When a Guru Eats Meat || Acharya Prashant, on Raman Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj

Questioner: So, a question that comes up for me is: Ramana Maharishi says — one of the best ways to stabilize is to eat more satvik food and give up meat. And then, I like his words and his teachings. And then, Nisargadatta Maharaj, whose words also penetrated me very deeply.

Someone asked him the question, “Why do you eat meat?” And he says, “My body has these habits — so what of it?” And I find myself, for me personally, if I just have no desire to eat meat anymore. I'm just curious what Nisaragdatta Maharaj meant when he said, “My body has these habits — so what?”

Acharya Prashant: These are coming from two different points. These two statements that you have just quoted. Ramana Maharshi is advising a seeker. Ramana Maharshi's counsel is for someone who is still on the way, so he is offering you a method to be lighter on your way, so that your journey is less loaded against yourself.

Nisargadatta Maharaj is saying from the point of one who has already reached. And he's saying, “I am at a point, where there is complete separation between me and the body.” Now, that kind of a separation does not exist for the one who is still on the way. So, Nisargadatta Maharaj says, “Let the body do what it wants to do. The body is anyway a conditioned mechanism, and situated where I am, if I interfere with the body — even to bring some purity, some correction, some