Abraham Joshua Heschel and The Sabbath: Its Meaning for Modern Man

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The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel

“For where shall the

likeness of God be found?”

The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel

Chapter 1:  “A Palace in Time”

Last night, Pastor Jessica Brendler Naulty and I concluded our five-week “Ancient Spiritual Practices” class with a small, intimate communion service.  Here at 21 Essays, this nine-part series on The Sabbath:  Its Meaning for Modern Man by Abraham Joshua Heschel has been a sort of complement to the course.  As we explored a variety of spiritual practices (including Sabbath observance) in our weekly evening classes at church, I blogged here on my personal Sabbath experiences, reflecting on Heschel’s poetic wisdom.  This is my final entry in the series.

Illustration of a man creating an eruv (Shabbat fence)
from Decisions of Isaiah of Trani the Younger,
published in central Italy in 1374.
From the British Library Catalogue of
Illuminated Manuscripts.

The third-floor room that we were in last night was a completely ordinary space, set up in a standard classroom style with rows of chairs and a table at the front for me to perch on.  The space was not special.  But our communion service was.  It was a special moment in time.

Heschel’s most soul-stirring metaphor in The Sabbath is his conception of the Sabbath as a palace in time.  The image serves as the title of the book’s first chapter, “A Palace in Time,” and is supported by an evocative cosmology that Heschel eloquently spins as he describes a unified “theory of everything,” encompassing space, time, humanity, and God.

In Heschel’s model, space is the inferior element:

“There is no quality that space has in common with the essence of God.  There is not enough freedom on the top of the mountain; there is not enough glory in the silence of the sea.”

… and time is the superior element, closer to the heart of God:

“Yet the likeness of God can be found in time, which is eternity in disguise.”

Heschel associates space with the first six days of the week—the world of labor and personal ambition.  He stresses that humanity is meant to actively participate in this world and acknowledges that space can be as sublime as the Grand Canyon.  Nevertheless, in Heschel’s view, even the Grand Canyon pales in comparison to the sublimity of the Sabbath, the day set aside by God as a free gift to man.  Heschel writes:

“This is the task of men:  to conquer space and sanctify time.”

Today, Heschel is remembered for the work he accomplished during his six-day work weeks, conquering space through the books he wrote and his social justice work with leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  It was important work but, for Heschel, secondary to the primary task of life:  the sanctification of time.  As an observant Orthodox Jew, Heschel sanctified time by observing the Sabbath, the festivals, and the Day of Atonement.

“The seventh day is a palace in time which we build.  It is made of soul, of joy and reticence.”

Note the verb.  We build the palace.  That’s interesting…

Like all the great mystics, Heschel was unafraid of paradox.  Did you catch the one he slipped in here?  By not working on the Sabbath, we build the most beautiful palace of them all.

I think we were palace building last night during our communion service.  Not that you’ll find a palace on the third floor of our church.  Go there now and you’ll see an ordinary classroom space, appropriate for meetings or Sunday School.  The palace we built is in time, not space.

“For where shall the likeness of God be found?  There is no quality that space has in common with the essence of God.  There is not enough freedom on the top of the mountain; there is not enough glory in the silence of the sea.  Yet the likeness of God can be found in time, which is eternity in disguise.”

The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel

Chapter 1:  “A Palace in Time”

Fanciful illustration of the mnemonic device YaKeNHaZ, used to
recall the sequence of ritual acts to perform at the close of
the Sabbath, from the Haggadah for Passover,
published in southern Germany, circa 1460.
From the British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

Reference Sources

The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel

Sabbath Keeping by Lynne M. Baab

Keeping the Sabbath Wholly by Marva J. Dawn

A Day of Rest: Creating a Spiritual Space in Your Week by Martha Whitmore Hickman

© 2013 Lee Price