[Advaita-l] Advaitic Foods - penance

Sunil Bhattacharjya sunil_bhattacharjya at yahoo.com
Fri Dec 17 14:35:31 CST 2010


Dear Sri Bharadwaj,

Sorry for the delay and you might have seen that reference yourself by now. However if I may add, we find in the Bhagavad that Lord Krishna tells us "Sparsaan kritvaa bahir baahyaamschakshus chaivaantare bhruvoh" and for that the  usefulness of the Shanmukhi mudra during the pranayama need not be overemphasised. The Mudra has also a expiatory action as it melts away papa.

Regards,

Sunil K. Bhattacharjya

--- On Thu, 12/16/10, Dr D Bharadwaj <dr.d.bharadwaj at gmail.com> wrote:

From: Dr D Bharadwaj <dr.d.bharadwaj at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Advaitic Foods - penance
To: "A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta" <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
Date: Thursday, December 16, 2010, 11:53 AM

Dear Sri Sunil,

Great reply. Crisp and to the point.

The anecdote about the power of Rama nama is indeed very interesting. The
the real input to me is what Manu's endorsement of Pranayama for parihara.

Can you help me find out where exactly Manu had said these  significant
words??























శ్రీరమణార్పణమస్తు

Dr. D. Bharadwaj
dr.d.bharadwaj at gmail.com

<dr.d.bharadwaj at gmail.com>
sarvE bhavantu sukhinaH |
sarvE santu nirAmayAH |
sarvE bhadrAni paSyantu |
*mA kaschit duHkha bhAg bhavEt || *








On Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 12:31 AM, Sunil Bhattacharjya <
sunil_bhattacharjya at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Dear Satishji,
>
> I appreciate your nice reply. However may I supplement your note with the
> following:
>
> Manu says that there is no sin in eating meat, though he indicates that it
> is better not to eat meat. Lord Buddha advised the monks  that they could
> eat meat provided the animal was not killed specifically for the monk and he
> did not see the killing and nor he heard the death-cry of the animal.
>
> As regards the penance Manu says that Pranayama is the highest of the Tapas
> and that can remove the sins..
>
> There is another alternative too. That is to take the name of Lord Ram.
> There is an anecdote related to this but I do not remember the reference.
> Once a person committed a grave sin and for its propitiation he went to a
> rishi's ashram. The rishi was not in the ashram at that time and he told his
> problem to the son of the rishi. The latter advised the former to utter the
> name of Lord Ram three times. later on when the rishi came to know about it
> he scolded his son saying uttering Lord Ram's name just once can removes
> hundreds of sins. However there is the  custom is to utter the holy name of
> Lord Ram three times or Sri Vishnu three times.
>
> These observations are not meant to discourage one from following the
> conventional ways you have suggested.
>
> Regards,
>
> Sunil K.Bhattacharjya
>
> --- On Thu, 12/16/10, Satish Arigela <satisharigela at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> From: Satish Arigela <satisharigela at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Advaitic Foods - penance
> To: "A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta" <
> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
> Date: Thursday, December 16, 2010, 2:47 AM
>
> >The dish had prawn oils in it.
> >Is there any official ritual i must perform for this sin I have committed?
>
> No need to lose sleep over this. But there are many penances for consuming
> prohibited foods.
>
> The best one is to follow that which one's sva-guru or a family purohita,
> or the
> AchArya of any maTha(if the family follows that maTha from generations)
> prescribes. Please also see the list below.
>
>
> >7.Or is it part of their svadharma (by virtue of being born into that
> >varna/jaathi) that they can meat regardless of locale of residence or
> occupation
> >
> >or >change in circumstance ?
>
> >This is true.
>
> A correction. To eat meat is not their sva-dharma.. but just one of their
> many
> options which the dharma-shAstra does not have a problem with.
>
> >brAhmaNa-s refraining from eating meat is more because of bauddha and
> jaina
> >influence.
>
> This should not be misunderstood to that mean before these mata-s Hindu-s
> were
> regularly consuming mAmsa or that these mata-s introduced a vegetarian
> lifestyle. With the arrival of these mata-s, preference for vegetarian food
> increased among the elite.
>
> As said before, smArta-s already had the practice of refraining from meat
> and
> women in the context of vrata/tapas/mantra-purascharana etc.
>
> Below is a list of penances if prohibited foods are consumed:
>
> 1.1) drinking vAruNi beer inadvertantly: Has to have to undergo a new
> upanayanaM
> to be ritually fit.
>
> 1.2) drinking vAruNi beer intentionally: There is no penance- the death is
> the
> only reliever, and one looses that status of a dvija
>
> 2) If he touches, receives or gives a beer or a wine, he should drink water
> boiled with kusha grass for 3 days.
>
> 3) If he accidently drinks urine he must underg a re-upanayanaM.
>
> 4) If inadvertantly eats foul-smelling food he is ritually impure until it
> is
> entirely excreted.
>
> 5)If he eats forbidden meats, mushrooms, or meat from a slaughterhouse he
> must
> under go the chandrAyana penance.
>
> 6)For meat derived from fowls he must undergo the arduous sAntapana
> penance.
>
> 7)If he eats food tained by the lick of a cat, dog, rat, mongoose, crow or
> insects, he should consume a decoction of the brahmasuvarchala plant that
> will
> save from their disasterous effects. He can become ritually pure if he
> vomits
> those foods.
>
>
>
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