A Balanced View of the Motives behind Dietary Preferences

Damodar K. Mavalankar · Down to Earth Series · 7 pages

Damodar Mavalankar's comment on an article by Purmeshri Dass, itself a comment on Anna Kingsford's The Best Food for Man — Dass having taken a stricter line than Kingsford herself and criticised her for allowing cheese, milk, butter and eggs into a vegetarian diet. From The Theosophist of April 1884, reprinted in Sven Eek's Damodar and the Pioneers of the Theosophical Movement.

The reply is a caution against making a dogma of diet. Theosophy, Damodar reminds his brother, admits of no dogmatic assertion of the fitness of things: no particular food is ordered imperatively and none is forbidden or prohibited in the strict sense. The occultist investigates the facts and circumstances of the whole case, considers them impartially with a broad and enlightened vision, and recommends a course of action as the best — always taking his stand in the middle and surveying the lines that point to the extremes. He states the opposing argument fairly before answering it: that destruction is the order of the universe, that everywhere one creature preys on another and is itself the food of a third, and that it is therefore natural for men to kill animals for food. The line quoted at the head sets the standard he applies: that only the true philosopher, in rapport with his spirit, can make the right choice.

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