Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetsky
Chazal (Beitzah 16a) tell us that Hashem grants each person a neshama yeseira at the commencement of Shabbos and takes it away at the end of Shabbos. The simple understanding of a neshama yeseira is that the neshama (soul) of each Jew feels different. Yet, interestingly, Rashi (ibid.) captures the meaning of this Chazal with a very unique and perplexing description: “The neshama yeseira is a widening of one’s heart... which allows one to eat and drink and yet his soul does not despise himself.”
Rashi is essentially telling us that the neshama yeseira enables a person to not despise eating on Shabbos. Yet what does this mean? While it is true that one should strive to eat and drink l’shem shamayim, in order to have the strength to serve Hashem, at its most basic level, what does it mean that on Shabbos one is able to withstand eating?
In truth, a person would not need to eat if not for the fact that he is human. And if a person would not need to eat, doing so would be superfluous. When Moshe Rabbeinu ascended Har Sinai, he did not eat anything. He was being sustained and nourished by ruchniyus, spirituality.
On Shabbos, when we receive the neshama yeseira, we are elevated to a level of tremendous spirituality. Our physical life takes on additional holiness. The question therefore becomes how our bodies which are now on a higher spiritual plane can intake something which is so physical? How can something spiritual, our bodies, handle consuming food?
This is what Rashi means. Shabbos is so great that a person is able to withstand eating. While generally the consumption of food is a physical act, on Shabbos, that changes. Eating on Shabbos has a different quality. Even the gashmiyus, the physicality, takes on spiritual dimensions. Shabbos gives physical food a taste of spirituality. Our otherwise physical bodies are spiritually enhanced by the neshama yeseira, and with the infuse of Shabbos and the elevation of food to a greater spiritual degree, we can withstand it. We do not despite food in the least, but rather fully enjoy it. With our spiritually elevated body consuming spiritually elevated food, there is perfect harmony.
This is what Shabbos offers us. A day when we ourselves are uplifted and our food is uplifted. And together, true enjoyment of Shabbos is achieved.
