Last year, my friends, we brought to Congregation Shaarey Zedek the hilarious comedian Modi. I hear laughing already. One of my favorite bits that Modi does is his distinction between Ashkenazim and Sephardim, Mizrahim—and how we greet one another on Yom Tov and Shabbat.

In his bit, he says he loves Sephardim and Mizrahim because on Shabbat they come with all this enthusiasm. They’ll give you a hug and a kiss on each cheek, and they’ll say: “Shabbat zeh yom menucha ve’oneg, bo navo v’nismach bo. Shabbat Shalom! Shabbat Shalom!” This is the day that God has made—let us rejoice! Shabbat Shalom!

And Ashkenazim? How do we greet one another? “Shabbos, Shabbos.”

We even drop off the good part of “Good Shabbos” and just say, “Shabbos, Shabbos.” It’s a very different way of expressing our love for the sacred and beautiful day we are gifted each and every week. But despite those cultural differences, I think the love and appreciation really is there—expressed in a more subdued and uninspiring way in the Ashkenazi world, for sure—but still there.

We Jews love Shabbat.

And when all of us come together at our shul on Shabbat, do you know what we talk about? Shabbat! Which seems appropriate, because after all: “Shabbat zeh yom menucha ve’oneg, bo navo v’nismach bo. Shabbat Shalom!”

But one thing I think we often neglect—because we don’t get the same turnout during the week as we do on Shabbat morning—is a thoughtful look at the Jewish understanding of chol, of those six days that aren’t Shabbat. That aren’t focused on menucha and simcha—on rest and joy, on seven-layer cake and tuna and egg salad.

So I’m going to propose something that might feel a little bit heretical: Let’s use this sacred time of Shabbat Kodesh, of Shabbat morning, to talk about this seemingly profane and mundane time of chol—of the rest of the week. Because if we do—okay, I’m going to show my cards here at the very beginning—if we do, then I think we’ll see that our tradition doesn’t consider the other six days of the week profane and mundane at all.

All of us view tradition through the lens of our present—our world, our context, our atmosphere. That makes sense. We are shaped—our understanding, our worldview, everything—by our environment. And our environment is a Western democratic capitalist one. Which means, again quite logically, our connection to Judaism—our fundamental understanding of Judaism—is influenced by that philosophy.

We can debate how much that influence exists, but the influence is there.

So our model for the week and for Shabbat usually fits into something like this: We bust our tuchases throughout the week, working hard, providing for our families, earning our paychecks—and for Izzy and her friends (I haven’t forgotten about you)—going to school, doing homework, finishing projects, doing chores. And as a reward for making it through the week, we receive the gift of Shabbat—the gift of rest, peace, and togetherness.

That’s the lens we use to view time. But the Torah itself suggests a radically different model. And Chazal—our Rabbis of blessed memory, the rabbis who created the Talmud, who had their own worldview, environment, and context—offered a beautiful articulation of our connection to time.

They used this week’s parasha, and specifically the very beginning of this week’s parasha, as their starting point. Moshe Rabbeinu, speaking on God’s behalf, says to Am Yisrael, to the Israelites: “Sheshet yamim te’aseh melachah, u’vayom hashvi’i yihyeh lachem kodesh, Shabbat Shabbaton l’Adonai.” Six days work may be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a Sabbath, a complete rest, holy to God.

Okay, so those words aren’t so remarkable—we already have this concept built into our tradition. But what follows? If you want to take a look with me, we’re on page 553 in your Etz Hayim, starting at verse 4.

What immediately follows? “Moses said further to the whole community of the Israelites: This is what the Lord has commanded: Take from among you gifts to the Lord. Everyone whose heart so moves him shall bring them—gifts for the Lord: gold, silver, and copper; blue, purple, and crimson yarns; fine linen and goat’s hair; tanned ram skins, dolphin skins, and acacia wood; oil for lighting, for the anointing oil, and for the aromatic incense; lapis lazuli and other stones for setting, for the ephod and the breastpiece. And let all among you who are skilled come and make all that the Lord has commanded.”

What is juxtaposed here with the observance of Shabbat? The building of the Mishkan. The construction of the sacred space—the precursor to the Temple—where God is meant to dwell. For lack of a better term, it’s God’s home.

When our Rabbis saw this, something clicked. On Shabbat, they said, we rest from the work. But during the other six days, we return to the work. And what is that work? Not our jobs, not our careers, not our emails or homework or paychecks. The work is building God’s home in the world.

If we take that understanding—this remarkable idea the Rabbis offered us—seriously, and if we carve out even just a little space in our Western democratic capitalist view of the week, we can dramatically enhance not just our workweek, not just the day-in, day-out grind that can become so rote and lifeless—we can also enhance Shabbat. And we can enhance our lives as a whole.

To see the six days of the week as a mandate to build God’s home in the world is to mindfully and intentionally create sacredness davka in those times that feel the least sacred. To wake up each day and replace monotony and redundancy with an active goal to create holiness. Whether that means personal spiritual practice—prayer, middot, Torah learning—or whether it’s altruistic: building God’s home brick by brick through kindness, compassion, tzedakah, and connection.

Whatever it is, it’s the mindful urgency, the seriousness, and the prioritizing of that sacred building that makes it extraordinary.

This is what the Rabbis proposed—and I want you to hear me: this is not a gentle suggestion. It’s not “When you have some free time, try to do some good in the world.” No. This is a radical re-envisioning of daily life. A theology that asks us to give the same attention to our spiritual lives that we give to our work lives. That if we have to-do lists at work, we should have to-do lists for our spiritual work.

If we set deadlines and goals for our careers, we should set goals for our chesed, our prayer, our Torah. If we can recognize how powerful and transformative this work is, then when we reach the end of the week—when we arrive at that palace in time known as Shabbat—we will relate to it differently.

Because we won’t see it as a time to collapse after an exhausting grind. We’ll embrace the truest form of Shabbat rest: the rest that God took after six days of creation, when vayishbot vayinafash—God rested, rejuvenated, and looked upon all that was done and said, ki tov—it is good.

How good it feels to make a difference. How good it feels to be together, filled with song and laughter, community and joy and love, after a week of building God’s home.

And if we can do that, then even we dry, sarcastic, deadpan Ashkenazim will have no choice but to greet one another with a big hug and a kiss on both cheeks and shout with all our hearts: “Zeh yom menucha ve’oneg, bo navo v’nismach bo. Shabbat Shalom!”

This is the day that God has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. Because what incredible, meaningful, transformative, beautiful work we have done.

So let’s take this environment of ours and carve out room—just a little room—to tweak our lens. To take us back 2,000 years and adopt a different definition of work. One that rejects the binary of sacred and profane. One that takes holiness seriously. One that fills our lives with limitless opportunities for meaning.

Zeh hayom asah Adonai, nagilah v’nism’chah vo. Shabbat Shalom.

Have a beautiful Shabbos, everyone. Mazel tov, Izzy.