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Post 2 – Limiting our Labor: Shabbos and Coronavirus

Post 2 – Limiting our Labor: Shabbos and Coronavirus

Pfeffer, Rabbi Yehoshua
January 12, 2022

“We have to refrain from our creation… [on Shabbos] in order to be together with HKBH.

 

This idea is reflected more than any other melacha in the melacha of lighting the fire [because it most] resembles the way HKBH creates… something from nothing… Of all the melachos, [this] one… tells us most about human creativity and the need to desist, to refrain from it, on Shabbos.

This is relevant to our current situation [of Coronavirus ]… If there is one thing that this [situation] has taught us, it’s about the limitations of human control. It’s about the boundaries on our ability to use and control the world….

 

Just like Shabbos doesn’t teach us a lesson just for one day, but we have to bring the lesson of Shabbos into the whole week even as we… engage in all of our great creativity… control and power… Even then we have to remember that it’s limited. We have to remember to leave space within ourselves, our hearts, and…our deeds for HKBH. Not to fall into the trap of pushing Hashem out of our lives because of our ‘total control’.”