Osho Quotes on vegetarian Food

1. Vegetarian food is not complete, and particularly for intelligence certain vitamins are
missing. Those vitamins can be found in meat. Certainly I cannot support non-
vegetarian food. Even though it gives you better intelligence, it destroys your very
soul; it maes you cruel, violent, inhuman. !o I suggested to them, "I have found
something #hich should be immediately accepted if any intelligence is left in you, and
that is eating eggs #hich are not fertili$ed, non-fertili$ed eggs. They are not living,
there is no life. If you leave them they #ill simply rot and disappear. There is no life in
them because the male sperm has not entered into the mother%s egg; the mother has
gro#n the egg #ithout the male sperm. It is not alive, so there is no harm in eating it.
It is vegetarian."

&. 'll the religions of the #orld have insisted on fasting. The reason is that #hen you are
fasting your capacity to (udge bet#een the real and the unreal is lost after three #ees.
)our mind needs the continuous nourishment of certain proteins; (ust a three #ee
fast, and those proteins are finished. The mind eeps a certain emergency reserve and
that emergency reserve is finished in three #ees -- and that is if you are a non-
vegetarian. If you are a vegetarian, then #ithin a #ee all your proteins are gone,
because vegetarian food is not sufficient food as far as the mind is concerned. It is no
coincidence that not a single vegetarian has received the *obel pri$e+ It is strange; it
should be other#ise. Vegetarians thin that since they are eating the purest food, they
must have the purest minds, but even the three persons from India #ho have received
the *obel pri$e -- all #ere non-vegetarians. ,eing a vegetarian and fasting and
isolation are all strategies to bring your mind to a position #here you cannot
distinguish #hether #hat you are seeing is real or unreal.

-. .a T$u insisted on vegetarian food. In his monastery non-vegetarian food #as
absolutely prohibited. It taes me bac to /autam ,uddha. /autam ,uddha #as a
vegetarian, strictly vegetarian. 'nd all his follo#ers #ere vegetarians. That #as a
revolution in a #ay, because man had lived as a non-vegetarian for millions of years.
'nd according to ,uddha, he #ould remain a barbarian unless he became vegetarian.
0illing life is destroying your o#n possibility of gro#th. )ou have to respect life; a
reverence for life #ill help your gro#th of consciousness. 'nd he #as absolutely right.

1. Vegetarianism functioned as a purification. 2hen you eat animals you are more under
the la# of necessity. )ou are heavy, you gravitate more to#ards the earth. 2hen you
are a vegetarian you are light and you are more under the la# of grace, under the la#
of po#er, and you start gravitating to#ards the sy. )our food is not (ust food3 it is
you. 2hat you eat, you become. If you eat something #hich is fundamentally based
on murder, on violence, you cannot rise above the la# of necessity. )ou #ill remain
more or less an animal. The human is born #hen you start moving above the animals,
#hen you start doing something to yourself #hich no animal can do. Vegetarianism is
a conscious effort, a deliberate effort, to get out of the heaviness that eeps you
tethered to the earth so that you can fly -- so that the flight from the alone to the alone
becomes possible. The lighter the food, the deeper goes the meditation. The grosser
the food. then meditation becomes more and more difficult. I am not saying that
meditation is impossible for a non-vegetarian -- it is not impossible, but it is
unnecessarily difficult.

4. remember, I am not against non-vegetarian foods for any other reasons. If a man is not
meditating, if a man is not trying to gro# in#ards, if a man is not in search of /od,
then it is perfectly oay -- he can eat #hatsoever he #ants to eat. The higher you are
trying to reach, the more and more you #ill have to drop any unnecessary luggage.
5nly then you can fly. This is unnecessary luggage.

6. I have not told everybody to drop non-vegetarian food, but I have told 7radeepa in a
very shocing #ay to drop it. 8er consciousness is gro#ing; no# this has become a
hindrance. 7eople #ho are not soaring high -- they can carry as much of a burden as
they lie; but those #ho are starting to soar high -- they have to drop all unnecessary
luggage. The more pure your energy becomes, the more you #ill have to be careful
about it, because something precious can be lost. 'nd it is very difficult to create that
precious energy, it is very easy to lose it. Those #ho don%t have anything to lose --
they need not #orry, they can go on doing all inds of stupid things. Their #hole
being is in tune #ith those stupidities. This has to be remembered by you all3 that as
you #ill be gro#ing I #ill be maing more and more demands on you.

9. The change of food is bound to change the :ualities of your physical body. ;ood is not
(ust energy, it is also a :ualitative thing. ;ood is not (ust a fuel, it contributes more
than fuel -- it gives you either transparency, or non-transparency. The insight into this
phenomenon can mutate, and you can have altogether a different type of body. 'nd it
is not so difficult to change this body, because the body is a flu<, every moment
changing itself; it is a process, it is not a static thing. The moment you came here, you
had another body; no# the body has changed. It is changing constantly, every
moment; it is riverlie, moving and changing -- it is not a static thing.
If you change direction, the body taes a (ump; only the direction has to be changed.
5ne should become a#are, that #hatsoever one is eating must be such that it doesn%t
mae one%s body heavy. This heaviness is not concerned #ith #eight3 sometimes you
feel that you are #eightless, as if you can fly. !o the food that can give you the feeling
of #eightlessness is the right food. The food that gives you the feeling of being
burdened is not the right food. 'll non-vegetarian foods mae you more rooted in the
earth; you cannot fly. Vegetarian foods give you #ings; you have an inner feeling that
you can (ust levitate, you can (ust go out of gravitation. ;ood is right if it is non-
gravitational. If you can feel non-physical in it, it is good. =eally, the body is felt only
#hen it is heavy; #hen you have the feeling of heaviness inside, only then you feel the
body. 2hen the body is not heavy #ith #rong foods, you are bodiless. That%s #hy
#hen the body is diseased, #hen the body is ill, you feel it; #hen it is healthy, you
don%t feel it. )ou feel your head only #hen there is a headache; #hen there is no
headache, there is no head.

>. I say 7atan(ali is scientific. If you #ant to change the body posture, 7atan(ali #ill say
change your food habits, because every food habit creates subtle body postures. If you
are a meat eater you cannot sit ,uddha-lie. If you are non-vegetarian your posture
#ill be different, if you are vegetarian your posture #ill be different -- because the
body is built by your food. It is not an accident. 2hatsoever you are putting in the
body, the body #ill reflect it.
!o vegetarianism for 7atan(ali is not a moralist cult, it is a scientific method. 2hen
you eat meat you are not only taing food, you are allo#ing a certain animal from
#hich the meat has come to enter in you. The meat #as part of a particular body; the
meat #as part of a particular instinct pattern. The meat #as the animal (ust fe# hours
before, and that meat carries all the impressions of the animal, all the habits of the
animal. 2hen you are eating meat your many attitudes #ill be affected by it. 'nd if
you are sensitive you can become a#are that #henever you eat certain things, certain
changes immediately come. )ou can tae alcohol and then you are not the same.
Immediately a ne# personality has come in. 'lcohol cannot create a personality, but it
changes your body pattern. The body chemistry is changed 2ith the change of the
body chemistry, the mind has to change its pattern and #hen the mind changes pattern
a ne# personality has come in.

?. ' violent diet does not only mean that a man eats non-vegetarian food. It is also a
violent diet #hen a man eats #ith anger. ,oth of these things are violent. 2hile eating
in anger, in suffering, in #orry, man is also eating violently. 8e does not reali$e at all
that (ust as he is violent #hen eating the flesh of something else, so #hen his o#n
flesh burns up inside due to anger and #orry, violence is present there too. Then the
food #hich he is eating cannot be non-violent.
The other part of right food is that you should eat in a very peaceful, a very (oyful
state. If you are not in such a state, then it is better to #ait until you are and not to eat
for a #hile. 2hen the mind is absolutely ready, only then should one tae his meals.
;or ho# long #ill the mind not be ready@ If you are a#are enough to #ait then at the
most it can remain hungry for only one day -- but #e have never bothered to listen to
it. 2e have made eating food a completely mechanical process. 5ne has to put food
into the body and then leave the dining table. It is no longer a psychological process --
that is dangerous. 5n the body level, the right food should be healthy, non-stimulating
and non-violent; on the psychological level the mind should be in a blissful state,
graceful and (oyous; and on the level of the soul there should be a feeling of
gratefulness, of thanfulness. These three things mae food the right food.