Work and rest: Parshat Vayakhel/Pekudei
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This week’s double Torah reading Vayakhel/ Pekudei has a lot to say about work and about when to stop work: “Moses then convoked the whole Israelite community and said to them: “These are the things that God has commanded you to do: On six days work may be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a sabbath of complete rest, holy to God…” (Ex. 35:1-2). If we closed our eyes, we might be in the early chapters of Genesis, not the closing chapters of Exodus. Our sedra opens by mimicking the language of creation about the purposefulness of work and the necessity of rest. We were to build the Mishkan for six days and rest on the seventh. What God declared when the world was created reflected the same pattern in building the portable sanctuary to honor him