Keeping the Sabbath Wholly: Ceasing, Resting, Embracing, Feasting

Keeping the Sabbath Wholly is a window into how Marva Dawn practices the Sabbath. She focuses on the four elements of the subtitle (ceasing, resting, embracing, feasting) as critical attitudes for robust Sabbath-keeping.

The book is filled with personal anecdotes and stories that give the reader ideas to integrate into their own practice. She offers her suggestions without any hint of legalistic arm-twisting: something that’s plagued our understanding of Sabbath for too long.

I was a little disappointed by this book, but that was likely because I misunderstood the genre. The first book I read by Dawn was Powers, Weakness, and the Tabernacling of God, an excellent theological treatise on Paul’s theology of the powers. The next book was show more To Walk and Not Faint, a devotional on Isaiah 40 that integrated solid exegesis into each meditation. I started this book expecting an exegetical foundation for Sabbath-keeping that was not to be found. She confined her writing to her own experience.

While it’s still a good book, but this married man often had difficulty identifying with the life-examples of a single woman. show less

Combining sound biblical theology and research into Jewish traditions with many practical suggestions, Keeping the Sabbath Wholly offers a healthy balance between head and heart: the book shows how theological insights can undergird daily life and practice, and it gives the reader both motivation and methods for enjoying a special holy day.

An interesting notion: keeping the Sabbath. Quakers believe that everyday is a holy day, yet Dawn makes a good case for the intentionality of a practice as rejuvenating.

Doctrinal Theology

Sabbath-keeping