Question

What do you think of Abraham Joshua Heschel’s idea that at the end of creation the goal of all life is rest?

Answer 1

Heschel reflects the presence & the power of GODHeschel s belief that a mans works are "windows allowing us to view the authors soul." Heschel's writings attest to the deep inner struggle in his soul, as he considers the almightiness and presence of God. Heschel's spiritual insights and brought on new conceptions, new in the sense that they represent renewed spiritual discoveries for Heschel's changing perspectives on the matters of the almightiness and of the potency of God throughout his lifetime.

Heschel wished to reestablish the Sabbath day as a celebration of holiness in time. In a civilization that cherishes production, tangible products carry utmost importance. The condition runs so deep, in fact, that Heschel describes our reality itself as being comprised of tangible objects: “Reality to us is thinghood, consisting of substances that occupy space

Heschel identifies the first declared “holy” in the Genesis creation story. It is not a place, or an object, The seventh day. Its the time that God sanctifies, & Heschel makes a compelling argument for the return to observance of the Sabbath as holy time. This is not in opposition to labor or the civilized spaces of this world, but rather that which gives meaning to these other endeavors.

Heschel argues that both are necessary, but one must always remember the priority: “We must not forget that it is not a thing that lends significance to a moment; it is the moment that lends significance to things”

He likens abstention from labor & activity as comparable to negative theology, that is, the description of God in negative terms, what God is not. For Heschel, we describe eternity not . Eternity is not concerned with the commercial endeavors of this world, but rather with tranquility & peace, the absence of the need for such endeavors. Returning to the Genesis creation account, Heschel cogently points out that God finishes God’s work not on the sixth day, but on the seventh. The Sabbath is an intentional creation of God’s, but it is not a tangible creation. Rather, it is the creation of an absence. Heschel identifies this created absence as menuha, a stillness and peace.

Heschel begins by affirming the divine nature of work. Heschel frames Sabbath rest not as a renunciation of labor, but as a way of reminding ourselves that we are not dependent on technological civilization. He seeks to create a harmony between labor and rest, that both may exist in a mutually beneficial relationship. The Sabbath is “more than an armistice, more than an interlude; it is a profound conscious harmony of man and the world” His objective here is to present a complementary view of the world and the spirit. The Rabbi of the story holds to the doctrine of the primacy of the spiritual, but when he emerges from the cave,

How humanity and the Sabbath should be joined, he makes allusions to two biblical passages traditionally used in marriage rites: Genesis (“It is not good that the spirit should be alone”) and the Gospel of Matthew (“What God put together could not be set apart”). Just as time needs division in order to be meaningful, Heschel argues, the Sabbath needs humanity in order to be fulfilled completely. Here he provides perhaps his most drastic departure from how the broader culture view the Sabbath: the observance of the Sabbath is not rote routine, but a relationship, and its celebration is like a wedding

Heschel brilliantly reframes religious observance in a way that reinvigorates it with meaning, moving it out of the realm of observance-for-observance-sake.

He maintains that images of the Sabbath as a queen or a bride are helpful and true, but that is not all the Sabbath is. This is Heschel’s warning to the reader not to take these illustrations too literally. The metaphors do “not represent a substance but the presence of God

Heschel ushers the reader into the calm that descends once the Sabbath arrives. He states that “the Sabbath sends out its presence over the fields, into our homes, into our hearts” . Heschel masterfully mirrors this slowing of pace by infusing the chapter with poetry and chants traditionally read during Sabbath observance. This requires the reader to slow the pace of reading, in a manner analogous to the slowing of pace during the observance of the Sabbath itself.

Heschel establishes the Sabbath as a glimpse of the world to come, of eternity. the Sabbath serves as a foretaste of the feast to come. It is also in this chapter that Heschel walks back slightly from a claim he made in chapter five, namely that humanity works with God as co-sanctifier of the Sabbath “The Sabbath is not holy by the grace of man. It was God who sanctified the seventh day.” While some clarification of chapter five may have been necessary, this sentiment goes too far. In his discussion of humanity’s role in making the Sabbath holy, Heschel needed to walk a thin rhetorical line, and did so admirably in chapter five. This addition to chapter eight seems an unnecessary hedge on an important point; Heschel here retreats too far into a conservative position.

Judaism is portrayed as distinct from other religious traditions in its emphasis on sacred times. While other religions have fixed places for prayer, Judaism has fixed times. Even when sacred places are involved in Judaism (such as the now-destroyed Temples in Jerusalem), they are not intrinsically holy. Rather, they are holy through the request of humanity and the action of God: “because man prayed for it and God desired it”

Heschel implores the reader to treat life as a pilgrimage to the Sabbath, with “the thought and appreciation of what this day may bring…ever present in our minds” (pg 89). The experience of all other days should then be an almost gravitational pull toward the Sabbath. Heschel ends his book with a discussion of these words from the Decalogue: “thou shalt not covet.” This coveting is a deep and passionate longing for the Sabbath, and the peace its observance instills. When understood this way, observance of the Sabbath does not demand restriction, but gives freedom. It is not a freedom to do whatever one wishes, but rather a freedom from those forces, systems, and cycles that muddy humanity’s experience of God’s presence in the world. In this way, Heschel’s entire endeavor in The Sabbath is contained in these words: “Who we are depends on what the Sabbath is to us”