________________
Table 6.3 Prohibited food items for Jains.
Reasons for Prohibition
Prohibited Items Foods produced by gross violence Meat
Alcohol
Violence to animals and birds, such as eggs, fish, poultry and other animal products that are considered meat. Many one- or more sense creatures multiply on the flesh of a dead animal. Meat harms one's physical and mental health Violence to countless one-sense creatures and harm to one's physical and mental health Violence to mobile creatures such as flies and bees. Violence to countless one-sense creatures, as butter is made from groups of one-sense creatures. In the preparation of cheese, animal products are used.
Honey Butter and cheese
Other harmful foods Ice crystals ice cream) Poisons, hard drugs, tobacco
Raw pickles (sandhaana bolaa)
Pulses and raw dairy products
Deteriorating foods and juices
Ice is made from groups of one-sense creatures. To prevent harm to the self, one should avoid any kind of poison and refrain from smoking and taking unwarranted drugs. Raw pickles, preserved in brine, are a medium for the growth of countless mobile creatures. Jains advise drying pickles in sunlight for three days and then preserving them in oil. Mixtures of raw milk or milk products with pulses (dwidal) become a media for the growth of innumerable mobile creatures, hence milk or its products should be heated before mixing with pulses. Innumerable mobile and immobile creatures grow in deteriorating foods and in cooked food kept overnight. Time-expired foods, which change their taste, smell, shape or feel, harm one's physical and mental health. Eating fruit and vegetables in which the seeds nearly touch each other, such as figs, does violence to a greater number of one-sensed creatures. Contain many seeds and mobile creatures in their pods. They are also harmful to one's physical and mental health. Indian fruit such as jaambu, canibora, sitaafala contain less pulp than seeds. Eating causes violence to their seeds, which are one-sense creatures, and one derives hardly any nutrition from them. Can be poisonous and may harm one's health.
Multi-seeed fruit & vegetables
Brinjal
Pulpless fruit
Unknown fruit
322
