Mitzvot and Mindfulness: A Blessing on Your Head

By Rabbi Elyse Winick
KOACH Director

Shulhan Arukh, Orah Hayyim 46:3
One is obligated to recite at least 100 blessings each day.

While one might expect that the season of Tishrei holidays would fill us with an overflowing sense of God’s presence and our own spiritual well-being, it’s not unusual to find yourself a little shellshocked when the holiday season comes to a close. Now, entering the month of Heshvan, we have the opportunity to take a deep breath and rediscover our spiritual center.

For most of us, the notion of reciting a brakhah or a blessing on virtually everything we do is a foreign concept. It’s not that we aren’t appreciative of what we have, or that we aren’t cognizant of God’s role in our world. It’s just not part of the rhythm of what we do or how we articulate those feelings.

That said, consider this. It’s a crisp Fall day and you’ve been out at class all afternoon. You finally come back home, blue sky and vibrant leaves behind you, and you are ravenous. There’s a bowl of apples on the table and before you even shift your bag off your shoulder, you’ve grabbed an apple and have taken a hearty bite. In an instant the edge is off your hunger and you are munching away while flipping through the mail or a magazine, still on your feet. Your hunger is abated, it’s true, but even that is a sidebar to whatever else you are doing.

Now replay the scenario this way. It’s a crisp Fall day and you’ve been out at class all afternoon. You finally come back home, blue sky and vibrant leaves behind you, and you are ravenous. There’s a bowl of apples on the table and before you even shift your bag off your shoulder, you’ve grabbed an apple and prepare to take a hearty bite. You pause for a moment to recite the blessing over fruit that grows on trees, borei pri ha-etz. In that moment, that very brief moment, you are aware of the heft of the apple in your hand, the smooth shine and color of its skin and its fragrance. After the brakhah you hear the skin pop as you sink your teeth into the fruit, the juicy crunch filling your mouth with tart sweetness. You’ve taken the edge off your hunger and, deep in your soul, something relaxes.

It didn’t take more than a brief moment to recite the blessing, yet that bit of awareness opened you up to a far greater appreciation of the apple, its life from seed to tree to fruit, the rain and the sunshine which nurtured its growth and the hand which plucked the apple from the tree. What could have been no more significant than meeting a basic human need has now been elevated to a moment of experiencing God’s presence.

We recite brakhot not to bless our food, but to acknowledge its source. In a way, the blessing is a legal transaction, giving us the right to consume something which has a different Ultimate Owner. But it takes us out of the demands of our day, superficial and otherwise, linking us with something greater than our selves. It infuses us with a sense of m’lo khol ha-aretz k’vodo – the whole world is filled with God’s glory (Isaiah 6:3).

Feed your body, of course, but also feed your soul.

[Posted 10/28/11]