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My daughter thoroughly enjoys the Shabbat observance. She can recite the prayers on her own now. We often bless the bread half a dozen times, since four-year-olds take great pleasure in repetition- and, after all, God cannot be praised too often. She also, and I hope this is not a great sin, has her own little shabbos candles. Ours are in nice silver candlesticks on the middle of the table and hers are in a smaller candle holder by her plate, so that she can watch them up close.

This week, however, she decided she wanted to put the candles out so she could light them again. “Absolutely not,” I said. Hazard aside, Jewish law prohibits extinguishing the Sabbath lights. Not that we’re so strict about Jewish law around here, but that one seemed important.

Later I got to thinking about the plethora of laws governing activity on the Sabbath - what you can and cannot carry, whether it is a sin to hand someone a piece of fruit, etc. - and it occurred to me that behind the myriad injunctions on personal action is a very simple meaning…

For one day of the week, leave the world alone. Don’t try to control it. Just let things happen.

It’s not just kids who fidget, is it? We’re all fooling with things all the time. Of course, when I’m shoveling out the driveway, I don’t think I’m fidgeting. I’m doing a necessary grown-up thing. How else am I going to get the cars out?

Well, why do I need to get the cars out? Where do I want to go? To the store to return something.

And is that more important than standing back to appreciate Creation as it is?

Keeping my hands and my mind still, I notice: the candles are very pretty, burning there on the table. We’re fortunate to have a house and a table - to be warm when it’s ten degrees outside. Through the glass I can see the tree branches, a little darker than the sky, shaking violently in the wind. Rebecca and I start talking and the longer we talk, the more interesting things we say to each other.

Just let things happen.

You can’t do that every day. The cars need to be dug out eventually. You need to clean up the house. You need to go to work. You need to buy stuff for your family. That’s why Shabbat is only one day a week.

This morning, I looked in the Talmud to see what the sages say about putting out candles on the Sabbath. The relevant Mishna citation is:

If one extinguishes a lamp because he is afraid of the officers of the government, or of robbers, or of an evil spirit, or in order that a sick person may be able to sleep, he is free. If he does this, however, to prevent damage to the lamp, or to save the oil or the wick, he is culpable.

The discussion that follows is really about striking the right balance between action and contemplation. It includes this intriguing story. (Abraham Heschel cites it in his essay on the Sabbath, but here’s the original version).

R. Jehudah, R. Jose, and R. Simeon were sitting and Jehudah, the son of proselytes, sat before them. R. Jehudah opened the conversation, saying: “How beautiful are the works of this nation (the Romans). They have established markets, they have built bridges, they have opened bathing-houses.” R. Jose said nothing, but R. Simeon b. Johai said: “All these things they have instituted for their own sake. Their markets are gathering-places for harlots; they have built baths for the purpose of indulging themselves in their comforts; they have built bridges to collect tolls from those who cross them.”

Jehudah, the son of proselytes, went and reported this conversation, and it came to the ears of the government. Said (the rulers): “…Simeon… shall be put to death.” R. Simeon and his son … went and hid themselves in a cave. A miracle occurred, that a date tree and a spring of water came out for them. They stripped themselves naked and sat down covered with sand up to their necks. Thus they sat all day studying; only at the time of prayer they put on their garments, and after performing their devotion they took them off again for fear they might wear them out.

In this wise they spent twelve years in their cave. Elijah then came to the opening of the cave and said: “Who will inform the son of Johai that the Cæsar (governor) is dead and his decree is annulled?” Hereupon they left the cave. They then went forth and saw men who were ploughing and sowing grain. Said R. Simeon: “These people leave the works which lead to everlasting life and occupy themselves with worldly things.” After this every place where they chanced to turn their eyes was burned. Suddenly a “Bath-kol” (heavenly voice) was heard, which said unto them: “Have ye come to destroy my world? Go, return to your cave.”

Ah… so Rabbi Simeon and his son are granted twelve years to meditate and pray. When they return to the world, they are repelled by man’s preoccupation with work. In fact, the power of their judgement is such that whatever they look at is destroyed! And for this, they are not rewarded. Rather, God sends them back to the cave to reconsider their position.

They returned and stayed in the cave another twelvemonth, saying the punishment of the wicked in Gehenna only lasts twelve months. At the end of that time came again the heavenly voice and said: “Go out of the cave,” and they came out. And R. Simeon said to his son: “It is enough for this world that I and you are occupied with the study of the Torah and with good deeds.”

This happened on a Friday near sunset. They saw a man hurrying with two bunches of myrtle in his hand. “What are they for? they asked him. “To honor the Sabbath,” was the reply. “Would not one bunch be enough?” “Nay; one is for the command ‘remember,’ the other for the command ‘observe,’” said the man. Said R. Simeon to his son: “Behold, how Israel loves the commands (of God).” This reassured them.

We work so that we can live (miracles notwithstanding). To work in order to live is, itself, a mitzvah (good deed). The Talmudic text cites Psalm 115: “The dead do not praise God.” But to occupy ourselves with worldly tasks beyond those needed to live is a waste, maybe a sin. Hence Rabbi Simeon’s criticism of the Romans, who build things “for their own sake… for their own comfort.”

As so often in Judaism, acts of compassion and humanism are excepted from the prohibition on work during the Sabbath:

The question, “Is it allowed to extinguish a lamp for the sake of a sick person on the Sabbath?” was propounded to Tan’hum of Navi…

I say this: A lamp is called ‘Ner,’ and the soul of man is called ‘Ner.’ Let rather the Ner which man has made (the lamp) be extinguished, than the ‘Ner’ (the soul) which belongs to the Holy One, blessed is He.”

So: we leave the Sabbath candles burning because they are a symbol of the light inside us, which it is our duty to tend; and because - like the many laws against working on the Sabbath - it is good practice in letting things be.

But if we are faced with a situation in which we must violate the Sabbath commandment in order to preserve life (our own, or someone else’s), we should not confuse the symbolic light with the real one. Adherence to ritual is not an end in itself. It’s a way of showing respect for God and of sancifying things that are important in life.

Finally, we tend to our inner light not for egoistic reasons (”my own gifts are so important to the world”) but because each of us is a flame that God has lit to illuminate the world - and we would not extinguish a candle lit by God.