Shomer Shabbat
This Shabbos, I ended up walking down Avenue J (The commercial area in Brooklyn, for those of you out-of-towners) and I was amazed.There was a total of 3-5 open stores on a span of 6 busy blocks. These are the streets that are so crowded, you ALWAYS meet someone you know when you're there. Without fail. Trust me. I have a streak going. You have to squeeze through people on Fridays.
But on Shabbos, it's relatively quiet. There were some people shopping in those few stores. I noticed that many signs touted the words, "Shomer Shabbat" and remembered hearing that when my Great-great-grandfather came to America in the late1800s- early 1900s, he opened his own business in order to prevent having to work on Shabbos. My teachers always told us all those stories about people who were fired every Friday for leaving early and informing their imployers that they would not be coming in the next day.
I can't help but feel lucky (but scared at the same time) that business owners can Baruch Hashem comfortably print on their awnings that they are Shomer Shabbos, and that they do not feel the need to sneak a few hours on Shabbos to increase their business. The menucha (rest) of Shabbos was felt through walking past all the gates down..just another way to appreciate Shabbos...
posted by Michelle @ 8:20 AM
2 Comments:
I definately love that beautiful feeling...It does make me sometimes appreciate the overly-tolerant and pluralistic American society even though I hate to sound liberal--we must be appreciative!
~MS
HOwever nowdays if you aren't in a field where you can take off for shabbos you have trouble finding a job. For example different computer fields, if a server goes down saturday the company can loose money and therefore not hire you. As for the jewish mom and pop stores who complain they aren't making enough money to pay the rent, if they aren't open on the weekends then they can't compete with stores that are open on saturdays.
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