Dvar Torah on Parshat Vayakhel

In Parshat Vayakhel, we see once again the juxtaposition of the commandment to build the Tabernacle and to also keep the Sabbath. The Rabbis understood the connection between these two commandments in a number of ways. Perhaps most crucially, they see the work done to build the Tabernacle as being the very definition of work which is prohibited on Shabbat – whatever it takes to build the Mishkan is exactly what you may not do on Shabbat. They also understand that the two laws are juxtaposed so that we may learn that, as important as building the Tabernacle may be, we may not engage in that work on Shabbat.

In Vayakhel, another wrinkle is added to our understanding of Shabbat. The Torah tells us that it is forbidden to work on the seventh day, and then specifically adds that we may not light a fire on Shabbat. The Rabbis and commentaries struggle to determine why this act was singled out; the other prohibited types of work are not specified, only implied by the general idea of prohibiting all work connected to building the Tabernacle. Why is the prohibition against the lighting of fire specifically mentioned?

In the Talmud (Shabbat; 70,a), there is a disagreement about this. Rabbi Yossi says it is to tell us that lighting a fire is different from other work in that it is a minor act, not real work, and therefore the consequences for doing it, which for doing work in general is death, is only corporal punishment. Rabbi Natan, on the other hand, says that the prohibition against lighting a fire is just like all the others, and is punishable by death. This act was singled out simply to teach us that any desecration of Shabbat is treated as an individual act: if someone does a lot of different acts of work on the Sabbath, he is liable separately for each one. The individuation of lighting a fire is simply a model for how all acts of work should be individuated.

Rabbi Natan’s understanding leads to an obvious question: why is the lighting of fire, out of all 39 categories of work, chosen to be the example of the separate standing of each category? Couldn’t any one of the 39 have been chosen to teach this?

The Tur answers by explaining that since, as Rabbi Yossi actually holds, lighting fire can be see as a simple, lesser act of work, and not really prohibited, the Torah chose it to be the example of the stand-alone nature of each type of work in order to disabuse us of that idea, to underscore that it really is work, and is completely forbidden, just as all other categories are.

Other commentators add that another reason we might have mistakenly thought that fire-lighting is not forbidden is because we actually do allow the use of fire, for cooking, on holidays. To teach us that this is not the case on Shabbat, and that fire is actually a forbidden act of work, it is used as the example of a separate prohibited act. The Sforno adds that fire destroys, rather than creates, which is why we may have thought it is not actually an act of work at all. (He says the Torah’s prohibition of fire corrects this misunderstanding, because, though it is destructive, it is “the tool for all work, or most of it”, an idea we will come back to.)

We also learn from this verse that, in one situation, we actually may use fire on Shabbat: in the Temple. Since our verse says “Do not light fire in all your dwelling places on Shabbat” we learn that, in the Temple, which is not one of our dwelling places, but God’s, we may use fire, for the sake of the sacrificial service.

Now I’d like to look away from the Torah and commentaries for a moment and take a look at what the Jewish people think. I have met quite a few people, and read similar anecdotal as well as statistical evidence, that many Jews who do not observe a traditional Shabbat, and do what is halachically considered work on that day, will be careful to not light a fire on Shabbat. They might write, watch TV, turn lights on and off, and do all kinds of things which traditional Jewish law forbids, but they will not strike a match or light the gas. (Some Jewish sects have prohibited even having a lit candle or fire in the home on Shabbat, but that is not to be found in normative Jewish practice.)

The reason for this would seem to be the fact that the Torah chose to single out the prohibition against fire and, alone among the acts of work, mention it explicitly. So it turns out that in spite of the fact that lighting fire actually is, according to Rabbi Yossi in the Talmud, a lesser form of work, and is less prohibited,  and, even according to the opinion voiced by Rabbi Natan, who holds that fire is prohibited like all other work, it still needs to be singled out because it doesn’t seem like real work, and needs a bit of beefing up, along with the fact that we do permit lighting fires in the Temple, many Jews have “misunderstood” the Torah and are more careful with this prohibition that with other “regular” ones: lighting a fire is the last act of work they would do, in spite of its relative weakness as work, which we have shown.  

Now, we could just dismiss this as a mistake, a misunderstanding of the Torah’s intent by people who are not keeping a traditional Shabbat anyway. I think, however, that there is wisdom, and beauty, in this decision. I will explain. It may be that these folks are offering their own interpretation (based, perhaps, on the Sforno’s point, mentioned earlier, that fire is the tool with which most of man’s work is done), of the singling out of fire-lighting above all other prohibited types of work. Fire is so central to man’s ability to manipulate and transform the world, so much a part of our myriad acts of creation - which is exactly what we are meant to refrain from on the Sabbath - that it really is worse than other work, and it is more important to refrain from it than from all others. This interpretation senses that the Torah is not being as “clever” as some of the commentaries think it is, by, somewhat paradoxically, warning us specifically against fire because it is a lesser, not greater, act of work. On the contrary, this more natural reading sees this singling out as stemming from fire’s power, and importance, in man’s role as creator, which is the role we step away from on Shabbat. It is singled out because it is more, rather than less, of an act of work.

This, added to a very healthy regard for the power of the written word – the other acts of work are not explicitly mentioned in the Torah, while fire is – explains the greater concern these people have for the lighting of fire on Shabbat. The fact that it is literally, rather than by mere implication, in the Torah, as it is so central to man’s conquest of the earth, must make it more important, and should lead us to be especially careful with it. This would seem to be the wisdom behind the choice made by those who have decided to not be particularly careful about the laws of Shabbat to be careful with this one.

This approach may also shed some light on why we may not desecrate the Shabbat to build the Temple, but may do so, by lighting fires, in the Temple service. The former is an act of human creation – the Tabernacle is ours to build - and therefore we must refrain from that creative act on Shabbat, completely. Once the Temple is built, it becomes God’s dwelling place, not ours, and the lighting of fire is for God, not for us. It is not our creative act, but His, and is therefore permitted.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Shimon Felix