That the law for keeping the Sabbath
day holy needed further interpretation and exploration is made explicit with
the story recorded in Numbers 1532-36. Here an Israelite is caught gathering
wood on the Sabbath day and is brought to Moses and Aaron for judgment. Numbers
15:34 is extraordinarily telling: “And they put him in ward [or “custody,” Hebrew
mišmâh], because it was not declared what should be done to him.” This
verse makes explicit what is implied elsewhere in scripture about keeping the Sabbath
day holy: the laws are not sufficient on their own to enable one to completely live
the law. Moreover, the punishment for breaking the Sabbath (or breaking it in
that particular way) is not contained in the commandment on the Sabbath in
Exodus. Thus, in order to keep this commandment properly, more inspiration
and interpretation is necessary. In the example of this man gathering
sticks, Moses inquires of Jehovah, who mandates that the man be put to death,
underscoring the importance of the Sabbath day not only to the ancient Israelites
but also to later readers of the scriptures. (Avram R. Shannon, "The
Sabbath in Rabbinic Judaism: Exploring the How of Keeping the Commandments,"
in Sacred Time: The Sabbath as a Perpetual Covenant, ed. Gaye Strathearn
[Provo, Utah: BYU Religious Studies Center; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book,
2022], 153, emphasis added)
