How should proper nutrition be?
“O prophets! Eat of good things and do righteous deeds” (Surah Al-Muminun, 51) If you pay attention, eating comes before action in the verse. Our elders used to say, “First learn to eat, then talk about knowledge.” Today, everyone talks about knowledge even though they have forgotten how to eat right. Those who do not know how to eat cannot distinguish right from wrong, cannot do righteous deeds, cannot do good deeds, in other words, those who are not of benefit to themselves cannot be of benefit to others. “If a bald person has an ointment, he should apply it to himself.” (Proverb)
In the 31st verse of the Surah Al-A'raf, it is stated, "Eat and drink, but do not waste. For He does not love those who waste." In order to find the measure in eating, drinking and waste, we need to look at the hadiths of our Prophet.
Our Prophet (pbuh) said, "Eating and drinking twice during the day and twice during the darkness of the night is waste and a disease."
Since food has a very important place in people's lives, the way it is produced, obtained and consumed has been the easiest way to make a mistake. The first person to make a mistake on this path and to be expelled from heaven for this reason was Hz. Adam. Today, the lack of importance given to proper nutrition and excessive greed for food have caused the reason for creation to be forgotten, moral and behavioral disorders, unhappiness and diseases.
The treatment of any disease must first begin with correcting eating habits, because unless the diet is corrected, the disease is being treated on one hand and nourished on the other.
It is necessary to start the treatment by replacing harmful foods with useful foods, decreasing cooked foods and increasing raw fruits and vegetables. The correct thing is that 40 percent of the daily diet should consist of cooked foods (including bread) and 60 percent of raw foods.
The second step is to reduce the amount of food and drink.
The number of meals should be reduced to two per day and the interval between two meals should not be less than 6-8 hours. The most suitable time for breakfast is between 7-8 and for the second meal between the afternoon and evening. The order of meals should be water, tea or fruit juice first, then fruit or dessert, then food and salad. For example;
Morning:
Evening:
You can drink water 1.5-3 hours after a meal.
There is a very important point to note here. The daily duty of the digestive organs ends at 21:00. The food eaten at this time cannot be digested, it rots in the stomach until 6-7 in the morning, then it goes down to the intestines and attacks the mucosa.
The amount and type of food depends on the person's job, mobility and age. However, it is necessary not to eat more than 250-300 grams and to leave the table without feeling full. At noon, herbal tea, natural coffee, water can be drunk or a type of fruit can be eaten.
Water can be drunk before a meal. However, as we explained above, there is a subtlety in this case. When the smell of the cooked food is detected, the salivary and gastric glands begin to produce the enzymes needed to digest this food. During this time, the water consumed washes these enzymes away and drains them into the intestines, making digestion difficult. If necessary, only a few sips of water can be drunk before a meal. Fruit, fruit juice, tea or water should be taken 30 minutes to 1.5 hours before a meal. These do not stay in the stomach for long, but rather go down to the intestines and prevent the stomach from expanding.
Drinking water with a meal reduces saliva production, weakens the enzymes in the saliva by mixing with them and prevents digestion that should take place in the mouth. As a result, the stomach, liver and intestines have a harder time doing their job. Drinking fruit juice after a meal makes things even harder because fruit juice is the opposite of food and disrupts digestion, causing fermentation in the stomach.
Water drunk after a meal cannot pass from the stomach to the intestines, it expands the stomach. It dilutes enzymes, slows down digestion, and increases the workload of the glands and heart involved in digestion. Only a few small sips can be drunk if needed. It is natural for a person to feel thirsty 1.5-3 hours after a meal, and this is the right time for water or unsweetened mint, thyme, ginger, rosemary, marjoram tea or green tea. However, those who eat stale, mixed or mixed foods or those with weak digestion can take these later, as they take longer to digest.
Food should be taken in small bites and chewed 21 times. In order to correct the impaired function of the stomach, spleen and intestines, sometimes it is enough to just correct the food and increase the number of chewings.
Those who want to live healthy should reduce the variety of food, choose a few types of fruits, vegetables and meals and continue with them. After the right meals, a person feels lively and light, sleeps less. He does not experience gas, bloating, belching, sourness, burning, reflux and bowel problems. After the wrong meal, heaviness settles, sleepiness, snoring, gas, constipation and bad breath occur.
Our Prophet (pbuh) loved dates, grapes, melons, watermelons, cucumbers, canak, celery, honey, clotted cream, milk, lentils, rice, keşkek (meat cooked with wheat), mutton and bird meat. He said, “If I asked my Lord to eat meat every day, He would grant it.” However, he did not want this and was content with water and dates throughout his life.
The common belief among the public is, “The more and more diverse I eat, the more beneficial it is. There are plenty of vitamins and necessary substances in various foods, and these provide resistance to diseases.” If that were the case, the rich would always be healthy and the poor would be sick. However, it is the opposite. The mixture of different foods cannot be digested in the stomach and rots, the rotten food metabolisms accumulate in the veins and block the capillaries. In this case, the tissues are deprived of the nutrients and vitamins they need. As a result, those who eat mixed meals always feel hungry. They are indeed hungry, while those who eat less are full. Because those who eat less and do not eat more than 2 times a day easily and completely digest what they eat, the necessary nutrients mix into the blood, and the harmful ones are excreted. The stomach, intestines and veins remain clean, resistant and healthy. Microorganisms living in healthy intestines produce vitamins and even proteins using nitrogen in the air. As our ancestors said, “Hunger satisfies the organs, satiety makes them hungry.”
Along with the life given to us, our sustenance is also given. Let's try to remember this fact that we have forgotten with the following story:
"God Almighty created a Peacock and gave it valleys full of the world as sustenance. The Peacock saw the sustenance given to it as abundant and ate for years without thinking, until finally, when there were only ten valleys left, he began to eat only ten grains a day out of fear. Then, when there was only one valley left, the bird began to be content with one grain. When the sustenance allocated to it was finished, the bird's death came."
Scientists have identified the gene that causes animals that are given limited amounts of food to live longer than those that consume more food. This gene, which increases lifespan, also regulates the functioning of other genes. Scientists state that giving an animal 70% of the food it normally consumes increases its lifespan by 20-30%.
In our age, a person who eats for 4-5 people is exposed to various diseases and loses his health. A person who is faithful and eats little, on the other hand, leaves this world quietly, without losing his health, without falling into the disgrace of old age, and when his sustenance runs out.
Dr. Aidin Salih / Real Medicine – In Search of Lost Healing
