Q & A about Vegetarianism in Buddhism

Vegetarianism

• Buddhists should be vegetarians, shouldn't they?

Not necassarily.The Buddha was not a vegetarian. He did not teach his disciples to be vegetarians and even today,there are many good Buddhists who are not vegetarians.

• But if you eat meat you are indirectly responsible for the death of a creature.Isn't that breaking the first precept?

It is true that when you eat meat, you are indirectly and partially responsible for killing a creature but the same is true when you can eat vegetables. The farmer has to spray his crop with insecticides and poisons so that the vegetables arrive on your dinner plate without holes in them. And once again, animals have been killed to provide the leather for your belt or handbag, oil for the soap you use and a thousand other products as well. It is impossible to live without, in some way, being indirectly responsible for the death of some other beings, and this is just another example of the First Noble Truth, ordinary existence is suffering and unsatisfactory. When you take ths First Precept, you try to avoid being directly responsible for killing beings.

• Mahayana Buddhists don't eat meat.

That is not correct. Mahayana Buddhism in China laid great stress on being vegetarian but both the monks and laymen/laywomen of the Mahayana tradition in Japan and Tibet usually eat meat.

• Bui i think Buddhists should be vegetarian.

If there was a man who was a very strict vegetarian but who was selfish, dishonest and mean, and another man who was not a vegetarian but who was thoughtful to others, honest, generous and kind, which of these two people would be the Buddhist?

• The person who was honest and kind.

Why?

• Because the person obviously has a good heart.

Exactly.One who eats meat can have a pure heart just as one who does not eat meat can have an impure heart. In the Buddha's teachings, the important thing is the quality of your heart, not the contents of your diet. Many Buddhists take great care never to eat meat but they are not concerned about being selfish, dishonest, cruel or jealous. They change their diet which is easy to do, while neglecting to change their hearts which is a difficult thing to do. So do whether you are a vegetarian or not, remember that the purification of the mind is the most important thing in Buddhism.

picked from "Good Question Good Answer" by S.Dhammika

Going to Buddhist Camp

To my beloved viewers,

Just to inform you guys that i will not be able to make any postings until Monday as i am going to attend a Buddhist Camp at a local temple half an hour later.
Please be patient.I will make a report about it when i am back.

With Love,
JI YUAN

Tomorrow's last day of term Exam...phew

Woow....what a relieve knowing that tomorrow's the last day of exams.
On the way home,i was in the car discussing about the chinese & english paper with my lovely friend Yin Tung aka Balitung.Then i was thinking about making a post about our "beloved" mdm. P****l*t* see this preivious post to know more about her :

http://logicyuan.blogspot.com/2005/04/satisfactionslapyes.html

But after that,when i arrive home and i switched on my tv in my room,it's Oprah Winfrey Show(pix),i always liked her show,so i take a look before starting to post the IDIOTIC teacher's "JOKE" after I recall what papers that i am going to take tomorrow and she teaches me EST(English Science and Technology).

Let me continue on the Oprah show that distracted me,today she is interviewing a prisoner-Clara Harris,a women who was sentenced to jail for murdering her own cheating husband.Well this is aired in US on April 28th and just aired in M'sia this afternoon. It will be kind of long if i describe the details seen in the program,why dont you have a look for yourself :
Oprah's interview with Clara Harris

Here's another source for the Clara Harris trial: http://www.toobeautiful.org/ap_030213.html

OK let's continue with our "beloved" EST teacher.First let me intorduce the subject English Science and Technology.

As everyone knows Malaysia has a literally lousy education system,EST is a subject specially set to help Malaysians to cope better when they go to higher institutes because Malaysian Students learn all subjects in Malay except language subjects when the whole world is using English for it.
The crappiest part is they let english language teachers to teach this subject and not science teachers and this leads to some humiliating incidence.

That one day,when i was having EST class,the teacher photocopied some exercises for us to practice.As our "beloved" P****l*t* was discussing it with the whole class we came to this objective question which is particularly easy that anyone who learnt elementary science or physical ed. can tell you the answer.

The question goes like this:


After reading the question,we all know that the answer should be B stomach, right?

Our teacher told us the answer is A mouth?Would you believe it?We told her that it is B and we told her we learnt it in science and guess what?She insisted her answer,she said : " No,the passage CLEARLY tells us that it is the mouth ! ". Oh my gracious god,"CLEARLY" it really clearly says that it is the stomach.
If the passage is wrong then we forgive her because she ain't from science stream but the passage also tells the correct answer.Do you know that she is an english teacher?oh..god..
How humiliating! Since she insists her answer we kept our mouth shut,after all its her loss not ours.

That's all for now,i'm kind of tired and don't feel like typing anymore.Enjoy.