(Betel)

This is not a bad habit. If it were a bad habit, Swami would not chew it. The leaves, their juice purifies the blood. The nut digests. Here, even with the little puppies, they mix the nut and give it for digestion. And the other thing that is put in is calcium. The three mixed make red colour. This is Indian. (CWBSSB, pp. 22-23)

Supari is brown, paan is green, chunam is white

but when these are chewed together

the colour is red.

When the three gunas, Sattva, Rajas and Tamas,

are equated in Sadhana

the result is Shanti

(SSS Vol.5, p. 6)

In everyday life, you know that the combination of the brown betel nut, the green betel leaf and the white chunnam produce a reddish compound. In the same way when man’s mind, speech and vital breath come together, theAtma emerges. This is the true sign of mankind. (SSS Vol.24, p. 75)

Betel leaf alone cannot make a pan. It has to be mixed with an appropriate quantity of betel nut and lime before it becomes a pan. Betel leaf is green in colour, betel nut is brown and lime is white. When mixed together in appropriate proportion, they form red colour. Lime adds taste to the pan, but when used in excess, it will burn the tongue. That is why it is said, Na Sreyo Niyamam Vina (no good accrues without the observance of rules). (SSS Vol.33, p. 177)