To rest is to reset! Week-offs are the days when we all are set ashore to change our physical or mental ability soaked up in laziness or weariness into the renewed vitality of plunging back into the sea of life again. It's the days that we yearn for spending time with our very intimate people, socializing with friends, or travelling to desired places with the given freedom of being into ownself, and are free from being watched by the eyes calculating merits and from every political or protocolic motives of business.
But, did we ever contemplate about the origin of weekly off? What is its one and the single and perhaps the only exclusive reason? Although being in love with the patience of its coming. Although knowing how it evolved through generations after generations all around the world. Yet, have we ever wanted to know what is the sole motive behind weekly off and who is its sole motivator?
To understand something, it's always advisable to begin with the beginning, of which its biblical term is said to be Genesis meaning origin/development/outset/ commencement/root/source of something. Genesis is also one of the first five books of old testament call as 'Pentateuch', inclusively known as 'Book Of Scrolls', that which Jews call as Torah meaning 'instruction, teaching or law', claimed to be the book given to prophet Moses (Peace Be Upon Him). However, they do not have any authority whatsoever in claiming their direct revelation to Prophet Moses (Peace be upon him). Also, if it has had communicated precisely in the same order without any change through an uninterrupted chain of narrators, there wouldn't be a chain of fabrication. Rather, it is a book attributed to the prophet based on suppositions & conjectures.
However, let's still understand Genesis 2:2-3 to reach the conclusive end by chasing their action of faith through their scriptures.
Genesis 2:2 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished (meaning God, which in Aramaic termed as Elah and when translated the same into Arabic becomes Allah, finished creating heaven and the earth.) all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
Genesis 2:3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
The authenticity of these verses is also to be doubted here in view of being written in 3rd person singular form, wherein God is being referred to as pronoun 'he' which is used when a third person is describing the affairs of first person, in English grammer. And consequently, according to prominient English Grammarians, a third person-narrative always contrasts with first-person narrative, unless the writer takes the authority of describing things in third-person narrative form to substantiate the all-knowing knowledge.
Also Islamically, Muslims believe, if God is tired of what he does, he is not God, see Sureh Al-Baqarah 2:255 the last testament of God/Elah/Allah, in which Allah himself says, that 'Neither drowsiness (feelings of tiredness and lethargy) nor sleep can overtake him. Because God is not like humans.
But, in Jewish scripture, God resting on the seventh day after having worked for six days is a concept termed as 'Sabbath' Rest, meaning abstinence from work, which is observed primarily by Jews from Friday evening to Saturday evening, and by most of the early Christians.
However, in the later years, a Roman Emperor, namely Constantine, who was Christian by faith, in his forceful attempt to differ with the Jews sets apart a different ruling to Rest on Sundays that vanished the practice of Sabbath Rest to physical/body-resting on Sundays, especially for craftsman and labours.
The only community almost closer to the Jews regarded in this tradition of taking a Sabbath Rest are Muslims who leave off their work on Fridays on the basis of this Quranic verse, which was revealed directly to Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) in its entirety, in Sureh Al-Jumu'ah 62:09,
Quran (62:09). O Believers! When the call to prayer is made on Friday, then proceed 'diligently' to the remembrance of Allah and leave off 'your business'. That is best for you, if only you knew.
Therefore, it's for this reasons prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) said, see Sahi Bukhari 11:01 (Chapter: Friday Prayer),
Hadith No 01: Narrated by Abu Huraira:
I heard from Allah's messanger (Peace Be Upon Him) saying, "We (Muslims) are the last (to come) but (will be) the foremost on the Day of Resurrection though the former nations were given the Holy Scriptures before us. And this was their day (Friday) the celebration of which was made compulsory for them but they differed about it. For Jews, it is tomorrow (Ie. Saturday), and for Christians, it is the day after tomorrow (Ie. Sunday).
And so for this good reasons the Islamic countries such as Dubai, Saudi Arabia etc., prefers to take a day off on Fridays to join in congregation, in addition to praying 5 times a day, to stand together as one family of faith and in oneness of the Almighty, shoulder to shoulder regardless of who we are and what we do, and then disperse to respective houses immediately after prayers have ended in order to dine together and spend time to foster the spiritual growth among immediate family, relatives, closed ones, or loved ones as if the day has been made to celebrate happiness in togetherness.
And in India, as the study says, the practice of taking a day off on Sundays was established in the due course of British colonial rule, especially for factory/industrial workers to give them a body-rest day off. It's, therefore, etymologically, through this consecrating route of sabbathing the seventh day as 'Holy Day' to the Early Modern or Modern English speaking community blended a new word out of them as 'Holiday' with a complete new meaning of intent. And If you have reached here to this line, then take a minute out to thank Almighty for giving us resting days after troubling days and state of wakefulness after sleeping days.
Blog Writer
Zain Khan
