Viaticum, Clean Food, and Simple Living: From the Teachings of Musonius Rufus (vegetarian), Part 2 of 2

Today, we will learn of the benefits of clean foods such as plants, fruits, and vegetables for both our body and soul, as well as the dangers posed by luxurious and wasteful lifestyles, which can lead to greed, corruption, and spiritual neglect.

ON FOOD “On the subject of food, he used to speak frequently and very emphatically too, as a question of no small significance, nor leading to unimportant consequences; indeed he believed that the beginning and foundation of temperance lay in self-control in eating and drinking. Once, putting aside other themes such as he habitually discussed, he spoke somewhat as follows. As one should prefer inexpensive food to expensive and what is abundant to what is scarce, so one should prefer what is natural for men to what is not. Now food from plants of the Earth is natural to us, grains and those which though not cereals can nourish man well […]. Of these foods the most useful are those which can be used at once without fire, since they are also most easily available; for example fruits in season, some of the green vegetables […]. Also, those which require fire for their preparation, whether grains or vegetables, are not unsuitable, and are all natural food for man.

On the other hand he showed that meat was a less civilized kind of food and more appropriate for wild animals. He held that it was a heavy food and an obstacle to thinking and reasoning, since the exhalations rising from it being turbid darkened the soul. For this reason also the people who make larger use of it seem slower in intellect. Furthermore, as man of all creatures on Earth is the nearest of kin to the gods, so he should be nourished in a manner most like the gods. […]”

ON FURNISHINGS “[…] For my part, then, I would choose sickness rather than luxury, for sickness harms only the body, but luxury destroys both body and soul, causing weakness and impotence in the body and lack of self-control and cowardice in the soul. Furthermore, luxury begets injustice because it also begets covetousness. For no man of extravagant tastes can avoid being lavish in expenditure, nor being lavish can he wish to spend little; but in his desire for many things he cannot refrain from acquiring them, nor again in his effort to acquire can he fail to be grasping and unjust; for no man would succeed in acquiring much by just methods. […]”