To achieve a balance in one’s diet has become virtually impossible! Every time a new theory crops up the balance tips.
There is no shortage of beguiling food theories presented on golden platters. The theories tempt, warn, and even spread mass hysteria. Only recently, milk which we learnt in textbooks, was a must for growing children because of its rich calcium content was proved to be undigestable. Food for thought?
Syedna Qadin N’omanRA has laid down theories on food as prescribed by AwliyaullahAS, theories that have not and will not change with the times.
- RasulullahSA has stated: Meat is the king of all foods– in this world and in the hereafter; water is the king of all drinks in this world and in the hereafter. Forty days without meat destroys a man’s character.
- Dates are from heaven.
- Apples are good for the stomach.
- He who begins and ends his meal with salt shall be protected from 72 diseases: leprosy is of one of these.
- RasulullahSA recommends that milk and honey not be consumed together as one suffices without the other, though consuming one with the other is not haraam.
- Amir ul mumineenAS used to eat the whole pomegranate by himself for one seed in every pomegranate is from jannat.
SyednaRA in his chapter on food, also, lists the rewards of feeding others and teaches food etiquette. RasulullahSA has said: He who feeds a fellow mumin will be fed from the fruits of heaven, and he who offers a drink to a mumin will drink from the Rahiq e Makhtoom in jannat. He who feeds a mumin for Allah is like one who feeds masses of people, he shall acquire wealth faster than a knife pierces a hump.
When the guests arrive, wealth is written for the host and when they depart his sins are absolved. No wonder then, that mumineen are so eager to hold niyaaz on each and every occasion, occasions of joy and bereavement alike. And during Ashara Mubaraka they flock in thousands to present sums of money for niyaaz in the name of Imam HusainAS.
One part of this chapter is devoted to ‘aadab ul akl’ (food etiquette) which mumineen follow when they eat on the thaal. We wash our hands before and after meals, recite Bismillah and do not eat in a reclining position. RasulullahSA teaches us that the last morsels on the platter are rich in barakat. The malaaekat shall pray salawaat and intercede to Allah for the wealth of he who cleans his platter.
