He Tried To Abandon Shabbat—But Every Friday At Sundown, The Same Dream Returned
Subtitle: A man running from rest, haunted by a message he couldn’t ignore.
Chapter One: The Clock That Wouldn’t Die
Eitan Katz was a man of precision. A high-ranking cybersecurity analyst in Tel Aviv, his days ran like code—clean, sharp, logical. There was no room in his life for mysteries. No space for the ancient traditions he’d left behind years ago, buried under work deadlines and glowing computer screens. Shabbat? That was for children and the elderly. He hadn’t lit candles in nearly a decade.
But every Friday at sundown, his apartment’s digital clock blinked wildly, short-circuiting—just for a moment.
19:12…
19:12…
19:12…
It froze. Then restarted.
The first time it happened, he replaced the clock.
The second time, he checked the wiring.
The third time, he moved apartments.
But it kept happening. And then came the dream.
Chapter Two: The Dream
It always began the same.
A desert, wide and ancient. No wind. No sound. Just heat—and the weight of time.
He stood alone, barefoot on cracked soil. In the distance, a shofar echoed—a long, deep, mournful blast that vibrated through his bones. He turned toward the sound and saw a man. Cloaked in linen, eyes like fire, holding a scroll in one hand and a flickering flame in the other.
The man spoke, but his mouth didn’t move. The words came like thunder in Eitan’s chest:
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” (Exodus 20:8)
Then the dream would shatter like glass. Eitan would wake up gasping, drenched in sweat, the city lights blinking coldly outside his window. Every Friday night. Every week. For three months straight.
Chapter Three: Running from Rest
He went to a psychologist. Sleep disorder, they said. Prescribed something. It didn’t work.
He flew to Tokyo on a work assignment to “escape the timezone.” But at sundown—Tokyo sundown—the dream returned.
He started working longer hours, trying to outpace the approach of dusk. But Shabbat didn’t care about timezones or to-do lists.
“If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on My holy day… then you shall delight yourself in the LORD.” (Isaiah 58:13–14)
The scripture haunted him now. The words flashed on billboards. Echoed in coffee shop music. Once, he heard it from a child on a bus. A verse his mother used to whisper while lighting candles, her hands trembling in reverence.
He had erased the ritual from his life—but the ritual had not erased him.
Chapter Four: The Messenger
On a rainy Thursday evening, Eitan received a package. No return address.
Inside: an ancient, tarnished silver Kiddush cup, wrapped in linen. And a note in Hebrew:
“The rest you reject is the refuge you need. Come back. Before the fire goes out.”
His hands shook. The handwriting looked familiar. Almost like his grandfather’s—the man who had survived Auschwitz with nothing but his Shabbat prayers and the very cup Eitan now held.
He remembered sitting at his grandfather’s feet, watching the flame of the Shabbat candles dance.
And then he remembered the fire.
Chapter Five: The Fire
It was the night his childhood ended.
Eitan was 12 when their home caught fire. It started in the kitchen. But when the firefighters came, they found the flames circling the dining table, as if avoiding it. The candles his mother had lit for Shabbat still stood, untouched—burning calmly in the center of devastation.
No one could explain it.
His father called it a miracle.
Eitan called it coincidence.
But now, years later, the memory returned with force. A table preserved in fire. A boy who watched the light and chose to forget.
Chapter Six: A Stranger on the Train
That Friday, Eitan boarded the train home early, desperate to sleep through sundown.
The car was nearly empty—except for an old man in the far corner, humming a niggun. A melody his mother used to sing on Friday nights.
The man looked up.
“Do you know the song?” he asked.
Eitan’s throat tightened. “I used to.”
The man nodded slowly. “Shabbat isn’t just a day of rest. It’s a doorway. If you leave it closed too long, you’ll forget what home feels like.”
Eitan blinked—and the man was gone.
Vanished between stations.
Chapter Seven: The Return
That night, Eitan stood alone in his kitchen, heart pounding. No candles. No wine. No challah.
But he placed the Kiddush cup on the table.
And then, for the first time in over ten years, he whispered:
“Baruch Atah Adonai Eloheinu, Melech ha’olam…”
His voice cracked.
He lit two candles with shaking hands.
The moment the flames caught, warmth flooded the room—an inexplicable peace. As if time itself had exhaled.
He sat. And wept.
Not from sadness—but from the overwhelming weight of being seen. Of being remembered by the Giver of Rest.
“Come unto Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)
Chapter Eight: The Final Dream
That night, the dream returned.
But it was different.
The desert was lush now. The man in linen smiled. Behind him, the gates of Jerusalem shimmered with golden light. And written in the sky:
“It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever: for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.” (Exodus 31:17)
The shofar blew again—but this time, it was not a warning.
It was a welcome.
Eitan fell to his knees in the dream, and when he awoke, he knew.
Shabbat wasn’t just a command.
It was a call.
Epilogue: The Unbroken Circle
Now, every Friday at sundown, Eitan’s lights dim automatically. His phone shuts off. His heart slows. He wears a white shirt, the Kiddush cup gleaming on the table.
Sometimes, he still dreams—but the man in linen no longer stands far away.
He walks beside him.
And when strangers ask why a tech executive “unplugs” once a week, he smiles and says:
“Because I stopped running from rest… and started running toward it.”
Reflection for the Reader:
Are you tired? Worn down? Frantic from a world that never stops?
You don’t need to wait for burnout to hear the call.
Shabbat is not about rules. It’s about returning.
To who you are.
To Who made you.
To the rhythm of creation.
“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.” (Mark 2:27)
So when the sun sets this Friday…
Maybe try letting go.
And maybe—just maybe—you’ll hear the Voice in your own dream.
Whispering,
“Welcome back.”
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