Parshas Achrei-Kedoshim 5786 "Lo Socholu Al Hadam" - Why Do (Not) We Eat Before Davening?

00:00 There is a well-known custom among chassidim: although the Shulchan Aruch says to take care not to eat before davening, in our generations, when people are weaker than they used to be, we eat at least something beforehand to strengthen ourselves. There is a well-known story about this involving the Tzemach Tzedek’s daughter-in-law, Rebbetzin Rivkah, the wife of the Rebbe Maharash. She was a young woman, but she was not well. Her doctor told her she needed to eat in the morning when she got up, to strengthen her body. She used to rise very early, daven, and only then eat. Naturally, that became difficult for her health. The Rebbe Maharash knew about it, and so did the Tzemach Tzedek. The Tzemach Tzedek called her in and told her that the Torah says of the mitzvos, “You shall live by them.” “You shall live by them” means that a Jew must be healthy and must therefore look after their health. A Jew needs to be healthy in order to fulfill mitzvos with vitality. For that, one has to be healthy. And he said what became a well-known saying among chassidim: Better to eat so that you can daven than to daven so that you can eat. In other words, a person gets up in the morning and rushes to daven because he wants to eat. And—

01:30 In other words, you’re standing in davening and thinking about food. So it’s better the other way around: eat so that afterward you can daven with greater focus, rather than daven so that afterward you can eat. And that is indeed the practice among chassidim. I once heard from the chossid Reb Mendel Futerfas, who told a story about an older chossid, one of the chassidim of earlier times, a graduate of Tomchei Temimim in Lubavitch, named Reb Shmuel Fridsher. He said there was once a whole discussion about this. Torah scholars and people versed in halachah asked: How is it that chassidim eat before davening? Reb Shmuel said, “That isn’t true. Chassidim don’t eat before davening.” But what do you mean? We see them eating before davening. He said, “That isn’t true. A Jew, a chossid, does not eat before davening. A chossid gets up in the morning, prepares to daven, and says the morning blessings. When a chossid says the morning blessings, he doesn’t merely recite them; he says them with concentration. He reflects, as explained in Chassidus, on how each of the morning blessings relates to the soul’s descent into this world. When he says, ‘Who gives the rooster understanding to distinguish between day and night,’ ‘rooster’ also means ‘heart’—the animal soul, the intellectual soul. And so, too, ‘to distinguish between day and night’: one must distinguish between Torah, between light and darkness, in serving Hashem. And when he says, ‘Who opens the eyes of the blind’—that—

03:01 one needs to open one’s eyes, to have good, discerning eyes with which to look at things, to be ‘one who sees,’ to see the world. And ‘Who clothes the naked’—one needs to clothe oneself in the garments of Torah and mitzvos. And ‘Who straightens the bent’—one needs to lift one’s eyes: ‘Raise your eyes on high and see Who created these.’ Every blessing takes on its spiritual meaning. After that, he says the short Shema, reciting Shema at its proper time. He says Shema with concentration, contemplating the oneness of Hashem. So he is already deeply immersed in davening. And after that, he eats something. You see? That isn’t eating before davening. He is already deep in serving Hashem. In any case, in today’s series, on Parshas Acharei-Kedoshim: Parshas Kedoshim is one of the parshiyos with many mitzvos. It contains the verse for one of the prohibitions from which we learn the ban on eating before davening: ‘Do not eat over the blood.’ On the verse ‘Do not eat over the blood,’ Rashi says that there are many interpretations in the words of our Sages, in Sanhedrin and elsewhere. What does the verse mean? What does ‘Do not eat over the blood’ mean? There are several interpretations. One is that it refers to eating before the blood of the offerings has been sprinkled, or before an animal has died after slaughter, among others. A number of halachos are derived from the verse ‘Do not eat over the blood.’ The Gemara in Berachos says that from the verse ‘Do not eat over the blood’ we learn that one must not… not—

04:37 Our Sages derive from ‘Do not eat over the blood’: ‘Do not eat until you have prayed for your blood.’ From here we learn the halachah that it is forbidden to eat before davening. It must be ‘until you have prayed for your blood’: a person must pray for his own blood, for himself and his needs, and only then may he eat. In other words, so long as one has not davened, one must take care not to eat; only after davening and making a request ‘for your blood’ may one eat wholesome food. That is the teaching of our Sages. Further on in the passage, the Gemara in Berachos says that not only is eating prohibited, but even greeting someone: one must take care not to ask after another person’s welfare, not to greet one another before davening. That, too, comes from the same idea. The Gemara cites a verse from Yeshayahu on this subject: ‘Keep yourselves from the person whose soul is in his nostrils, for of what account is he?’ A person must be careful: ‘Keep yourselves’—refrain ‘from the person whose soul is in his nostrils.’ When someone is in a state where his ‘soul is in his nostrils,’ it means that his soul has not yet spread through his body. He has just woken up, and his soul is still ‘in his nostrils’; it has not yet spread through him, and he is not yet fully alive and awake. So ‘keep yourselves’—do not greet him. Why? ‘For of what account is he?’ The Gemara says—

06:09 The Gemara says: ‘Do not read it as “of what account,” but as “a high place.”’ Such a greeting is a high place, a display of self-importance and pride; it is not a genuine greeting. Not before davening; only afterward does it become a genuine greeting. We need to understand: What is the reason for this, really? What is the deeper meaning of this reason? Why, in fact, is it forbidden to eat before davening? And why must one be careful about greeting someone before davening? What does ‘Do not eat over the blood’—‘Do not eat until you have prayed for your blood’—mean? What is the significance of the precise wording ‘for your blood’? What is it meant to convey? The Alter Rebbe has a maamar on this. As is known, the Alter Rebbe delivered this maamar privately to the Tzemach Tzedek. He told the Tzemach Tzedek to write it down and add explanations and clarifications. The Alter Rebbe asked that those explanations be incorporated into the body of the maamar. Later, the Rebbe Maharash added notes to the maamar in a special way, and it was subsequently printed in a book of the Rebbe Maharash—the first book published immediately after his passing—the well-known Likkutei Torah LeGimel Parshiyos. At the beginning of the book is the maamar ‘Lehavin Inyan Nefesh HaElokis,’ in which he explains this teaching of our Sages, the words of the Gemara themselves, in an illuminating way. There he helps us understand the meaning—

07:43 of ‘Do not eat over the blood.’ We need to understand the purpose of davening and the purpose of eating. In general, regarding eating, the Arizal teaches us about the verse, ‘Man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every utterance of the mouth of Hashem.’ A person who wants to live has to eat. One cannot live without food. That is human nature. The question is: Why does a person need to eat? Why did Hakadosh Boruch Hu create human nature so that people need to eat? Sustenance and nourishment come from the inanimate, plant, and animal kingdoms. We eat physical, material things. And a human being is a speaking being. Why should a human being—the speaking being, the choicest of creations—depend for his survival on things lower than himself? The answer, as explained at length in Chassidus based on the writings of the Arizal, is: ‘For man lives by every utterance of the mouth of Hashem.’ Foods contain sparks of holiness. Every physical thing in the world—in the inanimate, plant, and animal kingdoms—contains sparks of holiness. And those sparks of holiness come from very lofty levels. Chassidus explains why this is so: the source of these sparks follows the principle that ‘whatever is higher falls lower.’ It is specifically in the lower things—the inanimate, plants, and animals—that the spark giving them life comes from a very lofty level, far above even the level of the human being. Chassidus explains that the human being is from the World of Tikkun, whereas physical things, the sparks, come

09:17 From the world of Tohu—and Tohu is higher than the world of Tikkun, though this is not the place to explain it at length; it is explained in Chassidus in several places. About this we say, “You shall not eat over the blood.” For a person to be able to elevate physical things—food, drink, the things he uses, and all such matters—and make them vessels for G-dliness; to elevate not only his body and animal soul, but also everything he eats, drinks, and uses in the world, he must be strong within himself. He must be an adam, a fully developed person. His soul must be strong, and then he can overcome physical things and elevate them. As long as he has not yet become an adam, has not yet experienced refinement and purification within himself, [unclear], his soul does not yet shine, and he does not have the strength of an adam. Then not only will he be unable to overcome physical matters and elevate them, but the opposite will happen: physical matters will drag him down and diminish him. He will eat to satisfy his appetite and become coarsened, instead of elevating those things. This is the inner meaning of our Sages’ teaching: “You shall not eat over the blood”—not until you have prayed for your blood. The Maggid of Mezritch says that the word adam is alef-dam. There is depth to the Gemara’s words in Sotah here. But

10:51 the Maggid of Mezritch explains it according to Chassidus. Adam is alef-dam. Dam, blood, represents the flesh, the material and the physical—“the life of the flesh is in the blood”—the material side of the animal soul. The alef represents the Master of the world. When a person gets up in the morning, his soul is still, so to speak, asleep. He has not yet davened. He has the dam, but the alef is missing. In other words, he has a body, physicality and materiality, and when he gets up in the morning he wants to eat, wants to drink, wants to sleep, wants to... He is still a physical being. The alef, the Master of the world, the soul, is still hidden and does not shine within him. Then comes the avodah of davening. The whole point of davening is “a ladder set on the earth, with its top reaching heaven”: before davening, one contemplates the greatness of Hashem. Through that contemplation, one awakens love and awe of Hashem in the soul. One goes through Pesukei Dezimra, the blessings of Shema, and Shema itself—“Hear, O Israel, Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One.” One brings that “One” inside, and it shines within a person in its fullest measure. Then he becomes an adam, an alef-dam. Only then, when he is an adam, can he refine the physical; he can eat. Then he can elevate the spark, bring it back to its source, and fulfill the purpose. This is what our Sages mean: “You shall not eat over the blood”—do not eat until you have prayed for your blood. The same applies to the teaching that “one may not greet another person before davening.” And the holy Baal Shem Tov

12:20 The Baal Shem Tov explains: What is meant by the prohibition against greeting someone before davening? The Baal Shem Tov says that a Jew’s first thought, speech, and action when he gets up in the morning must be holy. Everything that follows is drawn after them, because it is into them that he brings his G-dly powers. In this way, everything he does afterward receives a G-dly influence. The Baal Shem Tov explains that this is like what is taught in the writings of the Arizal: Why must one “honor your older brother”? The Gemara says that “Honor your father and your mother” includes your older brother. In other words, one must honor one’s older brother. The Arizal asks: Why? Because the father placed in the older brother “the spirit he left within him.” The older brother holds the father’s powers, his strongest powers, and all the siblings receive their influence through him. Honoring the older brother is therefore part of honoring the father. That is what the Arizal writes. The Baal Shem Tov says the same is true of thought, speech, and action. When a Jew gets up in the morning, his first thought, speech, and action are devoted to holiness, to davening and to serving Hashem. Then everything else in the day receives its vitality from that thought, speech, and action. That is why we say one may not greet someone before davening. One must begin the day, one must...

13:47 begin the day by serving Hashem: with Modeh Ani, washing one’s hands, the blessings, serving Hashem, and davening. By connecting to G-dliness in thought, speech, and action, only then can he act in the world, go out into the world and [unclear], practice Ahavas Yisroel, and work to refine the world—to make the world a dwelling place for Hashem. He can refine all physical things and make them vessels for G-dliness. That is the ultimate purpose. The purpose of a soul’s descent into this world is to make the world a dwelling place for Hashem: to go out into the world, refine it, and elevate it, making it a dwelling place for Hashem. But to do that, the G-dly soul must be fully expressed within him. Only then, when he seeks to bring the alef together with the dam, so that the Master of the world shines within the blood, can he act in the world. The Rebbe also spoke about this at the farbrengen of Parshas Acharei-Kedoshim in 5751: that is why we find that the only difference between the words golah, “exile,” and Geulah is the alef. Geulah is golah with an added alef. It is the same idea: Geulah does not mean that we

15:08 flee the world or flee exile. Rather, we change the world, reality, and nature, bringing the Master of the world, Hakadosh Boruch Hu, into the golah. Then that very world becomes a world of Geulah, a G-dly world. It begins with ourselves, with our bodies and animal souls, and then extends to everything around us. In this way, we make the world a dwelling place for Hashem. And so may we merit to see the complete Geulah, when “Hashem will be King over all the earth; on that day Hashem will be One and His name One,” speedily in our days, amen.