Acharya Tulsi
Man is a rational animal. He thinks before he acts. If his thinking is correct, he can commit no wrong. However, if his thinking becomes vitiated, he loses discretion. Set on the path of indiscrimination a man is liable to act irresponsibly. It is man's reason which controls his mode of living, his manners and morals. The moment this control is lifted, man becomes unrestrained, and -his nature and inclinations becomes suspect.
Man of this age is continually dreaming progress. Along with scientific and technological progress, he is keen to change his entire life—style. lf no change is forthcoming, life becomes stereotyped. From this point-of-view, it is right to bring about a change. But if propriety is violated, the process of change becomes destructive. To suddenly break a centuries-old tradition may be an act of courage, but then it must be preceded by mature and serious thought.
Culture is an indivisible part of life. The development of culture is indeed the development of society. It is cultural values that give an individual, a society or a country their distinctive character. There is a culture of eating and drinking as well. It is also associated with religous rites. Many religions established in India lay great emphasis upon the purity of food. The purity of food generally implies a prohibition of liquor and meat. From every point of view—physical, mental, religious—meat and liquor are taboo. Despite prohibition, however, today's young generation is very much disposed to the use of eggs and wine. One must go into it.
Animal meat is an unnatural diet for man. His physical structure is not at all suitable for it. ln the religious books, meat is classed among tamsik (i.e. Characterised by darkness and ignorance) foods. Besides being an excitant, it is the source of many diseases. According to prof. Hege of England, meat and eggs contain uric acid which causes a number of diseases like rheumatism, paralysis, asthma, sleeplessness, diabetes, dropsy, hysteria, chronic headache, etc. Dr. A. Kinkaid has recognised meat-eating as one of the factors behind diseases like scrofula. Drinking spoils the liver, the stomach comes out and the brain gets warped, memory is weakened, and many other distortions take place. It is surprising that those who consume beer or soft wines think ‘they are not addicts to drinking at all. In the big cities, the teenagers growing into adulthood are very much influenced by this attitude.
Even after reading or hearing about the ill consequences of meat- eating and drinking, some people are not inclined to give them up. Others get addicted to them repeatedly. One main cause of this is thoughtless propagation of these on the television. On the one hand, if the children are made to read the character—sketch of a great man not affiliated to any religion, a protest is raised against it, even though the study of a noble character is always inspiring. On the other hand, we are faced with a new culture of advertisements which openly ridicules the sacred tradition of many religions. Does not this culture hurt the religious beliefs of many people? Even those belonging to a religious tradition which gives its followers freedom to act as they please, should consider this issue on merit.
As on the television, the culture of advertisements is thriving in the newspapers, too. The half-page advertisements-such as Sunday or Monday, Give us eggs every day."—from what distorted brain such advertisements flow! Do not these mislead the children? During recent years, the children of our community too have been observed not to abstain from taking cakes,pastries and other preparation with egg as an ingredient. Their guardians, too, are negligent in this regard. That is why, the age—old cultural values in respect of food and drink are being ignored.
Some people argue that meat and eggs have in them more nutritive elements. As far as we know, this, too, is illusory. According to the following table published in a newspaper some time back, giving the percentages of protein found in certain vegetarian and non-vegetarian foods, the soya beans top the list, with the highest percentage:
Commodity Percentage of Proteins:
Soyabeans 43.2
Groundnut 26.7
Urad (black gram) 24.0
Moong (green gram) 24.0
Gram 22.5
Arhar (yellow gram) 22.3
Massor lentil 24.1
Mutton 18.5
Beef 22.6
Fish 21.0
Egg 13.3
lf a table in respect of vitamins and other nutritive elements is made available, according to many doctors, the percentage of these will not be found to be any less in vegetarian foods as compared to the non-vegetarian. A table of balanced diet providing requisite number of calories to the human body is easily available. Unmindful of the available data, to ignore one’s culture in the name of health does not seem to be proper. If the young generation consciously makes a move for the preservation of our cultural values and raises a collective voice against meat-eating and drinking, it might be possible to halt the blind imitation of fashionable currents.
