Our double parsha begins with the command to keep shabbat (Exodus 35:1-3). Immediately following this command, with its prohibition against doing melakhah, work, we hear about the melakhah of building the mishkan. The rabbis learn from this juxtaposition that even the sacred work of temple building must cease on shabbat, or as the rabbis put it, even this work eyno doheh et hashabbat, does not push away shabbat (Rashi on Exodus 35:2). Shabbat still stands.
The Shabbat Place In You That Cannot Be Pushed Aside
I invite you to feel into this concept in your body. There is a place of perfect shabbat calm in you, and work, even sacred work, cannot be doheh, cannot push aside the shabbat that exists in you. Maybe feeling into all the noise and tumult and demands of your to do lists, and honoring how many of the things on that list are really important, if not sacred. And at the same time, noticing their cumulative effect on you, the feeling of overwhelm sometimes, maybe seeing all the concerns swirling around you like a storm, pushing and pulling at you in different directions.
Sensing all that swirling urgent doing energy, and at the same time, becoming aware that there is a core shabbat place in you that stands completely still in the midst of it all, like the eye of the storm. Indeed, all of that work energy eyno doheh et hashabbat, does not – cannot – push away shabbat. Shabbat is like a tree that stands steady amidst all the ravages of weather and history, witnessing it all in silence and peace. We have that place in us, too, a place that cannot be thrust aside, cannot be disturbed, cannot be destroyed, a place that, like Mordecai in the megillah, will not bow to the expectations of the work world, standing tall and firm and grounded in its own internal center.
Seating Yourself in the Trunk of the Tree
So maybe for a moment, letting all the working parts inside you continue to run around and do their thing – like squirrels on a tree (an image suggested by my mother), watching them scurry about – not arguing with them, but moving your seat from being completely identified and preoccupied and engrossed with them and their work concerns, moving yourself from being the squirrels or the winds or the swaying top branches to seating yourself in the core quiet of the middle of the trunk of the tree, shifting your perspective for a moment. All those doers can still be in the world of doing, but you seat yourself in the eternal divine place of just being. Come and rest here in this shabbat place, under the canopy of God’s eternal peace, sukkat shelomekha. Breathing deeply and resting like a tree in your trunk core, letting your top branches move about in the wind while you stay firmly rooted in your core.
Like the six work days and the one day of shabbat, there are many of these working parts buzzing around you, and only one shabbat core center, your essence.
This Is Who You Are
This core shabbat essence is who you are. Most of us are pretty confused about who we are. I don’t think you can over-emphasize the confusion around this issue in our society. We identify ourselves with our work, our accomplishments, our performance, our career. We say “I am a doctor” as if that is our core identity. Or even not career related, consider the question – “what did i get done today,” a question that implies we have to justify our existence through doing, as if it proves our worth to the world, like we are just utilitarian tools for productivity and efficiency. It is a fundamental misconception of who we are, not seeing that we have a core inalienable divine essence that is so much deeper than utility.
Shabbat calls us back into this divine essence, back into this unconditional inherent valuing of ourselves. Zakhor. Remember. Remember that your value is not tied to your work or your accomplishments or performance or what you produce or get done – remember that it is none of those. That’s not why I love you, God says. Yes, I’m happy you are involved in the world and doing things. That’s all good. But don’t think that’s what makes you valuable or beloved to Me.
A Parable
A Mashal, a parable. It’s like a teacher and a student. After many years away, the student comes back to visit her teacher and wants to prove her worth by showing him how much she has accomplished, how successful she has been. She brings reams of paper and essays and books she has written and artifacts of projects she has been involved in and she walks in with arms full of objects, speaking nonstop, wanting the teacher to recognize all the work she has done and see how valuable she is Meanwhile the teacher sits quietly in a chair watching the whole scene play out, trying to catch the student’s eye amidst all the hubbub of stuff and words that block the way. The teacher doesn’t care about accomplishments; he loves the student dearly and wants to connect to her, just to be with her and enjoy some time together, not to evaluate her productivity. There is nothing she needs to prove to him. It makes him sad that she thinks she does. And also sad that, in all that effort to prove herself, they miss an opportunity for relationship and connection.
The Insufficiency of Work-Related Validation
We think we want to be evaluated based on our accomplishments, for that mentor to see this new essay I’ve written and praise me, make me feel valued for that success. But the thing is – that kind of nourishment never quite satisfies us. It is a kind of slavery, keeping us dependent and tethered, like the Israelites in Egypt having to make their daily quota of bricks. Tomorrow and the next day, we will still wonder – wait, he liked that essay, but what about this one, what about now. What have I done lately to deserve that value, that care? I need to prove it all over again, again and again without end, never quite full.
Because recognition based on work doesn’t solve the core problem. What we most need – a burning gaping hole inside us – is unconditional valuing, unconditional loving, to be recognized and loved not for what we have done in this or that moment, but for who we are, exactly as we are, always, our incontrovertible and inalienable inherent divine essence, the thing that we can never earn and never lose, loved for free, for no reason at all.
It’s You I Want
And that is what shabbat offers us. On shabbat, God is like that teacher, just wanting to be with us. What if that teacher, seeing the student approaching his home laden down with artifacts, what if that teacher were to open the door and call out – hey, can you leave all that stuff on the doorstep and step in here to see me empty handed, unencumbered by any work product? That’s what God is saying to us on shabbat – on the day itself and also every day in that place of rest inside us– through shabbat God is sending us the message: leave all that work baggage behind and come to me just as you are, it’s you I want.
Take a minute to let that land. Maybe imagine setting down all those heavy bags, all the worry about how you will be received and if you are performing well enough, all the grasping need for success and validation to prove your worth, taking the backpacks and bricks off your shoulders and setting them down for a moment, feeling a little lighter and freer, opening the door and stepping in to connect to God, just you, the very stripped down essential you. Sensing how you are received by God, the open door, the warm embrace, the unconditional love, the intense delight God experiences simply from being with you. We talk about oneg, about delight, on shabbat. That’s what the oneg is. It is God’s delight at simply, finally, being with us without all the distractions. Locking eyes with us and just gazing, connecting. Nothing to do, no agenda, just being together. That in itself is me’eyn olam haba, a taste of the world to come where that is all that happens, people sit around basking in the glory of the divine presence. Shabbat invites us to taste that simple joy of connection and presence without reason. It’s you I want, God says to us. Not all your evidence and numbers and accomplishments. Nothing to prove or earn or deserve. It’s you I want. Letting yourself bask in God’s beaming delight in you. Let it warm you and fill you like nothing else can.
What About Work?
What about the other six days of the week? What about work? Where do those fit in? This is important. Of course we don’t spend all our time in rest. There is work to do in the world and much of it is sacred. But here is the thing – we do the work itself differently when we are nourished by shabbat, when we know the truth of who we are, when we remember that our value is not dependent on the work. Because there is not so much attached to it, because there isn’t the weight of deep unmet needs laid ontop of our work and our success, because we are not looking for external recognition to feed us through the work. It’s as if we have been trying to run with heavy backpacks on our shoulders and now we take them off, and the running becomes easy and effortless. From our shabbat place, we can do the work differently, more freely, more generously, without strings or competition or pressure or anxiety, like a freewill offering to the world, here it is, letting it flow through us, letting God’s gifts flow through us and overflow outward. Not because we are desperate to prove our worth, but simply because it is our nature to love and to give and to create, not out of obligation or grasping, but out of joy and a rising heart.
The Joyful Work of the Mishkan
Indeed this is what we see in the work of the mishkan that immediately follows this shabbat command. It is joyful collaborative colorful creative enlivening work that comes from an uplifted heart, everyone joining in and offering their own divine gifts with a spirit of generosity and abundance, not needing to prove anything or stand out or show off or earn recognition, just wanting to contribute and be part of the communal upsurge of divine service. This is how work looks and feels when we are well nourished by shabbat, when we remember who we are without the work, when we learn to work from a place of rest, from the deep rest of knowing we are enough without it, from the nourishment of that divine smile of delight at our company. We run free now without backpacks and our work becomes a dance and a song, a beautiful woven tapestry that creates divine sanctuary in the world around us.
Returning to Rest
Wherever you are right now, I invite you to return to your shabbat place, to that quiet stillness inside, resting in your tree trunk and sensing your connection to God there, letting yourself hear again – It’s you I want, my beloved. It’s you I want. Rest now with Me here.
Shabbat is the tachlit, the purpose of all of creation. For this moment of rest the world was created, for this moment of rest and peace right now.
