The food we eat is the most tangible exchange we make with our environment. Our food is what most immediately connects us with the physical world around us. When you take in food, you temporarily negate the illusion of separation between your body and the rest of existence. Food is a breach of the boundary where we normally perceive separation to begin.
In other words, food is communion. It is an affirmation of interconnection and unity with our environment. What we take in becomes, in a very visceral way, a part of us. And we increasingly become composed of it. Remember the common saying, You are what you eat.
This is exemplified in the Christian tradition when Christ tells his followers that, if they don't eat his flesh in the form of the sanctified bread they have no connection with him, he is saying that his essence must be taken into their being in the way that food is taken into the body. Divine substance must be taken in so that it becomes a part of us, and we a part of it. Our thoughts, feelings, our very cells, our total identity must be built of that divine substance -- until finally no boundary is seen between one's individual being and the eternal Being which sustains us. That is holy communion.
Similar esoteric principles are found, with greater or lesser emphasis, in all world traditions, such as Hindu traditions of prasad. Food is inherently communion with the physical world. It just requires that you peer a little deeper to recognize the more sublime communion, as well.
Something to chew on...
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A Morning Offering |
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Angelou, Maya Alone |
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Attar, Farid ud-Din The Hawk |
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Aurobindo The Word of The Silence |
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Eldar Edda (Anonymous) Odin's Shaman Song (from Eldar Edda) |
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Emre, Yunus The Truth fills the world |
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Francis of Assisi Prayer Inspired by the Our Father |
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Gibran, Kahlil Good and Evil |
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Gorakhnath Gorakh Bani |
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Hamadani, Ayn al-Qozat As Long as I Live |
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Holderlin, Friedrich Bread and Wine, Part 7 |
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Hsuan Chueh of Yung Chia / Yoka Genkaku [7] Release your hold on earth, water, fire, wind (from The Shodoka) |
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Hsuan Chueh of Yung Chia / Yoka Genkaku [35] High in the Himalayas, only fei-ni grass grows (from The Shodoka) |
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ibn Gabirol, Solomon Come to me at dawn, my beloved, and go with me |
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ibn Gabirol, Solomon Where Will I Find You |
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Izzet, Asik Ali The Path of the Beautiful |
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Janabai There is nothing empty of divine |
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John of the Cross Not for All the Beauty |
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John of the Cross Song of the Soul That Delights in Knowing God by Faith |
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John of the Cross The Fountain |
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Kerouac, Jack The Scripture of the Golden Eternity |
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Khayyam, Omar [11] Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough |
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Khayyam, Omar [56] And this I know: whether the one True Light |
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Ko Un Two beggars |
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Lalla Your way of knowing is a private herb garden |
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Lee, Li-Young From Blossoms |
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Levertov, Denise Stepping Westward |
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Levine, Stephen In the realm of the passing away |
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Maharshi, Ramana The Marital Garland of Letters |
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Maharshi, Ramana The Song of the Poppadum |
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McCombs, Chris Go Deeper |
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Merton, Thomas A Practical Program for Monks |
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Merwin, W. S. Finding a Teacher |
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Merwin, W. S. Thanks |
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Milarepa Response to a Logician |
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Milarepa The Song of Food and Dwelling |
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Nammalvar While I was waiting eagerly for him |
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Niffari (an-Niffari, Muhammad ibn al-Hasan) Stand at the throne (from The Standing Of the Presence Chamber and the Letter) |
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Oliver, Mary What is There Beyond Knowing? |
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Pope, Alexander The Universal Prayer |
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Rabia al-Basri (Adawiyya, Rabia al-) My joy |
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Ramprasad (Sen, Ramprasad) This time I shall devour Thee utterly, Mother Kali! |
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Ramsay, Jay Sadhu |
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Ramsay, Jay Sadhu |
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Rumi, Mevlana Jelaluddin Fasting |
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Rumi, Mevlana Jelaluddin What I want is to see your face |
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Ryokan Even if you consume as many books |
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Sanai, Hakim The Good Darkness |
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Sanai, Hakim Then through that dim murkiness |
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Saraha The Royal Song of Saraha (Dohakosa) |
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Sarton, May New Year Resolve |
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Shabistari, Mahmud Reason (from The Secret Rose Garden) |
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Silesius, Angelus So many droplets in the sea, in bread so many grains |
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Sinan, Ummi The Rose |
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Stein, Edith I Will Remain With You... |
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Stein, Edith Novena Of The Holy Spirit |
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Symeon the New Theologian You, oh Christ, are the Kingdom of Heaven |
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Therese of Lisieux The Divine Dew |
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Trungpa, Chogyam A Heart Lost and Discovered |
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Trungpa, Chogyam Purifying and Invoking the Four Directions |
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Tukaram Words are the only Jewels I possess |
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Underhill, Evelyn Corpus Christi |
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Ungar, Lynn Blessing the Bread |
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Vivekananda Song of the Sanyasin |
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Walters, Dorothy The Sibyl |
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Yeats, William Butler Sailing to Byzantium |