Embracing Shabbos- The real issue in discussing the Shabbos App

“LOL. My rabbi just misquoted a pasuk in his derasha.”

“Nisht Shabbos Geret. Are we going out later?”

“No one better say the score in the Alabama-LSU game. I recorded it and am watching it after Shabbos.”

When it comes to the new Shabbos App that will allow people to “halachically use a smartphone on Shabbos”, much more than halacha is really coming into play. Even if it can be argued that the app will avoid all Torah and rabbinical prohibitions (although I’m not sure why the concepts of “Zilzul Shabbos” and “Uvda D’chol” are being ignored), the narrowing of the discussion to purely halachic terms, and narrow ones at that, is dangerous, and, I would argue, contrary to the spirit of Torah.

Despite what Yeshayahu Leibowitz argued,Judaism is about  more than purely legal concepts. One does not have to wait until the Neviim Acharonim to see that there are theoretical and moral concepts that are discussed in the Torah in the narrative sections, as well as in many parts of Devarim. Indeed, the very concept of muktzeh is based, at least partially, on the idea of keeping Shabbos from being treated like every other day. Shabbos is about much more than an avoidance of melacha.

The developers of the app can certainly be applauded for trying to minimize chilul Shabbos, but I take issue with the idea that this app is in fact protecting Shabbos. To my mind, it plays into a mindset that sees Shabbos and indeed halacha itself, as a series of restrictions with which we must put up, and even then, only when we can not find a way out of there observance.

Many within the Modern Orthodox world, including myself, applaud the thinking of those like Rav Eliezer Berkowits and those who follow in his footsteps, in suggesting that halacha continues to be fresh and vibrant and, more importantly, alive. This is used to suggest a more activist role when it comes to interpreting Jewish law, suggesting changes that would permit more things, and give voice to the disenfranchised. It would be hypocritical to suggest that concepts and values can be used only to permit and never to prohibit. In other words, even if it was only Chazal who could technically establish something as a derabbonon, conceptually it should be possible by later halachic consensus.

Of course, I’m not sure which should need to use such terms. In the end of the day, chipping away at the atmosphere of Shabbos comes with a price, one that we already see when it comes to those who are using these phones already without any “permissible” app. It seems to me that rather than chip away at things to make Shabbos “easier”, it is time to focus educationally and communally on the spirit of Shabbos, so that Shabbos will be embraced, rather than being  merely tolerated, or worse.

Teshuva for Turbulent Souls

I can’t imagine testing potential medicines and chemicals on myself, yet in the 19th century, it was not so rare for scientists to use themselves as their own guinea pigs. In one of the chapters in  “A Short History of Nearly Everything”, Bill Bryson tells the fascinating and often humorous stories about those who did so.

Of the philosophers, both general and Jewish, whose works I have read, I have seen two approaches. The first is what I would call clinical. Their discussions of various topics are logically arranged and scientific, or at least, as scientific as philosophy can get. The second group is made up of turbulent souls, to borrow a phrase from Stephen J. Dubner. They study philosophy, not as dispassionate analysts, but as if there very existence depends on it. They are not just trying to understand things. They are seeking to know God and themselves.

As Yom Kippur gets closer, I have been doing quite a bit of reading and studying. As I read some of Heschel’s “Man is Not Alone” on Rosh Hashana, I had to put it down. This was no rationalist discussion of proofs of God. Heschel’s words gave me the discomfort of standing in the presence of God, as opposed to merely thinking about Him. Rav Shagar’s “Shuvi Nafshi” is nothing if not penetrating, intimate and revealing. Coupled with the viewing of a documentary about Rav Shagar, I was left with the sad yearning to sit and study at the feet of this open and honest man, who left the world before his time.

What is teshuva and do I even aspire to understand, let alone to act on that understanding? As I force myself to remember to add the words “HaMelech HaKadosh” to the Amidah, I have not sufficiently looked for Him inside of it. Late at night, as I prepare for a shiur I will be delivering on teshuva, I am, alternatively challenged and pained by Rav Shagar’s words, and the need to pull back and distract myself by checking Facebook. Dare I discuss and try to explain teshuva, when it is only in my mind, and, I fear, likely to go no further?

I have (I am?) a turbulent soul. How do I cross from the clinical understanding of teshuva, the almost voyeuristic experience of seeing Rav Shagar’s exposed soul, to looking inside myself? I don’t know what scares me the most; what I might see, that I might fail, or that I might succeed. The door of this dark room is open before me, showing a glimpse of the light outside. Dare I exit, or will I, once again, merely wonder about the Source of the light?