Dear Friends,
I am sure I am not the only one who has been suffering from P.D.S.D. (Post Dorian Stress Disorder) this week. Sometime around mid-week, I began noticing fatigue start to set in after the stress and adrenaline brought on by Hurricane Dorian and its aftermath subsided. The slight adrenaline boost that was brought on by 9/11 commemorations and then by the Democratic debate helped get us through to the end of the week.
It is at the end of weeks like this that I truly appreciate the restful nature of Shabbat. I recently shared with some older students one of the best ways I know of tapping into the restorative power of Shabbat. I told them you should do a bagel or a donut, meaning go to sleep on a specific number on the clock and wake up 12 hours later on that same number on the clock. (I was only slightly surprised that a few of the students had no idea what my circular references were talking about since some of them had never seen anything other than a digital clock before). The deep healing quality to this type of sleep is truly remarkable. In fact, even getting slightly more sleep and waking up a little bit later than we normally do during our weekday regimen is highly beneficial.
There is a Jewish teaching that the letters of the word Shabbat, Shin, Bet, Tav stand for the words Shaina, B‘Shabbat, Taanug – sleep on Shabbat is delicious. The Midrash teaches that one who works 6 days a week or 7 days a week will actually earn the same amount of money by the end of the year. When I was younger I thought this was some type of mystical or religious reward that we receive for observing Shabbat. As I have gotten older, I realize this is not necessarily a reward for Mitzvah observance, rather it is common sense, meaning the quality of work one produces over the long term by working 6 days and taking a day to rejewvenate is the same level of quality one would have by burning the candle at both ends working endlessly for 7 days a week.
I am reminded of the inspiring story I was told during my interview process by a longstanding pillar of the community. She mentioned that many decades ago when her son was in Charleston Hebrew Institute, he came home one Friday afternoon with a beautifully decorated challah cover he had made in school. When she asked her son if it was for her to use, her son responded “No mommy, we don’t do Shabbat here in our house. I’m going to give it to Bubbi instead.” She was so struck by the statement that she called her husband who was diligently working hard at his business just as he had normally done every Friday night and she told him in no uncertain terms that he would no longer be going to the office on Friday nights and instead they would be having Shabbat dinner together as a family from then on.
Achad Ha’am once wrote that “More than Jews keep Shabbat, Shabbat keeps the Jews.” I wish you a truly restful Shabbat together with your family.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Elisha Paul
Head of School
