Theos-Talk Archives (December 2006 Message tt00961)

Friends, 

HPB had this to say on "feasts and fasts".  Carlos. 

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THE RATIONALE OF FASTS 

[The Theosophist, Vol. IV, No. 4, January, 1883, p. 88]

[Commenting on a correspondent's letter, H. P. B. wrote:]

The rationale of fasts lies on the surface. If there is one thing 
more than another which paralyses the will power in man and thereby 
paves the way to physical and moral degradation it is intemperance 
in eating: "Gluttony, of seven deadly sins the worst." Swedenborg, a 
natural-born seer, in his "Stink of Intemperance," tells how his 
spirit friends reproved him for an accidental error leading to 
overeating. The institution of fasts goes hand in hand with the 
institution of feasts. When too severe strain is made on the vital 
energies by overtaxing the digestive machinery, the best and only 
remedy is to let it rest for some time and recoup itself as much as 
possible. The exhausted ground must be allowed to lie fallow before 
it can yield another crop. Fasts were instituted simply for the 
purpose of correcting the evils of overeating. The truth of this 
will be manifest from the consideration that the Buddhist priests 
have no institution of fasts among them, but are enjoined to observe 
the medium course and thus to "fast" daily all their life. A body 
clogged with an overstuffing of food, of whatsoever kind, is always 
crowned with a stupefied brain, and tired nature demands the repose 
of sleep. There is also a vast difference between the psychic effect 
of nitrogenized food, such as flesh, and non-nitrogenous food, such 
as fruits and green vegetables. Certain meats, like beef, and 
vegetables, like beans, have always been interdicted to students of 
occultism, not because either of them were more or less holy than 
others, but because while perhaps highly nutritious and supporting 
to the body, their magnetism was deadening and obstructive to 
the "psychic man."


>From "Collected Writings", H. P. Blavatsky --  
http://www.tonh.net/theosofie/hpb_cw_online/articles/v4/y1883_006.htm
  

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