by Vasu Murti das
According to the Bible, God intended the entire human race to follow a vegetarian diet (Genesis 1:29). Paradise is vegetarian. Rashi (Rabbi Solomon von Isaac, 1030-1105), the famous Jewish Bible commentator, taught that "God did not permit Adam and his wife to kill a creature and to eat its flesh. Only every green herb shall they all eat together." Ibn Ezra and other Jewish biblical commentators agree.
According to the Talmud, "Adam and many generations that followed him were strict flesh-abstainers; flesh foods were rejected as repulsive for human consumption." Although man was made in God's image and given dominion over all creation (Genesis 1:26-28), these verses do not justify humans killing animals and devouring them, because God immediately proclaims He created the plants for human consumption. (Genesis 1:29)
In a letter to Pope John Paul II, challenging him on the issue of animal experimentation, Dr. Michael Fox of the Humane Society argued that the word "dominion" is derived from the original Hebrew word rahe which refers to compassionate stewardship, instead of power and control. Parents have dominion over their children; they do not have a license to kill, torment or abuse them. The Talmud (Shabbat 119; Sanhedrin 7) interprets "dominion" to mean animals may be used for labor.
Man was made in God's image (Genesis 1:26) and told to be vegetarian (Genesis 1:29). "And God saw all that He had made and saw that it was very good." (Genesis 1:31) Complete and perfect harmony. Everything in the beginning was the way God wanted it. Vegetarianism was part of God's initial plan for the world.
by Vasu Murti das
This slogan is part of the "Enough" campaign, with its aim of reducing meat consumption. The campaign highlights the waste of resources involved in feeding grain to animals.
of the world's grain is fed to animals for meat."
Vegetarianism for a trial period is advocated to "help the hungry, improve the environment," and "stop untold animal suffering." Vegetarianism is also recommended on health grounds. This campaign actually has the support of organized religion.
by Vasu Murti das
Christian theologian Dr. Upton Clary Ewing writes:
"With all due respect for the integrity of Paul, he was not one of the Twelve Apostles... Paul never knew Jesus in life. He never walked and prayed with Him as He went from place to place, teaching the word of God."
In one of the finest books on early Christianity, "Those Incredible Christians," Dr. Hugh Schonfield reports:
"For the Apostolic Church much that Paul taught was grievous error not at all in accord with the mind and message of the Messiah. The original Apostles could urge that the truth was known by them. But Paul had never companied with Jesus or heard what he said..."
- In your book "They Shall Not Hurt Or Destroy” you say a few years ago Norm Phelps came to the conclusion, such as I myself have, that the animal rights movement will never succeed until we 'convert' the churches, mosques and synagogues to our cause. Is this also your point of view?
Yes. I would like to see organized religion take up the struggle for animal rights. Religion has been wrong before. It has often been said that on issues such as women's rights and human slavery, religion has impeded social and moral progress. It was a Spanish Catholic priest, Bartolome de las Casas, who first proposed enslaving black Africans in place of the Native Americans who were dying off in great numbers.
The church of the past never considered human slavery to be a moral evil. The Protestant churches of Virginia, South Carolina, and other southern states here in the U.S. actually passed resolutions in favor of the human slave traffic.
During 1986–1988, when I had access to USENET, a nationwide computer network linking corporations, military bases, think tanks, universities, etc., I paid close attention to the abortion debate. The subject of animal rights always came up, albeit indirectly.
The mentality of the pro-choicers was that the fetus wasn't human, but rather some kind of lower life form—and that lower life forms couldn't possibly have rights.
Hare Krishna,
I'm going to remove most of the blogs from this site, since they have been inactive for a long time, or are simply copies of content originally posted at our main site, namahatta.org.
I'll keep a backup of everything, of course, so if, for some reason, you are looking for a particular article that's not available on our main site, please write to me (phani@namahatta.org).
Devotees who would like to have their own blog at this site are welcome to write to me as well. I don't see much advantage over creating your own blog at blogspot or wordpress; the only one I can think of is that I would be willing to assist you in technical matters, image preparation, etc.—if my time permits.
Kaunteya Prabhu's new blog can be found at this address: The ISKCONoclast.
your servant, phanisvara das
by Vasumurti das
Purchase Online
(Lantern Books, U$ 17.00)
In his book, Holy Cow, author Steven Rosen (Satyaraja dasa) does an expert job of explaining the philosophy and history of the sankirtana movement to nondevotees. He begins by quoting Srila Prabhupada as saying, "Real philosophy is nothing more than this: 'friendliness to all living entities.'"
Here you can listen to an interview sith Satyaraja Prabhu by Toronto's animal liberation radio show, Animal Voices. The article with readers' comments is published here.
Praghosa Prabhu, in his latest article on Dandavats, Accepting our Lot, Gracefully, tells us that offending vaisnavas is really a bad thing, the most serious offense any vaisnava can possibly commit.
While this isn't exactly news to those who have been following Srila Prabhupada for more than a few weeks, I do agree that it's a very important point to remember for all of us. In the heat of an argument it's easy to say or write things that, on more sober reflection, qualify as vaisnava-aparadha. Forcefully stating an opinion about one subject, one can easily offend others, also vaisnavas, who see the problem from a different perspective, or arrive at different conclusions.
Almost all of us are still in the conditioned stage of devotional service, prone to make mistakes, and even if we are very sure of our convictions, there's still a chance we may be wrong. When that happens we say "sorry," and assume that others accept that as a valid apology. Fine, but we have to extend the same courtesy to those who disagree with us, even when we're right—not treat them as enemies, assuming the worst possible motives for their mistakes.
Up to this point I fully agree with Praghosa Prabhu, even though I don't see the need to prove this with many quotes. Every devotee knows that vaisnava-aparadha is bad; it's just that we're often not able to see ourselves as aparadhis, even if we are.
A deus ex machina (Latin IPA: de:us eks ma:khina (literally "god out of a machine") is an improbable contrivance in a story. The phrase describes an artificial, or improbable, character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot (such as an angel suddenly appearing to solve problems, or the entire story having been just a dream one of the characters was having).
After hundreds of devotees have signed an online petition against GBC Resoluton 311, including many senior devotees and disciples of Srila Prabhupada, and the issue became a hot topic on several devotees' blogs, the directors of the BBT decided to keep Srila Prabhupada's books as they are and not to add footnotes or annotations, or change them in any way to make them more palatable to today's educated audiences.
Jyoti Marie writes:
Where I work I am particularly disturbed about all this boasting of people becoming "yoga teachers" and still eating animals.
What do you think about the idea of co-writing an article on what I am calling "Faux-ga Teachers"... the blasphemy of all these American-westerners supposedly studying yoga and becoming adorned with the title of "yoga teacher" whilst still consuming animal flesh galore.
The only person I know of who will address this hypocrisy in public is Dr Gabriel Cousens who goes so far as to say—not only is it an insult to the original Sutras to eat meat and study or teach yoga --- if you eat animals, better NOT to take yoga, because you are putting the death energy further into the :"nadis".
In such an article I would also add the example of meeting a "Green Path Yoga Teacher" who: ate animal flesh, smoked pot, attended group sex parties, and never even heard of eco-scientist Rachel Carson. And he was a very successful yoga teacher with a DVD etc. etc. !!
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