Part of being a good Jew is keeping your body healthy

By Michael R. Mantell, Ph.D.

Dr. Michael Mantell
Dr. Michael Mantell

SAN DIEGO –A Jewish young man was seeing a psychologist for an eating and sleeping disorder.

“I am so obsessed with my mother… As soon as I go to sleep, I start dreaming, and everyone in my dream turns into my mother. I wake up in such a state, all I can do is go downstairs and eat a piece of toast.”

The psychologist replies:

“What, just one piece of toast, for a big boy like you?”

Yes, it’s sort of humorous but not really. In today’s world, we know all too well that 50% of Americans have one or more preventable, chronic diseases and more than 66% have what I call,  “overbesity” – overweight or obesity. Despite the best intentions of Jewish mothers and psychologists such as the ones in the story above, despite the incredible attention to health and wellness by physicians and other healthcare professionals, despite the attention in the media to exercise and weight management, over the past 30 years, the percentage of people worldwide considered overweight or obese increased 28% in adults and a whoppng 47% in children.

It’s time to take stock, recognize that self-styled and other “experts” have largely failed and begin to look to other sources. Why not Torah?

Torah has answers for us in our search for optimal health, which I define as resting on the tripod of “ThEaMo” – Thinking well, Eating well and Moving well. As Rabbi Moshe Feinstein noted, matters of health and diet are best addressed through the lens of Torah. After all, aren’t our bodies receptacles of our souls? If we believe this, then let’s turn to what it says in Tehillim (119:105) Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path.” Keeping our health at its optimal level is a spiritual mandate in that it allows us to fully fulfill mitzvot – not simply look good in our summer bikinis and in our form fitting gym clothes. The Rambam wrote, “Maintaining a healthy body is among the ways of serving Hashem, since it is impossible for one who is not healthy to understand or know anything of the Creator. Therefore one must distance himself from things which harm the body, and accustom oneself to the things that strengthen and make one healthy.”

Obesity, which comes from the Latin word “obesus,” appeared for the first time in 1620 in Thomas Venner’s Via Recta. However the Rambam, Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, a preeminent rabbi, medieval Sephardic Jewish philospher, astronomer and physician, wrote about this disease centuries ealier.

Ours is clearly a religion of the body. We sanctify our bodies in so many ways from blessings on going to the bathroom, to our dietary “laws,” to laws about dealing with the body after death, to the “laws” of sexual behavior, to the Rabmbam’s observation in his famed, Mishneh Torah, Whoever conducts himself in te ways we have set forth, I will guarantee that he will not get sick througout his life…He will not need a doctor and his body will be in perfect shape and remain healthy all his life.”  Big claim for sure. But one that the Yemenite Jewish population, which followed the Rambam’s main principles and teachings on eating and moving, found to be true. They had an average life span of 100 years.

Much of the Rambam’s advice can be succinctly stated, as he did, “A person should eat only when he is hungry and he should drink only when he is thirsty.” He goes on to add, “In the practice of medicine, the first and most important regimen is the one for the healthy, which insures that the existing state of health is not lost.”  He also adds, “An expert physician who wants to guard his patient’s health begins by improving his diet.”

A good friend of mine, Dr. Walter Bortz, of Stanford Medical School noted, Americans live too short and die too long…the most important ‘organ’ of the body is not the lungs, the heart, liver or kidney but the legs. We’ve got to move to live to 100 – which we can do.” It says in Genesis (3:19), “By the sweat of your brow shall you get bread to eat.” The famed Kli Yakar and Rambam note this is related to exercise and eating properly and as long as a person exercises and exerts himself, one will find health.

I’ve been commited to developing health and wellness programs in companies, schools, organizations, gyms, diet centers, on apps and for colleges and universities throughout the world. It’s time we in the Jewish community raised our commitment to health, happiness, wellness and longevity for all of our members from pre-school and Torah school children and their families, to our baby boomers and active aging members.

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Dr Michael Mantell, based in San Diego, provides coaching to business leaders, athletes, individuals and families to reach breakthrough levels of success and significance in their professional and personal lives. Mantell may be contacted via michael.mantell@sdjewishworld.com

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