Essays Essays III
Tablet Six
FOOD
<1>In general food can be categorized into three types:
1- Satvic (sentient): fruit, milk and milk products, grains, most vegetables, most legumes, natural sweeteners, nuts and seeds, seaweed (except kelp), black pepper, green pepper, cooked dried mustard (in small quantities).
2- Rajasic (mutative): chocolate, coffee and tea, soda pop (especially colas), lentils (tamasic at night), sea kelp, chilies, vinegar.
3- Tamasic (static, crudifying): meat and fish, poultry, seafood, eggs, onions, garlic, mushrooms, tamari, red lentils, mustard spread, uncooked dried mustard, stale spoiled food, cayenne (in small quantities is rajasic), wine, beer and other alcoholic beverages, tobacco, blue cheese with mold.
<2>The satvic (sentient) foods are for consciousness and create sentient vibrations. <3>In fact in the beginning of creation when man was more consciousness than flesh, God demanded man to be vegetarian:
And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
(Gen. 1:29)
<4>Flesh is tamasic in comparison with consciousness, and man became more flesh after the flood. Therefore, meat became nourishment for the body, and it was allowed to be consumed. <5>So tamasic food may be good for the flesh but not for the consciousness.
<6>Rajasic foods are usually the stimulants. They accelerate and release prana from places where stored in the body. So they usually give a burst of energy. By using the stored prana, the defense system of the body is weakened.
<7>The animals are divided into clean and unclean. Those which are clean have flesh that is easier to digest and is convertible to human flesh. <8>Those which are unclean are not good for human consumption.
<9>The clean animals are:
These are the beasts which ye shall eat: the ox [beef], the sheep, and the goat,
The hart, and the roebuck, and the fallow deer, and the wild goat, and the pygarg [antelope], and the wild ox, and the chamois [mountain sheep].
And every beast that parteth the hoof, and cleaveth the cleft into two claws, and cheweth the cud among the beasts, that ye shall eat.
(Deut. 14:4-6)
<10>The unclean animals are:
Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the cloven hoof [except the camel if it is a part of the regular diet of a people]; and the hare and the coney: for they chew the cud, but divide not the hoof; therefore they are unclean unto you.
And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcass.
(Deut. 14:7-8)
<11>Clean fishes are:
...all that have fins and scales...
(Deut. 14:9)
<12>There are six characteristics for clean birds:
1- They should not be birds of prey.
2- They catch food thrown to them in the air and bring it to the earth, then divide it with their bills and eat it. Unclean birds devour their catch in the air, or press it with one foot to the ground and tear it with their bills.
3- They must have an elongated middle front toe and a hind toe.
4- They must spread their toes so that three front toes are on one side of a perch and the hind toe on the other side.
5- They must have craws or crops.
6- They must have a gizzard with a double lining which can easily be separated.
<13>Animals that are dead or their blood has not been drained should not be eaten. <14>To drain the blood, the Adam's apple in the throat area should be cut in the middle.
<15>In an emergency when there is no other alternative, all these rules can be relaxed, and even a dead carcass might be eaten.
<16>However, it is advisable to have an emphasis on vegetables in our diets or more sentient (satvic) foods. But if it is desirable to eat meat, the above rules should be followed.
<17>Also the weather, environment, availability of food, etc., are factors to determine the diet of a person. For example, some tamasic or rajasic foods become rajasic or sentient respectively in cold or extremely cold weather. <18>So any diet should not become a burden, but the joy of food in the ideation of God is more important.
<19>Also, the Goal Of The Life Is To Be(come) Divine (righteous), although what we eat usually affects the amount of control we have over our thoughts and actions. But if a man is righteous and follows God's Laws, yet eats everything, he is exalted over the man who eats vegetables but is unrighteous.
<20>Tamasic and rajasic foods, overeating, or food which is not chewed thoroughly, stimulates the lower energy centers (chakras). <21>However, those who are in their higher selves will always have their energies directed upward toward higher centers. That is why even when they eat these kinds of food, still they are not affected (by His Grace) very severely or at all.
<22>But those who are not able to transform the energy from the lower centers to higher ones are greatly affected by these foods or by overeating. <23>That is why being vegetarian is recommended for these people, so they can easily transfer the lower energies to the higher, because the vegetables, grains, etc., are sentient (satva) and are easily directed to the higher energies.
<24>This is the reason why in the Bible Paul called those who eat herbs weak in belief, "For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs" (Romans 14:2).
<25>The reason is that those who are truly believers are the ones who are in their higher selves (were born again). But the vegetarian diet is for those who are in the beginning of the journey.
<26>However, emphasis on vegetables in our diets (even for those in their higher selves) is recommended. <27>But meat-eating is not condemned, especially for those who have no guilty conscience about it, because, "Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man" (Matthew 15:11).
<28>Or in other words, "The Goal Of The Life Is To Be(come) Divine." That is only possible by following the Divine Path and gaining His Grace, not by diet alone.
<29>Furthermore, the true food and highest nutritious food is the Holy Manna or nectar. Whoever eats such a food has "meat to eat that ye know not of [from the Father]" (John 4:32).