Stop, Look, Listen: Celebrating Shabbos through a Spiritual Lens

The prophet asserts that when we observe boundaries, when we settle in to one place and refrain from overreach on Shabbos, we are granted genuine expansiveness and a buoyant freedom:

When sharing your insights, keep in mind the core dispositions of inclusion, benevolence, love, respect, and compassion. Listen more than you speak.

We can exit the maker-train not because the train has reached the end of the line but because, taking satisfaction in what we have accomplished in six days, we are ready to release it as a signed work that represents us with grace and elegance and is worthy of our signature.

The path of wisdom and courage requires holding one’s ground, facing the growth pangs, and bringing forth new life.

desisting from melakha, “work” as defined by the Mishna and Talmud, is a proclamation of God as Creator of all things, an assertion of human subordination to God, and an affirmation of the creation account in Genesis 1.

we must adopt the posture of shaanan, naĥat, shalva vehashket – tranquility, calm, serenity, and stillness – which can only be accomplished if we have avoided af – the habit of reacting to everything with frustration, disgruntlement, and disappointment.

Each Shabbos deposits a baseline of preparedness for further growth. Every Shabbos enriches – blesses – the following weekdays, to enable them to be days of preparedness for the Shabbos to come.

you detect a flaw in someone else, know that the same flaw is within you; otherwise, you would not have noticed it. Rather than attempting to change the other person, search yourself, and you will find an area to rectify. By improving yourself, you will elevate the other person as well, and, as a bonus, you will have made peace between you.

is that we must refrain from judging others; we must humbly acknowledge that we have no access to other people’s hearts and that judging people is the sole prerogative of God.21