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Hukam Of Animals And Plants


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Guest up in the mountains

Waheguru ji ka khalsa waheguru ji ki fateh

Each breath has living things in it

Why breath

Waheguru ji ka khalsa waheguru ji ki fateh

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Question: Master ji, we all know that it's very crucial to abstain from the eating of meat because this increases our karmas, but can you explain in more detail the reasons for becoming vegetarian?

Thakar Singh: We should not increase our burden of karmas as you have already said. There is karmic value in every kind of thing we use in this world. The air we consume, we have to pay for. The water we use, we have to pay for. The light of the sun or moon is also not free for us, and this green grass is also to be paid for - nothing is free. Depending on the "Jun" (life-form), there is a price to be paid. Lower life forms have a lower price to pay. Plants have a lower spiritual price than animal life forms. So why take the higher burden?

If you are to construct a house, you don't make it with gold or silver or jewels. If you can, you make the house with stone - Stone is very strong and cheap -- So, why don't you make your house with stone and bricks instead of gold? This body is like a house. Build it with material that is spiritually cheap and strong. Fruits and vegetables are spiritually cheap and they can make you spiritually and physically strong. Higher life-forms are expensive - and you will have to pay a higher price!

In the same way, if we can maintain a simple life style, with a spiritually lower cost - with this greenery, fruits, etc - then why attract so much burden and payment of karma by consuming higher life-forms? God did not really say that it is "burden-less" or it is all free. He has never explained it like this, but He has allowed us to have these lower forms because with our meditations we can release ourselves very quickly and easily and therefore we will not "over-burden" ourselves for a long time.

This is also the case with people who eat animals. Their nervous systems have been seriously disturbed and shaken. Even if you look at an animal that has been killed you will be emotionally affected; your nervous system will be disturbed and you will lose so much peace; you will not feel good and your heart will be affected by it. Look at a dying fish. It is out of water and if you look at it, for one or two hours or even some days your heart will not feel good. You will think of the condition of that fish and it will feel horrible and your heart and mind will be in some kind of perturbed state.

For months even this state of mind will continue. Maybe after a long time you will forget this scene and its effect will be gone from your heart and then perhaps you cannot remember it - still it has its effect. If just looking at a dead fish causes this then what will be the case when we eat it and all these negative vibrations enter into our system. So many diseases will come up and our mental systems will be disturbed.

But when we eat some greenery or fruit everything is wonderful. The plant produces the fruit for consumption by an animal so that the seeds can be transported to new places. In fact by eating the fruit you are doing a favour to the plant! - the fruit is a bait for the animal to do a function that the plant desires - That is the function of a fruit. If you look at fruit that is ripe the colors tell you so wonderfully that it is ripe. A fragrance is also available and when you smell it you enjoy it and even when you remember the smell you feel good. Your heart is also enjoying and your mind and body are at peace.

Q. Flesh-eaters often say to vegetarian Sikhs, if you eat only vegetables you are also taking life. What, then is the difference between taking the life of, say, a pig and that of a vegetable?

A. All the difference in the world. Does a potato cry out when it is taken from the earth the way a calf does when it is taken from its mother? Does a stick of celery scream in pain and terror when it is picked the way a pig does when it is being led to slaughter and is having its throat cut? And how sad, lonely, and frightened can a head of lettuce feel?

We don't need a polygraph to demonstrate that plants have consciousness of a sort, but this consciousness is obviously of a rudimentary kind, far different from that of mammals with well developed nervous systems. Nor do we need tests to prove that fowls and pigs and sheep experience pain to the same degree as human beings, for it is common observation that animals wince, howl, wail, and show terror when abused or injured and make every effort to avoid pain.

Actually many fruits and vegetables can be picked without killing or even harming the plants. These include berries, melons, legumes, nuts, seeds, pumpkins, and many other vegetables. Potatoes are taken from the ground after the plant has died. Most vegetables are annuals, harvested at or near the end of their natural life.

In fact, there is considerable scientific evidence that the human physiology, like that of our closest living creatures - the great apes, is vegetarian in design. The structure of our skin, teeth, stomach and bowels, the length of our digestive system, the composition of our saliva, stomach acids and urine, etc. are all typically vegetarian. There is also a mountain of evidence proving that a meat-based diet contributes to a whole range of diseases. Many scientists now concede that fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and grains appear best suited to the human body.

Finally, we know that we cannot subsist for long without food, and all food is matter that was once alive. But since we can subsist well and even thrive without meat, why take animal life in addition to the plant life we need to survive?

Among certain spiritually oriented persons one will often hear this strange rationalization: "Sure, we eat meat", they say, "what of it"? What is most important is not what enters the stomach but what comes out of the mind! Although it is true that ridding oneself of one's delusions, breaking out of the prison of the ego-I into a life of sympathy with all sentient beings is paramount, how can we establish a sympathetic rapport with non-humans while we are feasting on them?

"Do not cause pain to any creature, Go back to your Home with honour." (Sri Guru Granth Sahib, pg 322)

Story of Bheesham Pitama

In accordance to Hindu mythology, Draupadi asked the saint Sant Bheesham Pitama, why he had not come to her rescue when she was stripped of her clothing in Duryodans court. She queried him, saying that if he was a saint, why did he not raise his voice when evil was going on before his very eyes in Duryodanas court. He started to cry and said, Daughter, I shall tell you the truth; my mind became clouded by darkness as I had eaten in Duryodans house.

Therefore, this shows how the love of God breaks away from a being as their mind becomes clouded by filth and prevents them from performing good deeds.

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Question: Master ji, we all know that it's very crucial to abstain from the eating of meat because this increases our karmas, but can you explain in more detail the reasons for becoming vegetarian?

Thakar Singh: We should not increase our burden of karmas as you have already said. There is karmic value in every kind of thing we use in this world. The air we consume, we have to pay for. The water we use, we have to pay for. The light of the sun or moon is also not free for us, and this green grass is also to be paid for - nothing is free. Depending on the "Jun" (life-form), there is a price to be paid. Lower life forms have a lower price to pay. Plants have a lower spiritual price than animal life forms. So why take the higher burden?

If you are to construct a house, you don't make it with gold or silver or jewels. If you can, you make the house with stone - Stone is very strong and cheap -- So, why don't you make your house with stone and bricks instead of gold? This body is like a house. Build it with material that is spiritually cheap and strong. Fruits and vegetables are spiritually cheap and they can make you spiritually and physically strong. Higher life-forms are expensive - and you will have to pay a higher price!

In the same way, if we can maintain a simple life style, with a spiritually lower cost - with this greenery, fruits, etc - then why attract so much burden and payment of karma by consuming higher life-forms? God did not really say that it is "burden-less" or it is all free. He has never explained it like this, but He has allowed us to have these lower forms because with our meditations we can release ourselves very quickly and easily and therefore we will not "over-burden" ourselves for a long time.

This is also the case with people who eat animals. Their nervous systems have been seriously disturbed and shaken. Even if you look at an animal that has been killed you will be emotionally affected; your nervous system will be disturbed and you will lose so much peace; you will not feel good and your heart will be affected by it. Look at a dying fish. It is out of water and if you look at it, for one or two hours or even some days your heart will not feel good. You will think of the condition of that fish and it will feel horrible and your heart and mind will be in some kind of perturbed state.

For months even this state of mind will continue. Maybe after a long time you will forget this scene and its effect will be gone from your heart and then perhaps you cannot remember it - still it has its effect. If just looking at a dead fish causes this then what will be the case when we eat it and all these negative vibrations enter into our system. So many diseases will come up and our mental systems will be disturbed.

But when we eat some greenery or fruit everything is wonderful. The plant produces the fruit for consumption by an animal so that the seeds can be transported to new places. In fact by eating the fruit you are doing a favour to the plant! - the fruit is a bait for the animal to do a function that the plant desires - That is the function of a fruit. If you look at fruit that is ripe the colors tell you so wonderfully that it is ripe. A fragrance is also available and when you smell it you enjoy it and even when you remember the smell you feel good. Your heart is also enjoying and your mind and body are at peace.

Q. Flesh-eaters often say to vegetarian Sikhs, if you eat only vegetables you are also taking life. What, then is the difference between taking the life of, say, a pig and that of a vegetable?

A. All the difference in the world. Does a potato cry out when it is taken from the earth the way a calf does when it is taken from its mother? Does a stick of celery scream in pain and terror when it is picked the way a pig does when it is being led to slaughter and is having its throat cut? And how sad, lonely, and frightened can a head of lettuce feel?

We don't need a polygraph to demonstrate that plants have consciousness of a sort, but this consciousness is obviously of a rudimentary kind, far different from that of mammals with well developed nervous systems. Nor do we need tests to prove that fowls and pigs and sheep experience pain to the same degree as human beings, for it is common observation that animals wince, howl, wail, and show terror when abused or injured and make every effort to avoid pain.

Actually many fruits and vegetables can be picked without killing or even harming the plants. These include berries, melons, legumes, nuts, seeds, pumpkins, and many other vegetables. Potatoes are taken from the ground after the plant has died. Most vegetables are annuals, harvested at or near the end of their natural life.

In fact, there is considerable scientific evidence that the human physiology, like that of our closest living creatures - the great apes, is vegetarian in design. The structure of our skin, teeth, stomach and bowels, the length of our digestive system, the composition of our saliva, stomach acids and urine, etc. are all typically vegetarian. There is also a mountain of evidence proving that a meat-based diet contributes to a whole range of diseases. Many scientists now concede that fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and grains appear best suited to the human body.

Finally, we know that we cannot subsist for long without food, and all food is matter that was once alive. But since we can subsist well and even thrive without meat, why take animal life in addition to the plant life we need to survive?

Among certain spiritually oriented persons one will often hear this strange rationalization: "Sure, we eat meat", they say, "what of it"? What is most important is not what enters the stomach but what comes out of the mind! Although it is true that ridding oneself of one's delusions, breaking out of the prison of the ego-I into a life of sympathy with all sentient beings is paramount, how can we establish a sympathetic rapport with non-humans while we are feasting on them?

"Do not cause pain to any creature, Go back to your Home with honour." (Sri Guru Granth Sahib, pg 322)

Story of Bheesham Pitama

In accordance to Hindu mythology, Draupadi asked the saint Sant Bheesham Pitama, why he had not come to her rescue when she was stripped of her clothing in Duryodans court. She queried him, saying that if he was a saint, why did he not raise his voice when evil was going on before his very eyes in Duryodanas court. He started to cry and said, Daughter, I shall tell you the truth; my mind became clouded by darkness as I had eaten in Duryodans house.

Therefore, this shows how the love of God breaks away from a being as their mind becomes clouded by filth and prevents them from performing good deeds.

Thank you paaji :) this has helped me out a lot. It was a question asked by one of my students so hopefully I'll be able to explain this to my class!

Thanks once again :)

waheguru ji Ka Khasla Waheguru Ji K Fateh

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