featured_media":44296,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_cloudinary_featured_overwrite":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[85,83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inspiration","category-torah"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Bereishit: The Rest of Shabbat<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Shabbos as a goal teaches that we must work to find Hashem (and find Hashem at work) so that when we rest we can bask in His glow\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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