Onion and Garlic Facts

8/8/2019 Onion and Garlic Facts

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This presentation is prepared not

to quarrel or argue with people

who say that garlic has medicinal

effects or may be good for the

body, but to help them understandthat we should never accept

foodstuffs that are harmful for the

mind.

Everyone of us know how tempting a foodstuff prepared using onion or

garlic could be to the tongue but if one is aiming at mind control, then we

should try to avoid eating foodstuff containing onion and garlic.


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A humble offering

ToHis Divine Grace

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami

Prabhupada

Founder Acharya of ISKCON

By

ISKCON MysoreKrishna Balaram Temple


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Garlic - An onion like plant having a bulb that

breaks up into separable cloves with a strong

distinctive odor and flavor.

Onion - The rounded edible bulb of this plant

composed of fleshy, tight, concentric leaf bases

having a pungent odor and taste.


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Scientific Facts

Historical Facts

Famous Personalities

Vedic Facts

Srila Prabhupada

Lord Sri Krishna

Excerpts from Puranas

Lets try to understand why Onion and Garlic are harmful

for the mind through..


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Dr. Robert C. Beck, DSc, highly respected research physicist in his lecture

given at the Whole Life Expo, Seattle, WA, USA, in March 1996 on his last

research project that focused on the brain and altered states of

consciousness.

Scientific Facts


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The reason why garlic is so toxic is that it contains sulphone hydroxyl

ion that penetrates the blood-brain barrier including the corpus

callosum in the brain, and is a specific poison for higher life-forms andbrain cells.

At Alpha-Metrics Corporation he built biofeedback equipment and

found out that garlic usually desynchronizes brain waves.

Onions contain complex sulphur compounds. When you cut into an

onion, two chemical reactions take place.

First, when a knife cuts through the cells of an onion, its enzymes

release a strong odor.

Second, the onion releases allicin, a volatile sulfur gas that irritates theeyes and sends one rushing for a tissue. One cannot deny the power of

the onion on the olfactory senses.


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Historical Facts


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Because of its stimulating qualities, garlic was

never part of Buddhist tradition in China or

Japan, whose practitioners felt it would upset

ones spiritual balance. Garlic was never adopted

into traditional Japanese cuisine and was

shunned by Zen masters.

The Greek citizenry, especially the aristocracy,firmly rejected garlic and found its smell

repugnant. Anyone smelling of garlic was

considered vulgar and was prevented from

entering the temples.

Garlic Like the Greeks, the early Roman nobility did

not embrace garlic in their own diets but

considered the herb worthy only of being fed to the

laborers and slaves, to give them strength and vigor.

Any man smelling of garlic was considered of low

breeding.


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The seventeenth century British view of garlic

was solidly negative, with expressions like, not

fit for Ladies palates, nor those who courtthem, or that eating garlic was part of the

Punishment for such as had committed the

horridst Crimes.

In Pompeii those lowly vendors who sold onions

were rejected from the guild of fruit and vegetable

vendors, and had to form their own guild.

Even till today Hindus and Brahmins eschewgarlic and onions, as they are too stimulating

and interfere with the ability to reach a high

spiritual plain in meditation and self-

realization.


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The pungent odor and awesome strength of the onion

was a mystery to ancient man. An old Turkish legend

explains it rather profoundly. It tells that when Satan

was thrown out of heaven, garlic sprouted where hefirst placed his left foot, and onions grew where he

placed his right foot.

In the ancient world in Egypt the onions were

highly revered by the poor and eaten extensively

along with bread and beer. From ancient history upto the 19th century, onions were relegated as the

food for the poor. The rich found the odor of Onion

downright disgusting.


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Dr. Robert highly respected physicist says most people have

heard most of their lives that garlic is good for you, and we

put those people in the same class of ignorance as the

mothers who at the turn of the century would buy morphine

sulphate in the drugstore and give it to their babies to putthem to sleep.

Horace, famous Roman lyric poet and satirist, said of garlic

in his Epodes, it is more poisonous than hemlock.

Famous Personalities


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Hippocrates, history's most famous physician did warn

that garlic caused flatulence, a feeling of warmth on the

chest and a heavy sensation in the head; it excites anxiety

and increases any pain which may be present.

Percy Bysshe Shelley one of the greatest lyric poets in the

history of English literature, when he visited Italy with his

friend Lord Byron, he was shocked and appalled to see hisfriend eating the garlic that was served at a social

gathering.


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Vedic Facts


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O sages, one who eats garlic, onions, sigrum (a kind of plant), turnips and

meat, that person should observe a candrayana fast.

- Padma Purana, Brahma Khanda 19.10, spoken by Suta Gosvami

Onion, shit-thriving pigs, Selu, garlic, Goplyusa (milk of a cow before the

lapse of ten days from calving), Tanduliya (a grain growing in faecal rubbish)and mushrooms - all these are to be avoided.

- Skanda Purana 40.9

The expiation for having eaten the prohibited food is fasting. One should do

the stiuka expiation tisucandrayana for having eaten bhustma (a kind of

fragrant grass) and garlic.

- AgniPurana 173.37


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Garlic, leeks and onions, mushrooms and (all plants), springing from impure(substances), are unfit to be eaten by twice-born men.

A twice-born man who knowingly eats mushrooms, a village-pig, garlic, avillage-cock, onions, or leeks, will become an outcast.

- Manu Samhita

(But) he should avoid stalks of lotuses, safflower, gold or silver, onion, garlic,sour gruel, a thick fluid substance; so also chatraka (a kind of mushroom),

vidvaraha, greasy milk of a cow during the first seven days of calving, vilaya

(a particular product of milk) and mushrooms.

- Padma Purana Vol. 42, 4.56.19b -24

By eating garlic and onion one becomes sinful and as atonement one should

perform Candrayana.

- Garuda Purana 1.96.72


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Srila Prabhupada


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So far foodstuffs offered do the needful. Whatever is available and also very

nice, that is offerable, as long as no meat, fish, eggs, garlic, onions, or other

very objectionable foodstuffs are there.- 19th February 1972. Letter to Upendra dasa Calcutta.

Regarding the cook-book, that is a nice proposal to divide into two parts.

There is no harm if devotees have invented recipes, so long they are strictlyvegetarian, no garlic, no onions, like that.

- 27th October 1972. Vrindavan - Letter to Kirtanananda.

No. No meat, no onion, no garlic, no intoxication, no liquor, we dont smokeeven, we dont take tea, coffee. We simply take what is absolutely necessary

for keeping the body fit to execute Krishna consciousness. We dont indulge

in luxury or for the satisfaction of the tongue.

- 12th March 1968. Radio Interview on KGO. San Francisco


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Lord Sri Krishna


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Foods that are too bitter, too sour, salty, hot, pungent, dry and burning are

dear to those in the mode of passion. Such foods cause distress, misery and

disease.

- Bhagavad Gita Ch.17:9

The devotees of the Lord are released from all kinds of sins because they

eat food which is offered first for sacrifice. Others, who prepare food for

personal sense enjoyment, verily eat only sin.

- Bhagavad Gita Ch.3:13

If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I will

accept it.- Bhagavad Gita Ch.9:26


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Excerpts from Puranas


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Once, in Satya Yuga the rishis were performing gomedha and asvamedha

sacrefices for the welfare of the whole universe. A cow or a horse would be

cut into pieces and placed in the fire. Afterwards the rishis would utter

mantras and the same animal would come alive in a beautiful young body.One time the rishi who was about to perform a gomedha sacrifice, his wife

was pregnant. She had a very strong desire to eat and she had heard that if,

during pregnancy one has a desire to eat and does not fulfill this, then the

baby that will be born will always have saliva coming from its mouth. Very

strangely, she desired strongly to eat meat, thus she decided to keep one

piece of meat of the cows body that was offered in sacrifice. She hid it andwas making a plan to eat it very soon. At that time the rishi was finishing the

sacrifice and uttered all the mantras for the new young cow to come to life.

However when he saw the new cow, he noticed that there was a little part

missing from her left side. He went into meditation and realized that his wife

had taken away a piece of meat during the sacrifice. Now his wife alsounderstood what happened and quickly threw the meat far away in a field.

Due to the effect of the mantras uttered by the rishi there was now life in this

piece of meat. Then the bones in that piece of meat became garlic and the

meat became onions in that field. Thus these foods are never taken by any

Vaishnava devotee because it is not vegetarian. Plus it is in the mode of

ignorance.


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Here isanotherstory, from Puranic Encyclopaedia by Vettam Mani (under CANDRA

VI.):

Solar eclipse according to the Puranas. The Devas and the asuras jointly churned

Kshirabdhi wherefrom emerged Dhanvantari with the Amrtakumbha (pot of nectar).

But an asura mayavi (magician) called Saimhikeya absconded to Patala with theAmrtakumbha which nobody noticed as everybody was busy with dividing other

divine objects. Only after the mayavi's disappearance was it noticed that the

Amrtakumbha was missing. At once Mahavisnu assumed the figure of a beautiful

woman, got back the Kumbha and gave it to the devas. The devas began drinking the

amrta when, at the instance of some other devas, Saimhikeya, the mayavi, assuming

the form of an old Brahmin reached svarga, got a share of the amrta and began todrink it. Surya and Candra (Sun and Moon) who were on guard at the gates divined the

secret of the 'old Brahmin' and informed Mahavisnu about it. He cut the throat of the

pseudo-Brahmin with his Sudarsana Cakra. But, half of the nectar he had drunk stayed

above the throat and the other half below it. Therefore, though the head and the

trunk were severed they remained alive. These two parts, in course of time, evolved as

Rahu and Ketu. When the throat was cut some blood dropped on the ground, andbecame the red onion and the white onion (garlic) respectively. So both onion and

garlic originated from the throat and blood of the demons or asuras, thus their

consumption brings us closer to tamo guna (mode of ignorance) which characterizes

the nature of the demons and thus is detrimental to bhakti.

(Kamba Ramayana, Yuddha Kanda and Bhagavata, Astama Skandha. Kamba Ramayana

is a Tamil text by poet Kambar.)


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Hope the presentation was helpful.

If you are serious about avoiding food stuffs that cannot be offered to the Lordand that may ruin our spiritual progress then we have a practical solution for

you.

Just chant.

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna

Krishna Krishna HareHare

Hare Rama Hare Rama

Rama Rama HareHare

attentively

Onion and Garlic Facts

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