This Shabbos, thousands of Jews across the world are coming together to celebrate a special Shabbos known as the Shabbos (or Shabbat) Project. While every Shabbos is special, this weekend has been promoted and hyped in cities across the world to encourage those who may not observe Shabbos to participate in this Shabbos and those who do celebrate Shabbos every week to make this one even more unique.
This week’s Torah reading takes place on the third day after Avraham had his Bris (circumcision). Hashem appears to Avraham in the heat of the day. The Talmud (Bava Metzia 86b) tells us that Hashem made it especially hot so that visitors wouldn’t come while Avraham was recovering from his Bris. Avraham sent his servant Eliezer to see if there were any people outside that he could invite. When he said there weren’t, Avraham didn’t believe him and went outside himself to see if there were any potential guests. Rashi on the Torah points out that when Hashem saw that Avraham was more pained by the fact that he didn’t have visitors, he sent him the three angels disguised as people.
Why was Avraham so upset that he couldn’t have guests? He was ill and needed to take care of himself and therefore he was exempt from performing the Mitzvah of Chesed.
Rav Moshe Feinstein points out that even though it is true that he was exempt, he had such a love of doing kindness that he yearned to do the Mitzvah of Chesed. When you yearn for something you try to seek it out even if it isn’t in front of you. Avraham wanted so much to do kindness that he went looking for it when the opportunity didn’t present itself.
The desire to do a Mitzvah, is itself a Mitzvah. When things are important to us, we think about them even when they are not in front of us. We plan how we are going to make it happen and then when the opportunity does present itself we make sure to make the most of it.
Shabbos comes once a week on the 7th day, yet we look forward to it all week. Every day we count the days in relation to Shabbos. In Judaism it is not Sunday, it is the first day of the week towards Shabbos. Every morning we say the Psalm of the day in relation to Shabbos. When we go shopping for food we think about what special foods we will purchase for Shabbos. When Shabbos arrives, we want to make sure that we maximize the opportunity that we have been waiting for all week.
The Shabbos Project highlights the specialness of Shabbos and provides us with a way to infuse our Shabbos with extra meaning. May we enjoy this Shabbos together and may we use it as an inspiration to make the most of every Shabbos in connecting with Hashem and with our souls.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shaps and the JET Team
