Religion & Law

The Christian Century has a review of a new book by Judith Shulevitz entitled The Sabbath World: Glimpses of a Different Order of Time. The author is ambivalent about the Sabbath. The review describes the book as a "wide-ranging investigation of the Sabbath with stories of her own persistent struggle." The book covers not only standard religious sources, but also Hannah Arendt, romantic poets, and Stalin. The review by Dorothy Bass concludes that the book is an important contribution to the literature on the Sabbath and an important reflection on religious life itself. Bass hopes that the honesty of the author about her ambivalence toward the Sabbath will inspire similar honesty in her readers "as we help one another to discern the contours of faithful living in the information age."

Among other things, I try to follow the practice of engaging in spiritual reading on the Sabbath. But I have never read material about the Sabbath on the Sabbath. I am not sure whether it is better to read this book as a preparation for the Sabbath or whether reflecting on the Sabbath on the Sabbath in this way makes sense (but I share Shulevitz's sense that getting caught up in rules about the Sabbath is not spiritually productive). I am sure that I want to read this book.

cross-posted at religiousleftlaw.com