Why do some Indians eat with their hands?

 

Why do some Indians eat with their hands?

The ancient tradition of eating with hands is derived from mudra (postures) practices and are widespread in many aspects within Hinduism. As we know that hands postures are used during mediation and Yoga. Even in many classical forms of dance, hand postures are important.

 As per Vedic knowledge, our hands and feet consist of the five elements - Space, Air, Fire, Water and Earth. Practice of eating with hands is also mentioned in Ayurveda. As per Ayurveda texts, each finger is an extension of one of the five elements:

Thumb: Fire

Index finger: Air

Middle finger: Heaven/ Ether

Ring finger: Earth

Little finger: Water

Each finger transforms food in digestive form before it passes to human digestion system. Improved digestion enhances the pleasure of eating as taste, texture and smell is felt better while having food with hands.

* The skin sends the senses to the brain about the temperature, texture of the food and this acts like a catalyst in the action of generating the necessary salivary juices.

* Eating with the hands, one can verify the temperature of the food before and it can prevent one from burning of the mouth.

* Some people believe that hands behave as energetic cleanser when the food passes via hand to mouth. Similar kind of tradition is followed in other religion also when people eat food after placing their palms above the food.

The logic behind it that food contains various external energies positives, negatives, pains, emotions, thoughts etc. when it passes from various people like vegetable/ spice seller, cook, waiter etc. It is believed hands help cleaning all external energies so that it could not impact the human soul.

A similar pattern is found in many people coming from abroad that they feel suffocation and negative feelings when they eat through knife and fork. On the other hand, if they eat with their hands, they experience heavenly and divine feeling.

Science behind Eating With Hands:

We have some bacteria, known as normal flora, found on our skin. These bacteria are not harmful to human instead they protect us from many harmful bacteria from outside environment.

It is required to establish normal flora in various parts of our body like in mouth, throat, intestine, gut etc. for the betterment of health.

Eating with spoon for long time can change the arrangement of normal flora. With this, the pattern of normal flora can be changed in the gut. It results reduced synchronous immunity to environmental bacterial germs.

Let’s take an example, in India, when some people come from abroad after spending several years of staying there mostly suffer from acute gastroenteritis whereas the local people don't, because their normal flora and gut flora are in sync.

Karaagre Vasate Lakssmih Karamadhye Sarasvati |
Karamuule Tu Govindah Prabhaate Karadarshanam ||

Some Indians don’t eat with their hands. ALL Indians, esp. Hindus, eat with our hands. There is nothing in Hindu life that is not connected to yoga. Our habits are engineered to be yogic practices, so we do them without even thinking about the underlying yogic purpose.

Yoga tells us to eat with our hands, as prana flows through our hands, and specifically through each of the 5 fingers corresponding to a different tattva (Agni, vayu, akasha, prithvi, and jala) and health is directly related to the balance in this tattvas as per ayurveda. We offer all food to the pancha-pranas (prana, apana, vyana, sama, udana) first before consuming them ourselves.

It prevents eating food that is either too hot or too cold (to the touch), so it prequalifies whether the food is appropriate for the body.

Hands are nature’s own utensils, why waste plastic or wood or metal? Do you see any other animals out there eating with utensils?

We wash our hands frequently before, after, and at other times, so we are always aware of the state of hygiene. In fact, eating with hands forces you to be conscious of hygiene instead of outsourcing your concern to the circumstance/environment you are in.

Specifically, we eat with the right hand (left hand reserved for cleaning ourselves).

We don’t shake hands in our culture, we say ‘namaste’ and fold our palms together - this prevents germs and viruses from transmitting freely, and maintains a respectful attitude/distance between people.

In Orthodox Hindu Brahmin families, no saliva is shared between family members, or with anyone else for that matter. In other words, we do not touch anything with our hands while we are eating. Someone else (e.g., host/hostess) serves the food to avoid cross-contamination of the utensils, the food, and the plates. We don’t even enter the kitchen without first taking a bath, wearing fresh cotton clothes. These are hygienic practices comprise a larger practice of madi-achara.