Chapter 6- The Arts

CHAPTER 6

The Arts

Dietary Exercise Suggested:

The presentation of imaginative, colorful, most beautiful banquets.

Commentary:

Co-ordinating and displaying the dishes at a banquet can involve themes and levels of richness. The meals offered can be deliciously delicate or voluptuously flavoursome; spicily exotic; nakedly raw, wild and wholesome; inspired from just one country’s fare, or from many all at the once; with condiments of savoury sauces, sweet chutneys, creams and toppings; all manner of breads: puff, grain, crisp, moist, unleavened; desserts that excite the more trivial of appetites, decorated appealingly, inviting - at the very least - a happy curiosity!

Attention can be given also to the supporting ‘props’ displaying this wonderful table laid of foodstuffs. How so the colours in the arrangement? The materials of the plates and dishes themselves? How much is too much? Should it detract from the platters? Yet how may we enliven the cloth? - Perhaps with flowers, with a central table display (if large enough a small altar for special occasions can be decorated accordingly, or with a miniature font or fountain); or, for small settings the theme of the seasons brought into the presentation; and for community dinners there can be photographs displayed at the buffet itself, of those fellows who could not actually make it to attend the event (placed somewhere tastefully of course, not necessarily as the main feature to the overall setting).

Individual baskets of sweet treats, nuts or seeds; cordials and teas, juices and carbonates; a cross or a candle, a miniature ribboned maypole, a decorated tree (all seasons, not just Christmas) with nougats or truffles or something similar which can be easily tied to a tiny branch and plucked off from it to eat.

At no time should animals of any kind be present in the dining area. It is acceptable and correct that if the animals are given to the run of the house they are to be dismissed to the yard just prior to serving and for the duration of the eating. Here is something of an explanation as follows:

When we are preparing to eat something, and then given to enjoy that eating, we are immediately thankful within to that which is bringing us the pleasures of certain nourishment and of taste. The experience is quite large upon our beings, even though this is something performed throughout every day by most. It is a time when we are most ‘open’ and susceptible, having relaxed the veneer of our egos, of our self-sense, that we may take this food into ourselves in the first place. It is a disposition of openness, and this is precisely why many dealings are seduced over dinners (a practice we do not recommend, should you wish to decide any important matter wisely). Meals make for communal benefits, or family bondings, or soulful interludes, because of this ‘open’ factor for which we are so given to.

This is one of the reasons why the dietary exercises are so useful, because during these periods the student will be receptive to that meal-lesson taught much moreso than by other means. The receptivity works through to many other levels besides, and this is precisely why it is quite dangerous to have an animal’s presence during the consumption of food. This is not an influence that we should readily endure, and many children and adults are given to physical illnesses as a result of the anima (in the breath, smell, astrality) around them. No matter how beloved these companions may be to us, their evolution and lifestyle must hold to its respectful perimeters, not being encouraged to impinge upon that of our own, for it is simply not conducive to our wellbeing and as a matter of health most apparent.

Preparing food in a creative manner brings much added love and care to the meal itself. When we deliberately arrange our meals to be as attractive as possible we are being respectful both to the consumer and also that life which is there before us. This does not have to denote some lavish arrangement. It might mean that the beauty is in the moderate simplicity, with but a simple adornment besides ... there are many differing expressions to this art.

For the inartistic to begin to pursue this creative talent there becomes a further challenge in this, one whereby their efforts will have an immediate and appreciative audience, whilst also an almost immediate disassembly of their effort. Of all of the mediums to work with, this one does encourage the aspirant in these two diverging ways satisfactorily. Whether it be done in sculpturing doves in icing, or bread twisting into mystical knots, we find that the nature of the culinary artist at work is tried and tested because he knows that his expression will be short-lived - and yet he still labours. He knows he must give up his art at the end of it all, for the fulfilment of a successful meal implies that his work is demolished - piece by piece it is gone, it is no more!

So in both an effort of will and of selflessness as well, we find that unlike other more lasting expressions of creativity the banquet-making prepares the soul for the pure effort - that perfect moment, giving to the moment for the moment, wholly best to where it is suited to.

When we consider that the elements within the Arts comprise those forward cosmic impulses approaching us from the very futures, then we can understand that it is only by this conception of working for that very moment at hand can we begin to invite these new and reviving forces.

One cannot seek to stultify them, contain them ere they have arrived or then conceal them - block them, or pervade them with the past. The very forces which are of the ‘new’ are given and to be received in their spirit of purpose made apparent in the moment, for it is there where they are most needed, pertinent and best fitting for the World.