Like everything else in life, Shabbat does not exist in a vacuum.
If we are going to set aside one day a week for rest and renewal,
we must think carefully about how to prepare for the Sabbath
and how to return to our everyday lives.
To use Heschel’s language,we must learn
how to venture into the “palace” and how to exit from it.

A Talmudic Drama

Rabbi Jose son of Rabbi Judah said:
“Two ministering angels
accompany a person on the eve of the Sabbath
from the synagogue to his home:
one a good and one an evil.
And when the person arrives hom
e and finds the lamp burning,
the table laid and the bed covered with a spread,
the good angel exclaims,
‘May it be even so on the next Sabbath [too],’
and the evil angel unwillingly responds ‘amen.’
But if not,
the evil angel exclaims,
‘May it be even so on the next Sabbath [too],’
and the good angel unwillingly responds ‘amen.’

  [Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Shabbat 119b]