No Mourning on Shabbos
When sudden grief struck his family on Shabbos, the Netziv held to the holiness of the day, and wept only after Havdalah.
A story ofRav Naftali Tzvi Yehuda Berlin of Volozhinהרב נפתלי צבי יהודה בן יעקב ברליןProfile ›
It is told that one Friday night a sudden death struck the family of the Netziv. Rav Chaim Berlin, his son, had married a third time only a few months earlier, and now his wife passed away without warning. Rav Chaim was away in Vilna on yeshivah business, and the news reached the house while the table was still set for Shabbos.
Those who saw the Netziv that night did not see a man in mourning. The spirit of the day rested on him, and his face shone. A relative, overcome by the tragedy, let a tear fall. The Netziv turned to him and said that today is Shabbos, and there is no mourning on Shabbos.
He kept the whole day this way, in calm and in song, giving the household nothing to lean on but the day itself.
Only after Havdalah did the other side show. He went into his room, closed the door and wept aloud, and no one could console him. The firmness of the day before had never been coldness. He had held his grief back because Shabbos asked it of him, and when the day was over he gave it its full due.
The account is recorded in the memoir of his son Rav Meir Bar-Ilan, and it shows a rosh yeshivah who could rule his heart by Torah and still feel every loss.
Source: Rav Meir Bar-Ilan (Berlin), Mi-Volozhin ad Yerushalayim (From Volozhin to Jerusalem), pp. 54-55, as cited in the Volozhin Yizkor book (Sefer Volozhin), section on Rav Chaim Berlin.
When something hard lands on you shortly before or during Shabbos, you do not have to pretend that nothing happened. You can still choose to let the day carry the first hours. Say what is true in a sentence to Hashem, set the matter aside until Motzei Shabbos, and let the table, the davening and the song steady you. Afterward, give the matter real time and, if you need to, tears. Holding back for Shabbos is a form of trust, and feeling it fully later is not weakness.