Shabbat Candle lighting time: 4:15 (Friday, November 22, 2019)
Shabbat ends: 5:15 (Shabbat night, November 23, 2019)
Brooklyn, NY
other cities
Lessons for today,
Thursday, 23 Cheshvan, 5780 - November 21, 2019
In the fifth aliyah Eliezer and Rivkah's family celebrate, and in the morning Eliezer asks that he be allowed to return immediately to his master with Rivkah. But her family wants to hold her for a year. In the end they ask Rivkah, which, Rashi says, teaches us that a woman can't get married against her will.
Eliezer and Rivkah return and find Yitzchak praying in a field as it was getting to be evening. Actually, our sages say that this was the invention of the Mincha (afternoon) prayer.
The wedding takes place and Yitzchak takes Rivkah to his mother Sarah's tent. When Sarah lived, this tent had three constant blessings: the candles burned from Shabbos to Shabbos, the dough was blessed, and the cloud of the Shechina rested over the tent. When Rivkah entered the tent, these three blessing returned. Incidentally, these three blessings correspond to the three special mitzvot of Jewish woman: Lighting Shabbos candles, the taking of challah which is associated with a kosher home, and Taharas Hamishpocha -- the observance of the laws of family purity -- a G-d given gift to the Jewish people for the spiritual and physical health of the family.
