struggling over Yom Tov

[cellio]

Today is the seventh day of Pesach. The Torah states quite clearly that this is a festival day (like the first). Yet here I am at work, just like last year and the year before and...

I don't know why I have so much trouble with this one. (And, correspondingly, the last day of Sukkot.) There is natural resistance -- it's another vacation day, and clumps of holidays disrupt work schedules already, and there's no real ritual associated with it (unlike the seder), and -- locally, at least -- there's basically no community encouragement for it outside the Orthodox subset. (Yes, everyone has holiday services, but the presumption that of course you're observing the holiday is absent.)

But the Torah tells us it is a festival and to "do no work", just like the others, and that ought to be sufficient. And every year I feel a little more guilty and become a little more aware that I am sinning.

Maybe next year I will finally overcome this. (Once I start, I will feel bound to do it every time -- no "just when it's convenient" observances here.)

Comments

Gehennom...

[goljerp]

Like everything, there have been various strands of Jewish thoughts over the years. One which slightly contradicts what you said an idea of "Gehennom", as a place which isn't all to pleasant where one might go -- for a finite period of time -- to atone for one's sins.

Re: Gehennom...

[cellio]

I've heard of Gehennon but thought it wasn't mainstream or necessarily literal. Is it held to be a place? A place of torment? Just a place without God?

When did this idea enter Judaism? Is it possibly a reaction to Christian Hell, or is it earlier?

Yea, I know that the Torah has one cryptic reference to descending into "Sheol", and I don't recall offhand what the commentaries have to say about it. I mentally indexed it under "hand-wave", but I guess now I'll have to look it up if I can remember where it is. (It's in Genesis somewhere, I'm pretty sure.)

I'm pretty vague on what the Prophets have to say about the subject. First, I haven't read them thoroughly; second, they frequently are clearly speaking figuratively and not literally anyway.

Re: Gehennom...

[goljerp]

I've heard of Gehennon but thought it wasn't mainstream or necessarily literal. Is it held to be a place? A place of torment? Just a place without God?

I don't think it's mainstream now, but it was a strand of thought during late rabbinic/early middle ages. Originally "Gehennon" was a place (outside Jerusalem, where the garbage got thrown?), but in by the late rabbinic/early middle ages it morphed into a place one might go before going to heaven. There were lots of different Jewish opinions on this sort of thing, although mainstream Judiasm focuses on this life rather than what might happen after death.

Is it possibly a reaction to Christian Hell, or is it earlier?

I think probably it must have been influenced by christian ideas, given the time I'm placing the idea. The difference (as far as I know, based on Dante mainly) is that Christian Hell is a place of eternal torment, while Gehennom is only a temporary place, even for the nastiest people.

I'm pretty vague on what the Prophets have to say about the subject.

I think it was a post-prophetic idea.