Candle lighting, the three meals, what is and is not done — and, at the end, a realistic way to begin if you never have. No guilt anywhere on this page.
This year
Candle lighting
6:11 PM — Friday, October 16
Shabbat
Shabbat ends (havdalah)
7:07 PM — Saturday, October 17
Computed live for San Jose. Full zmanim for today, and Shabbat times for the coming weeks, are on the times page. Our service times are on the schedule.
One day in seven on which you stop making things. It runs from a little before sunset on Friday to nightfall on Saturday — about twenty-five hours — and it is the only ritual observance in the Ten Commandments.
The reason given in Exodus is the creation: six days of making, one of stopping. The reason given in Deuteronomy is different — you were slaves in Egypt, and slaves do not get a day off. Both are read every week, and the pairing is the whole idea. Shabbat is simultaneously a claim about the universe and a claim about what a person is worth.
In practice it is an evening and a day in which nothing is bought, nothing is written, nothing is switched on, no screen is opened, and the phone is somewhere else. What fills the space is food, conversation that goes on far too long, sleeping in the afternoon, walking places, and reading.
Friday: candle lighting
Candles are lit eighteen minutes before sunset. That time moves every week and is the one thing worth checking — it is on the times page, computed for San Jose. If you miss it, you have missed it; the candles are not lit afterwards.
The custom is:
Married women light two candles. Many add one for each child.
Girls light one candle each, from the age of three.
Where there is no woman in the house, a man lights, with the same blessing.
Light first, then cover your eyes, then say the blessing. The reverse of everything else, and for a good reason: the blessing accepts Shabbat, and once you have accepted it you can no longer strike a match. So you light, hide the flames from yourself, bless, and then look.
Blessed are You, L-rd our G-d, King of the universe, who has sanctified us with His commandments and commanded us to kindle the light of the holy Shabbat.
On a festival the wording is different, and different again when a festival falls on Shabbat. Ask us and we will give you a card with the right one on it — that is not a thing to work out from a web page ten minutes before sunset.
Many women add a private prayer at that moment, hands still over their eyes. It is one of the few completely unscripted moments in the week.
Friday night
In Shul: Kabbalat Shabbat — six psalms for the six weekdays, then Lecha Dodi, in which the community turns to the door to greet Shabbat as a bride — followed by the evening service. It runs about forty-five minutes. Our times are on the schedule.
At the table:
Shalom Aleichem — a song welcoming the angels who are said to walk home with you.
Blessing the children, a hand on each head. Parents who do nothing else Jewish all week often keep this one.
Eishet Chayil — the closing chapter of Proverbs, sung by a husband to his wife.
Kiddush over a cup of wine or grape juice.
Washing, then the blessing over two whole challot — two, for the double portion of manna that fell on Fridays in the wilderness.
The meal, then songs, then grace after meals.
The meal is the institution. Everything else on this page can be learned later; a Friday night table with people at it is the thing that actually changes a household. If you do not have one to go to, we will find you one — that is what the hospitality page is for, and it is used far more than people assume.
Saturday
Morning services, with the weekly Torah portion read from the scroll and an additional Musaf service. Longer than Friday night — people arrive across the morning, which is normal.
Kiddush afterwards: a drink, herring, cake, and half an hour of talking. Frequently the reason people come.
The second meal, at home, with Kiddush and two challot again. Then, traditionally, a nap.
Mincha in the afternoon, then seudah shlishit, the third meal — small, eaten in the dusk, often with singing and a short teaching.
Maariv, and then havdalah.
Havdalah closes it: a cup of wine, a box of spices passed round so the smell carries the day a little further, and a braided candle with more than one wick, held up so the light catches your fingernails. Four blessings, and the week starts.
Melacha, in plain terms
The word usually translated “work” is melacha, and the translation is what confuses everybody. Melacha does not mean effort. It means constructive, purposeful activity — specifically, the thirty-nine categories of activity that were used to build the Sanctuary in the wilderness, which the Torah places immediately next to the command to keep Shabbat.
So the test is not “is this hard”. It is “am I making, changing, or fixing something”.
Which produces a set of results that seem strange until the principle lands:
Permitted: carrying a sofa across the room. Walking five miles. Reading for eight hours. Eating a meal for three.
Not permitted: striking a match. Writing your name. Tearing a piece of paper along a line.
The categories that come up in an ordinary week:
Fire and electricity. No lights switched on or off, no oven, no car, no appliances. Timers set in advance are the standard solution.
Cooking. Food is cooked before Shabbat and kept warm on a covered heat source that was already on — a hotplate, or a blech over the stove. Water for tea comes from an urn.
Writing and erasing. Which takes in phones, laptops, drawing and the crossword.
Commerce. No buying, no selling, no money, and no talking about business.
Carrying between private and public space, which is why an eruv matters — and is the difference between a family with a stroller coming to Shul and staying home. See the eruv page, and confirm the boundary with the people who maintain it before you rely on it.
Tearing, gardening, laundering, and a long tail of others that come up rarely.
Saving a life overrides all of it. Call the ambulance, drive to the hospital, switch on whatever needs switching on, and do not pause to work out whether it is serious enough. The halacha is explicit that hesitating in order to ask a question first is the error, not the action.
How to start, if you never have
This section exists because the usual presentation of Shabbat is all-or-nothing, and all-or-nothing reliably produces nothing. It is not how anybody actually starts, including people who now keep it fully.
Three principles first.
One thing is a whole thing. Lighting candles is a complete Mitzvah. It is not “partially keeping Shabbat”. There is no grade being awarded.
Preparation is most of it. Shabbat feels impossible when you arrive at Friday evening unprepared and pleasant when the food is cooked and the phone is already away. The difference is one hour on Thursday.
A week you get wrong is not a verdict. Everybody has weeks where it collapses. The people who keep Shabbat are not the people who never lost a week; they are the people who did the next one anyway.
A workable sequence, at whatever pace suits:
Light candles. Two candles, eighteen minutes before sunset, this Friday. Check the time on the times page. Ask us for candles and a card with the blessing on it if you want them — we have them.
Eat a Friday night meal. Challah from the shop, grape juice, and whoever you can get to the table. Say Kiddush from a card. Nobody has to sing.
Put the phone away for the evening. Friday sunset to Saturday morning. Most people find this is the part that surprises them.
Come to a Shabbat meal at somebody’s house. Doing it once with a family that keeps it teaches more than reading does. Ask for an invitation; hosts want guests.
Come to Shul on Shabbat morning. Arrive late, leave when you like, stay for Kiddush.
Extend the day. Phone away until Saturday night. Then no driving. Then the rest, in whatever order suits your household — there is no fixed sequence and no deadline.
Practical things nobody mentions
Set light timers, or leave the lamps you want on.
Turn off the phone before candle lighting rather than putting it face down.
A hotplate or a blech, and an urn of hot water, solve most of Saturday.
Tear the toilet paper on Friday, or buy tissues. Everybody does this and nobody says it out loud.
Take out contact lenses, cut nails, and set out clothes before candle lighting.
Tell people at work you are unreachable from Friday afternoon. In this valley that is a smaller ask than you think.
Coming here
Our service times are on the schedule, this week’s candle lighting on the times page, and what to expect as a first-time visitor on the visitors page. There is no membership and nothing to pay.
And if what you want is not a service but a table with people at it — say so. It is the most common request the office gets and the easiest one to answer.
Want it on paper? There is a Shabbat checklist you can tick off as the week goes, or print.
This Friday, in order
Friday before candle lighting
2 days to go
Tick these off as the afternoon goes. The ticks clear themselves each week.
Cook, or buy, the Friday night meal and the food for Saturday.
Set the lamps and timers, and start the hotplate or blech.
Two whole challot, a cup, and wine or grape juice for Kiddush.
Candles and matches ready. Light them eighteen minutes before sunset.
Tear the toilet paper, set out clothes, and put the phone away.
Give a few coins to Tzedakah before lighting. Tzedakah
Tick each as you go. Ticks stay on this device only.
Questions people ask
When does Shabbat start and end?
Candles are lit eighteen minutes before sunset on Friday, and Shabbat ends at nightfall on Saturday — around forty to seventy minutes after sunset depending on the reckoning used. Both times move week by week with the season. This site computes them for San Jose on the times page.
Who lights the candles?
The custom is that the women and girls of the household light: a married woman lights two candles, and girls light one each from the age of three. Where there is no woman present, a man lights with the blessing. The order is unusual — you light first, then cover your eyes, then say the blessing — because saying it first would begin Shabbat and lighting would then be forbidden.
What does melacha actually mean?
Not “work” in the sense of effort. Melacha means constructive activity, and the thirty-nine categories are drawn from the activities used to build the Sanctuary in the wilderness. So carrying a heavy table across the room is permitted, and striking a match is not. The test is whether you are changing or making something, not whether it is tiring.
Why can’t you switch on a light?
Kindling a fire is one of the thirty-nine categories, and completing an electrical circuit is treated as falling within that family of prohibitions. In practice households set timers before Shabbat, leave a lamp on, and put the hot food on a covered heat source that was turned on beforehand.
What if there is an emergency?
You act, immediately and without hesitating. Saving a life overrides Shabbat completely — you call the ambulance, you drive to the hospital, you do whatever is needed. This is not a grudging exception; the halacha is that someone who stops to ask a rabbi first has done the wrong thing.
I have never kept Shabbat. Where do I start?
With one thing, this Friday. Light candles at the right time. That is a complete Mitzvah on its own and it takes ninety seconds. Add a Friday night meal when you are ready, then try putting the phone away for the evening. Doing one part of Shabbat is not a half-measure; it is the part you are doing.
Will people at Shul be able to tell that I do not know what I am doing?
Possibly, and nobody is keeping score. A shul is full of people at completely different points, most of whom were where you are at some stage. Tell somebody it is your first time and they will find you a seat and the right page.
Anything on this page that is a question about your situation — a fast you have been told not to keep, a kitchen you are not sure how to handle, a custom your family does differently — is a question for a person, not a page. Ask Rabbi Mendel, or call the office. Nobody will think less of you for asking; the questions on this list are asked every single year.