The Miracle at the Shabbos Table

Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. -John 14:11-14

There will come a time, very soon, when we will be shown miracles so great, they will make the ten plagues and the splitting of the Red Sea appear as ordinary as nature itself.

So great, no mind can begin to fathom them; so powerful, they will transform the very fabric of our world, elevating it in a way that the wonders of the exodus never did.

For then, our eyes will be opened and granted the power to see the greatest of miracles: Those miracles that occur to us now, beneath our very noses, every day.

Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
Greater Miracles
Chabad.org

I don't know why, but I continue to be amazed at how the teachings of Jesus (Yeshua) parallel the Talmudic masters and even the modern Jewish sages. They are all painting the same picture and revealing the same vision. We are all looking for miracles and we are all looking to God to provide those miracles. Even with evidence of the hand of God all around us, we can still fail to see what He is doing in the world and in our lives.

I suppose this shouldn't surprise us. Face it. The world is a mess. You have problems. I have problems. The world has problems. Where is God? Just look at His holy nation; the one He established Himself. We have members of the Fogel family murdered in their sleep in their Itamar home by Palestinian terrorists. Hamas fired a rocket from Gaza at a school bus critically injuring a teenage boy who later died. Several young Jewish men were murdered by Palestinian police while worshiping at Joseph's tomb in Nablus. Where does it all end? Where are the miracles of God? Why isn't He saving His people?

Any Jew alive on the face of this planet today is a walking miracle. Our mere existence today is wondrous, plucked from the fire at the last moment again and again, with no natural explanation that will suffice. Each of us alive today is a child of martyrs and miracles.

Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
Walking Miracle
Chabad.org

The fact that there are Jews on earth today at all is a miracle. For thousands of years, the world has been trying to exterminate the Children of Israel, and it always seems like the Jewish people are on the verge of extinction. Yet we still have Jews among us. As much as the world hates Jews and hates Israel, the world needs the presence of the light of the world.

“It is too small a thing for you to be my servant
to restore the tribes of Jacob
and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make you a light for the Gentiles,
that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.” -Isaiah 49:6

This is what the LORD Almighty says: “In those days ten people from all languages and nations will take firm hold of one Jew by the tzitzit of his robe and say, ‘Let us go with you, because we have heard that God is with you.’” -Zechariah 8:23

In the last days the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established
as the highest of the mountains;
it will be exalted above the hills,
and peoples will stream to it.

Many nations will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the temple of the God of Jacob.
He will teach us his ways,
so that we may walk in his paths.”
The Torah will go out from Zion,
the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. -Micah 4:1-2

And lest you think that Israel has irredeemably failed God and that the Christians have taken over, here is Paul's commentary on the matter:

I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in, and in this way all Israel will be saved. As it is written:
“The deliverer will come from Zion;
he will turn godlessness away from Jacob.
And this is my covenant with them
when I take away their sins.” -Romans 11:25-27

It's not just that Israel is part of God's plan. In many ways, Israel is the plan. The salvation of the rest of the world depends on the Jewish people. We Gentiles will turn to them in the last days and through the Jewish Messiah, we are all redeemed.

However, even the most far reaching cosmic plan can have very humble elements. God created the miracle of the nation of Israel and through his mercy, sustains each and every Jew. Yet we see that every individual has a part in that mission, even down to a single parent and how he or she raises their children.

Rav Shmuel Aharon Lider, shlit”a, learns a beautiful lesson from this. “We see from this that Shabbos is the time for us to sanctify and educate our children at the table. The best way to be mechanech and sanctify our children is through the zemiros that we sing and the divrei Torah that we say at the Shabbos table.”

Rav Shach, zt”l, had a neighbor - a simple baal habayis who was not too learned - whose sons grew to all be exceptional masmidim and great talmidei chachamim. Rav Shach himself lived and breathed Torah all the time, yet his neighbor’s children appeared to surpass his own in certain ways as far as Torah study was concerned.

Rav Shach himself commented on what seemed to him at the root of the distinction. “My neighbor spent a long time at the Shabbos table interacting with his children and singing zemiros. I, on the other hand, was always very engrossed in working through a difficult Rambam or some other intricate Torah argument. One should never underestimate the power of filling the children with a spirit of holiness through the simple singing of zemiros and speaking divrei Torah at their own level at the Shabbos table!"

Daf Yomi Digest
Stories off the Daf
The Power of the Shabbos Table
Menachos 50

Here we see a miracle. One does not have to be an exceptional Jewish Torah scholar or exalted sage or saint in order to raise children who are close to God. We can also extend the metaphor, so to speak, beyond Israel. We can apply what else we've learned in this short lesson and say that by the Gentiles attaching themselves (ourselves) to Israel through the Jewish Messiah, we can also share in the miracle of not only continuing in the world, but of being able to belong to God.

The Torah has gone forth from Zion and, as the Master sometimes said, "to those who have ears, let them hear".

Shabbat Shalom.

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark.

Heeding Jesus the Righteous Prophet

The 172nd mitzvah is that we are commanded to obey each of the Prophets, may they rest in peace, and to fulfill all their instructions. Even if his instructions contradict one or many of these commandments, [we are commanded to obey him] as long as his instructions are temporary. This does not apply, however, if he permanently adds or subtracts [from the commandments], as we explained in the Introduction to our Commentary on the Mishneh.

The source of this commandment is G-d's statement (exalted be He), "To him you must listen." In the words of the Sifri: "The verse, 'To him you must listen,' means that even if he tells you to temporarily transgress one of the commandments of the Torah, you must listen to him."

Sefer Hamitzvot in English
Heeding a Prophet
Positive Commandment 172
Chabad.org

What?

This is very confusing. Why, if the Torah of God is perfect, would a Prophet be commanded (Prophets don't speak on their own authority; they speak the words of God, otherwise, they're false Prophets) to temporarily contradict or override one or more of the commandments?

The commentary I quoted from above contains a footnote with the answer:

See Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah 9:3, where the example is brought of the prophet Elijah, who brought an offering on Mount Carmel, in spite of the prohibition to bring offerings outside the Temple in Jerusalem. Since it was a temporary measure — only to disprove the idolatry of Baal — it was permitted.

What this says to me is that, under certain circumstances, a Prophet may, as directed by God, temporarily override or disobey a commandment to uphold a higher commandment or to "make a point", so to speak.

That brings me to the class I taught last night.

Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”

He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”

Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus. -Matthew 12:9-14

Jesus (Yeshua) could have waited until the next day to heal the man's shriveled hand. The fellow had probably lived with it for years and waiting one more day wouldn't have made much of a difference. Even in Israel today, on Shabbat, such a disability probably wouldn't be treated by observant Jewish doctors, and only injuries and illness where the person was suffering would be attended to. Christ's example, ("if any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath") doesn't seem to be a good comparison, because a sheep falling into a pit could be injured and might die (or at least suffer terribly) if not rescued from the pit immediately. Not so with this man's shriveled hand.

So why did Jesus heal the man's hand on the Shabbat, especially when he knew the group of Pharisees present were just looking for an excuse to bring charges against him? Why did Jesus (apparently) violate the Shabbat?

While it's passages such as this one that traditional Christianity use as a "proof text" to illustrate that the Shabbat, along with the rest of "the Law", was done away with by Jesus, it's more likely (this presupposes the authority of the ancient Jewish sages to render opinions based on Torah and Oral Law) that the Jewish Messiah was acting in the role of a Prophet. Certainly as the Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:8), he would know precisely what is and isn't permitted Shabbat behavior, but using the example of the 172nd mitzvah, we see that he could also temporarily suspend or weaken a portion of his Shabbat observance to obey a higher commandment or to "make a point". In this case, (my opinion), I think Jesus is saying that doing good is upholding the spirit and intention of the Shabbat, as opposed to manipulating the commandments in order to snare someone (which seems to be what the Pharisees were up to).

The Shabbat isn't a straight jacket that God uses to restrict us and to frustrate us. It's a protection from the troubles and problems we must endure the rest of the week. It's a "protected zone" where we are more free to pursue our experiencing God and to behave more completely out of His desires, including "loving our neighbor" (Mark 12:31), which is an extension of the commandment to love God (see Mark 12:28-34 for the complete context). The behavioral restrictions associated with the Shabbat are there to guide us and to help us structure how to observe the Shabbat, not to provide a list of "thou shalt nots".

Keep in mind that Jesus, as a true and righteous Prophet, as well as the Messiah, could not permanently override any of God's Torah because to do so, would have made him a false Prophet...and we know there is nothing false about the Jewish Messiah.

We are told to heed the Prophet because he speaks in the Name of God and not on his own authority (Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does." -John 5:19). We are also told in the 6th mitzvah to "cling to the Sages" (based on Deuteronomy 10:20), imitating them in their "good and upright ways" because heeding and imitating a tzadik (righteous person) brings us closer to clinging to God.

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark.

Flickering

Barukh atah Adonai, Eloheinu, melekh ha'olam
asher kidishanu b'mitz'votav v'tzivanu
l'had'lik neir shel Shabbat. (Amein)

Blessed are you, Oh Lord, our God,
King of the universe
Who has sanctified us with His commandments
and commanded us to light the lights of Shabbat. (Amen)

Shabbat Kiddush

For those of you who observe a traditional Sabbath in some manner, you probably recognize the blessing over the candles, typically recited by the woman of the household to welcome in the Shabbat:

At least two candles should be lit, representing the dual commandments to remember and to keep the sabbath. The candles are lit by the woman of the household. After lighting, she waves her hands over the candles, welcoming in the sabbath. Then she covers her eyes, so as not to see the candles before reciting the blessing...The hands are then removed from the eyes, and she looks at the candles, completing the mitzvah of lighting the candles.

Judaism 101

Probably the candle lighting ceremony in Judaism that is best known to non-Jews is the lighting of the Chanukah menorah, which symbolizes the ancient Jewish victory over their Hellenistic oppressors and the cleansing and rededication of the Temple of God.

In Judaism, and in other religious traditions, candles or light represent a state of spiritual illumination and even a guide on the path of holiness.

Your Word is a lamp unto my feet
and a light unto my path -Psalm 119:105

When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” -John 8:12

“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. -Matthew 5:14-16

We see a strong image in these verses that both the Word of God and His living Word, the Jewish Messiah, are our light and our guide on the journey of holiness set before us by our Creator. And while God and Jesus (Yeshua) can never fail to be our light, the light within each of us is not invulnerable. Like any living thing, the Spirit; the light within each of us, must be protected, fed, and nurtured, or it will dim and finally fade away.

We were so close, there was no room
We bled inside each others wounds
We all had caught the same disease
And we all sang the songs of peace
Some came to sing, some came to pray
Some came to keep the dark away
So raise the candles high, 'cause if you don't
We could stay black against the night
Oh raise them higher again and if you do
We could stay dry against the rain

Melanie Safka
Lay Down (1970)

Even in popular songs (from when I was young, anyway), candles are used to symbolize the same things as in the world of faith. Without the light that God gives to each of us, we will "stay black against the night". The parable of the ten virgins (Matthew 25:1-13) abundantly warns us against the dangers of allowing our lamps to run out of oil, and both oil and light in the Bible often represent the Spirit of God.

I should be happy that another Sabbath is approaching. Friday is here, the work week is winding down, and tonight, I have the privilege of watching my wife light the Shabbos candles and witnessing a special holiness enter my small home. At once, it's such a simple and yet magnificent event. On many occasions, it is the candle lighting is the biggest joy of my Sabbath experience.

But like some other Fridays, I approach the Shabbat with a mixed sense of anticipation and melancholy. I find that the uncertainty of the future of my faith and the congregation where I currently worship, has cast a shadow over my rest that even the light within me cannot overcome. Then again, maybe it's my candle that is burning low. The wick is almost exhausted and the oil is all but consumed.

I'm holding out my only candle, though it's so little light to find my way
Now this story's been laid beneath my candle
And it's shorter every hour as it reaches for the day
Yes, I feel just like a candle in the way

Jackson Browne
Song for Adam (1972)

Like most people in the dark, my eyes are searching for some source of light I can focus upon, no matter how faint. I keep looking around me, but my sight is growing dim and my eyes are getting weary. Or is it just that the only light I'm looking vainly for is the one that is supposed to be within me? Where is the "light upon my path" I am trying to find?

Oh people, look among you
It`s there your hope must lie
There`s a sea bird above you
Gliding in one place like Jesus in the sky
We all must do the best we can
And then hang on to that Gospel plow
When my life is over, I`m going to stand before the Father
But the sisters of the sun are going to rock me on the water now

Jackson Brown
Rock Me on the Water (1972)

This is why we can never let ourselves be isolated and alone. Most of us, or maybe I'm only speaking for myself, can't sustain our "lights to the world" very long without support. The ten virgins were ten, after all, and they had each other for comfort and encouragement if need be, while waiting for the groom to arrive.

Melanie Safka's classic lyrics say that we either hold our candles high or we "stay black against the night". The world we live in is dark and the only light we can see by is the one we accept from God. But having accepted it, we must nurture and protect it. For that, we need help. If that help is not forthcoming, we're like a candle in the wind.

And it seems to me you lived your life
Like a candle in the wind
Never knowing who to cling to
When the rain set in
And I would have liked to have known you
But I was just a kid
Your candle burned out long before
Your legend ever did

Elton John and Bernie Taupin
Candle in the Wind (1973)

This song was written in memory of actress Marilyn Monroe, but it describes all of us; it describes me. Jackson Browne's lyrics speak of a hope within each of us, a connection to Jesus "in the sky" and a future standing "before the Father". John's and Taupin's song speaks of a life lived in loneliness and a flame that did not survive the struggle to stay aglow.

Perhaps, knowing all this, the custom of candle lighting to welcome in the Shabbat exists to remind us that we are not alone in the dark. There is a light shining in the blackness and even though it sometimes seems dim and far away, it is always there. Even when the light within us threatens to be extinguished, His light can never fail. If only I can keep my eyes on the light and not give in to the shadowy abyss.

And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.

Friedrich Nietzsche

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark.

Could You Live Without the Internet for Just One Day?

I know that most of the people in the Messianic world "rest" on the Shabbat, from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday, but the level of "rest" is most likely variable. In Judaism, and particularly within an Orthodox framework, the requirements that make up a Shabbat rest are numerous and specific. Chances are, most non-Jews who have adopted the Shabbat don't rest as "well" as they (we) could.

For instance, do you turn off your computer, your iPad, your smart phone, and all of your other electronic communications devices before Shabbat candlelighting and keep them off until after Havdalah the next evening?

I may be asking a lot of people, including myself. After all, most of us, including our Messianic Jewish brothers and sisters drive to shul and perform other acts that would be considered "breaking the Shabbat" in an Orthodox context. While "keeping the commandments" usually requires building up set of habits and behavioral patterns over the span of years or even decades, as human beings, we usually reach a "comfort zone" of Shabbat activities and then stay there. In other words, we don't try to get closer to the goals we originally set for ourselves when we first made a commitment to a Sabbath's rest.

I bring all this up because I received a prompt from the Sabbath Manifesto site announcing that the Shabbat starting at sundown on March 4, 2011 is the National Day of Unplugging.

Think of it as a challenge to help improve your Sabbath rest. Could you completely unplug from all of your electronic communication devices for over 24 hours? Could you sign out of your email, stop tweeting and Facebooking, turn off your cell, and log off your computer?

Are you getting the shakes? No Internet or electronic communications for approximately 25 hours. That's harder for some people than not eating for the same amount of time (remember Yom Kippur?).

The idea isn't to deprive you in any way, but to help you reclaim your lives and insert more friend and family face-to-face interactions. This allows you more time to "smell the roses", so to speak, to study the Word of God, to fellowship with like minded people of the faith, to do all of the things the Shabbat was designed for. This isn't restriction; it's freedom from a sort of tyranny what we allow to control us the other six days of the week.

If you keep the Sabbath but would like to keep it better, there's hope. If you are a Jew, a Christian, or anyone who'd like to live without phone calls, texting, tweeting, IMing, and emailing for just one day, in order to experience what the rest of your life is like, take the National Day of Unplugging 2011 challenge. If you keep the Shabbat, but not this deeply, you could experience greater rewards of rest and peace. If you don't typically take a rest day from your electronics, give it a try. You may find a freedom you never knew existed.

On the seventh day God finished the work that He had been doing, and He ceased on the seventh day from all the work that He had done. And God blessed the seventh day and declared it holy, because on it God ceased from all the work of creation that He had done. -Genesis 2:2-3

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark.

When Shabbat Meets Christmas

This sense of missing something kept gnawing at me, until one day I realized what it was: I missed the Christmas season. I missed that time of year in America. At first I denied it. Growing up in an Orthodox Jewish home and in yeshivas, I had obviously never celebrated Christmas. How could I miss something that I never had? And being so Jewish, how could I miss the quintessential Christian holiday? It seemed religiously wrong, maybe even sinful.
Dennis Prager
A Yeshiva boy and Christmas

I discovered this article early this morning on twitter and found it fascinating. Particularly in the Messianic movement, we make a specific effort to separate our worship of the Messiah from Christmas or Easter in order to establish and maintain the "Jewishness" of Messianism. Prager's article indicates that in the larger Jewish world, that separation doesn't have to be absolute.

I decided to take time out from what I should be doing (I have one more paid authoring assignment due before the end of the year) and to briefly blog about this matter. I specifically wanted to address the events of this particular year. You probably know why.

The upcoming Shabbat starts on Christmas Eve and ends on Christmas Day. Just one week later, Shabbat worship competes with New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

In traditional Judaism, this isn't much of a point. In fact, my wife is helping out at the Chabad on Christmas Eve (well, the Erev Shabbat of December 24th, anyway) to cook a traditional Chinese meal (on the east coast in areas with a large Jewish population, Chinese restaurants serve Kosher meals on Christmas since Jews, who have the time off from work but who don't celebrate Christmas, have time on their hands). I don't imagine that there's a Reform, Conservative, or Orthodox synagogue in America that would even consider closing their doors because Shabbat falls on December 25th or January 1st and for the church, it is a complete "non-issue".

But closing our doors for two consecutive Shabbats exactly what my congregation is doing this year. I posted the notice on our website and sent out a broadcast email this morning.

I feel sad and even a little guilty for doing this, but that board decided that we would likely have few, if any, members or guests attending on either of those two dates.

But is it the right thing to do? I don't know. We presented it to the people who attended services yesterday (It snowed early, so we didn't have a stellar crowd) and no one objected. We already have members who'll be out of town over "the holidays" so attendence is dwindling as December advances. If we were a larger congregation, we likely wouldn't have made this decision, but we are a rather modest group.

What about you? All Messianic congregations are facing this "scheduling conflict" this year. How is your congregation managing this?

I'll wrap up my missive with another quote from Prager's article:

It is that season now, and I never fail to get goose bumps when I hear Burl Ives sing “Have a Holly Jolly Christmas,” let alone when I attend a live performance of Handel’s “Messiah,” surely the most glorious religious music ever composed. I love hearing people wish each other “Merry Christmas.” When my yarmulke-wearing children were younger, I used to take them to see beautiful Christmas lights on homes.

Those who wish to remove Christmas trees from banks and colleges and other places where Americans gather are not only attempting to rob the 90 percent of Americans who celebrate Christmas of their holiday, they are robbing this committed Jew, too.

Comments?