Delicious Sins

Delicious Sins, this phrase sounds very ironic. How can sins be Delicious, they are supposed to be bad and full of misery and suffering. What we as human beings perceive as sins and what sins actually are based on the scriptures   are two different things. In the modern world , sins are  become more personalized, more often than not we hear the phrases, "Oh this could be sin in your religion , for our religion is it not considered as sin" or  " Sins or no sin is good as far as on thinks like that , its all in the mind". It seems that everybody has his philosophy of life, however foolish he or she may be, but they follow their own concocted philosophy. Although the free will provided by Krsna ( God) to every living entity allows one to have his or her own philosophy and idea or concept of what is sin and what is not sin, but whether such an idea is in compliance with the scriptural evidence or not, that is often not verified, hence people misunderstand and have to pay for those sins which they carried out in ignorance. Some may argue that sins carried out in ignorance should not be punished, but just like if a child in ignorance touches the fire, fire still burns the child, similarly if one commits all kinds of sinful activity in ignorance of scriptural teachings he or she is still liable for punishment. In short ignorance is no excuse, since if a person so desires there are many avenues to learn and understand,the things as they are.

 One such sin which everyone of us commit in ignorance is related to eating food hence the name Delicious Sins.. Although it sounds astonishing that how come eating food be sinful , since everyone tends to think that all the food in the world is meant for human consumption. To some extend many can understand even though they may not agree, that meat eating involves cruel killing of animals which according to Vedic literature is sin, since we are taking life of a living entity to satisfy our tongues. Not only meat eating but even eating vegetables, fruits, grains, etc which are obtained from the plants are also sinful, since that also involves killing of living entities, even though killing of plants and killing of animals are not at the same level, still it imposes a minor sin on part of the person eating vegetables etc. Material nature is designed in this way that one will not be able to escape sin and its sinful reaction, since the law of this material nature is that one living entity is food for another, jivo jivasya jivanam.  So how is that one can be freed from these sinful reactions, since without being sinless it is not possible to be liberated from this material entanglement and Go back home back to Godhead.

Sri Krsna solves this apparent contradiction , when he instructs Arjuna in Bhagavad Gita , that  persons who perform sacrifice and take the remnants of the food offered in Sacrifice for the satisfaction of Lord Vishnu are freed from all the sins.  Following two verses establish the necessity of performing yagna or sacrifice and consequences of not doing so.

"In the beginning of creation, the Lord of all creatures sent forth generations of men and demigods, along with sacrifices for Visnu, and blessed them by saying, "Be thou happy by this yajna [sacrifice] because its performance will bestow upon you everything desirable for living happily and achieving liberation." [ B.g. 3.10]

 Also the following Bhagavad Gita Verse  explains the glory of getting relieved of sins by offering food stuff in sacrifice to Vishnu.  

yajïa-çiñöäçinaù santo
mucyante sarva-kilbiñaiù
bhuïjate te tv aghaà päpä
ye pacanty ätma-käraëät  [ B.G. 3.13]



"The devotees of the Lord are released from all kinds of sins because they eat food which is offered first for sacrifice. Others, who prepare food for personal sense enjoyment, verily eat only sin."

Now one may argue  that it sounds logical and we may agree to offer food stuff in sacrifice to Lord Vishnu and take his remnants to get freed from sin, but why there is restriction for eating only vegetables and not meat. Like vegetables it is possible to offer meat to the Lord and it will be purified and then it can be taken as prasadam what is wrong there . The answer to this is also given by Lord Krsna when he specifically mentions how and what food should be offered.

patraà puñpaà phalaà toyaà
yo me bhaktyä prayacchati
tad ahaà bhakty-upahåtam
açnämi prayatätmanaù 
[ B.g. 9.26] 


"If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I will accept it."


 Lord Krsna in this verse specifically mentions that the he accepts foodstuff from family of leaf, flower, fruit and water, which means in general vegetables, grains etc, he has not mentioned anything related to meat. Moreover he mentions that only when one offers him these simple food stuffs with Love and Devotion ,he accepts them, otherwise gorgeous preparations of foodstuff prepared without love and devotion are not accepted by the Lord.

There is a nice story in Mahabharata which expalins the nature of the Lord and  proves as a evidence to the statements of Lord Krsna from Bhagavad Gita. Once Lord Krsna visited Hastinapura to visit Pandavas and other relatives. During that time, Duryodhana and Sakuni has some ulterior motives and wanted to Please Lord Krsna to get some favors from him, in general they did not like Lord Krsna , but since they wanted his favor they had prepared a massive feast for Him with a variety of preparations all very tasty and delicious. On the other hand Vidura who was a minister in the court   offered lord Krsna some simple fruits with great devotion and love without wanting anything in return , just to please the Lord for his Pleasure. Lord was overwhelmed by Viduras devotion and accepted those simple offerings and did not even touch the offering made by Duryodana , knowing his intent.

So it is evident that any person who want to be free from eating sins should offer  whatever he can with love and devotion to the lord and then partake of his remnants as prasadam which will certainly purify and elevate the soul to spiritual understanding leading them closer to Love of Godhead. Though in this age of Kali yuga , people generally do not believe in these evidences , since most of the people are after enjoying the senses to the fullest, nevertheless the laws of material nature do not change and one has to suffer the sinful reactions. The laws of nature are working at a very subtle level and nobody in this mortal world has the power to change them. So knowing all this why should we become victims to such sinful reactions, a wise man will take necessary steps to rectify the sins after getting this knowledge. It is best to prepare food in goodness and offer this simple food to Lord Krsna and be satisfied with the prasadam of the lord. We have seen practically people who follow this practice develop such a love for Prasadam that they then do not even look at the  ordinary foodstuff. Just like if one develops a higher taste for a sweet meat , one can give up eating chipped rice. This simple process of cooking simple food and offering to Lord Krsna will rid on of the "Delicious Sins" and will elevate one slowly but steadily to achieve the spiritual enlightenment which will ultimately rid one of all miseries in life