The Christian discipline of substantive conversation at the family table. The biblical foundation is the integrated household-and-meal pattern of OT life: the table as the site of fellowship (Genesis 18, Abraham's meal with the LORD and the two angels; the patriarchal-household meals throughout Genesis); the Passover meal as deliberate formative pedagogy (Exodus 12:25-27, And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto you, What mean ye by this service? That ye shall say, It is the sacrifice of the LORD's passover; the table as site of catechetical question-and-answer); the Lord Jesus's frequent meal-fellowships in the Gospels (eating with Pharisees, tax collectors, sinners; the Last Supper). The Reformed-Puritan tradition emphasized substantive conversation at the family table as the principal site of practical catechesis and the principal sustaining fellowship of the household. The Lutheran Tischreden (Table-Talk) of Martin Luther, recorded by his students at the Wittenberg dinner table, is one of the great historical witnesses to the practice; comparable Puritan family-meal pedagogical traditions are richly attested. The patriarchal-Reformed reader recovers table conversation as substantive household discipline: the father initiates and shapes conversation toward substantive matters (the day's events under providence; questions of doctrine and the catechism; the news of the brethren and the church; practical wisdom for the household's labors); the children are invited into the conversation as their capacity grows; the meal is the daily setting in which the family's collective formation under the gospel takes place. The discipline is opposed both to the silent meal (television, phones, no conversation) and to the entertainment-meal (frivolous chatter without substance).