The Seventh Day Factor

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The Seventh Day Factor

• Numbers 11.10-15
• Exodus 20.8-11
• Deuteronomy 5.12-15

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The Seventh Day

• "The seventh day is like a palace in time with a
  kingdom for all. It is not a date but an
  atmosphere."
• Abraham Joshua Heschel

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Num 11.10-15 Moses Falls Apart!

• Moses heard the people weeping, each with their
  families, each at the entrances of their tents.
  Then Yahweh became very angry, and this was evil
  in the eyes of Moses. So Moses said to Yahweh,
  "Why have you caused evil to your servant? Why
  have I not found favor in your sight, that you
  lay the burden of all this people on me? Did I
  conceive all this people? Did I give birth to
  them, that you should say to me, 'Carry them in
  your bosom, as a

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Num 11.10-15 Moses Falls Apart!

• nurse carries a nursing infant, to the land that
  you promised to their ancestors? Where am I to
  get meat to give to all this people? For they
  come weeping to me and say, 'Give us meat that we
  may eat!' I am not able to carry all this people
  alone, for they are too heavy for me. If this is
  the way you are going to treat me, kill me now!
  but if I have found favor in your sight do not
  let me see my misery (evil)."

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• From the moment that Moses left the hospitable
  environ of the Midianite life style he began to
  loose control of his safe world.
• Exod 4.18-25 The trip to Egypt was filled with
  family problems, so much so, that it may have
  been the cause for the later break-up of his
  marriage.
• Exod 5.1-11.10 Pharaoh drove a hard bargain to
  the very end, while Moses had had a hard time
  getting things right.

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• Exod 15.22-The trip to Sinai was no picnic
  either, with little water and much murmuring.

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• Exod 19 and God's Theophanic presence
• Exod 20, the Decalogue
• Exod 21-23, the Book of the Covenant

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• Exod 25-31, 35-40 Blueprints for the Tabernacle
  and its Completion

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• The Apostasy lead by Aaron in Exod 32 and the
  following clean-up project took a great toll on
  Moses.

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• Lev 1-7 Regular rituals for sacrificing, etc.
• Lev 10 the death of Nadab and Abihu

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A Hectic Lifestyle

• This "Hectic Lifestyle" may explains why . . .
  when the people began to complain about not
  having meat to eat again, it was just too much
  for Moses . . . so he broke (Num 11.4-6 ).

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The Seventh Day in Exod

• Exod 20.8-10
• Remember (za4kor) the sabbath day, to keep it
  holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your
  work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to Yahweh
  your God you shall not do any work you, your
  son or your daughter, your male or female slave,
  your livestock, or the alien resident in your
  towns.

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The Seventh Day

• The cessation of work! (Num 15.32-36)
• This commandment assumes that the cessation of
  the normal activity of work is in order to set
  aside this day for something special.
• Throughout the OT the sabbath is described as
  being holy (Exod 16.28 Lev 23.3 Neh 9.14 Isa
  58.13) it received this quality when God blessed
  it (Exod 20.11).

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The Seventh Day in Deut

• Deut 5.12-14
• Observe (sa4mor) the sabbath day, to keep it
  holy, as Yahweh your God commanded you. Six days
  you shall labor and do all your work. But the
  seventh day is a sabbath to Yahweh your God you
  shall not do any work you, or your son or your
  daughter, or your male or female slave, or your
  ox or your donkey, or any of your livestock, or
  the resident alien in your towns, so that your
  male and female slave may rest as well as you.

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The Seventh Day

• The central command in the Decalogue. (Patrick
  Miller, Jr.)
• "It looks backward to the rule of Yahweh and
  imagines that Yahweh on the seventh day was
  either spent and needed rest thus vulnerable
  or was serenely situated in creation and able to
  be at ease. Either way, the conduct of Yahweh on
  the seventh day is in sharp contrast to the world
  of pharaoh, in which there is no rest but only
  feverish productivity." (Brueggemann)

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The Seventh Day

• "The command on Sabbath also looks forward to a
  human community, an Israelite community peaceably
  engaged in neighbor-respecting life that is not
  madly engaged in production and consumption, but
  one that knows a limit to such activity and so
  has at the center of its life an enactment of
  peaceableness that bespeaks the settled rule of
  Yahweh." (Brueggemann)
• It is the slaves' observance that is paradigmatic
  .

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Exod 20.11 God did it in Creation

• For in six days Yahweh made heaven and earth,
  the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the
  seventh day therefore Yahweh blessed the sabbath
  day and consecrated it.

• The motivation for the Seventh day rest is here
  seen as modeling what Yahweh did in Creation.
• Its importance is emphasized by Yahweh's
  blessing.
• As W. Brueggemann put it, "we find at the core of
  creation the invitation to rest."

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Deut 5.15 God delivered from slavery

• Remember (za4karta4) that you were a slave in
  the land of Egypt, and Yahweh your God brought
  you out from there with a mighty hand and an
  outstretched arm therefore Yahweh your God
  commanded you to keep the sabbath day.

• In Deuteronomy the commandment is grounded in
  God's redemption of Israel from Egypt.
• The memory of slavery is essential for Israel to
  observe the sabbath.

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Putting Exod Deut Together

• "Within the context of the canon, the two
  motivations interpret each other. 'God's creative
  activity is liberating, and God's activity as
  liberator is creative. There cannot be one
  without the other' (Siker, 16). Once again
  creation and salvation are two aspects of the one
  theological reality." (B. Childs)

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All Days

• "What present-day Christians alas do tend to
  forget is that the Sabbath is a precious and
  effective symbol of something very basic in
  biblical religion viz., God's lordship over
  time. . . . the Sabbath is an eschatological
  symbol of perfection. By setting aside one day in
  seven, Israel was confessing that all days are
  God's, that all of time is potentially sacred."
  Simon J. De Vries

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The Seventh Day

• "The seventh day is like a palace in time with a
  kingdom for all. It is not a date but an
  atmosphere."
• Abraham Joshua Heschel