SABBATH RECONSIDERED: HUMAN DIGNITY AND THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT

Abstract

This paper will consider the meaning and significance of the Sabbath commandment through the lens of human dignity, considering how various communities in the biblical traditions wrestled with the question of how to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. So the Sabbath commandment will be read in terms of the dual commandment to work as well as to rest underlying this commandment, showing how the basic human right to work as well as to rest forms an important part of reading this commandment in terms of a human dignity framework. In particular, this paper will show that reading the Sabbath in terms of human dignity may offer theological resources to contemporary communities to resist the growing tendency of disrespecting or violating people’s humanity when it comes to the central desire and need to work.