“Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days thou shalt labor and do all thy work; but the seventh day is a sabbath (rest) unto the Lord thy God, in it thou shalt not do any manner of work…For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested on the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.” Exodus 20: 7-10

Sabbath is the nexus, the center of gravity, around which the life of a Jew revolves. The entire week is in anticipation and preparation of a day set aside for complete suspension of labor and an observation of rest. In short, Shabbat (Sabbath for Christians) is your weekly, spiritual reset button.

When I was a fire and brimstone, fundamentalist, hypocritical Christian (say that five times fast!) in high school, I observed Shabbat the same way my other Christian brethren did: wake up early, stress over dressing up for church. Get to church and listen to some music and a sermon about Jesus. Get anxious toward the end of said sermon because I want to beat the other Christians to the Sunday lunch buffet at a local restaurant. Spend the rest of the afternoon either a) feeling miserable for eating too much, b) watching a sporting event, c) fishing, d) participating in some sort of social event, e) stressing out about preparation for Sunday evening services.

Of course, this isn’t a comprehensive or authoritative list of what I or any other Christian may or may not do on Sunday. The point is that I’ve never really known a Sunday to be  all that restful or even holy.

So when I ran into the Jewish concept of Shabbat, I knew it would be a “back to the basics” lesson in what I should have done all along. As the scripture passage suggests above, Shabbat is a holy day made so by the inaction of rest. The first part of the commandment, “Remember the Sabbath,” can be taken in two ways–both of which bring you to the same place of reverential rest: 1) Is God asking us to remember the first Shabbat–his Shabbat? or 2) to remember the Shabbat in general that he has prescribed for us? I think the answer is both.

Those who follow Torah are keenly aware of humanity’s special status of being created in the image of God. What is the image of God? I don’t think it’s referring to some anthropomorphic quality, but in the attributes of the formless, abstract, all-pervasive reality that is God. These qualities being creativity, wisdom, free will, etc. Notice how God spent the first six days exhibiting these qualities in the act of Creation. He then asks us to mimic him, to be like him, in observing a day of holy rest from our daily lives. In the Torah on the seventh day, God steps back and witnesses his creation, calls everything “good,” and sanctifies the act of rest on this day as holy. We are then called to the holy action of inaction in that we stop what we are doing in order to meditate on our work as it fits within a world we are to center around God. We judge our actions/accomplishments; is everything we’ve done “good”? Have we been God-like in our dealings? This is just one part of the restful meditation enjoined upon us by throwing the brakes on our hectic lives.

Shabbat officially begins 18 minutes before sunset on Friday after the Shabbat candles are lit. A special ritual accompanies the lighting of the candles, and it goes something like this:

1) Light the candles (typically the women of the home do this, however if there are no women present, a man can perform the ritual).

2) Wave your hands over the candle, then toward your face (I remember this sort of movement from Hinduism with Aarti!), washing yourself with the warmth.

3) Cover your eyes and recite the following prayer: “Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe, who has sanctified us with his commandments, and commanded us to kindle the light of the holy Shabbat.”

With that prayer, Shabbat is officially in full swing and will last until sundown the next day. Other traditions, such as partaking in challah (a special type of braided bread), visiting (traditionally by walking, if possible) your local synagogue for special prayers and rituals, giving to a household charity box (pushka), and meeting with family and friends mark every Shabbat. There is also emphasis in studying Torah or other Jewish material. For more details, I recommend this website.

The challenge for me in observing Shabbat is that I have not rested, not one day off, since Day 1 of Project Conversion. I don’t think many folks understand just how much work goes into a project like this, and honestly, how much work goes into learning a new faith in general. I spend everyday from sunrise (actually about 1 1/2 before) to late at night reading, interviewing, learning about these religions. But to rest, to make rest holy…can I do that? And here’s the irony of it all: Jewish tradition states that Shabbat should be spent studying about God via Torah and other texts. Since studying these texts is my job, so to speak, what am I to take rest from? I think the answer lay in how I read these texts and my normal daily activity. No computer, no (or very limited) vehicular use, no cooking…just me and God, me and the texts. On Shabbat, there is no Project Conversion. In every since of the word, my work is transformed into my pleasure, my holy, sacred, rest.

Gut Shabbes (Good Shabbat) to you and yours, and Shalom, my friends.