A Humanitarian’s Prayer

We are asked to offer prayers not only for creatures on this earth but for all living things in all the worlds. Here is one such prayer offered us for guidance: –

In all lands may all the sufferings of living beings come to an end!

May the beaten be freed from blows!

May those who are threatened with death be restored to life!

May those who are in tribulations become free from all pain!

May those who suffer hunger and thirst receive food and drink in abundance!

May the blind see and the deaf hear and women with children give birth painlessly!

May sound of pain be nowhere heard in the world!

May living creatures avoid the low way!

May the torment and anguish of these. Who dwell to in narka lokas come an end!

May the animals renounce the habit of devouring each other!

May the ghost be happy!

May living beings be liberated from the cycle of re-incarnation!

Ahimsa—The True Culture of India

The culture of India is inspired by a vision of reverence for Life. The soul of India has never countenanced the killing of creatures.

The Hindu doctrine of ahimsa (non-violence) is a comprehensive one and emphasises the valus of satya (truth), brahmacharya (self restraint), tyaga (non-covetousness). Meat-diet is prohibited. Don’t kill even for “sacrifice”!

The mighty faith of Mahavira, the prophet of Jainism, re-proclaimed the truth of the ancient Vedic Rishis. Over and over again he taught: -“Regard every living being as thyself, and harm no one.” The Mahavira’s life was dedicated to the service of this great truth of ahimsa. At the age of 28, his father and mother pass away, and the call comes to him to take to the multitudes the great message of mercy. Like Jesus, he feels he must renounce all and enter upon a ministry of service. Like Buddha, he distributes his wealth among the poor. He gives over his kingdom to his brother, then passes into a life of penance and meditation. Attaining to Illumination, he goes upon his great mission of Teaching. For 30 years he moves from place to place: he preaches, in Bengal and Bihar, his great gospel of happiness. He takes his message even to savage tribes unmindful of their cruel treatment to him. He goes on his mission to Himalayas! A band of men beat him in a forest. He is silent! He must harm no one. He becomes a “Mahavira”. The word means, literally, a “Great Hero” “a superman”. Not a superman of egoism and violence but of humility and love. “Control your senses,” he taught, “and limit your possessions and simplify the necessities of life.”

In his last Sermon given on the last day of his earth-life, he said: -“Destroy the bondage of karma. Be kind to every creature!” “O man!” he said, “thou art thine own friend!” Yes, — man is his own friend, he also is his own enemy. For there is the great Cosmic Law that what you do comes back to you. What you do unto others, you do unto yourselves. Therefore be kind to all, if you will be truly happy. This doctrine of ahimsa means anything but inaction or cowardice. Ahimsa is something very positive. Indeed, it is something more even than “virtue.” It is energy, the energy of peace, which the warring world needs!

An Incident From Mahabharata

Piteous and urgent is the world’s need of this vision of the One life in all. Humanity cries for a new Mahavira, a new Buddha, a new St. Francis to teach us the truth that to love God, the Great Lover of the little creatures, is to love the little ones.

Yudhishthira of the Great Heart stands, — so we read in the “Mahabharata”, — before the gate of heaven.. And the Angel at the gate tells him : — “Come! Enter thou the heaven!”

Yudhishthira says: — “ The dog is with me!”

The Angel say’s to him : — “You must leave the dog behind.”

Yudhishthira says : — “Faithful has been the dog to me : I cannot leave the dog, — no! Not for the sake of God!”

“Come !” says the Angel, “let the beast stand outside : enter thou!”

Yudhishthira says: — “ I cannot enter heaven alone!”

And the dog changes its form : the dog becomes Dharma and says to Yudhishthira : — “Well done! Enter thou the highest heaven!”

And into the kingdom of Krishna man cannot enter alone. Man must receive into his brotherhood both bird and beast. And without their blessings, their association, their comradeship, and without a heart of helpful love, man cannot fulfill his pilgrimage nor enter the highest heaven. In the words of Blessed One: —

For whoso beholds in every form

The One Living Life,

Sees all separate living things

Issued from the One.

Such as one

Is by the Eternal blessed!

He attains!

Animal Sacrifice

Animal sacrifices in India! What a blot on India’s culture and India’s dharma! It is, essentially, a dharma of Humanity

Ahimsa is the ancient word. Fragrant with rich associations! Vedic Yagnas came to be misconstrued as animal sacrifices. In the Mahabharata, the dispute re animal sacrifices was referred over to a Rishi who said, in clear, emphatic terms, that by “sacrifice” was meant not “animal” sacrifice, but the offering of food-grains and medicinal plants.

There is yet nobler view of “sacrifice.” It is mentioned, again and again, in Hindu books. Sacrifice or “bali” of kama and krodha, (sexual passion and anger).

The triple form of ahimsa is emphasised—ahimsa by body, mind and speech. Harm none with any of the limbs of the physical body. Harm none by thoughts of hate or revenge. Harm none by cruel or unkind words.

The teaching of ahimsa is inspired by the doctrine of unity. There is the One in all. Therefore harm none. Respect all forms.

“Animals also have a Spiritual Functions”

Krishna and Christ, Mahavir and Buddha, Nanak and Chaitanya had cosmic conciousness.

To have this consciousness is to realise that whatever one has is for the service of all.

Hast thou power? It is meant not for bhoga (enjoyment), but for helping the poor and weak. Hast thou knowledge? It is meant not for vanity, but for spreading the light among those around thee.

The will-to-serve-all must take the place of the will-to-hate-and-fight-and-kill. Modern civilization has misused science to produce more and more destruction. This civilization is a servant of Death.

A brotherly civilization was at one time built in ancient India, — a civilization of mercy and love.

The animals, too, are our brothers. This is what the truly great ones of Humanity so richly realised. They had cosmic consciousness.

Yes, — these animals are thy brothers. Kill them not.

If we could but appreciate the poetry of animal life! Some of the birds are a miracle of beauty in nature’s Wonderland. And I have wondered how man can have the heart to catch and kill them! Larks and nightingales, — sweet singing birds,— alas! are killed and eaten!

Many year ago, there was held in Paris an “Intelligent Animals Competition”. “Dozen of dogs,” we read, “went through rifle-drill, cats jumped through hoops, and fowls danced the polka. The first prize was given to a Japanese dog who made a bark and made different gestures to express various wants, for instance, putting its paw to its jaws with a peculiar yapping when it was hungry”. The second prize was bestowed on a dog, a cat and a hen who played “absolutely like children”. More striking phenomena have happened since. They indicate that animals have some measure of intelligence. They can smell bomb and even catch thieves.

They have power of forming association of ideas. Animals understand commands, e.g. “fetch the stick”. They use gestures. They have some sort of language: and is not language a witness to the power of thought and emotion?

One day science will advance, I believe, to the position that animals have, also, a spiritual function.

I have seen God’s image shining in animals and birds. I have learnt of them lessons which have drawn my heart nearer to Truth and Love. And one of the purest aspirations of my life is to be spent more and more, in the service of these younger brothers and sisters in the one Great Family of him who loveth all life.

Current civilization has broken loose from spiritual disciplines. It has trampled upon the vision of mercy and love. Hence the deep unrest every-where,— violence in the west, hate and passion in the East. Brother! Spread the message of mercy and love. They will build the new Humanity whose vision is the hope of all wounded hearts in East and West.

25th NOVEMBER IS OBSERVED AS AN INTERNATIONAL MEATLESS DAY

www.sadhuvaswani.org

Build Ye in Brotherhood!

Modern India is coming, more and more, under western influences. Western industrial civilization, reducing man to an “economic category”, is absorbing the cities of India: and we are beginning to hear the voice of a new anarchism threatening Hindu society. As I survey the situation, I feel more and more, that India’s hope is not in “dollar democracy”. The hope of India, her highest welfare is in the message of her prophets and dervishes, her rishis and saints. For, this teaching emphasises the truth that man becomes truly human, therefore truly civilized and truly human, therefore truly civilized and truly free, when he gains cognizance of the Divine. Life is to him, who is in tune with the soul of India, a pyramid on the top of which is the atman reflected in dharma and spirituality: and at the basis of the pyramid is artha or economic life, which the modern world, alas! has defined.

Civilization, as the seers of India saw it, began in the peasant’s hut or the farmer’s field and moved to the town and the city on right lines only, if it obeyed the law of the simple life. In simple life were developed the creative powers which were reflected in India’s literature and art, philosophy and education. The basis of the State in India was the simple life. The secret of India’s social and political programmes was love of simplicity.

India, true India, not the India as we see her today in her great cities which are an imitation of western society, India always believed that in simplicity was the seed of Shakti or national strength and vitality. Communism is today spreading to East and West. In the Communist State bread is given to the hungry, but spiritual ideals, which are to the Indian thinker the very heart of the individual and his true life, are denied. In the Communist State there is

(1) denial of the Life Divine; and

(2) disregard of the individual’s spiritual value and destiny. Not without reason did Communism work for freedom through violence and bloody revolution.

The emphasis in the Indian type of civilization was on the individual: and the individual was not regarded as a tool of government. The individual endeavored to live free,—the secret of freedom being dedication to virtue, to the good, to the Life Divine. And so, everyday, from home to home, from temple to temple, moved the one aspiration —“Lead us, O Lord! From light to fuller light!”

The social problems, alike in East and West, will, as it seems to me, remain unsolved as long as they are cut off from spiritual ideals. If there be not a renewal of the heart, your social plans will be dominated, at best, by a bourgeois spirit, aiming at the elevation and strengthening of the middle class,—a class that loves property and power. The noble ideal of work and social service was voiced in beautiful words by Kabir, who inherited India’s great traditions—

Touch the Feet of God:

Le your work and your silent hours

Be filled with music and song!

Touching Him, you are freed

From fear and pain!

And resting on His Feet,

You shed abroad the radiance of Love!

Modern India is entangled in struggles between labour and capital, in continual conflicts between millions of have-nots and a small propertied class. India’s great scripture, the bhagavad Gita, raised the voice, which I have with sorrow in my heart dwelt, again and again: “He who shares not his food with the needy is no better than a thief!”

The tragedy of our life is just here: we live in ego-centric isolation from our brothers and sisters who are in hunger and suffering. They endure: they have alas! endured for centuries. A few of us enjoy the good of life. Our society, forgetful of the great social ideals of India’s rishis, moves on, day by day, without a cognisance of the bond of brotherhood, which alone can make us all one nation of the free. And for lack of this bond of brotherhood, our States create laws which breed hunger: hunger breeds crime: and our prisons are filled with our brothers and sisters whom our laws make criminals and then chastise and put in chains.

Our States are built in love of money and power than in service of humanity. And we see the life of India, once so fair because so radiant with the spirit of compassion and sympathy, stained today with the blood and slaughter of dumb animals.

The living centre of India’s life was discerned by her rishis as residing in the will and heart of the individual. And education in India aimed at 1) purification of the heart: and

2) strengthening of the will-power of the student. Its is for my countrymen to judge if Indian education is not, in the last analysis, a pursuit of money and power, and a deep denial of the eternal dignity and divinity of the individual.

To the rishis of India life was essentially divine, and God’s revelations were written not only in the history and traditions, in the scriptures and songs of the race but, also, in Nature,—in stars and streams, on stones and trees, and in the Heart within. A nation was to the rishi not an organization of power anxious to impose its will upon other; a nation was a Brotherhood of individuals, of free personalities moving in an atmosphere of freedom. And freedom was fellowship with men,—and birds and beasts,—and fellowship with the poor and weak. Freedom was, to the rishis of India, essentially, dedication to the Life Divine.

Cosmic Consciousness

To commune with the Earth-Spirit is to have a feeling for the ‘animal’ world.

The ‘lower’ animals are then seen to be children of Mother-Earth. To treat them harshly is wrong. To take them to the slaughter-house is a sin.

The ‘lower’ animals are our brothers. This is what the greatest among the great ones of Humanity so richly realized. They had Cosmic Consciousness.

Yes: these animals are thy brothers. Kill them not. Believe me, meat-eating will one day be condemned as murder.

To defend the weak, to guard those that are below us in the scale of evolution, is to grow in the nobility and strength of life.

The beast and the bird cannot speak to us in the language we understand: they cannot protect themselves: for centuries they have suffered for our sins against them.

The Blessed Buddha said :- “ When wisdom came to me, I resolved to defend the weak, and to all living things I gave compassion of my heart.”

Yes, — with wisdom glows “maitri” or feeling of kinship with all life: and maitri (compassion) will be the basis of a new morality, a new culture, a new civilization in the coming days.

Destroy The Bondage of Karma

Near the place of Tukaram’s meditation in the forest there was a crop of corn. The owner of the corn often saw Tukaram sitting quietly in the forest.

The owner promised to give Tukaram half a mound of grain, if Tukaram would protect the corn from the birds. Tukaram agreed. But when the birds came for a meal, Tukaram said to himself:-

Are not the birds, too, God’s creatures,-

Children of Vithal, the Beloved?

Are they not hungry?

Last year a famine spread far and wide:

This year God hath sent us a crop.

Have the birds no share in the crop of corn?

Must I turn them away?

The birds came, day by day: and Tukaram fed them, day by day.

The proprietor of the corn, – a peasant,-came one day to see the field. He was taken aback when he found that the whole field was empty. The peasant flew into a rage. Alas! He dragged the Saint by the hair and brought him to the panchayat (the city-council). They heard and they laughed: what else could they do?

They couldn’t challenge the compassion which Tukaram had for birds and animals.

Like Tukaram, there is a voice within each man. It makes the heart a channel of wisdom and love. And the more we study the life and consciousness of the lower animals, the more do we learn of their sociability, their intelligence, their emotions, and their essential kinship with the man.

Every religion preaches mercy and kindness to all creatures.

“Beasts and birds,” says the Koran, “are a people like you, and to their Lord shall they return.”One of the great sayings of Muhammad is “:-“Creation is a family.”

Gautama Buddha realized this truth on that eventful Vaisakhi when sitting beneath the Bodhi Tree, he saw creatures as a chain of causation, and the world as a wheel of Karma. And to live aright, he taught that one must walk the way of Dharma. Buddha gave the message of Dharma, of Daya Dharma, the Religion of Kinship and Compassion. And, on the last day of his earth-life, as his body lay stretched beneath two trees and his beloved disciple, Ananda, with tear filled eyes, asked of the Master to give a parting message, Buddha said:-“Weep not for me, Ananda! Hold fast to the Lamp of Dharma!” The lamp of Daya Dharma is the Lamp of Compassion and Love.
Even in the rules of Taoism is enshrined a whole theory, put into practice of compassion which is essential to the re-building of our civilization, which suffers today from decadence.

Here are some of the rules put into practice by the Taoist monks:-

  • 1. Thou shalt not whip nor beat domestic animals.
  • 2. Thou shalt not intentionally or carelessly crush beneath thy feet insects and ants.
  • 3. Thou shalt not climb trees to take nests and destroy the eggs.
  • 4. Thou shalt not take delight in fish-hooks or arrows in order to get amusement.
  • 5. Thou shalt not catch birds or animals in snares or nets.
  • 6. Thou shalt not alarm and scare away birds sitting in their nests.
  • 7. Thou shalt not pluck flowers nor pluck up grass without reason.
  • 8. Thou shalt not cut down trees without reason.
  • 9. Thou shalt not burn commons or hill-side woods.

In the last sermon given on the last day of his earth-life, Mahavira said:-

“Destroy the bondage of karma. Be kind to every creature!”

There is the great Cosmic Law that what you do comes back to you. What you do unto others, you do unto yourselves. Therefore be kind to all, if you will be truly happy.

“He who blesses others is blessed, and he who injures others is injured.” Such is the Great Law.

Dreaming of a New Social Order

The modern world is face to face with many problems. To solve them we need the light of a New Renaissance and a New Faith in Life.

The world needs the gospel of simple life and the spirit of creative sympathy. It needs intuition of the kinship of all sentient life, a vision of the Fellowship and Brotherhood of life. In its larger sense, men of unselfish service.

He, who is inspired by the motive which sees one’s own good in the welfare of others, will draw an increasing number to the service of man, — the service of the Universe.

And are not the animals, too, children of the Universe? Yet we send them to the slaughter-house! Meat-eating, unfortunately, is a growing habit.

“Man is what he eats;’’— wrote the German thinker, Feuerbach. And the Hindu teaching connects mana (mind) with anna (food). It is not right to say that vegetarian races are weak. History bears witness to the fact that the athletes of ancient Greece took figs, nuts, curds, grain and bread.

Unfortunately, many, under the influence of Western thought, regard animals as no better than convenient articles provided by Nature for human consumption. Yet, even in the West, today, a new outlook upon the animal world is developing.

The time has come when we should rekindle in us the faith of the Vedic Rishi who said: “Look upon all sentient begins with friendly eyes.’’ Current civilisation suffers from cruelty. There is cruelty in our laboratories: we call it “vivisection”. There is cruelty in our sports and fashion: how we destroy birds for beautiful feathers! There is cruelty in our diet. There is cruelty in our dealings with dogs and horses. This cruelty (himsa) is entering more and more into Indian life. This cruelty reacts on our character.

To defend the weak, to guard those that are below us in the scale of evolution, is to grow in the nobility and strength of life. The beast and the bird cannot speak to us in the language we understand: they cannot speak to us in the language we understand: they cannot protect themselves: for centuries they have suffered for our sins against them. The blessed Buddha said: “when wisdom came to me, I resolved to defend the weak, and to all living things I gave compassion of my heart”. “Yes, — with wisdom grows “maitri” or feeling of kinship with all life: and maitri (compassion) will be the basis of a new morality, a new culture, a new civilization in the coming days.

In a pretty, little story, we read that the Angels asked God if there was anything in the world stronger than rocks.

“Yes,” answered God; “stronger than rocks is iron: for iron can break rock.”

“Anything stronger than iron?” asked the Angels.

And the Lord answered: “Yes water; for fire is quenched by water.”

“Anything stronger than water?” the angels asked again.

And the Lord answered: “Yes, wind; for wind may scatter water.”

“Anything stronger than wind?” asked the Angels.

“Yes,” said the Lord; “sympathy is stronger. And nothing there be that is stronger than the compassionate heart.”

Compassion, maitri, will be the key to the new social order.

“The practice of religion involves as a first principle a loving compassionate heart for all creatures.” And did not the English poet Coleridge voice the very teaching of the Rishis of India, when he said:

He Prayeth best who loveth best

All things both great and small;

For the dear Lord who loveth us,

He made and loveth all.

The beautiful sentiment of kinship with the lower world survives in our custom of feeding birds and the fish and the ant and the crow. It is a custom most of the “educated” have ceased to respect. The cry of the animals whom we slay for our sense-satisfaction rises in our cities every day: and see how mercilessly horses and oxen are beaten who will save the animals?

There is need, too, of a strong village-organization. Volunteers should be sent to the village –folk to ask them not to sell cattle to those who would slaughter them. Workers should go out into different parts in Krishna’s and Buddha’s spirit of money, and build up centres of daya dharma, — the religion of humanity. The movers and shakers of India, the makers of history, her true leaders and liberators have ever been the dreamers and music-makers of this dream and music of mercy, — the prophets and proclaimers of ahimsa.

The war-mind of the modern man must be combated with the weapon of new education. Schools and colleges should teach that nobler patriotism which shows the fallacy of physical force and which relates the nation to the life of humanity. For centuries and centuries nations have long organised hate: it is time to organize forces of sympathy and fellowship. Let schools and colleges give to their students lessons in kindness to animals! Let boys and girls be trained in little acts of mercy, little deeds of love!

Piteous and urgent is the world’s need of this vision of the One Life in all. Humanity cries for a new Mahavira, a new Buddha, a new St. Francis to teach us the truth that to love the little creatures is to love God, the great Lover of the little ones.

Face of Compassion

As early as 19th century Thoreau has written, ‘Is it not a reproach that man is a carnivorous animal? True, he can and does live, in a great measure, by preying on other animals, but this is a miserable way—as anyone who will go to snaring rabbits, or slaughtering lambs may learn— and he will be regarded as a benefactor of his race who shall teach man to confine himself to a more innocent and wholesome diet.’

Whatever my own practice may be, I have no doubt that, it is a part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each other when they came in contact with the more civilized world.

Man has evolved physically, emotionally and intellectually. Time has come for man to ‘take off’ for the spiritual evolution. Spiritual evolution will manifest itself in the attributes, of love, compassion, sympathy and a feeling of oneness.

The deeper we look into nature, the more we recognise that it is full of life, and the more profoundly we know that all life is a mystery and that we are united with all life that is in nature.

Man can no longer live his life for himself alone.

We realise that all life is valuable and that we are united to all this life. From this knowledge comes our spiritual relationship to the universe.

The time has come when we should rekindle in us the faith of the Vedic Rishi who said: “Look upon all sentient begins with friendly eyes.’’ Current civilisation suffers from cruelty. There is cruelty in our laboratories: we call it “vivisection”. There is cruelty in our sports and fashion: how we destroy birds for beautiful feathers! There is cruelty in our diet. There is cruelty in our dealings with dogs and horses. This cruelty (himsa) is entering more and more into Indian life. This cruelty reacts on our character.
It makes us aggressive and hard hearted. Earlier, the Indian culture upheld the doctrine of Ahimsa. We had many animal friendly customs.

The beautiful sentiment of kinship with the lower world survives in our custom of feeding birds and the fish and the ant and the crow. It is a custom most of the “educated” have ceased to respect. The cry of the animals whom we slay for our sense-satisfaction rises in our cities every day: and see how mercilessly horses and oxen are beaten who will save the animals?

Piteous and urgent is the world’s need of this vision of the One Life in all. Humanity cries for a new Mahavira, a new Buddha, a new St. Francis to teach us the truth that to love the little creatures is to love God, the great Lover of the little ones.

Stop All Slaughter!

Animals and birds have, alas! No language which we can understand and in which they can tell us of their suffering and pain.
Won’t you see in them your brothers and sisters? Won’t you behold in animals and birds the shadow of evolving Humanity?

Gospel Of Ahimsa

If indeed, our pupils be trained in the school of ahimsa, harmlessness or reverence for every life, they, in the years of their manhood, would receive a twofold treasure: —

1. A new conscience sensitive to suffering and compassionate to every creature.

2. The treasure of the knowledge that understands India’s hidden tradition.

We speak of knowledge, — yes. We need to learn this truth that our logic, our psychology, our books taught in the schools may teach us to know the mind and its processes, but they do not teach us that which we need to know, first and last. They do not teach us to love and to pour out compassion upon the creatures of God who suffer and, as it seems to me, groaning daily in pain, cry for a deliverer, a savior to come and redeem nature and humanity.

We must rise higher: we must learn to serve Humanity. Yet higher still: we must learn to serve all creatures and all creation, and so enrich our lives with the one treasure which counts, — the treasure of compassion. Yet higher still we must rise to love of the Spirit, love of God, love of life Universal. In receiving education along these lines we may answer aright the call of Atam Vidya.

This Religion of Reverence must enter our schools and colleges. Student-groups must be formed. Students with their idealism will respond to the call. The world, Alas! still is drunk with blood; nations have not lost their lusts; and in the shouts and tumults of today, the Face of Compassionate God is dim. There must be change in the heart of the world. And this task of transformation will be achieved by Education and Legislation. The transformation must take place in childhood and adolescence.

Programmes of violence have, for a long time, been accepted in Europe. The pages of her history are strewn with wreck and ruin. War! Destruction! Religious persecutions! Civilisations have failed. Power and pride shout in our fierce cry of progress. We have not carried the vision of ahimsa (non-violence) into our life. Our food, our commerce, our social life, our national programs are infected with himsa.
This civilization of himsa (violence) must go. A New Brotherly Civilisation must we build. Hate will not help us. Today the nations spend their wealth of emotions in strifes. It is the Religion of Reverence we need to rebuild humanity.

Hate Never Helps

Programmes of violence have, for a long time, been accepted in Europe. The pages of her history are strewn with wreck and ruin. War! Destruction! Religious persecutions! Civilisations have failed. Power and pride shout in our fierce cry of progress.

We have not carried the vision of ahimsa (non-violence) into our life. Our food, our commerce, our social life, our national programmes are infected with himsa.

This civilization of himsa (Violence) must go. A New Brotherly Civilisation must we build. Hate will not help us. Today the nations spend their wealth of emotions in strifes. It is the Religion of Reverence we need to rebuild humanity.

The Religion of Reverence must enter our schools and colleges. Student-groups must be formed. Students with their idealism will respond to the call.

The world, alas! still is drunk with blood; nations have not lost their lust; and in the shouts and tumults of today, the Face of Compassionate God is dim.

There must be change in the heart of the world. And this task of transformation will be achieved by education and legislation. The transformation must take place in childhood and adolescence.

How Leo Tolstoy Became A Vegetarian

If a man’s aspirations towards a righteous life are serious.. if he earnestly and sincerely seeks a righteous life, his first act of abstinence is from animal food, because, not to mention the excitement of the passions produced by such food, it is plainly immoral, as it requires an act contrary to moral feeling, i.e., killing- and is called forth only by greed.

It is horrible! It is not the suffering and the death of the animals that is horrible, but the fact that the man without any need for so doing crushes his lofty feeling of sympathy and mercy for living creatures and does violence to himself that he may be cruel. The first element of a moral life is abstinence.

Not long ago I had a talk with a retired soldier and he was surprised at my assertion that it was a pity to kill animals for food, and said the usual things about its being ordained. But afterwards he agreed with me: ‘Especially when they are quiet, tame cattle. They come, poor things trusting you. It is very pitiful.

Such a situation is dreadful. Not the suffering and death of the animals, but that man suppresses in himself unnecessarily, the highest spiritual capacity – that of sympathy and pity towards living creature- and by violating his own feelings, becomes cruel. And how deeply seated in the human heart is the injunction not to take life. But by the assertion tha God ordained the slaughter of animals, and above all as result of habit, people entirely lose their natural feeling.

Sometime ago I decide to visit the slaughter house at Tula, and meeting a meek, kind acquaintance of mine, I invited him to accompany me. My friend refused; He could not, he told me, bear to witness the slaughter of animals. It is worth remarking, that this man is a sportsman and himself kills animals and birds..

And.. A kind refined lady will devour the carcasses of these animals with full assurance that she is doing right, at the same time asserting two contradictory propositions:

First that she is so delicate that she cannot be sustained by vegetable food alone; and secondly, that she is so sensitive that she is unable , not only herself to inflict suffering on animals, but even to bear the sight of the suffering.

Whereas the poor lady is weak precisely because she has been taught to live upon food unnatural to man; and she cannot avoid causing suffering to animals – for she eats them.

The wrongfulness, the immorality of eating animal food has been recognized by all mankind during all the conscious life of humanity. Why, then have people generally not come to acknowledge this law? The answer is that the moral progress of humanity is always slow; but that the sign of true, not casual progress, is its uniterruptedness and its continual acceleration. And one cannot doubt that vegetarianism has been progressing in this manner.

The progress of the movement should cause especial joy to those whose life lies in the effort to bring about the kingdom of God on earth, not because vegetarianism is in itself an important step towards that kingdom, but because it is a sign that the aspiration of mankind towards moral perfection is serious and sincere.

Courtesy: The Voice of the Voiceless Ones

Sadhu Vaswani Mission

If You Want to be Happy

Is there not a brotherhood broader than the East, broader than the West? Is there not a brotherhood broader than that of Humanity? There is the Brotherhood of Life: to it belong birds and beasts, animals and insects.

I breathe out an aspiration that some of us may see in the forsaken and the weary, wandering ones, in the animal and in the bird, an Image of Krishna, the Buddha and the Christ. May we not forget that the ancient word, the highest word, the nobles word, is compassion, is love!

The Creative Mystery of Life built a beautiful earth. But see what man has made of this earth! He has waged war against things of beauty. He has revelled in slaughter, murder, riotous living. He has stifled the joy of life, and creation “groaneth and travaileth in pain!”

The Hindu doctrine of ahimsa (non-violence) is a comprehensive one and emphasies the value of satya (truth), brahmacharya (self-restraint), tyaga (non-covetousness). Meat-diet is prohibited. Don’t kill even for “sacrifice”!

This is the teaching of the Hindu sages. The Stateman sage of Mahabharata Bhishma censures animal slaughter for sacrifice.

The mighty faith of Mahavira, the Prophet of Jainism, reproclaimed the truth of the ancient Vedic Rishis. Over and over again he taught: “Regard every living being aas thyself, and harm no one.”

In his last sermon given on the last day of his earth-life, Mahavira said: “Destroy the bondage of karma. Be kind to every creature!” “O man!” he said, “thou art thine own friend!”

Yes– man is his own friend; he, also is his own enemy.

So the Mahayana asks us to pray for all beings (1) that they may suffer no want; (2) that all be spared pain and sickness; (3) that no beings may be deserted and oppressed; and (4) that all beings may pass a happy life free from care.

When the Vedas and the Upanishads speak of “yagna”, they refer to “internal sacrifice”, the sacrifice of the “senses” and egoistic self-seeking impulses, the sacrifice of the “animal within” us.

Dharma is the great Indian word for “religion.” And Dharma, literally, is what “holds”, “upholds” creation. “Dharmo-dharayati prajah”. Dharma is what secures the “greatest happiness of the greatest number.”

Kinship With All Life

Back of the ideal of reverence for all life and, therefore, the thought of “protection of animals” is India’s theory of jiva. “Jiva is literally, “what is alive.” Jiva is individuated Atman or soul. This is different from prakriti or matter. The jiva is associated with matter, but is not matter.

The jiva is in lower animals too. They attained to that stage in evolution when consciousness of pleasure and pain appeared. Modern science tells us this consciousness is developed even when the body is in bacterial stage.

The lower animal, thus, has its “rights”. To voluntarily inflict pain upon it is to violate its rights. Nor can we be unconcerned in causing it pain. For in obedience to the Law of Return (Karma), the pain I inflict upon another will come back to me, and happiness I give to another will vibrate back to me, adding to my happiness.

To defend the weak, to guard those that are below us in the scale of evolution, is to grow in the nobility and strength of life.

The beast and the bird cannot speak to us in the language we understand: they cannot protect themselves, for centuries they have suffered for our sins against them.

The Blessed Buddha said: “When wisdom came to me, I resolved to defend the weak, and to all living I gave compassion of my heart.”

Yes, with wisdom grows “maitri” or feeling of kinship with all life: and maitri (compassion) will be the basis of a new morality, a new culture, a new civilisation in the coming days.

The time has come when we should rekindle in us the faith of Vedic Rishi who said: “Look upon all sentient beings with friendly eyes.”

Current civilisation suffers from cruelty. There is cruelty in our laboratories: we call it “vivisection.”

There is cruelty in our diet.

There is cruelty in our dealings with dogs and horses. This cruelty (hinsa) is entering, more and more into Indian life, also. This cruelty reacts on our character.

The few words only does Gautama speak on one occasion:

O men! You can take life easily but,

remember, none of you can give life!

So, have mercy, have compassion!

And, never forget, that compassion

Makes the world noble and beautiful.

Gautam Buddha realized this truth on eventful Vaisakhi when, sitting beneath the Bodhi Tree, He saw creatures as chain of causation, and the world as a wheel of Karma. And to live aright, be taught one must walk the way of Dharma.

Buddha gave the message of Dharma, of Daya Dharma, the Religion of Kinship and Compassion. And, on the last day of his earth-life, as his body lay stretched beneath two trees, and his beloved disciple. Ananda with tear-filled eyes, asked of the Master to give a parting message, Buddha said: “Weep not for me, Ananda! Hold fast to the Lamp of Dharma!” The lamp of Daya Dharma is the Lamp of Compassion and Love.

Love and sympathy for fellow beings

Albert Schweitzer-the famous German doctor, who devoted his life to the welfare of the people of Africa, writes:
“The deeper we look into nature, the more we recognize that it is full of life, and the more profoundly we know that all life is a secret and that we are united with all life that is in nature.

Man can no longer live his life for himself alone.

We realize that all life is valuable and that we are united to all this life. From this knowledge comes our spiritual relationship to the universe.”

Albert Schweitzer then coined the phrase,” Reverence for Life.”

Reverence for life is the fundamental concept of ethics. What is Ethics? Ethics is essentially the reverence for life. Its one essential rule, one sadhana, is that I devote myself for other lives. For, all life is sacred, even the life of savages, of primitive peoples, of uncivilized ones, of wild jungle men, of the criminal, the robber,-of the bird and the beast.

All life is sacred. All life has its claims on every one of us. True ethics, therefore, rests on recognition of this thought-the reverence of life.

Reverence for life includes (1) sympathy or fellow-feeling and, (2) something more than that i.e. love.

Reverence for life is love for all living beings,-the whole universe. This reverence makes it imperative on us not to cause pain to anybody. This pain is triple,-pain by thought, pain by word, pain by deed.

Reverence for life demands of us unselfish service and devotion to others, and some-thing more, sacrifice for others.

Further, reverence for life asks for love for the Absolute i.e. love for God, the All-life.

He, who is filled with deep reverence for life, becomes creative, releases creative forces and, with the creative powers un-folded within him, he becomes a helper of all. He becomes, what Eastern books call a bodhisattva or a servant of bodhisattvas. Such a man the Gita calls a karmayogi.

In reverence for life are emphasized the following elements:-

  • 1. affirmation of life;
  • 2. affirmation of the world as a theatre wherein is played the drama of life;
  • 3. Service, not only of humanity but of all creatures;
  • 4. Commution with God through love.

Reverence for life finds its fruitage and fulfillment in the will-to-love. He who is filled with reverence for life (1) awakens his interior life through communion with the Absolute or the Life Divine, and (2) on the outer plane, takes his share of the burden of pain that is found everywhere.

True ethics is to defend the weak, to guard those that are below us in the scale of evolution, is to grow in the nobility and strength of life.

The beast and the bird cannot speak to us in the language we understand: they cannot protect themselves: for centuries they have suffered for our sins against them.

The blessed Buddha said: – “When wisdom came to me, I resolved to defend the weak, and to all living things I gave compassion of my heart.”
Yes – with wisdom grows “maitri” or feeling of kinship with all life: and maitri (compassion) will be the basis of a new morality, a new culture, a new civilization in the coming days.

Also The Religion of Reverence must enter our schools and colleges. Student-groups must be formed. Students with their idealism will respond to the call.

The world, alas! Still is drunk with blood; nations have not lost their lusts; and in the shouts and tumults of today, the Face of Compassionate God is dim.

There must be change in the heart of the world. And this task of transformation will be achieved by education and legislation. The transformation must take place in childhood and adolescence.

Maitri-A key to the new social order

The modern world is face to face with many problems. To solve them we need the light of a New Renaissance and a New Faith in life. Humanitarianism is rooted in Faith in life.

The eminent French thinker rightly said: “The heart has its reasons which reason knows not.” I believe the work and message of humanitarianism will spread far and wide through simple men, men of awakened hearts. The world is waiting to listen to simple things and simple men.

Humanitarianism stands for the gospel of simple life and the spirit of creative sympathy. Humanitarianism is inspired by an intuition of the Kinship of all sentient life, a vision of the Fellowship and Brotherhood of life. In its larger sense, humanitarianism covers the whole field of unselfish service.

He, who is inspired by the motive which sees one’s own good in the welfare of others, will draw an increasing number to the service of man—the service of the Universe.

And are not animals, too, children of the Universe? Yet we send them to the slaughter -house!

“Man is what he eats,”— wrote the German thinker, Feuerbach. And the Hindu teaching connects mana (mind) with anna (food). It is not right to say that vegetarian races are weak. History bears witness to the fact that the athletes of ancient Greece took figs, nuts, curds, grain and bread.

Unfortunately, many, under the influence of Western thought, regard animals as no better than convenient articles provided by Nature for human consumption. Yet even in the West today, a new outlook upon the animal world is developing.

“I plead for them (beasts and birds),” said the late Archbishop Wilberforce, that powerful preacher of the Gospel of love, “that you will help to shield them, first, from the thoughtlessness of ignorance; secondly, from the senseless cruelties of fashion; thirdly, from the thoughtful barbarities of science.”

The sacred Upanishad rightly said: “Ahimsa is yagna, is true sacrifice.” Abolish animal sacrifices ! Surely, true religion should teach us to be guardians of birds and beasts, our younger brethren. As a Chinese sage said: “The practice of religion involves as a first principle a loving, compassionate heart for all creatures.”

The time has come when we should rekindle in us the faith of the Vedic Rishi who said – “Look upon all sentient beings with friendly eyes.” Current civilisation suffers from cruelty. There is cruelty in our laboratories: we call it “vivisection.” There is cruelty in our sports and fashion: how we destroy birds for beautiful feathers! There is cruelty in our diet. There is cruelty in our dealings with dogs and horses. This cruelty (himsa) is entering, more and more, into Indian life, also. This cruelty reacts on our character.

To defend the weak, to guard those that are below us in the scale of evolution, is to grow in nobility and strength of life. The beast and the bird cannot speak to us in the language we understand: they cannot protect themselves: for centuries they have suffered for our sins against them. The Blessed Buddha said— “when wisdom came to me, I resolved to defend the weak, and to all living I gave compassion of my heart.” Yes—with wisdom grows “maitri” or feeling of kinship with all life: and maitri (compassion) will be the basis of a new morality, a new culture, a new civilisation in the coming days.

Slavery in its gross forms has been abolished in civilised areas. In anew era of awakening, animal rights will, also, be recognized. Civilisation will become humanisation, and men will learn to bend in reverence to the human God.

In a pretty, little story, we read that the Angels asked God if there was anything in the world stronger than rocks.

“Yes,” answered God; “stronger than rocks is iron: for iron can break rock.”

“Anything stronger than iron?” asked Angels.

And the Lord answered: “Fire: for iron may be melted in fire.”

“Anything stronger than fire?” asked the Angels.

And the Lord said: “Yes, water: for fire is quenched by water.”

“Anything stronger than water?” the Angels asked again.

And the Lord answered: “Yes, wind for wind may scatter water.”

“Anything stronger than than wind?” asked the Angels.

“Yes,” said the Lord; “sympathy is stronger. And nothing there be that is stronger than the compassionate heart.”

Compassion,,maitri, will be the key to the new social order.

The beautiful sentiment of kinship with the lower world survives in our custom of feeding birds and the fish and the ant and the cow.

Piteous and urgent is the world’s need of this vision of the One life in all. Humanity cries for a new Mahavira, a new Buddha, a new St. Francis to teach us the truth that to love God, the great Lover of the little creatures, is to love the little ones.

Mercy, not Sacrifice

The soul of India has never countenanced the killing of creatures. The Vedas are India’s most ancient scriptures. They enjoin “mercy”, not “sacrifice”.

When the Vedas and the Upanishads speak of “yagna” they refer to “internal sacrifice”, the sacrifice of the “senses” and egoistic self-seeking impulses, the sacrifice of the “animal within” us.

Dharma is the great Indian word for “religion”. And Dharma, literally, is what “holds” creation. “Dharmodharayati prajah”. Dharma is what secures the “greatest happiness of the greatest number.”

Nine Rules

The ancient ethic of China, to which Lao-Tse bore witness, was practiced by contemplatives in their monasteries. In the rules of Taoism is enshrined a whole theory, put into essential to the re-building of our civilization, which suffers today from decadence.

Here are some of the rules put into practice by the Taoist monks:

  • 1. Thou shalt not whip nor beat domestic animals.
  • 2. Thou shalt not intentionally or carelessly crush beneath thy feet insects and ants.
  • 3. Thou shalt not climb trees to take nests and destroy the eggs.
  • 4. Thou shalt not take delight in fish-hooks or arrows in order to get amusement.
  • 5. Thou shalt not catch birds or animals in snares and nets.
  • 6. Thou shalt not alarm and scare away birds sitting in their nests.
  • 7. Thou shalt not pluck flowers not pluck up grass without reason.
  • 8. Thou shalt not cut down trees without reason.
  • 9. Thou shalt not burn commons nor hill-side woods.

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The beautiful sentiment of kinship with the lower world survives in our custom of feeding birds and the fish and the ant and the cow. It is a custom most of the “educated” have ceased to respect. The cry of the animals whom we slay for our sense-satisfaction rises in our cities every day: and see how mercilessly horses and oxen are beaten and driven by garriwallas and cartmen! Who will save the animals?

There is need, too, of a strong village-organisation. Volunteers should be sent to the village-folk to ask them not to sell cattle to those who will slaughter them. Workers should go out into different parts in Krishna’s and Buddha’s spirit of mercy, and build up centres of daya dharma,— the religion of humanity. The movers and shakers of India, the makers of history, her true leaders and liberators have ever been the dreamers and music-makers of this dream and music of mercy,- the prophets and proclaimers of ahimsa.

–By Sadhu T.L. Vaswani

Respect the shrine called body

According to Hindu thought the physical body is a vehicle of the Atman (Spirit).To express the Atman, the vehicle must be a fitting one.

Flesh-diet disturbs the vehicle, and it becomes less serviceable to express the spiritual.

A musician is at a disadvantage if given a broken instrument.So the soul does not find it easy to function through a body nourished on an unnatural food.

Walt Whitman did well to emphasise the mystic value of the body.

The motive of Hindu fasting, diet rules, breathing exercises, etc., is to discipline the body so that, purified and refined, it may become a fit instrument for the Atman.

The brahmacharya body is what Hindu culture aims at. “Brahmacharya” is “moving with Brahman”, “walking with god.”

The man with a pure body, the brahmacharya-body is to quote the words of the Scriptures, “a companion of the Lord.”Such a body carries about a brain which transmits pure, noble thoughts through the ether. Such a body becomes the vehicle of a mighty spiritual energy. Such a body could not be built on a meat-diet or any himsa-food.

-Sadhu Vaswani

Reverence For All Life

Schweitzer’s beautiful life has been a running commentary on his great teaching of reverence for all life

Schweitzer’s work is rooted in the great thought that all life is sacred. Therefore he endeavours to help all life and to avoid injuring anything living.

He breaks no ice crystals that sparkle in the sun. He tears no leaf from a tree. He plucks no flower. He is careful to see that, as he walks, he crushes no insect underfoot. If he works by lamplight, on a summer evening, he keeps the window shut and is content to breathe stifling air, rather than to see insects falling on his table. If an insect falls into a pool, he gives it a leaf or stalk to clamber up and be saved. If he sees a worm in a street after a rain-storm, he helps it into the grass. He prays for all creatures.

Schweitzer protests, again and again, against mal-treatment of animals. How we force them into bondage to man and are not careful of the sufferings we inflict on them! The responsibility is upon us all. “Let no one shirk,” he says, “the burden of his responsibility.” Think of the cries of animals who thirst in railway-trucks and no water is given them! Think of our slaughter-houses! “We are all guilty,” he says, “and must bear the blame.”

“In ancient China,” Schweitzer says, “the burning of forests was regarded a crime, because it means painful death to so many creatures.” There is burning, too, in our forests. The heavy timber, says Schweitzer, burns slowly and incompletely. And” I am seized by compassion,” he says, “for the poor beasts that perish in these fires.”

The catalogue of our sins against birds and beasts is a long one. Think of what we do to pluck feathers of birds for our pleasure! Think of what independent India is doing in her dealings with monkeys! There is continuous traffic in monkeys via London Airport to America. Some years ago, about four hundred rhesus monkeys were suffocated in an unventilated van at London Airport.

Current civilisation is decadent because it turns a deaf ear to the ever-increasing agony of men and women, of birds and beasts. The foundation of a new civilisation must be the service of mercy or love. This service grows out of reverence for life, for all life. In this service is the strength of altruistic men and women.

The Religion of Reverence must enter our schools and colleges. Student-groups must be formed. Students with their idealism will respond to the call.

The world, alas! Still is drunk with blood; nations have not lost their lusts; and in the shouts and tumults of today, the Face of Compassionate God is dim.

There must be change in the heart of the world. And this task of transformation will be achieved by education and legislation. The transformation must take place in childhood and adolescence.

This civlisation of himsa (violence) must go. A New Brotherly Civilisation must we build. Hate will not help us. Today the nations spend their wealth of emotions in strife. It is the Religion of Reverence we need to rebuild humanity.

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