EXOD329 What is it that a Jew may not do on Shabbat? The Torah simply says that melachah is prohibited. This word is often mistranslated to mean work. It cannot be the intention that work, manual labor, is prohibited since the Hebrew word for manual labor or work is avodah and not melachah. What, then, is melachah that is prohibited and what does it symbolize? The word melachah is found in the Torah in only two contexts besides Shabbat. One is at the end of the creation story. Genesis 2:1-3 God finished all the melachah and rested from His melachah. This, it is clear that melachah is that activity that God did during the first six days of the world, that is, creation or creative activity. This, then, is what is prohibited on Shabbat, and not work. ... The only other Torah reference to melachah is the building of the Tabernacle. Exodus 31:3-4. This, too, is related to creative and purposeful activity, and the building of the Tabernacle has been compared to a microcosm of the original creation itself. Thus, the thirty-nine categories of forbidden creative activity are derived from those activities performed in building and maintaining the Tabernacle. Shabbat 49b