What did it mean to "bless" a physical object?

Question

And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee.
— Exodus 23:25

And it came to pass, as he sat at meat with them, he took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them.
— Luke 24:30

Generally, what does it mean to bless a physical object, and specifically what would people (both in Moses's time and in Jesus's time) have understood blessing bread to mean?

Note that this is asking about the common understanding before the sacrament/ceremony/ritual of communion was instituted, so answers should not mention that, nor any modern interpretation of the word.

Answer 1

I want to start with a wide angle lense on aspects of OT blessing:

Genesis 2:3

"So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation" ESV. MY emphasis. [bless/barak]

There is here a setting apart. "Blessed" has the element of being made different or special. The 7th day is given the special purpose of acknowledging God as Creator by marking out the day on which He rested from creating.

Exodus 23:25

"You shall serve the LORD your God, and he will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from you."

Here blessing is associated with acknowledging God through service, and the result is health through wholesome and beneficial food and drink. Here the quality of blessed bread is good.

Deuteronomy 7:12-13

"And because you listen to these rules and keep and do them..He will love you, bless you, and multiply you. He will also bless the fruit of your ground, your grain and your wine and the oil, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock..".

"multiply" and "increase" here refer to quantity. Acknowledging the Lord by keeping His rules here brings physical abundance.

Genesis 24:31

'He said, "Come in, O blessed of the LORD."'

Here Laban acknowledges that the LORD is using the servant in a wonderful holy way. The servant is blessed because he is being used by God to reveal God's goodness. Being blessed is being used by God to reveal His love and provision.

Luke 1:64

"And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God."

We are not told the words Zechariah employed to bless God. But John's father spoke well of God. eulogon; eu-well/logon-spoke. Be that praise or thanks, blessing here was good acknowledgement of God's hand behind the circumstances.

Luke 9:16

"And taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing over them."

Jesus looked up to heaven. Whatever Jesus said, by the action of looking up to heaven He acknowledges a need for a relationship between ordinary everyday food on this earth and God in Heaven. He acknowledged the hand behind the gift.

In my comments on these examples of blessing I have always put in "acknowledge/acknowledging". One thing these examples of blessing have in common is acknowledging God, however much the circumstances vary.

To bless a physical object is at least to acknowledge God's hand behind the object or gift, be that bread or any other part of creation.

Answer 2

In Jewish tradition, the act of 'blessing' is not about changing the physical or material nature of an object, but about acknowledging and expressing gratitude for God's bounty. When we bless bread, we are not altering the bread itself, but rather, we are changing our relationship to it.

The Hebrew word for 'bless', 'baruch', is related to the word 'berech', which means 'knee'. To bless, then, is to bend the knee, to acknowledge, to show gratitude. When we bless bread, we are pausing to recognize that this bread is not simply a product of human labor, but is ultimately a gift from God.

In the time of Moses, this act of blessing was a central part of the covenant relationship between God and the Israelites. God promised to bless the Israelites' bread and water, which meant not only ensuring their physical sustenance, but also offering protection and favor.

In the time of Jesus, who was himself a Jew, the act of blessing bread would have been part of the tradition of 'birkat hamazon', the Grace after Meals. This is a series of blessings recited after a meal that includes bread, expressing gratitude to God for the sustenance He provides.