In biblical times, breakfast could be served at any time from early morning to noon (Pro 31:15; Joh 21:12, Joh 21:15). Lunch came after the morning’s work had been completed (Mar 7:4) or when the midday sun made work too difficult (Rth 2:14). Dinner was generally the main meal for the Hebrews (Rth 3:7), while the Egyptians served their most important meal at noon (Gen 43:16). Jesus fed the multitudes at the end of the day (Mat 14:15; Mar 6:35; Luk 9:12).
The foods of the people of the East can be classified into four groups:
grains, vegetables, fruits and animal products. The grains were obtained from the fields, rubbed with the hands to separate the chaff and eaten raw (Luk 6:1). Sometimes they crushed or ground the grains in the mortar and cooked the flour into pottage or cakes (Num 11:8; Pro 27:22). This work was usually done by women (Mat 24:41) or by servants (Exo 11:5; Jdg 16:21).
Fruits grew in great abundance in Palestine and consisted of grapes, figs, olives, blackberries, pomegranates, oranges, lemons, melons, dates, almonds, and walnuts. The grapes were eaten fresh or dried in the form of raisins. They served as the main element of wines that were made sweet or fermented. Olives were eaten as food but were also used to make olive oil. There were two kinds of figs, the early ones, or figs (Isa 28:4) and the main crop (Jer 8:13). The latter used to be dried and crushed into cakes. Dates were used both raw and dried.
Most of the meats came from fattened sheep, lambs, goats, and calves. The pig was eaten but not by the Hebrews. Some eggs were used as food (Isa 10:14). They also ate lobsters and fish. The Hebrews used milk from cattle and goats to drink. They made cheese and butter from it.
Knives, forks and spoons were not used for eating. They used to wash their hands and offer a word of prayer before eating. The meat was cooked and put in its own juices on a large plate on the table. The content was taken with the fingers or placed on a slice of bread and brought to the mouth. The Egyptians sat around a round table for meals. The early Hebrews sat, kneeled, or squatted while eating, but later they evidently reclined to eat. Usually three would fit on a cushion, so that the head of one was on the chest of another (John 13:23-25).
They reclined on three sides of a rectangular table leaving the fourth side free so that the servants could serve.
Food was cooked in a variety of ways over a fire made of charcoal (Pro 26:21), wood (1Ki 17:10), thorns (Isa 33:12), or grass (Luk 12:28).
Source: Hispanic World Bible Dictionary
(-> food, sacrifices, bread, wine, vegetarians, multiplications, Eucharist). Since ancient times, meals have had a sacred character, forming perhaps the most important of all religious signs. They constitute an essential element of the Israelite identity, centered in an intense way on the rites of the table and bed (that is, of food and family). From that base we need some elements, principles and more significant features of the Israelite meals.
(1) Food, a religious gesture. We begin with some features that define the sacred character of meals, from a general perspective, which we apply especially to Israel, (a) Feeding God. Some peoples have thought that they should feed God with their sacrifices, as the myth of blood in the Aztecs of Mexico and the background criticism of the story of Bel and the Dragon (Dan 14) suppose. Jotán’s poem can be understood in this line, when he declares that wine makes gods and men happy (cf. Je 9,13), assuming a theme common to many Canaanites and Greeks, who present the gods on Saphon or Olympus , eating and drinking ambrosia, came from heaven. This vision is at the heart of the Jewish ritual of sacrifices, performed by the priests of the temple, when they pour out and/or burn the noblest parts of the animals in their honor (cf. Jew 6:17-24; 13:15- 23.26). (b) Eat with God. More than feeding God, the Bible supposes that men should feed themselves with God, sharing his sustenance; thus it is said that they must eat in the presence of God, celebrating his blessing (cf. Dt 12,5-7). In this way a joyous communion can be established (men and gods share food), but a division and competition can arise, as Hesiod has shown when he affirms that Prometheus instituted sacrifices, dividing a part of the great bull for the gods, another for the mens. The common bull (which should have been a sign of the pact) has confronted them, since both wanted the best part (cf. Teogonia, 535-559). Religion has been able to become an expression of selfish competition between God (who asks men for a type of tax) and men who have difficulty paying it, as Malachi has seen when he criticizes the stingy Jews because they bring defective animals to God, miserable offerings (cf. Mal 1,9-14). (c) Eating with other men. In the previous moment, men reserved something for God and burned it on the altar, eating the rest themselves. But at a given moment, the faithful no longer reserve anything for God, but offer everything (because it belongs to Him), but, at the same time, they can eat and eat everything they have offered (because God returns it to them). blessed). Everything belongs to God, not a part, and everything, absolutely everything, is for men, although sometimes with some exceptions: the Jews always reserve the blood for God, because it contains the life that belongs only to God (cf. Lv 17,10-14).
(2) Principles of Israelite food. The account of creation (Gn 2-3) supposes that men are maintained and united and separated by their meals. Well, the Jews have developed a special food law, even assuming that only one who eats pure food (kosher) with other pure Jews is a true Jew. Two norms are included here, (a) Eat only pure food, never impure food such as pork or mixed, such as milk with meat (cf. Dt 14,1-21; Lv 11), because they constitute a threat against holiness and separation from the people. (b) Eat only with other clean eaters, since the impurity of others causes a stain on the Israelites. These norms constitute an essential element of the Israelite identity, since the biblical religion is not a simple inner feeling, an intimate piety or faith, separated from life, but an integrating social institution, with family and social laws: Sabbath and circumcision; land, city and temple, festivals and meals. At first, every meal of meat began as a sacrifice, presided over by the priest or father of the family, so that the animal is offered to God and shared in a joyful gesture of social communion and praise. At a given moment (around the 6th-5th century BC), with the centralization of the cult in Jerusalem, normal foods became de-sacralized, including animal meat. Paradoxically, this change constitutes the starting point of a stronger re-sacralization: many pious Jews, of the Essenian, Pharisaic or Rabbinical line, at least since the time of Jesus, have interpreted all their meals as a rite of purity, a celebration that it keeps them linked to each other and separate from other peoples. Along these lines, it can be added, in a very profound sense, that only one who eats in brotherhood and purity with other Jews is a true Jew.
(3) Israel, table religion. Good Jews are only those who can take part in religious meals: those who can eat together, remembering and blessing the God of their nation. Every house of pious Jews is a temple, every meal a purity sacrifice. Thus it is added that they are good Jews (and not simple people of the earth) those who comply with the rules of separation in food, avoiding food offered to idols or touched by contaminated people, (a) An essential element of purity in the food is the absence of blood. This implies that the meat must come from a ritually slaughtered animal, so that, in fact, pious Jews can only eat meat purchased from Jewish butcher shops; but in this they agree with Islam, which also assumes the food laws that are at the bottom of Noah’s commandments* (“You shall not eat meat with its life, which is its blood”: Gn 9:4). (b) We must also cite the law of pure food (which maintains the cosmic order, willed by God) and impure food, which goes against God’s order and contaminates man according to Law (cf. Dt 14,1- 21; Lev 11), forming a threat against the sanctity of the people. Every meal is therefore a prayer that confirms the creative work of God. For this reason, in a very deep sense, only one is true Jew who eats before God, in brotherhood and purity, with other true Jews. Many pious Jews, of the Essenian, Pharisaic or Rabbinical line, at least since the time of Jesus, take their meals as a rite of purity, a celebration that keeps them linked to each other and separated from other peoples. Along these lines, it has been possible to affirm that Judaism is a table religion: each house of the pious is a temple; each meal, a sacrifice of purity. Thus it is added that good Jews (and not simple people of the earth) are those who comply with the rules of separation in food, avoiding food offered to idols or touched by contaminated people. In this context, the novelty of Jesus is inscribed, who eats with sinners and offers bread and fish to all who come looking for him, without distinction of purity; From here we understand the first institutional novelty of the Church, which defends the union of Jews and Gentiles (cf. Acts 15; Gal 1-2). From this perspective, many Christians have accused the Jews saying that they maintain food taboos that go against the goodness of creation and food rationality… But there are Jews who respond to Christians by telling them that their Eucharist has ceased to be what was, a real meal, to become a kind of spiritualized food simulacrum.
(4) Judaism. (1) The God of food. The rabbinical fixation of Jewish traditions, which began after the fall of the Second Temple (70 AD) and accentuated after the Bar Kokba War (135 AD), culminates with the publication of the Mishnah, around the year 200 AD Only from then one can speak of Judaism strictly speaking, where part of the previous traditions (Essene, Pharisees, Sadducees) are collected, while others are left out (in the line of political messianism, hard apocalyptic, Christianity, Hellenistic proselytism and even gnosis). This is how Judaism was born, which has survived in later centuries, as a religion of law and purity, centered on the Mishnah, which is…