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Sabbath restrictions are for Jews only
#21
B"H
There are some misunderstandings in your reasoning. The statement in question, "Abraham a righteous gentile kept the Shabbat," requires proper explanation and correct understanding, and it does not imply that any Noahides should keep the Shabbat.

1. This statement (which is woefully incomplete as you've presented it) is based on Midrash/Aggadah, which are homiletic stories within the Torah tradition. As such, Midrashic stories themselves are never to be used as sources from which it is correct to derive decisions for what should or should not be done in practice.

2. Certainly, established / accepted Torah Laws for practical observance (halacha) can never be overturned by a homiletic story that's found in Midrash/Aggadah. That is because the earlier Sages who ruled on and accepted the halacha certainly also knew the Midrash/Aggadah stories, and in fact understood them much more correctly and deeply than we imagine to understand them in our small way. Therefore we are obligated (and held accountable in G-d's judgment) to practice what halacha requires, and not what we imagine that a Midrashic story implies.

3. The actual accepted halacha, as ruled by the Rishonim Sages according to what the Talmud teaches, is that all Gentiles (including Noahide, Ger Toshav, etc. etc.) are forbidden by G-d to practice the ritual Jewish Sabbath restrictions (i.e., to "keep the Shabbat"). See, for example, "The Divine Code," Part I, chapter 3: https://asknoah.org/books/the-divine-code

4. Whatever Abraham may or may not have done in actual practice has no bearing or consequence on this issue, or on any mitzvah observance by either Jews or Noahides, because he lived before the Torah was given through Moses at Mount Sinai. The commandments and halacha that people are obligated by G-d to observe are from the Torah Laws that G-d gave through Moses. Therefore one must know what the Torah Sages have ruled, based on the Oral Torah from Mount Sinai which was transmitted to them.

5. The Jews' Patriarchs - Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - were the spiritual bridge to the future Jewish people. They were prophets who saw prophetically the 613 Jewish Commandments which their descendants, the Children of Israel, would receive from G-d at Mount Sinai in the Torah. To create the spiritual bridge within their covenantial family to that future time, the Midrash stories say that they practiced some aspects of the 613 Commandments as personal customs - bearing in mind that the Torah's prohibition against making a new religion for oneself had not yet been given. It is understood that some observances could have been done by them in actual practice as the Torah would later specify, and other observances could only be done in some spiritually analogous way through spiritual meditations and intentions.

6. To the case in point, how can we reconcile any Sabbath observance by Abraham with the fact the prohibition for a Gentile/Noahide to "keep a Shabbat" was already previously given by G-d to Noah, as explained in the Talmud? Great Rabbis have asked this question, and they have explained that Abraham made sure to perform some action between sundown on Friday and sundown on Saturday that for a Jew would constitute breaking the Sabbath observance:
- The great Rabbi Yehoshua Yehuda Leib Diskin (1818–1898), also known as the Maharil Diskin, explained how Abraham could have done this by having (carrying) tzitzit fringes added onto his garment (which is not permitted for Gentiles to do post-Sinai), in the public domain.
- The great Rabbi Pinchas HaLevi Horowitz (c. 1731-1805) explained how Abraham could have done this by reckoning the beginning and end of the days of week from sunrise, as was common for Gentiles, instead of from sunset as Jews do.

In any event, those and any similar reasonings are in the realm of Rabbinical pilpul to propose theoretical reconciliations on homiletics, and they don't have any bearing on the actual Torah Law post-Sinai, which is that Gentiles are not to take on any ritual Sabbath observances for themselves. Instead, it is allowed for a Noahide to enhance his or her permitted activities (like meals, manner of dressing, prayer and Torah study, etc. ) on the seventh day.


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