Prasadam – Sacred food offered to the Lord
Prasadam (a Sanskrit word) is food that has first been offered to God. Meaning “the Lord’s mercy”, prasadam is prepared by devotees specifically for God and offered to Him with devotional prayers, and is thus considered sacred.
Food offered to Lord Krishna is transformed spiritually into prasadam. When we eat food which has been offered to Krishna we receive the mercy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. To offer food to Krishna, and to take the remnants as prasadam, is a spiritual activity.
We should never consider ordinary food on an equal level with prasadam. Instead of merely eating food offered to Krishna we speak of honouring prasadam. Honoring prasadam helps us to develop love of Krishna. So by eating prasadam we make advancement in spiritual life.
The tongue is very difficult to satisfy since it is always craving different kinds of foods. Due to this desire, we end up eating things that we shouldn’t. In acquiring such food, we go to great lengths such as killing innocent animals. We become bound up in the material world through our eating and thus have to suffer the results through the laws of karma.
Prasadam is considered “karma-free” food since it is sanctified by God. Prasadam is prepared and offered to satisfy the Lord and not to satisfy our senses. We purify ourselves by remembering that God supplies us everything and that we should aim to please Him instead of ourselves. In preparing and eating prasadam, we thank God for everything He has done for us and we pray that we will always remember Him.
In the Bhagavad-gita Lord Krishna says, “All that you do, all that you eat, all that you offer and give away, as well as all austerities that you may perform, should be done as an offering unto Me.” So offering what we eat to the Lord is an integral part of bhakti-yoga and makes the food blessed with spiritual potencies. Then such food is called prasadam, or the mercy of the Lord.
The Lord also describes what He accepts as offerings: “If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I will accept it.” Thus, we can see that the Lord does not need anything, but if one offers fruits, grains, and vegetarian foods, He will accept it. The Lord does not accept foods like meat, fish or eggs, but only those that are pure and naturally available without harming others. So we offer what Krishna likes, not those items which are distasteful to Him. We also do not use garlic, onions, or mushrooms when we prepare food for Krishna.
Due to its auspicious nature, prasadam should be distributed to as many people as possible. This sanctified food ignites a spiritual spark in the soul which will eventually reawakens one’s dormant love for God. Vedic literature references many historical incidents where people have had the good fortune of partaking of prasadam, sometimes even by accident, and have had their lives made perfect as a result. It is believed that anyone who regularly partakes of it, will at the very least return as a human being in their next life.
Food offered to the Lord with love and devotion becomes spiritualized
The Lord is fully satisfied in Himself. He is the creator of all so everything is already His. He supplies us with food through nature, but we give thanks to Him by offering it back in a mood of loving devotion. So if His devotee offers something with love, out of His causeless mercy Krishna accepts it. The Lord is never hungry for our food, but for the love and devotion we offer. And then He reciprocates with that love.
So on the spiritual path eating food that is first offered to God is the ultimate perfection of a vegetarian diet. The Vedic literature explains that the purpose of human life is reawakening the soul’s original relationship with God, and accepting prasadam is the way to help us reach that goal.
The food is meant to be cooked with the consciousness of love, knowing that it will be offered to Lord Krishna. In the spiritual world, Radharani cooks for Krishna and She never cooks the same preparation twice. The temple kitchen is understood to belong to Radharani.
The ingredients are selected with great care and must be fresh, clean and pure vegetarian. Also, in cooking for Krishna we do not taste the preparations while cooking. We leave the first taste for Krishna when it is offered.
After all the preparations are ready, we take a portion of each one and place it in bowls on a special plate and take it to the altar to offer it to the Deities or pictures of Krishna.
Then the preparations are presented with special prayers as we ask that God accept our humble offering. The Lord accepts it with the most important part being the love with which it is offered. God does not need to eat, but it is our love for God which attracts Him to us and to accept our offering. Even if the most sumptuous banquet is offered to God but without devotion and love, Krishna will not be hungry to accept it. It is our love which catches the attention of Lord Krishna who is then inclined to accept our service.
After He glances over and tastes that loving offering of vegetarian preparations, He leaves the remnants for us to honor and relish. Krishna’s potency is absorbed in that food. In this way material substance becomes spiritualized, which then affects our body, mind and soul in a similar way. This is His special mercy for us. Thus, the devotional process becomes an exchange of love between us and God, which includes food. And that food not only nourishes our body, but also purifies our consciousness.
By relishing the sacred food of Krishna prasadam, it purifies our heart and protects us from falling into illusion. In this way, the devotee imbibes the spiritual potency of Lord Krishna and becomes cleansed of sinful reactions by eating food that is first offered in sacrifice to God. We thus also become free from reincarnation, the continued cycle of life and death. This process prepares us for entering the spiritual world since the devotees there also relish eating in the company of Krishna.
Not only do we make advancement, but also all of the plants that are used in the preparations as an offering to God are also purified and reap spiritual benefit. However, we become implicated in karma if we cause the harm of any living being, even plants, if we use them for food without offering them to God. Thus prasadam also becomes the perfect yoga diet.
Therefore, the cooking, the offering and then the respectful eating or honouring of this spiritualized food all become a part of the joyful process of devotional service to the Lord. Anyone can learn to do this and enjoy the happiness of experiencing prasadam. The Sunday love feast in the Hare Krishna temples is the opportunity in which everyone can participate in this opulence of Lord Krishna. So we invite you to attend as often as you like and make spiritual advancement simply by relishing Krishna prasadam.
How to cook for the Lord
As you walk down the supermarket aisles selecting the foods you will offer to Krishna, you need to know what is offerable and what is not. In the Bhagavad-gita, Lord Krishna states, “If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, a fruit, or water, I will accept it.” From this verse it is understood that we can offer Krishna foods prepared from milk products, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and grains. Meat, fish, and eggs are not offerable. And a few vegetarian items are also forbidden–garlic and onions, for example, which are in the mode of ignorance. (Hing, or asafetida, is a tasty substitute for them in cooking and is available at most Indian groceries.) Nor can you offer to Krishna coffee or tea that contain caffeine. If you like these beverages, purchase caffeine free coffee and herbal teas.
While shopping, be aware that you may find meat, fish, and egg products mixed with other foods; so be sure to read labels carefully. For instance, some brands of yogurt and sour cream contain gelatin, a substance made from the horns, hooves, and bones of slaughtered animals. Also, make sure the cheese you buy contains no rennet, an enzyme extracted from the stomach tissues of slaughtered calves. Most hard cheese sold in America contains rennet, so be careful about any cheese you can’t verify as rennetless.
Also avoid foods cooked by non-devotees. According to the subtle laws of nature, the cook acts upon the food not only physically but mentally as well. Food thus becomes an agent for subtle influences on your conscious. The principle is the same as that at work with a painting: a painting is not simply a collection of strokes on a canvas but an expression of the artist’s state of mind, which affects the viewer. So if you eat food cooked by non-devotees-employees working in a factory, for example–then you’re sure to absorb a dose of materialism and karma. So as far as possible use only fresh, natural ingredients.
In preparing food, cleanliness is the most important principle. Nothing impure should be offered to God; so keep your kitchen very clean. Always wash your hands thoroughly before entering the kitchen. While preparing food, do not taste it, for you are cooking the meal not for yourself but for the pleasure of Krishna. Arrange portions of the food on dinnerware kept especially for this purpose; no one but the Lord should eat from these dishes.
How to offer food to the Lord
After cooking for Krishna, the food will be offered to Him, on a altar or in front of a picture. The easiest way to offer food is simply to pray, “My dear Lord Krishna, please accept this food,” and chant the Maha-Matra:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna – Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama – Rama Rama Hare Hare
One also can chant the temple mantras three times while ringing a little bell:
Prayer to Lord the spiritual master:
nama om vishnu-padaya krishna-preshthaya bhu-tale
shrimate bhaktivedanta-svamin iti namine
namas te sarasvate deve gaura-vani-pracarine
nirvishesha-shunyavadi-pashcatya-desha-tarine
“I offer my respectful obeisances unto His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, who is very dear to Lord Krishna, having taken shelter at His lotus feet.
Our respectful obeisances are unto you, O spiritual master, servant of Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Goswami. You are kindly preaching the message of Lord Chaitanyadeva and delivering the Western countries, which are filled with impersonalism and voidism.”
Prayer to Lord Chaitanya:
namo maha-vadanyaya krishna-prema-pradaya te
krishnaya krishna-chaitanya-namne gaura-tvishe namah
“O most munificent incarnation! You are Krishna Himself appearing as Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. You have assumed the golden color of Srimati Radharani, and You are widely distributing pure love of Krishna. We offer our respectful obeisances unto You.”
Prayer to Lord Krishna:
namo brahmanya-devaya go-brahmana-hitaya ca
jagad-dhitaya krishnaya govindaya namo namah
“I offer my respectful obeisance’s unto Lord Krishna, who is the worshipable Deity for all brahmanas, the well-wisher of the cows and the brahmanas, and the benefactor of the whole world. I offer my repeated obeisances to the Personality of Godhead, known as Krishna and Govinda.”
Bevor you remove the plate of food offered to the Lord, you wait 10 minutes, than you chant the Maha-Mantra and remove the plate:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna – Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama – Rama Rama Hare Hare
Remember that the real purpose of preparing and offering food to the Lord is to show your devotion and gratitude to Him. Krishna accepts your devotion, not the physical offering itself. God is complete in Himself–He doesn’t need anything–but out of His immense kindness He allows us to offer food to Him so that we can develop our love for Him.
Everything you offer on your altar becomes prasadam, the mercy of the Lord. The flowers, the incense, the water, the food–everything you offer for the Lord’s pleasure becomes spiritualized. When we offer the Lord something with genuine love and devotion, He enters into the offering, and thus the remnants are non-different from Him. So you should not only deeply respect the things you’ve offered, but you should distribute them to others as well.
After offering the food to the Lord, wait at least ten minutes for Him to partake of the preparations. Then you should transfer the food from the special dinnerware and wash the dishes and utensils you used for the offering. Now you and any guests may eat the prasadam. While you eat, try to appreciate the spiritual value of the food. Remember that because Krishna has accepted it, it is non-different from Him, and therefore by eating it you will become purified.
Before honouring the Prasadam we say the following prayer:
maha-prasade govinde
nama-brahmani vaisnave
svalpa-punya-vatam rajan
visvaso naiva jayate
“For those who have amassed very few pious activities, their faith in maha-prasad, in Sri Govinda, in the Holy Name and in the Vaishnavas is never born.”
sarira avidya-jal, jodendriya tahe kal,
jive phele visaya-sagore
tar’ madhye jihva ati, lobhamoy sudurmati,
ta ´ke jeta kathina samsare
krishna baro doyamoy, koribare jihva jay,
sva-prasad-anna dilo bhai
sei annamrita pao, radha-krishna-guna gao,
preme dako chaitanya-nitai
O Lord, this material body is a place of ignorance, and the senses are a network of paths leading to death. Somehow, we have fallen into this ocean of material sense enjoyment, and of all the senses the tongue is most voracious and uncontrollable. It is very difficult to conquer the tongue in this world.
But You, dear Krishna, are very kind to us and have given us such nice prasadam, just to control the tongue. Now we take this prasadam to our full satisfaction and glorify Their Lordships Sri Sri Radha Krishna, and in love call for the help of Lord Chaitanya and Lord Nityananda.
Srila Prabhupada Taking Prasadam
Prasadam means mercy, and this offering is dedicated to the fountainhead of all mercy, the spiritual master, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. He is by nature kind to every living entity, but that ocean of mercy becomes fully visible through Bhagavat Prasadam. When the spiritual master sees that the devotees are satisfied by eating bhagavat-prasada, he is satisfied.
chatur-vidha-sri-bhagavat-prasada-
swadv-anna-triptan hari-bhakta-sanghan
kritwaiva triptim bhajatah sadaiva
vande guroh sri-charanaravindam
“The spiritual master is always offering Krsna four kinds of delicious food [analyzed as that which is licked, chewed, drunk, and sucked]. When the spiritual master sees that the devotees are satisfied by eating bhagavat-prasada, he is satisfied. I offer my respectful obeisances unto the lotus feet of such a spiritual master.” (Sri Gurv-astaka)
There are six kinds of rasas (tastes), and if one is agitated by any one of them, he becomes controlled by the urges of the tongue. Some persons are attracted to the eating of meat, fish, crabs, eggs and other things produced by semina and blood and eaten in the form of dead bodies. Others are attracted by eating vegetables, creepers, spinach or milk products, but all for the satisfaction of the tongue’s demands. Such eating for sense gratification-including the use of extra quantities of spices like chili and tamarind-is to be given up by Krishna conscious persons. The use of pan, haritaki, betel nuts, various spices used in pan-making, tobacco, LSD, marijuana, opium, liquor, coffee and tea is indulged in to fulfill illicit demands.
The tongue is the most important sense within the body. Therefore it is recommended that if we want to control our senses we should first control the tongue. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura has emphasized this. He describes our present conditioned state as sarira avidya-jal: we are packed up in the network of this material body, and we are just like a fish caught within a net. And not only are we caught in this body; we are also changing this “net” life after life, through 8,400,000 species. In this way we stay caught in the network of ignorance. Then, jodendriya tahe kal: our imprisonment within this network of ignorance is being continued on account of our desire for sense enjoyment. And out of all the senses, Bhaktivinoda Thakura says, the tongue is the most dangerous.
If we cannot control the tongue, then the tongue will oblige us to take different types of bodies, one after another. If a person is very much fond of satisfying his tongue by eating flesh and blood, then material nature will give him the facility to regularly taste fresh flesh and blood: he will get the body of a tiger or some other voracious meat-eating animal. And if one does not discriminate in his eating–if he eats all kinds of nonsense, everything and anything–then material nature will give him a hog’s body, in which he will have to accept stool as his food. So much suffering is caused by the uncontrolled tongue.
If we can practice accepting only remnants of food offered to Krishna, it is possible to get free from maya’s victimization. Vegetables, grains, fruits, milk products and water are proper foods to offer to the Lord, as Lord Krishna Himself prescribes. However, if one accepts prasada only because of its palatable taste and thus eats too much, he also falls prey to trying to satisfy the demands of the tongue.
Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu taught us to avoid very palatable dishes even while eating prasada. If we offer palatable dishes to the Deity with the intention of eating such nice food, we are involved in trying to satisfy the demands of the tongue. If we accept the invitation of a rich man with the idea of receiving palatable food, we are also trying to satisfy the demands of the tongue. In Chaitanya-caritamrita (Antya 6.227) it is stated:
jihvara lalase yei iti-uti dhaya
sisnodara-parayana krsna nahi paya
“That person who runs here and there seeking to gratify his palate and who is always attached to the desires of his stomach and genitals is unable to attain Krishna.”
As stated before, the tongue, belly and genitals are all situated in a straight line, and they fall in the same category. Lord Chaitanya has said, bhala na khaibe ara bhala na paribe: “Do not dress luxuriously and do not eat delicious foodstuffs.” (Cc. Antya 6.236)
Those who suffer from diseases of the stomach must be unable to control the urges of the belly, at least according to this analysis. When we desire to eat more than necessary we automatically create many inconveniences in life. However, if we observe fasting days like Ekadashi and Janmashtami, we can restrain the demands of the belly.
As far as the urges of the genitals are concerned, there are two-proper and improper, or legal and illicit sex. When a man is properly mature, he can marry according to the rules and regulations of the shastras and use his genitals for begetting nice children. That is legal and religious. Otherwise, he may adopt many artificial means to satisfy the demands of the genitals, and he may not use any restraint. When one indulges in illicit sex life, as defined by the shastras, either by thinking, planning, talking about or actually having sexual intercourse, or by satisfying the genitals by artificial means, he is caught in the clutches of maya. These instructions apply not only to householders but also to tyagis, or those who are in the renounced order of life. (Nectar of Instruction, Chapter 1)
The Hare Krishna Cook Book 1973
(PDF Datei, 5,92 MB, English)
Speak Your Mind