Imagine you are on a train, traveling toward your destination. You look to your right and see a fellow passenger. Attempting to be friendly, you ask him where he’s heading. He shrugs his shoulders and says, “I don’t know.” Confused, you ask again. He repeats, “I’m just riding the train. I don’t know where I’m going.” At this point, you begin to wonder if this guy is out of his mind. Who goes on a train without a destination in mind?
However, if you ask the average person on the street the same question, “Where are you going in life? What’s your ultimate destination?” they will probably give you a similar answer. They’ll shrug and say, “I don’t know.” Now, if the absence of a defined destination for something as simple as a train ride is so clearly absurd, how can we fail to treat life in the same manner? Life, the most important journey we take, must surely require a clearly defined and meaningful destination.
The key to approaching this topic lies within the concept of Shabbos. And as Shabbos occupies one-seventh of our lives, and much of Judaism centers around its observance, let us delve into its inner meaning in order to gain a deeper understanding of this unique and beautiful day.
Shabbos as Fundamental
It is striking to consider how essential Shabbos is to Jewish thought and practice. Shabbos is included amongst the Aseres Hadibros, the Ten Commandments, which are viewed not only as uniquely important but as the root categories that contain all the other mitzvos (Rashi, Shemos 24:12). Furthermore, the punishment for desecrating Shabbos is not just death but skilah (stoning), the most severe of the four death penalties.
When considering whether or not someone is an observant Jew, we usually ask whether he or she is “shomer Shabbos.” What makes Shabbos a root mitzvah, why is its punishment so severe, and why do we see it as the measuring stick for all of Torah observance? What is the secret of Shabbos?
Theme of the Day
Usually, when we have a specific time of kedushah, a holy point in time, there is a unique positive act that we associate with it. On Rosh Hashanah, we blow shofar; on Sukkos, we sit in the sukkah and shake the lulav; on Chanukah, we light the menorah; on Purim, we read the Megillah; on Pesach, we have the Seder; and on Shavuos, we learn Torah. On Shabbos, though, we tend to think less about what we are meant to be doing and more about what we are not allowed to do. The issur melachah, the prohibition against creative work on Shabbos, dominates our focus. We can easily fall into the trap of associating Shabbos with only restrictions, leading to an unfortunately negative connotation. These prohibitions can take over the day, leaving us feeling restricted, limited, or even trapped.
A Taste of Olam Haba
In an enigmatically cryptic manner, the Gemara (Berachos 57a) compares Shabbos to Olam Haba. The exact terminology is that Shabbos is “me’ein Olam Haba,” a taste of the World to Come. Once again, we are left to wonder: What is the deeper meaning of Shabbos?
This World and the Next
In order to answer these questions, we must first understand the natures of Olam Hazeh and Olam Haba, and their unique relationship:
Olam Hazeh, the world we live in, is the place of process. In this world, you choose who you will become; you have the ability to build, mold, and create yourself. Every single day presents you a new opportunity to become greater than you were the day before. This world is therefore the place of movement and becoming, where we progress along our personal path of change and growth. The joy of this world is the ability to grow, to learn, and to become. The pain is that it is limited; we are only in this world for a short amount of time before we leave.
Olam Haba, in contrast, is the place of being, where you experience everything you have built in this life. We experience a new static world, lacking both movement and process, where we enjoy all that we created and achieved during our lives in this world. The pain of Olam Haba is that it’s only that and nothing more. All the potential we failed to actualize will remain eternally so: potential.
This can be compared to a person who is given a pile of clay and one hour to mold it. During that hour, he can create anything he wants and impress any form he desires into the clay. After the hour, the clay is placed into the kiln, and whatever form he created during that hour will remain forever. So too, we receive a lifetime in this world to mold ourselves. During our time here, we have the free will to create ourselves, to grow. Once we leave this world, we remain forever as the being that we created.
It is essential to understand that the reward in the World to Come is not merely an external reward, some “treat” given to you for the good deeds you performed. Rather, the reward is you, the consciousness and self that you created during your lifetime. As the Ramchal and the Nefesh HaChaim explain, when you die, your mind and consciousness are peeled away from your physical body, almost like taking off a coat, and you exist eternally as the essential being that you have created.
Weekdays and Shabbos
The weekdays are an experience of this world, a time to physically create, build, and grow. Shabbos is more than just a day of rest; it’s a taste of Olam Haba. On Shabbos, we cease creative physical activity and experience what it means to simply exist. This is the spiritual parallel to our transition from this world to the next. Shabbos is the ultimate reminder that our lives have an end point, and that the result is only as great as every bit of effort that we have invested into building it. On Shabbos, we reflect on what we have built and become – both in the preceding week and in our entire life leading up to this point.
This is why, despite the fact that we may pause our physical growth on Shabbos, we don’t stop our spiritual growth; in fact, we place special emphasis on it. This is because the experience of Olam Haba that we taste on Shabbos should compel us to take full advantage of this world and to further build, develop, and grow. Shabbos is the reminder that one day we will no longer have the opportunity to take advantage of this world, and thus our response should be to redouble our conviction to do so. We can then enter the next week rejuvenated and inspired to become even more.
This is also why the Gemara in Berachos specifically says that Shabbos is one-sixtieth of Olam Haba. In halachah, if something is less than one-sixtieth it has no taste. This is why the halachah of bittul (nullification) applies to that which is less than one-sixtieth. By stating that Shabbos is one-sixtieth of Olam Haba, the Gemara is explaining that Shabbos is just enough of a taste of Olam Haba so that it is not nullified, but not more than that. It is a glimpse of another dimension, the faintest taste of the World to Come. This is the ultimate oneg Shabbos, the pleasure of experiencing a taste of Olam Haba.
Halachic Applications
This profound understanding of Shabbos sheds a new light on many of the halachos and characteristics of Shabbos. If a muktzah object (an object that cannot be used on Shabbos) is resting on a table at the time that Shabbos enters, the halachah is that the entire table takes on a muktzah status. This is true even if the muktzah object is somehow removed from the table over the course of Shabbos. Conversely, if a muktzah object is placed on a table once Shabbos has already begun, the table does not become muktzah. Whatever the status of the table is when Shabbos enters remains its status throughout Shabbos. Why?
Shabbos is compared to Olam Haba, and once you enter Olam Haba, your status becomes static. So too, an object that takes on a muktzah status at the outset of Shabbos retains its halachic status throughout Shabbos, remaining static and unchanged – parallel to Olam Haba.
Shabbos: Focusing on Destination
It is all too easy to lose focus of the bigger picture, of what is truly important in life. Many people are stuck in an endless cycle of work, eat, sleep, repeat. Life becomes about weekends and vacations, and the purpose of life is simply to get by. However, this is not what we were created for. Each and every one of us has the potential for greatness, and our job in this world is to find our unique greatness and bring it to life.
Businesses hold regular meetings to discuss their goals and progress, and athletes build specific training programs to ensure maximum performance. Both constantly track their progress and adjust themselves when necessary to ensure that they continue progressing toward their target. Yet, when it comes to the important things in life, such as our life’s purpose, our family, and our spiritual growth, how often do we create concrete goals? How often do we sit down and measure our progress, recalibrating as necessary to achieve our goals? Shabbos is the time to focus on destination, to ask ourselves: “Where am I going in life? What are my goals? What am I trying to accomplish?”
The Goal of Shabbos
Shabbos is an opportunity to solidify past growth and propel ourselves toward future greatness. The first step to achieving this is looking back at everything you have become until now and enjoying everything you have built – the person you have created. The second step is to take a reflective step outside of yourself and to view yourself objectively from an outside perspective. We need to have the courage to go into a room, alone, and ask ourselves the important questions: “Who am I? What drives me? What makes me unique? What are my talents? What are my passions? What can I contribute to the Jewish People and the world as a whole?” But, most importantly, “How am I doing in life? Am I achieving my goals? Is there anything that needs more work, more attention?”
The last step is to redirect and recalibrate. Just as a GPS recalibrates when you veer off course, Shabbos is the time to do the same for our life trajectory. Our lives are built through the decisions we make, and Shabbos provides us with the ideal opportunity to make the decision to become more. Every decision we’ve ever made in our lives has led you to this very moment, and any decision we make going forward can forever alter our lives for the better. May we be inspired to fully experience Shabbos, a taste of Olam Haba, and use this taste of destination to unlock our true greatness.
