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Andrea Useem, creator and publisher of ReligionWriter.com, is a freelance journalist and editor based in Northern Virginia who specializes in writing about religion. Andrea holds a Masters of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School, as well as a Bachelors degree in religion from Dartmouth College. Previously, Andrea worked as a freelance journalist in Eastern Africa for four years; she has also lived in Muscat, Oman. She is married and has three sons.

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What Would Prophet Muhammed Eat?

July 18th, 2007 • Related • Filed Under

Given that some American Protestants are finding dietary inspiration from Jesus, it seems only fitting that American Muslims might look to the Prophet Muhammed for inspiration to lose weight, eat healthy and fight the obesity epidemic. After all, evidence of Jesus’ diet in the Gospels is thin, and the Last Supper’s bread and wine is pretty carb-heavy, but that hasn’t stopped people like Gwen Shamblin from creating a complete — and megasuccessful — faith-based weight-loss program.

Muslims can find very specific dietary advice in the prophetic traditions, or hadiths. The voluminous collections of hadiths are the equivalent of the Muslim Gospels, since both record the sayings and doings of Muhammed and Jesus, respectively.

This morning, ReligionWriter sat down with vol. 7 of the English translation of the hadiths collected by Al-Bukhari to read the “Book of Meals.”

The first answer to the question “What would Prophet Muhammed Eat?” is: Not much. He shared his food with others, and many of the stories about him and his companions refer to periods of extreme hunger. The prophet lived the dietary life of a poor man; as one companion put it, he did not see “well-baked bread” or a full roasted sheep “until he met Allah” (i.e. died.)

Muhammed was a great proponent of portion control. According to Abu Huraira, the Prophet said: “The food for two persons is sufficient for three, and the food of three persons is sufficient for four persons.”

The Prophet’s comment that “a believer eats with one intestine, while an unbeliever eats with seven intestines” advocates a kind of will-power-induced stomach staple.

And here’s one for Muslim mothers with picky-eater children: Abu Huraira narrated that Muhammed “never criticized any food (he was invited to.)” Rather, he would eat the foods he liked and simply leave the foods he did not.

White flour? Not for Muhammed. One of his companions related that the prophet only ate bread made from unsifted barley flour with the husks blown off.

But before he sounds too perfect, the prophet’s favorite wife, Aisha, testified that he also had a sweet-tooth, enjoying honey and other edible treats.

The field is open for an American Muslim to write the first Prophet Muhammed-based diet. Good luck to you!

There Are 5 Responses So Far. »

  1. Pingback by What Would Prophet Muhammed Eat? at Ijtema on 19 July 2007:

    […] Andrea Useem of Religion Writer, asks the interesting question: what would our beloved Nabi, Muhamme… Given that some American Protestants are finding dietary inspiration from Jesus, it seems only fitting that American Muslims might look to the Prophet Muhammed for inspiration to lose weight, eat healthy and fight the obesity epidemic… Muslims can find very specific dietary advice in the prophetic traditions, or hadiths. The voluminous collections of hadiths are the equivalent of the Muslim Gospels, since both record the sayings and doings of Muhammed and Jesus, respectively. Powered by Gregarious (21) […]

  2. Comment by Editor @ I J T E M A on 19 July 2007:

    Assalamu ‘alaykum wa rahmatullah
    I pray that you are in the best of health & imaan.
    This is a short message to notify you that this entry has been selected for publishing on IJTEMA, a venture to highlight the best of the Muslim blogosphere.
    To find out more about IJTEMA, and how you can further contribute, please click here.
    May Allah bless you for your noble efforts.
    Wa’salam

  3. Comment by Anon on 19 July 2007:

    There is a lot more information about what the Prophet ate… for one thing, he ate a lot of dates, which were grown in his city and which are very nutritious. You might be interested in listening to a lecture series by Hamza Yusuf called “Food for Thought”.

  4. Comment by Glenn Reynolds on 20 July 2007:

    Hi Andrea,

    I love the layout of your site! Very clean, fresh and useful. Well done.

  5. Comment by ali mundodan on 13 July 2008:

    realy excelent hadees and promot like this lerning

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