17 - Decision about Acceptable and Prohibited Food 

Great importance has been attached to purity of food since ancient times. Chandogya Up. (vii, 26.2) emphasizes the purity of food as it is conducive to the remembrance or meditation of the Atman. The Smrutis deal extensively with this topic. So do Mbh. Anušhasana chs. 135 and 136 and Puranas like Bm. P. 221-109-112 Bv. P. I. 27. 3-45 and others. 

Vruddha-Hārita XI. 122-123 and Bs. P. as quoted by Aparārka (P. 241) give the following classification of "pollutions" and hence prohibition of food articles: 

1. Jāti-dushta ‘inherently or by nature polluted’ e.g., onions, garlic.

2. Kriya-dushta 'polluted by action' e.g., served with bare hands, seen by a dog or an out-caste. 

3. Kala-dushta-polluted by passage of or inappropriateness of time." e.g., stale food, eating during solar or lunar eclipse. 

4. Saṁsarga-duşhta 'polluted by contact' e.g., contacted with a dog, insects or wine. 

5. Sahrullekha 'disgusting to the mind' e.g., faeces. 

6. Parigraha-duşhta 'polluted due to its belonging to an undesirable person' e.g., an out-caste. 

The intake of 'polluted' food being a sin, the topic is treated in details by Dharma-Shastra-writers of old. (vide KP. 17-15b and 16a below). 

The KP does not deal exhaustively with this topic. 

Vyasa said:

1. A Brahmana should not eat food offered by a Shudra whether out of delusion or otherwise. He who eats it, except in an emergency, is born as a Shudra. 

2. The Brahmana who partakes of the condemned food of a Shudra for six months becomes a Shudra even while he is alive, and after death he becomes a dog (v.l. as a Shudra). 

3. O leading sages, a person is reborn as a Brahmana, a Kshatriya, a Vaishya or a Shudra according as the food offered by these is still in his belly when he dies, (e.g., he dies with the food of a Brahmana in his stomach, he is reborn as a Brahmana, so on). 

4. One should avoid the cooked food of six groups of people viz.: the actor, the dancer, the carpenter, the smith, a gang of rogues and the prostitute.1 

1. VV. 4-15 give the list of persons food from whom is not acceptable, That food is Pratigraha-dushta as explained above. The belief was that the eater of that food eats up the sins also of the giver (vide v. 16a below). 

We find this belief and the list of such polluters in the Dharma Sutras of Apastamba (I. 6. 18. 16-33), Vasishtha 14, 2-11 and in old Smrutis like Manu IV 205-220 Yaj. I. 160-165. 

5. One should avoid food offered by an oil-monger, washerman, thief and the vendor of spirituous liquors. He should avoid the food of a minstrel, a blacksmith or an impure person. 

6. He should avoid the food offered by a potter, a painter, a usurer, a fallen man, a goldsmith, a dancer, a hunter, an imprisoned fellow or an ailing person. 

7. He should avoid the food offered by a physician, an unchaste woman, a staff-bearer (a police-man?), a thief, an atheist or a person who blasphemes gods. 

8. One should avoid the food offered by a person who sells Soma juice and especially of Chandala. He should avoid food offered by one who is hen-pecked or one who allows the paramour of his wife to remain in his house. 

9. One should avoid taking these cooked-stuff, viz.: that of one who is defiled by Ucchishta, that of miser, that of one who partakes of the leaving of others' food-stuffs, the cooked food of a person who is inferior—not worth allowing to sit in row for dinner, the cooked food meant for a multitude and that of one who maintains himself by means of weapons. 

10. One should avoid food offered by an ascetic, by a eunuch, the food of an insane or a drunkard fellow, of a frightened one or a crying person, the food that is of inferior quality and that offered as charitable gift. 

11. One should avoid food offered in Shraddha or. offered by a hater of Brahmanas, one who is interested in sins and a man who is defiled by the impurity of birth (sutala, the food of one who cooks in vain (?) the food of a rogue and that of the shrewd fellow, (v.l. father-in-law). 

12. One should avoid the cooked food of all these: viz: women without children, a servant, a mason and one who sells weapons. 

13. The cooked food served by these should be avoided one who is addicted to drinking wine, a murderer, the physician, one whose organ of generation is mutilated and person who, though a younger brother, married earlier than the elder brother. 

14. One should particularly avoid the food served by a widowed woman who has remarried, nor should he partake of the food served by one who carnally enjoys the wife of his dead brother. Similarly, he should avoid partaking of the food served with contempt or anger, spurning, dislike or arrogance or astonishment. 

15. Even the cooked food served by the preceptor should not be eaten if it is devoid of due consecration. All the evil deeds of man are stabilised in his food. 

16-17. If a person partakes of the food of anyone he shares his sins too. The following persons viz.: A farm-labourer, a friend of the family, cowherd, barber, musician, potter, ploughman of the fields. After eating food among these Shudras, some money is given to them by the wise. The following things can be taken on payment, from a Śhūdra1 viz.: - Milk pudding, articles fried in oil, Milk products, Satu (Powdered fried grain), oilcake and oil. 

1. VV. 16-17 give the list of Shudras whose food was acceptable to Brahmanas, cf. 

su (sua) däso näpito gopah kumbhakāraḥ krushivalah|

Brāhmanairapi bhojyānnāh panchaite shūdra-yonayah ||

-      Devala Smr.

also Cf. Parāśhara Smr. XI. 20-24 

In fact, realities of life forced the Dharma-śhāstra to accept these exceptions. 

18-23. One should avoid these plants:2 Vruntāka (a kind of Brinjal), Jālikāśhāka (a kind of green), the Safflower, the Ašhmantaka (the plant) the fibres of which are used to make the girdle (Mekhala) of a Brāhmaṇa. He should avoid onion, garlic, sour articles and thick exudations from trees. He should avoid Chatraka (Mushroom), Vidvaráha (a plant growing in filth), shaila (Śhleşhmāntaka fruit?), beestings, Vilaya (a milk product? Simukha and Kavaka (Mushrooms). A Brahmana eating Gruñjana (the meat of an animal killed by a poisoned arrow), a fowl, the gourds, the Kimśhuka, the Udumbara etc. undergoes downfall. One must scrupulously avoid (purposelessly prepared i.e., not for offering to deity), the Kruśhara (rice cooked with gingelly seeds), the wheat cake, Milk pudding, pie, cooked meat but not consecrated, food offerings to gods, Yavāgu (rice gruel), Mālulinga (Chitrons), non-consecrated fish, the Kadamba tree, wood-apple and Plakṣha (Indian fig tree). During daytime* he should avoid the oilcake from which oil has been extracted as well as fried barley. 

*divadhana is probably a mistake for deva-dhanya 'God's grain', recorded as v.l. 

2. VV. 18-23 contains the list of articles of food, vegetables, herbs etc. which were by their nature regarded as 'polluted' and are known as Jatidushta. 

The list of 'polluted' herbs, vegetables etc. is found in old works like the Dh. s. of Apastamba (I. 5. 17. 25-27) Vasişhtha 14.33. KP, assimilated the following verses from Manu V. 5-7, 12, 14, 19. 

24. During night, he should scrupulously avoid everything connected with gingelly seeds as well as curds. One should not take in milk and butter milk together. 

25. One should avoid food polluted by action, served indifferently (bhāva-duşhta) and polluted by bad contact (as with dogs) and by falling therein of hair, insects and disrespectfully given.1 

1. VV. 25 ff give the list of Kriya-duşhta foods. 

26. One shall avoid an article once smelt by a dog and cooked again. So also, the article seen by a Chāņdāla, or a woman in her menses, or smelt by a cow, or seen by fallen men, shall be avoided. 

27-28a. He should avoid these articles as well—that with which no worship has been performed, that which is stale, that which has been touched by crows and fowls, that which is infested by germs, that which is smelt by men or touched by a leper. 

28b-30a. One should not make use of any article given by a woman in her menses, or by an unchaste woman, or by a woman angrily. Manu has said that the milk of a cow whose calf has died should not be drunk. Similarly, the milk of a camel, within ten days of her calving, shall not be drunk. So also, the milk of a ewe and that of a cow milked unseasonably.2 

2. Sandhini-Mitākşhară on Yaj. I. 17-explains it as (i) a cow in heat (2) a cow that gives milk once a day (3) a cow which yields milk on account of another calf brought to it, its own being dead, 

30b-33. The following birds and animals shall not be eaten viz.3 the crane, the swan, the water crow, the sparrow, the parrot, the osprey, the tusk of a hog, the web-footed birds, the cuckoo, the Casha (blue jay), the Khañjarīta (the wag-tail), the falcon, the vulture, the owl, the ruddy goose, the cock, the dove, the pigeons, the Tittibha (lapwing), the village fowl, the lion, the tiger, the eat, the dog, the hound, the jackal, the monkey and the donkey. 

3. Dharma Sūtras give a number of rules about the flesh of beasts, birds and fish, vide. Gautama 17. 27-31, 34-35 Vishnu 51.6, 29-31. Smrutis like Manu v. 12-14 Yāj. I. 172-175 give long lists of such birds etc. fit to be eaten. KP based its list on the Smrutis. 

34a. All types of deer should not be eaten nor should wild birds be eaten whether the living beings move about in the water or on the land. This is the established convention. 

34b-35a- Manu the Prajapati has said that these five- clawed animals1 may be eaten viz. Godha (alligator), Kūrma (tortoise), Shašha (hare), Shvavit and Sallaki (the small and the big porcupine). 

1. This injunction about the eatability of five-clawed animals appears in VR, Kishkindha 17.39, cf. MK. P. 35. 2-4 which shows a common source of KP. and MK.. 

35b-36a. O excellent men, one may eat those fish with thorny scales (?) and the flash of the deer Ruru. They can be eaten after offering them to the deities and the Brāhmaṇas and not otherwise. 

36b-37a. The Prajāpati has said that the peacock, the francoline partridge, the Kapiñjala (a variety of the ruddy goose), the rhenocero and the panther can be eaten. 

37b-38. O leading sages, among fishes, these are mentioned as worthy of being eaten, viz.: the Rājīvas (lotus-like ones) the Simhatundas (lion-snouted), the Pathīnas and the Rohitas.2 The flesh of these must be sprinkled with holy water and consecrated before eating if the Brāhmaṇa so desires. 

2. Cf. Manu V. 16 

39. One shall eat meat in accordance with the injunctions or as enjoined at a time when life is in danger. One who eats the remainder (i.e., what is left after worship) or as a medicine or when one is powerless or is deputed, he is not affected by sin. 

40. If a person invited for the Shraddha or the worship of a deity eschews meat he may have to be in the hell as many years as there are hairs on the body of the animal.3 

3. Although KP insists on acceptance of non-vegetarian food when served in a Shraddha, it staunchly prohibits wine under all circumstances. Dh. S. of Apastamba 1.7.21.8, Vishnu 35.1 and Manu XI. 54 and Yaj. III. 227 hold that wine-drinking is a very grave sin.

41. The established rule is that, wine should not be drunk, should not be touched and should never be thought of by the twice-born. 

42. Hence, one shall scrupulously avoid wine which despicable. By drinking it, one incurs downfall and loses his merits (good acts) nor should he be talked to by Brahmin. 

43-44. (Partly defective) By eating foodstuffs that should not be eaten and drinking that should not be drunk, a Brahmana loses his rights. He then faces downfall. 

45. Hence, one should scrupulously avoid forbidden foodstuffs. He goes alone after elevation* (?). And after death goes to the hell Raurava. 

*Venk. Text, aropya yāti chaiveko is not satisfactory as the text reads: Apeyāni cha vipro, the Brahmana avoids forbidden drinks.