The word bread has been entering my thoughts frequently this past week.
Over a week ago I was thinking about the word sacrament which lead me to the word eucharist, which is known by many as the Holy Communion. This is a ritual commemoration of Jesus’s last supper with his disciples. It comes from Greek eucharistia for “thanksgiving”. And “breaking bread” is a way of saying you are sharing your food with family and friends.
This week I got into a conversation with a boy in one of my classes about cooking. He told me that he likes to cook. When I asked him, “What do you like to cook?” , he responded that he liked to cook bread, and he specifically mentioned Monkey Bread.
I let our conversation end since school work was waiting for his attention. After school I researched Monkey Bread since I was unfamiliar with this name. I found a very easy recipe using Pillsbury Grand Biscuits. While I was looking at pictures of Monkey Bread, I thought it looked like it would be perfect for breaking bread with my family this coming Thanksgiving.
Just the other day I was picking up laundry detergent at the store, and I saw a large wall filled with Oreo cookies. Normally, I try to avoid these since they can be very addictive. Something made me take a closer look, and this is when I saw the Limited Edition Gingerbread Oreos .
As you can see the breads I have been seeing this week are both sweet breads. This thought made me remember a Persian meal I was served in Paris long ago.
There are sweet breads and then there are sweetbreads. “Sweetbreads” have a very misleading name because they are not sweet nor are they bread. They are the thymus and pancreas glands of animals.
When I was served a meal of sweetbreads long ago, it was whispered to me that it was pig brains, so I am not sure what I ate. I did not eat very much of it despite the risk of being rude to our host.
Historians think they are called sweetbreads because they are richer and more delicate than typical meats, and they are breads because the old English word for flesh was “braed”.
Today I am focused on the phrase…”bread upon the waters”… What does this mean? There are many interpretations of this phrase. The one I like has to do with spreading goodness into the world without the expectation of getting anything back in return.
This is an attitude I would like to adopt because expectations can set you up for disappointment and resentment, which is even worse. I would like to try and spread goodness for its own sake, and for no other reason.
As you can see here, words can be very tricky and have different meanings for different people. Words are symbols and language is an art form. When one is trying to understand the written word, we should look beyond our own personal connection to the words, and look into the history of their roots.
When reading the words of those that have lived before us, we cannot always rely on our first interpretation of their words. The author’s intention is not always how we interpret it.
movingforwardslowly 