CHAPTER 31

Perhaps it has already become clear to you what is the cause of the Law’s establishing the Sabbath so firmly and ordaining death by stoning for breaking it. The Master of the prophets has put people to death because of it. It comes third after the existence of the deity and the denial of dualism. For the prohibition of the worship of anything except Him only aims at the affirmation of the belief in His unity. You know from what I have said that opinions do not last unless they are accompanied by actions that strengthen them, make them generally known, and perpetuate them among the multitude. For this reason we are ordered by the Law to exalt this day, in order that the principle of the creation of the world in time be established and universally known in the world¹ through the fact that all people refrain from working on one and the same day. If it is asked: What is the cause of this?, the answer is: For in six days the Lord made.²

For this commandment two different causes are given, corresponding to two different effects. In the first Decalogue, the cause for exalting the Sabbath is stated as follows: For in six days the Lord made, and so on. In Deuteronomy,³ on the other hand, it is said:⁴ And thou shalt remember that thou wast a slave in Egypt.⁵ Therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day. This is correct. For the effect, according to the first statement, is to regard [72b] that day as noble and exalted. As it says: Wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.6 This is the effect consequent upon the cause stated in the words: For in six days, and so on. However, the order given us by the Law with regard to it and the commandment ordaining us in particular to keep it are an effect consequent upon the cause that we had been slaves in Egypt where we did not work according to our free choice and when we wished and where we had not the power to refrain from working. Therefore we have been commanded inactivity and rest so that we should conjoin the two things: the belief in a true opinion — namely, the creation of the world in time, which, at the first go and with the slightest of speculations, shows that the deity exists — and the memory of the benefit God bestowed upon us by giving us rest from under the burdens of the Egyptians.⁷ Accordingly the Sabbath is, as it were, of universal benefit, both with reference to a true speculative opinion and to the well-being of the state of the body.