Philosophy Now Forum

You must not kill any living being for the sake of your food.
The killing is the greatest sin

You must not kill any living being for the sake of your food. God has given enough vegetable food that contains all the ingredients present in the non-vegetarian food. After all, the source of ingredients of any flesh is only vegetable kingdom only. Eating the non-vegetarian food is not a sin because same ingredients exist in both vegetarian and non-vegetarian foods. But, you have to kill a living being for the sake of non-vegetarian food. The killing is the greatest sin.
You may argue that you have not killed the living being directly. Such argument cannot stand. Since you are eating the non-vegetarian food, the living being is killed. You are responsible for its killing. Therefore, you are the principle shareholder of the sin. There is nothing wrong if you eat a living being after its natural death. In Hinduism, there is a sect of people called ‘Kapalikas’, who eat the dead living beings. Therefore, they do not acquire sin. The tsunami is always due to anger of God since you are killing the living beings present in water for food. The earthquakes are due to killing of living beings that exist on the earth. God in the form of Buddha and Mahavir preached the non-violence and severely opposed the killing of living beings.

God in some other human forms might have followed the practice of non-vegetarian food in order to join with non-vegetarian people so that, certain other higher aspects to be preached might have been taken into consideration. That does not mean that God has encouraged the killing of living beings through non-vegetarian food. He might have kept silent on this issue in order to give importance to other serious issues. God follows the ignorance of the students in order to become friendly with them. To control a running bull, you have to run along with it for some distance before controlling it.

All these are the basic concepts of nivrutti, which are the core of pravrutti. By following the ethics of pravrutti, you will avoid God becoming furious with you. Then, through nivrutti, you can please God. On one hand, you are making God furious by not following the ethics of pravrutti and how can you please God through nivrutti simultaneously?
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The Inuit will be chuffed.

Why did 'god' give us canines?

Why did 'it' make us omnivorous?

Arising_uk wrote:The Inuit will be chuffed.

Why did 'god' give us canines?

Why did 'it' make us omnivorous?

A goat is a pure vegetarian but you are eating that goat also. When you find a human being, who is a murderer, will you kill him directly or hand over him to the court? Assuming that the fish is also a murderer, you cannot kill it directly. God will punish it. In the case of the fish, you need not file a case against the fish in the court of the God, because there is no need of such filing in the case of God.

Moreover you are raising your voice against the hanging of a murderer stating, “If you cannot give life, you have no right to take it away”. You are also pleading that hanging is the most barbaric deed and that several countries have banned it. Your statement applies to the fish also, which is a murderer of the creatures.

Life is common in the human being as well as the fish. Both are living beings. If you don’t have right to take away the life of a human being, you have also no right to take the life of the fish also. The Dharma Shastras say that non-voilence is the highest justice (Ahimsa Paramo Dharmah). If you say that the fish kills the creatures for food and that there is no sin, there should not be sin if cornivorous hunters from forest enter the city and start eating the human beings.

You should not object their food also, but you will kill them because your fellow human beings are killed. If you broaden your heart and see the fish as your fellow living being, you are practicing the highest form of justice, which pleases the Lord. You cannot compare the plants with animals and birds. Even in the case of plants, the green plants should not be cut.

What about viruses, bacteria, microbes?

Wootah wrote:What about viruses, bacteria, microbes?

God has designed them appropariately...

dattaswami wrote:

Wootah wrote:What about viruses, bacteria, microbes?

God has designed them appropariately...

Can we kill them?

Carnivorous animals were designed by God to eat vegetarian animals and to keep them in balance, or so it seems.
A lion eats sick and old antilopes and thus diminishes their population to a reasonable proportion.
In Australia rabbits procreated to nightmarish numbers because there were no foxes to eat them.

If we come from apes we can be healthy eating plants only.

The terrible thing about people killing for food is not so much killing a wild animal but mass production of cheap meat in farms which have to be called concentration camps.

It may be difficult to stop eating meat and milk products from one day to another, just like it would be difficult to stop eating chocolate or to drink beer. But you can change your eating habits gradually if you want to. A chart helps to keep track of how much of what you really eat.

Everyone has a different body and should find the best solution for himself and for the rest of the creation.

Michael Moore spoke dismissively of sprouts. He should not be forced to eat them but he could try so many other things and decide whether they nourish him better than meat. Cooked grains for example, as the teachings of microbiotics recommend.

What answer is this?

I asked why your 'god' 'made' us omnivores? Why if 'it' 'gave' us canines we were not meant to use them?

dattaswami wrote:... Life is common in the human being as well as the fish. Both are living beings. If you don’t have right to take away the life of a human being, you have also no right to take the life of the fish also. The Dharma Shastras say that non-voilence is the highest justice (Ahimsa Paramo Dharmah). If you say that the fish kills the creatures for food and that there is no sin, there should not be sin if cornivorous hunters from forest enter the city and start eating the human beings.
...

What are these "rights" you talk about?

How would 'sin' apply to carnivorous animals that attacked us? You still in the medieval age? You would put them in court and try them?

... You should not object their food also, but you will kill them because your fellow human beings are killed. If you broaden your heart and see the fish as your fellow living being, you are practicing the highest form of justice, which pleases the Lord. You cannot compare the plants with animals and birds. Even in the case of plants, the green plants should not be cut.

I don't object to being their food. After all and in the long run we all end up as some creatures food. Doesn't mean I won't fight back if they try to eat me.

duszek wrote:Carnivorous animals were designed by God to eat vegetarian animals and to keep them in balance, or so it seems. ...

Only to the theist. The rest of us think things evolved this way.

A lion eats sick and old antilopes and thus diminishes their population to a reasonable proportion. ...

They also eat the young as they are weak and slow.

In Australia rabbits procreated to nightmarish numbers because there were no foxes to eat them. ...

But mainly because man introduced them.

If we come from apes we can be healthy eating plants only. ...

Good job we don't 'come from apes' but are a primate. Chimps eat meat as well. Whilst its true we can survive upon vegetables its because we are omnivores not vegetarians.

The terrible thing about people killing for food is not so much killing a wild animal but mass production of cheap meat in farms which have to be called concentration camps.

Why do they have to be called 'concentration camps'? As they have a pupose to feed us but the death camps had no purpose other than extermination.

It may be difficult to stop eating meat and milk products from one day to another, just like it would be difficult to stop eating chocolate or to drink beer. But you can change your eating habits gradually if you want to. A chart helps to keep track of how much of what you really eat.

I agree, eat healthily and exercise.

Everyone has a different body and should find the best solution for himself and for the rest of the creation.

'the rest of the creation' seems a touch big. But I agree, live as healthily as you can and try to minimise your environmental impact.

Michael Moore spoke dismissively of sprouts. He should not be forced to eat them but he could try so many other things and decide whether they nourish him better than meat. Cooked grains for example, as the teachings of microbiotics recommend.

I thought we were discovering that grains are not that good for us as our diet should be meat and veg but that grains have produced civilization and possible larger populations so the health problems are the lesser evil?

Grains are plants.
So are nuts I would say.
I distinguish only between animal products and plant products.

Cooked rice and cooked grains give long-chained carbohydrons and so give energy for a long day.
I have cooked a rice or grain soup for breakfast for a couple of months now.
The traditional English porriadge seems to have similar effects, but the microbiologists argue that flakes and flour are not so good because the structure of the plant is destroyed. That´s why they say one should cook whole grains.

My soups work for me and so I continue.

Are you arguing at the end that bread is bad ?

In the case of microorganisms you do not really kill them when you eat them.
Lots of them are on salad leaves and that´s why you should eat salad with the microorganisms on it because you actually need the microorganisms to process food in the intestines.
So when you eat salad you just move the microorganisms from the salad field to your body. They do not even notice their move, they continue their lives and their work inside of you.

duszek wrote:Carnivorous animals were designed by God to eat vegetarian animals and to keep them in balance, or so it seems.
A lion eats sick and old antilopes and thus diminishes their population to a reasonable proportion.
In Australia rabbits procreated to nightmarish numbers because there were no foxes to eat them.

If we come from apes we can be healthy eating plants only.

The terrible thing about people killing for food is not so much killing a wild animal but mass production of cheap meat in farms which have to be called concentration camps.

It may be difficult to stop eating meat and milk products from one day to another, just like it would be difficult to stop eating chocolate or to drink beer. But you can change your eating habits gradually if you want to. A chart helps to keep track of how much of what you really eat.

Everyone has a different body and should find the best solution for himself and for the rest of the creation.

Michael Moore spoke dismissively of sprouts. He should not be forced to eat them but he could try so many other things and decide whether they nourish him better than meat. Cooked grains for example, as the teachings of microbiotics recommend.

Suppose I say that the purpose of creating the man is also to supply the food to tigers, lions, man-eating hunters in the forests, etc., how do you feel? Why don’t you allow tigers and lions to freely come to villages and towns and have their food? A soul is being punished through these births of fish etc., A bird, fish,etc., does not store any thing for future. Thus the soul is in the training of decreasing its selfish behaviour. A sinner who amasses the wealth of others and goes on storing for selfish purpose is born as fish etc., By leading a life of a fish, which does not store even food for tomorrow, the soul is learning the self-less attitude. Punishment is only meant for change. Thus the births of fish etc., is for a particular purpose of its soul in the spiritual path. God is the teaher who punishes all these souls, which are His students. If you view God in this angle, you will understand God as the kindest teacher.

A sinner who stores the wealth and does not donate to others, gets the birth of a plant or tree. The plant or tree stores the excess earned food in the form of fruits and is forcibly made to donate these fruits to the living beings. Thus a soul in a tree is forced to learn sacrifice, which is the most essential part of the spiritual effort. Thus God is leading all the souls towards the highest spiritual goal. If you understand this real purpose, you will not dream of eating those living beings. Will you kill your classmate who is learning? This whole world is a single classroom with the single teacher who is ‘Guru Datta’, meaning the Lord given to this world in the form of a teacher. Even in the green plant a soul exists and therefore should not be cut. From this point of view, the Lord came in the human forms like Bhuddha and Mahavir Jain and preached the non-voilence as the highest duty of a human being. The Hindu Dharma Sashtra (Manu Smrithi) clearly condemns such killing (‘Ahimsa Paramodharmah’).

Dataswarmi why do you dismiss the fact that plant life is alive and deserves not to be killed? The forests cry out for you to stop eating and if you were a real incarnation you would only eat sunlight nowadays.

Wootah wrote:Dataswarmi why do you dismiss the fact that plant life is alive and deserves not to be killed? The forests cry out for you to stop eating and if you were a real incarnation you would only eat sunlight nowadays.

Plucking leaves and fruits is not killing. The crops are cut only when they die after loosing the sign of the life, which is the Green Chlorophyll. In plants life exists but mind and intelligence do not exist.

Life is called as Pranamaya Kosa. Mind is Manomaya Kosa. Intelligence is Vijnanamaya Kosa. The life is only inert mechanism of exchange process of Oxygen and Carbondioxide and release of energy by oxidation. This mechanism has no awareness of the pain.

The mind is represented by the nervous system, which is not present in the plants. The mind may be in very very primitive stage in plants as per the research of Mr. Bose. The ancient Indian sages avoided even plucking the leaves and fruits. They ate leaves and fruits when they have fallen from the plants (Swayam Viseerna Dhruva Patra Vruttita).

They avoided this trace of sin also. In plucking the leaf and killing an animal, the sin is qualitatively equal, but there is a lot of quantitative difference. One percent sin and hundred percent sin cannot be equated. Your argument concludes that if one does one percent sin, why not hundred percent sin be done? This equates to your statement that if one plucks a leaf why not we kill an animal.

Are you pained equally if I steal one rupee or one lakh rupees from your pocket. The trace of sin can always be neglected. The Lord came as Bhuddha and preached this non-voilence. Veda also says that one should kill his animal nature in the sacrifice and not the animal (Manyuh Pasuh).

Wouldn't a large part of the Indian sub-continent die if your ways were adopted?