And on the Shabbos day, two unblemished lambs under the age of one year. (Bemidbar 28:9)
The Baalei Tosafos cite a question of Chazal from the Midrash: among all the various Mussaf offerings, you will not find one as small as that of Shabbos. All other mussaf offerings have at least one bull and one ram and seven lambs. But on Shabbos there are only two lambs and that’s it. Chazal say that Shabbos protested this and complained before Hakadosh Baruch Hu about its meager Mussaf.
Hakadosh Baruch Hu answered that this is the offering most fitting for her, because all the matters of Shabbos are double. There is a double song – “A psalm, a song for the Shabbos day.” A doubled delight – “And you shall call Shabbos a delight, the holy day of Hashem honored.” A doubled punishment – “Those who desecrate it shall die, they shall die.” A double bread – “lechem mishneh.” Thus it is fitting that Shabbos’s offering should be double – “two unblemished lambs.”
This may be compared to a king who said to his servants, “Prepare a banquet for my son. Prepare such and such foods.” Afterwards he commanded them to prepare a banquet for himself. His servants said to him, “What shall we prepare for the king?” He said to them, “And for my son, what did you prepare?” They said to him, “Such and such.” He said to them, “Prepare for me the same thing, no more than what you prepared for my son.”
We can understand the message as follows. Shabbos is called “bris olam,” an eternal covenant. That means it is a bond and connection between the Jewish people and Hashem. And the bond is so strong that Hakadosh Baruch Hu adapts Himself to us, so to speak, as in the above mashal about the king. He loves his child so much that he doesn’t want a meal fit for a king to be prepared for him, because then he won’t be able to be together with his son, due to the grandeur of the event. He would
