Who Wants to Eat After Ne’ilah!?
We should attempt to bring ourselves to a higher level where we will not think about food and drink right after the conclusion of Yom Kippur.
The annual Guard-your-health dash for food
The regular conduct of a Jewish person according to Shulchan Aruch should be in a manner of ‘Guard your life,’ i.e., we should maintain a healthy body through a sufficient intake of food and drink. That being the case, immediately upon the conclusion of the Yom Kippur fast – the ‘one [i.e., unique] day in the year’ – there is a sudden rush to conclude the Maariv service including its final prayer, Aleinu LeShabei’ach, and all the subsequent Kadeishim, followed by a dash to eat some food... No doubt due to the Shulchan Aruch’s directive to guard our bodily health – especially as the Shulchan Aruch clearly stipulates that ‘on Motzei Yom Kippur one should hold a festive meal with an abundance of food,’ concerning which it is written ‘Go and eat your bread with joy.’
Who in Heaven thinks of food?
However, there exists a loftier level than this, where one does not rush [to eat] since the very thought of physical food and drink does not even enter his mind: Why, he has only just prayed the Ne’ilah service, the fifth prayer [of Yom Kippur, which is the loftiest prayer of the entire year] and concluded it with Aveinu Malkeinu (‘Our Father, Our King!’), Shema Yisrael (‘Hear O Israel!’), etc., and the proclamation Leshana HaBa’ah Birushalayim (‘Next year in Jerusalem!’) followed by the sounding of a Teki’ah Gedolah (“great” drawn-out blast) on the Shofar which recalls, spurs and hastens the fulfillment of our request Teka BeShofar Gadol LeCheiruseinu (‘Sound the great Shofar for our Redemption!’) -- in an elevated spiritually–charged standing such as this, what is the great hurry and rush to eat...?!?
Doesn’t Chassidus expound the body’s virtue over the soul?
Now, there is bound to be someone who will make an outcry [upon hearing these words]: “Gevald!” he will exclaim, “How can one not rush to go eat after Yom Kippur?! After all, the Torah commands us ‘Guard your life exceedingly’ and there is the precept that ‘saving a life overrides all other Mitzvos of Torah.’ “What is more,” he will continue his claim, “do not the teachings of Chassidus extol the virtue of the Jew’s body – even to the point where it is explained that in the Age of Resurrection the soul will receive its nourishment from the body...!”
Un-Chassidic hunger pangs
The answer to this [argument] is simple: If he were rushing to eat because of the aforementioned command from Torah to preserve one’s physical health and because of what Chassidus explains about the great preciousness of the body, there could be room for debate. However, the truth is, as he himself knows, his hurry is not for these [admirable] reasons... Rather, like we say, Du Halst Nit Derbai, Nit Das Kvetcht Dir, “You are not holding on that [refined] level; that’s not what’s bothering you...!” Instead, he rushes to eat because of his body’s physical hunger; the deliciousness of the food and its appeal to him is not derived simply from the ‘good taste’ he gets from fulfilling the Torah’s command to ‘go eat your bread with joy,’ but rather, mixed in with this factor is the Geshmak, the enjoyment of the food itself... This is due to ‘the foreign god which is within your midst’ [i.e., the Nefesh HaBahamis, the animalistic soul]; for his consumption is via his ‘vessels’ [i.e., his physicality, as opposed to following the dictates of his ‘light,’ his Neshomah]; his personal motives and religious motives are all mixed together until the wonderfully great taste of the [post-Fast] meal causes him to forget afterward to even learn the laws of building the Sukkah...!
Yom Kippur: Work up a spiritual climax – not an appetite
Therefore, one ought to strive so that he will be on a spiritual standing like the one we previously described: that upon reaching the conclusion of the holy day [of Yom Kippur], he will not be thinking about food and drink, since he will be openly experiencing [the refined truth] that his very life-force comes from matters of holiness. His [eventual] consumption will be on a higher level; it will then be done Lishmah – in order to fulfill the Torah’s command to ‘go eat your bread with joy,’ without his mixing in the Geshmak of the physical food, the Lo Lishmah!” (Simchas Torah 5750; Hivaaduyos, p.230-231)
