The Significance of The Forbidden Labors

The Kitzur Shulchan Arukh does not discuss in a systematic way the labors that are forbidden on Shabbat and their characteristics. As he points out in the introduction to this chapter, most literate people in his time were well aware of the basic outlines of Shabbat observance. In fact, even the Shulchan Arukh does not discuss the forbidden labors in a systematic way. But if we are to gain any deep insight into the meaning of these labors, we will need to start from the beginning and explain where the concept of forbidden labor, or melakha, comes from, and how the particular labors were chosen.

 

The Mishna enumerates thirty-nine distinct archetypal labors that are forbidden by Torah law on Shabbat. Most of these labors fall into three distinct categories, corresponding to three of the most important industries of ancient times: food, fabric, and leatherwork.

 

The category of food includes the basic AGRICULTURAL labors: 1. sowing, 2. plowing, 3. gathering, 4. heaping, 5. threshing, 6. winnowing, and 7. sorting; as well as the basic CULINARY labors: 8. grinding, 9. sifting, 10. kneading, and 11. baking or cooking.

 

The  category of fabric involves: 12. shearing, 13. bleaching and laundering, 14. carding, 15. dyeing, 16. spinning, 17-20. four labors connected to weaving on a loom, 21. tying and 22. untying, 23. sewing and 24. undoing a seam.

 

The category of leatherwork includes: 25. trapping, 26. slaughtering, 27. skinning, 28. tanning 29. scoring, 30. stretching and 31. cutting.

 

In addition, we have the following melakhot which are arranged in pairs: 32. writing and 33. erasing; 34. building and 35. demolishing; 36. lighting a fire and 37. extinguishing a fire. (Note that 21-24 above are also arranged in pairs.) Finally, there is 38. the more general labor of "finishing off" some handiwork and 39. moving something from one domain to another.

 

Of course, many, many other kinds of labor are also forbidden on Shabbat. They are offshoots that fall into these broader archetypal categories. For instance, pruning a tree is a melakha, since, like sowing, it encourages plant growth.

 

CREATING AN ABODE FOR GOD'S PRESENCE

 

Where does this particular list of labors come from? The Talmud (Shabbat 73b) connects them to the labors that were done in the Tabernacle or Sanctuary (Mishkan). We desist from creative work on Shabbat to commemorate God's desisting from creation on the seventh day. But the specific acts from which we abstain are those that were involved in the creation of the Tabernacle. This seems to hint that in human terms, the building of the Temple can be compared to the creation of the world! Let us examine this comparison.

 

People of many faiths are sometimes inclined to ask why it is necessary to have elaborate places of prayer. After all, God can be found anywhere. Why do we need to construct a fancy building in order to worship Him? Indeed, for this very reason a few religious groups favor simple and unpretentious places for communal devotion, or dispense with communal prayer altogether.

 

Once we ask why the infinite God needs a brick and mortar house in which to dwell, we may go on to ask a more basic question: why does an infinite God need a material world at all? Why did God "bother" to create the world - whose natural beauty infinitely exceeds the splendor of the most elaborate place of worship?

 

The Midrash explains that when God created the world, He sought a "nether dwelling," so that His presence should rest even amidst the material world. The whole world was meant to be the sanctuary of the Holy One, blessed be He - a place for His presence to dwell.

 

But when Adam sinned, God's presence (the Shekhina) was driven from this world, and the continued wickedness of subsequent generations drove the Shekhina farther and farther away. However, the Patriarchs reversed this trend, and set in motion a process of drawing near to God. This process culminated in the creation of the Tabernacle, which again restored His presence in the nether world (Tanchuma Naso).

 

We see that the construction of the Tabernacle was intended to achieve the same object as the creation of the world itself: to provide a place where God's Presence could indwell within the material world. Indeed, the Tabernacle succeeded where the original creation failed, for since this sanctuary was built, God's presence has never completely been driven from the world.

 

And for this very reason, the work of preparing the Sanctuary must cease on Shabbat. The Torah says "Keep My Shabbatot and be in awe of My sanctuary - I am God" (Vayikra 19:30), and our Sages inferred that building the Sanctuary is forbidden on Shabbat (Yoma 6a). In this way, we demonstrate that preparing the Tabernacle (or Temple) is a continuation of the work that God began when he created the world - preparing a place where God's presence can dwell among mankind. And just as God desisted from His efforts on Shabbat, so we desist from ours.

 

Of course, we don't cease only from building the sanctuary on Shabbat. We rest also from our everyday labors. But by relating these mundane labors to the work of the sanctuary, we demonstrate that all of our weekday labors are ultimately directed towards making the world a fit place for God's presence. The spiritual repair of the world is intimately bound up with its physical repair. By pursuing our workaday concerns in accordance with the laws of the Torah and with the proper intention, we create an abode for Godliness in our surroundings.

 

By relating the thirty-nine forbidden labors to the work of the Mishkan, our Sages are telling us that these labors are not forbidden on Shabbat because they are so profane. On the contrary, they are forbidden because they are so holy - our daily labors are our way of building a sanctuary for God. Even so, these labors must cease on Shabbat, just as the work of building the Sanctuary ceased on this day, and as God's own work of creating the world ceased on the Shabbat. Together with our efforts to repair the world, we need to remind ourselves that these efforts will eventually cease when they are crowned with success, on the future "day which is all Shabbat," and we need to experience a bit of that future in order to properly prepare for it.

 

THE WORK OF THE SANCTUARY

 

We pointed out above that the thirty-nine archetypal melakhot, chosen because of their importance in preparing the Sanctuary, are actually labors important for ordinary industry. This should not be surprising. The design of and worship in the Mikdash recall the structure of and activities in an ordinary dwelling. At the center of the Temple service is the altar, on which sacrifices are offered; these sacrifices consist of bread and oil (meal offerings), wine (libations), and kosher meat (animal sacrifices) - the staples of an ordinary diet. Indeed, a cardinal requirement for offerings is that they be from food that is fit for ordinary consumption (Sukkah 50a).

 

When God commands us to serve Him through acts that recall our everyday activities, He is hinting that all of our everyday activities can be elevated and performed in ways that serve Him. (We discussed this reasoning in chapter 41, where we learned that salt should be on our tables as a commemoration of the Mikdash.)

 

Ultimately, as we refrain from each mundane labor on Shabbat, we remind ourselves that this kind of work was done to prepare the Sanctuary as a place fit for God's Presence, and that our performance of the same kind of work on weekdays likewise prepares the world for receiving the Shekhina.

 

 

SOME COUNTERINTUITIVE LABORS

 

Most of the categories of melakha we mentioned are quite intuitive. But a few seem surprising and deserve some elaboration.

 

SORTING

 

Three different melakhot don't actually "do" anything to the work - they merely separate the good from the bad. These melakhot are winnowing, sorting, and sifting. (Numbers 6, 7 and 9. The Talmud explains that these three melakhot are really just variations on the same idea - Shabbat 73b.)

 

When we recall that the mundane labors of ordinary industry embody the spiritual endeavor of sanctifying the world (as we explained in the introduction to the Laws of Shabbat in chapter 72), then we can see that classifying sorting as a melakha involves a profound insight.

 

Our tradition indicates that the main work of repairing the world is actually a work of sorting. When the world was created, God made a clear division between good and evil. Man knew only good, but when he ate of the "tree of knowledge of good and evil," he came to know evil as well. Ever since, good and evil confront man in a confusing mixture. (See Nefesh HaChayim I:6.)

 

Nothing is easier than acting in the proper way - if only we could know for sure what that way is! Since the fall and curse of Adam, man is faced with bewildering moral choices that seem almost impossible to sort out.  Extracting the good and leaving behind the evil in all the varied spheres of human endeavor is very hard work - often more difficult than the various undertakings themselves.

 

Certainly there is much good in aesthetics, in government, in economic life. Creativity in such endeavors is one of the ways in which we repair the world. But often, the most difficult labor of all is not to excel as an artist, a politician, or a businessman, but rather to be able to discern when it is really best NOT to excel - to know what aspects of these endeavors are harmful to man and his spiritual advancement.

 

FINISHING

 

The penultimate labor in the list is finishing. It seems paradoxical to define "finishing" as a melakha. If the act that completes some workmanship is not in and of itself a melakha, how can it be forbidden just because I view this act as a "final touch"?

 

If we examine carefully the concept of melakha on Shabbat, we see that this question is really formulated backwards. The melakhot themselves are only forbidden because they achieve some significant result. The labor of "finishing," far from being an exception to the ordinary concept of melakha, is actually its most direct expression.

 

One example of this melakha, known in Hebrew as "makeh befatish" (literally, tapping with a mallet) or "gemar melakha," (completion of workmanship) is picking out loose strings from a weave (SA OC I302:2). Normally taking a loose thread out of a garment is not really a labor, but this is the way a newly woven fabric or garment is prepared for use.

 

CARRYING

 

Of all the melakhot, carrying is the most perplexing. Why should merely moving an object from one place to another be considered work? Since four chapters of the Kitzur Shulchan Arukh (81-84) are devoted exclusively to this particular melakha, we will discuss it in those chapters.