Dvar Torah for Parshat Behaalotekha

Based on Likutey Halakhot, Hilkhot Shabbat 3:7

"The people ShaTU (would search around) and gather [the manna]" (Numbers 11:8); biShTUsa, in foolishness (Zohar 2:62b).

One of the regular challenges of Jewish life is dealing with the seeming dichotomy between the six days of the unsacred and the Holy Shabbat. Which is the reality that we ought to make the focus of our life? Is it possible to treat the two as one unit? If so, how?

You will recall that when we were in the Garden of Eden there was no need to work. Whatever we wanted to eat we simply took from a tree and it grew back. No plowing, no planting, no work. Everything was down "by itself," as it were. Shelter and clothing were also automatic. It was all "Shabbosdik," prepared in advance and waiting for us to enjoy as a tool to commune with Hashem. However, it all came to an abrupt when, due to a momentary but unfortunate lapse, we ate from the Tree of Knowledge. Part of our punishment is, "By the sweat of your brow you will eat bread" (Genesis 3:19).

What is the "measure-for-measure" here? How does the punishment fit the crime? As we all know, perhaps too well, earning a livelihood consumes a great deal of our time, energy and focus. How many suffer from the various pressures of work and, as a result, lose the ability to utilize their personal time to grow in daat, awareness of Hashem's presence. However, since we declined the awareness of Hashem's presence there in the Garden, we are now put in a position to have to struggle in order to regain it. In other words, we rejected the Shabbat, God-awareness, so now we must toil in order to regain it.

But God doesn't want a sinner to die, but to repent. So He places the tools for return within easy reach. He sends us to work! Because while work is a curse, a punishment, on one hand, on the other hand it is a building process. Because the work we do is meant to build the Mishkan (Tabernacle), a home for God, where people can come and grow in faith. When is it a curse and when is it a privilege? It's a curse when one behaves like the Serpent, faithlessly and selfishly; it is a privilege when one works with faith, for God.

The litmus test for faith is Shabbat observance. It is often pointed out in our holy writings that every time the Torah commands the Jews to build the Mishkan they are first warned about the importance of not violating the Shabbat. The reason is that Shabbat essentially declares that everything is God's. When we cease from "work," we proclaim that even when we do work it's not we who our accomplishing, but God, Who has invested us with talent and skill. When we limit our speech to Torah-talk we show that our weekday speech is meant to build a dwelling for Him. When we divert our minds from thinking about workaday concerns, we open up new parts of our consciousness to feel the closeness to God we were created to feel.

So by observing Shabbat we acknowledge its superior reality. By focusing on it and extending its thinking into our weekday work, we eliminate the ShTUsa, the foolish lack of God-awareness from our livelihood and re-enter the Garden of Eden.

(Shabbat observance is not all-or-nothing. The Mishnah Brurah points out that it's impossible to observe Shabbat perfectly without constant review of its laws. Nonetheless, the commitment to guard Shabbat, the fourth of the Ten Commandments, is critical. No matter what a person's current level of observance, the next little bit that s/he adds is very important. Because the next bit is another negation of ego which allows Hashem's light to shine into our too-dark world, on Shabbat and throughout the week.)

agutn Shabbos!
Shabbat Shalom!