In Judaism the Shabbat, or Sabbath Day, is a holy day. I loved the way Greenburg talked about the Shabbat (pg. 25-26):
"You would not think of time as having texture, yet in a traditional Jewish household it becomes almost palpable. On Shabbat, I can almost feel the difference in the air I breathe, in the way the incandescent lamps give off light in my living room, in the way the children's skins glow, or the way the trees sway. Immediately after I light my candles, it is as if I flicked a switch that turned Shabbat on in the world, even though I know very well the world is not turned on to Shabbat. As remarkable as this experience is, even more remarkable is that it happens every seventh day of my life."
I thought this paragraph was one of the most beautifully phrased written pieces I have ever written. She communicated to my soul what the Sabbath Day is to me by her words. Sunday is a unique, wonderful day that is different for me than the other days of the week, and she is right, we are so blessed for the remarkable blessing that it is in our lives.
"Why do I or any other Orthodox Jew take these steps, week after week, month after month, year after year, with never a slip up?...I do so because I am so commanded."
So many times in my life my non-LDS friends would ask me why I couldn't go out on Sundays and hang out with them or go swimming, etc. It is because the Sabbath is a holy day for me and is sacred in its whole existence. They would also ask how I could stand to go to Church for 3 hours every Sunday and I would always say, "because I have to." Now that I look back at saying that, I didn't mean that I was literally forced to, but I 'had' to because I committed to God to keep the commandments and to do what is right. I wanted to keep my commitments to him. Greenburg said it so well above. This is exactly how I feel.
"The Biblical commandment to observe Shabbat has two reference points: God's Creation of the world, and the Exodus/freedom from slavery. True, these are events in history, yet, linked as they both are to Shabbat, they also suggest something else between the poles of one's life, mastery at one end and enslavement at the other; mastery in drive, energy, and creativity---and enslavement to the pressures and seduction of the hurly-burly world."
When I read this, I identified with it so strongly. Truly, this life is full of polar opposites, and that is necessary to bring balance to the universe. Good and evil, happiness and sadness, love and hate, etc., but now I have learned of another opposite through Greenburg, "...the poles of one's life, mastery at one end and enslavement at the other; mastery in drive, energy, and creativity---and enslavement to the pressures and seduction of the hurly-burly world." How true is it that we can so easily become enslaved to the natural desires and tendencies, that the world presents before us, that impulsively come to us? We can either be free agents that act upon this world and become our own masters, so to say, or we can make choices that cause us to be acted upon, or enslaved.
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