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Thought for the Day: Best Advice for a Good Livelihood? A Tranquil Shabbos

I printed out R' Biderman on parahas Vayakhel last week and saw that it started with "El Man de Hoy en Dìa" -- מן/Mahn Nowadays. (I transliterate מן as "mahn" so it doesn't get confused with English word a male adult. No such issue in Spanish.) Anyways... I thought I had printed out the Manatìales de la Torà for the wrong week, since the mahn is not discussed on this parasha.

Nope; correct parasha. Hang on... this parasha (and the following) is ... ahem "just" a review of the parts of the משכן, right? The fact that the Torah seemingly repeats what has already been described in detail is a fascinating topic, but not for now. The topic for today is really encapsulated in the first three verses of the parasha, which feel wildly disjointed. Let me paraphrase: (1) Moshe gathered the entire nation to tell them: these are the things HaShem commands be done. (2) You shall work six days a week, but it is a capital crime to perform forbidden labors on Shabbos. (3) You shall not start burning a fire on Shabbos.

In fact, this juxtaposition of the exhortation to protect and keep the Shabbos with the verses describing the construction of the משכן is the source for us to know what, precisely is forbidden on Shabbos. Namely, anything that was essential for the construction (and perhaps running) of the construction, is forbidden to do on Shabbos. Verse #2 is telling us how serious it is to violate Shabbos precisely here where we would be tempted to work 24/7 on building the most holy man-made structure in the history of the world. Because of the aspiration of the Jewish people to strive for holiness, the Torah tells us in no uncertain terms that nothing overrides Shabbos.

How many categories of labor go into constructing and/or running the משכן? We all know the answer: they are the ל''ט malachos of Shabbos. No one even says "39"... we know it is ל''ט. R' Mordechai of Neshchiz taught that it is no coincidence that there are 39 malachos on Shabbos. The Torah tells us, back in parashas beshalach that the מן was delivered each morning enwrapped in dew. In fact, that is one reason that we cover the challah at the Shabbos table even for shalosh s'udos (when there is no wine to worry about embarrassing) -- a memorial to the מן that we received on erev Shabbos enwrapped in dew.  The word "dew" in the Holy Language (and also modern Hebrew) is טל.

R' Mordechai of Neshchiz, z"tzl teaches that our livelihood in the dessert was delivered enwrapped in טל, and nowadays our livelihood is delivered enwrapped in our strict observance of the ל''ט malachos of Shabbos. Isn't that cool? The connection between Shabbos and the משכן is not a simple juxtaposition of verses... it goes much deeper than that. R' Biderman notes R' Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, z"tzl, says that to believe that are livelihood come because of our השתדלות/efforts is tantamount to עבודה זרה/paganism. Chazal tell us the violating Shabbos is also tantamount to עבודה זרה/paganism. Another deep connection between keeping Shabbos and our livelihood.

I would like to end with a beautiful vort that I heard from the most adorable young lady (10-ish) at our kiddush after vasikin. This young lady makes sure her zaidy and I have cups to make a l'chaim. This week she added a d'var Torah. The fire of verse #3 refers to our anger; we have to work very hard to not let anger disturb our Shabbos. (It is a good vort; much more adorable to hear it from her.)

Put this all together and you have new meaning and incentive for: שבת שלום

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