View source for How to Eat to Live Book I/How To Keep Food from Hurting Us

{{header2
 | title    = Message to the Blackman in America<br>
 | author   = Elijah Muhammad
 | section  = How To Keep Food from Hurting Us
 | previous = [[How to Eat to Live Book I/How Allah's Way Prolongs Life|How Allah's Way Prolongs Life]]
 | next     = [[How to Eat to Live Book I/The Proper Food and the Proper Time to Eat it|The Proper Food and the Proper Time to Eat it]]
 | notes    = 
}}

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=1}} I thank Allah in the Person of Master Fard Muhammad, to whom praises are due forever, for bringing us life and light so that we may be able to enjoy life, and to enjoy that life longer than we have previously enjoyed it.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=2}} Many years to be added to our lives if we only knew how to protect our lives from their enemies. As He (meaning Master Fard Muhammad) said to me, food keeps us here; it is essential that we eat food which gives and maintains life. That same food destroys life. Therefore, to keep this food from destroying our lives, we must protect our lives as well as we possibly can from the destruction of food. If we eat the proper food, and eat at the proper time, the food will keep us living a long, long time.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=3}} Eating three or four times a day is to your stomach as dripping water is to a stone or iron. The dripping water will eventually wear a stone and iron away. But, just to look at the water, it does not appear powerful enough in its dripping to wear the stone and iron away. It is the same with food; we continuously put it into our stomachs to be digested and eventually it will destroy the stomach. If we let our stomachs rest a while and gain strength, they will last longer in doing a job of digesting food for us .

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=4}} Eat one meal a day and eat the food that will not harm you so quickly. You do not have to obtain a long, detailed knowledge of what foods you have to eat, because the wrong food has already been pointed out to you-foods such as the pig , nuts, white flour, meats (of course, we eat some meats ), the wrong kind of peas, the wrong kinds of breads, too many starchy foods and to many sweets.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=5}} All of these foods destroy us. Bread should be cooked thoroughly and slowly, and if you have plenty of time, cook the bread two or three times and then eat it. Meat should also be cooked two or three times.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=6}} Eating great meals of highly seasoned and sugared pastries is definitely not good for us. They most surely take years of our lives away. You may eat some sweets, but do not make an entire meal of sweets or eat them every day. Fruit is good for us; we should eat plenty of fruit.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=7}} To live a long time, eat once every 24 hours or once every 48 hours, if you’re able to do so. But, if you have heavy, manual work to do, do not try to eat once every two or three days. And, if you eat once a day, you should fast every month for two or three days. By doing that, there will be no poison left in the body at the end of a year to make you sick even one hour.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=8}} I would like you, who try to live and eat just as this book teaches you, to please send me a letter telling me of the result that you have gained from eating as I have instructed you in this book. I repeatedly teach that the way Allah, in the Person of Master Fard Muhammad, has taught us to eat will do away with many doctor bills and do away with much maiming of the limbs caused by certain diseases.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=9}} Sugar diabetes can be controlled and cured if you only eat correctly. Stay off sugar and starchy foods and leave those old, white potatoes alone. Do not eat spaghetti and macaroni at every meal. If you are overweight, do not eat it at any meal, and if you want to live a long time, do not eat it at any meal. Foods such as spaghetti and macaroni are processed, and are hard to digest.

{{verse|chapter=2|verse=10}} There are some people who claim that they do not receive beneficial results as they should. This is due to wrong mental food that they are eating, which has an effect on their digestive system. To get good results from eating the proper foods, we must have good thoughts.

{{header2
 | title    = Message to the Blackman in America<br>
 | author   = Elijah Muhammad
 | section  = How To Keep Food from Hurting Us
 | previous = [[How to Eat to Live Book I/How Allah's Way Prolongs Life|How Allah's Way Prolongs Life]]
 | next     = [[How to Eat to Live Book I/The Proper Food and the Proper Time to Eat it|The Proper Food and the Proper Time to Eat it]]
 | notes    = 
}}