Yesterday I talked to my friend who is a teacher at a charter school. Today she was to start online classes for her 9th grade students as a result of the quarantine. Since I know that she teaches at a charter school in inner city Houston, I know that her students are overwhelmingly Latino, poor and have parents that want a better education for their children than currently available in their neighborhood public school. I asked my friend if all her students were set up for distance learning with computers and internet access. My friend told me that she called each of her student’s families and asked what they needed for distance learning and how the school could help in general. She reported that in a lot of her families, the parents were no longer being paid and asked specifically for food.

I have complained about the quarantine, but for now I have a job that pays me every two weeks. Even if I lost my job, I have enough resources so that food safety will not be one of my concerns for a very long time. I am not concerned that my children do not have access to everything they need for distance learning. In a word, I feel blessed. “Blessed” in modern American English can mean “lucky to have something” and that is what I mean. “Blessed” can also mean “to make holy; to consecrate”.

When we “bless” food, we generally are invoking the second meaning. I don’t routinely bless my food, but I always try to express gratitude for the person who prepared it (usually my wife) and I will try to express gratitude for the life I lead. Do I believe in God? Am I thanking God for my blessings? I don’t know, but I know that life is more meaningful and enjoyable when I feel gratitude for what I have, not envy for what I do not have. When we Thank God by blessing food, we are consecrating it, making it something more than biological sustenance, but we are also expressing gratitude for what we have – gratitude that through a complex web of biological processes and social relationships I am able to enjoy a delicious meal.

Today’s Daf starts a new chapter. Unlike the previous chapters where I was unsure of what was different, this chapter starts with a new topic altogether – the blessings we say over food. We start with a Mishnah that tells us what blessing we say over various food items – fruits, wine, nuts, bread, greens, etc. Our Gemara starts with the question, why do we have to say a blessing at all before we eat. We look to Leviticus 19:24 (“In the fourth year all its fruit shall be set aside for jubilation before the Lord.”). The Talmud is not happy with this explanation because this verse really only applies to the special case of wine. We consider the requirement to bless bread, but this too had special ritual rules that might make it different. In the end, the Talmud cannot find a suitable scriptural source for the requirement that we bless all food before we eat it. Instead, the Talmud concludes that reason requires us to say a blessing before we derive any benefit from this world.

We then learn that deriving benefit from the world without first offering a blessing is like stealing from the Temple. We learn that until we bless something we intend to use, it belongs to God. Only after we bless the object (in effect thanking God and asking permission) can we make use of it.

As a side note, the Talmud today notes that Torah study needs to be combined with an occupation. The Talmud cites Deuteronomy 11:14 (“I will grant the rain for your land in season, the early rain and the late. You shall gather in your new grain and wine and oil -“). Not all of the sages agree with this principle. Some believe that if we follow God’s law, Jews will be free to study as others will take care of their physical needs. However, I believe to be a good leader (religious, political, sports, military), you need to understand the people you lead and there is no better way to understand than to share the life of those you lead.

We get a lot of discussion of a golden age of the past. The Rabbis look to a time when everyone was pious, studious and good looking. People worked to be able to study Torah. Now, we do not have such physical safety and abundance, so we work harder. We care less about our religious obligations and now we feel insecure in both the secular and religious realms. Of course, most societies in this world have looked back to a mythical golden age. Even if such an age never existed, the dream tells us a lot about what people want in their lives.

Wine (and grapes) are a special case for blessings. We say a different blessing over wine than we do over other fruits. The Rabbis want to know why. While investigating this anomaly, we learn that Rava would drink a lot of wine on the day before the first Passover Seder. Rava did this to beautify the commandment to eat Matzah on Passover because he would desire Matzah more if he had been drinking. Ultimately, the Rabbis do not conclude (at least in today’s Daf) why wine gets a special blessing.

While we sit at home and wait for this pandemic to pass, I sincerely hope and pray that your are well, safe and lack nothing that is necessary.