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General Buddhism => General Buddhism => Topic started by: DS Star on September 22, 2012, 11:14:25 PM
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I wonder if the karma will be worse for eating animal that is still alive as compared to eating the meat after it is killed?
So, what do you think in term of karma, same or worse?
1st Scenario: Eating animal that is still alive:
http://youtu.be/ZwviinaA7co (http://youtu.be/ZwviinaA7co)
http://youtu.be/jwkccvsj6fc (http://youtu.be/jwkccvsj6fc)
2nd Scenario: Killed it first before eat it (cooked or uncooked):
http://youtu.be/xgN6ju10muw (http://youtu.be/xgN6ju10muw)
http://youtu.be/VepUk2ggrZ0 (http://youtu.be/VepUk2ggrZ0)
http://youtu.be/yeMJt9tpk_A (http://youtu.be/yeMJt9tpk_A)
and;
3rd Scenario: Animal still alive while its body (meat) is being eaten:
http://youtu.be/NMIK6ZgMXwk (http://youtu.be/NMIK6ZgMXwk)
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If we are eating an animal that is live (alive), that means we are killing it - wholeheartedly, intentionally, purposely. This means that we will have to pay for our karma. The animal being killed most likely is not wholeheartedly dying of its own choice, therefore we have created negative karma and will have to repay it in some way, shape or form as yet to be seen.
However, it is different if the animal is already dead by another person's intention and hand. Then, when the food gets to you, it is no longer a live animal, but rather a leftover carcass. This is a different issue.
This applies not only to Buddhists, but to all life forms - human, animal, birds, insects...Everyone values their life, EVERYONE and no one wants to be forcibly deprived of life. Therefore, when someone does deprive us of the chance to live, we will be vengeful and seek retribution. That is the karma that we must repay. Nothing in life is free.
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Although eating meat/animal is not specifically forbidden in Buddhism in Buddha time, eating meat/animal definitely creating negative karma and is the cause for bad health or illness in the future.
Buddha's three-fold rules of meat eating “Do not eat meat knowing that it has been killed specially for (your) used; I allow the use of fish and meat 'uncontaminated'/'blameless' (pari?uddha) in three way, unseen, unheard and unsuspected”
Therefore, eating animal alive definitely has broken the three-fold rules above that it is done 'seen', 'heard' and intentionally. From this angle, I would think it will create a lot more negative karma than eating the normal meat from the market.
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Eating the animal while it is still alive definitely creates greater negative karma than eating the animal after it is killed. The pain inflicted on the animal being eaten alive is continuously whereas the pain for the animal that was killed before being eaten is non-continuous. However, the method used to kill the animal before it was eaten also determines the severity of negative karma of killing. The more pain or suffering inflicted on the animal when it was killed, the more severe the negative karma is generated.
All forms of animal killing for their meat create heavy negative karma for the consumers directly or indirectly. The consumers are involved in the cause of the death of the animal and hence will be subject to the karma of killing. Unless the animal died of natural death, the consumption of the animal’s meat creates negative karma.
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Everything boils down to our motivation. In this case, eating animals alive creates heavy negative karma due to the intention (whether conscious or unconscious) to kill another living being. Here, the killing is motivated by greed or craving for food. Some people think the flesh of a live animal is fresh and thus more delicious. The karma is worse than eating meat bought from the market because here we are either directly involved in the killing of the object or it is being killed for us. Killing means the destruction of any living being including animals of all kinds. To complete this offence of killing, five conditions are necessary, viz: a being, knowing that it is a being, intention of killing, effort, and consequent death.
This kind of karma is classified as immoral karma which is rooted in greed (lobha). Immoral karma results in the plane of misery. The effects of killing are: short life, illness, constant grief caused by separation from loved ones and constant fear.
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OK..friends, whether to eat animals alive with or without intention, there's karma. No way we could run away from that. Of course, having the intention in eating them alive is even worst! Why worse? Imagine eating them alive and we are happily and gaily enjoying them without realising or want to know the excruciating pain the animal is going through or suffering when we pull, cut, bite and chew them?! What about we trade ourselves with them and we are on the table for others to relish? Could you just imagine that?! Oh my oh my, I just can't imagine myself to go through such excruciating pain.
In addition, every living being be they animals, insects, or human, have been our mothers before. Would we want to kill our own mother for our own delight? Again here, imagine your mother is on the table..... (well, I will stop here for your own imagination...:'( :'( :'().
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DS Star, are you serious !? Eating animals alive DEFINITELY creates worse karma then eating when it's dead. Why? Simple - it inflicting much much much more suffering onto the poor creature. I cannot imagine the pain, fear and suffering of a slow death, and to think this is done to fellow sentient beings just because we think the meat is more fresh?
I have read and personally seen animals being eaten alive and I just cannot, for the live of me, understand why human being can do this, just to fill their stomach.
The animals must have had negative karma that led to them being born in three lower realms, but his does not give us the right to inflict sufferings onto them.
Just go on vegetarian diet, we don't need animal proteins to survive.
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All form of killing of animals for their meat creates heavy negative karma. It is even worse if the animal is eaten alive. When we eat these animals we are causing pain and fear in the animals that are slaughtered for our consumption thus a large quantity of negative karma is placed upon us. This is shared by all humans to varying degrees, but those who eat meat take on much more and even more for those who chose to eat them alive as compared to those who do not. Those who actually raised the animals for food or operate the slaughterhouses where they are killed also have an enormous burden of karmic debt to discharge.
According to the law of karma, if we cause pain and suffering to other living beings, we must endure pain and suffering in return, both individually and collectively. We reap what we sow, in this life and the next; no one can escape the law of karma.
It is better to go on a vegetarian diet.
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OMG…Screw karma… how can anyone want to eat an animal alive?? The thought makes my stomach turn. When I first read this post, my immediate thought was what kind of mentality would make one think that it is okay to eat an animal while it is alive? Then as I thought further, I felt really bad for those who do. It is like sociopaths who have no moral values and do not feel that killing another human being is wrong. Here, people do not feel that killing another sentient being is wrong. What we can do is educate them – write to the countries where they practice this kind of inhumane consumption (yes I do love writing letters!) and let’s hope that this kind of practice can eventually be stopped.
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It depends, if the animals are killed for the person sake, the killer conducting lesser karma than the person ordering. Like a assassin whose conduct for heinous crime was motivated solely on money taking command from other, whereas the former motive was on reality purpose of murdering. Therefore, most often than not, the heavy karmic seemed pointing to the person/persons as meats of animals are demand more than supply that resorted to high tech science and medical on the expedition of animals growing.
In buddhism, it's does not neither forbid not not forbid to eat meat, but clarifying the reality of meat and humanity as well as development of soul. Buddha only allowed monks on 'begging' for foods to take meat to avoid choosy but with caution that animals are not slaughtered for him, no hearing of the animals being slaughter for him and no seeing of the animals being slaughtered for him. However, these monks on the merits of compassion and world health ought to feed himself lest the meat in the bowl. ;D
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My take on this is that both actions of killing is the same but to be eating the meat of another being who is still alive is really gross. Imagine the torture inflicted onto the victim. I think this happens only to animals. It takes another beast to be such a way, I think Karma is heavier by eating an animal alive. Although both actions of killing the animal by yourself is equal, the former action inflicted heavier karma because of the brutality of the mind to be able to stand the gross action of eating an animal which is still alive.
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Eating for the sheer "pleasure" of consuming the "delicacy" fresh? It seems wrong on all levels and indicates an incredible degeneration and desensitization of the human race. It was not so long ago that we hunted for our food for sheer sustenance but now, with the onset of modernization it seems we have reverted to eating to merely please the senses... that is if that accounts as such. For me it is pure disgust and shockingly horrid to even think that people resort to such cruelty let alone watch these horrid videos.
What are we doing to ourselves? We certainly are spiraling down in this degenerate age whereby we do not even know how to perceive what is right or wrong anymore... what more the Dharma and the purity it teaches us.
The lack of care is prevalent among ourselves, so i guess a "lesser" living being does not even make the equation. It is indeed a very scary thought to envision where we, as a human race is leading towards...
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If we are eating an animal that is live (alive), that means we are killing it - wholeheartedly, intentionally, purposely. This means that we will have to pay for our karma. The animal being killed most likely is not wholeheartedly dying of its own choice, therefore we have created negative karma and will have to repay it in some way, shape or form as yet to be seen.
However, it is different if the animal is already dead by another person's intention and hand. Then, when the food gets to you, it is no longer a live animal, but rather a leftover carcass. This is a different issue.
This applies not only to Buddhists, but to all life forms - human, animal, birds, insects...Everyone values their life, EVERYONE and no one wants to be forcibly deprived of life. Therefore, when someone does deprive us of the chance to live, we will be vengeful and seek retribution. That is the karma that we must repay. Nothing in life is free.
[To add to what you have written here Tenzin K, whether we are the one killing or ordering the live to be killed for our consumption or eating meat of a dead carcass, there is karma involved. No one escapes from karma. It would be varying degrees of karma depending on the motivation and whether it was direct or indirect killing. Remember the famous story about Buddha killing the robber onboard a ship to save the 499 people? When he died, he had to go to hell too but for a very short period. My point: instead of worrying whether it is bad karma or otherwise, we should just stop eating meat. Better safe than sorry]
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The karma is much much greater because we are directly causing the death of the animal, torturing to its death, and enjoying eating it. Even not many animals eating other animals alive. We can see from the documentaries animals killed other animals before eating it.
Live to eat instead of eat to live will cause us to chase after good food from one food to food another. There is a whole bunch of shows these days featuring exclusively on finding good food, exotic food, making dishes from the fresh or meat, and capturing animals for making dishes. These shows promotes the eating of animals. If we are not vegetarian we might be curious to try these exotic food of eating animals alive. :(
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Thanks for all the answers above which we all learned that it creates negative karma.
I just wondering where the believe of eating fresh meat is good and the best is to eat alive animal come from? How come the result of killing does not occur in their minds? Perhaps the result of actions doesn't turn out fast enough therefore people still enjoy with it, hence there are so many TV programs, newspapers, magazines promote about the best fresh food, best way to cook, including eat them when they alive, especial on the TV program which you see how enjoy, proud and happy they are. And do you believe that many of the TV programs are in Buddhist country..
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It is far important to know the life that the animal lived,rather than the way they died.There is something odd about people who do this sort of thing.Human being are able to discriminate between right or wrong and it is plain wrong to eat animals alive, It is cruel to eat other creatures to stay alive.Causing unnecessary suffering to the animals is pure cruelty.Eating live creatures is often more circus of squeamishness than a culinary adventure.I will never try this even if I am not a vegetarian!
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I believe that eating any form of meat is bad. But the three options are the worst. Eating it alive is just plain wrong in my opinion as it is experiencing the pain that you are giving it. Also, having someone kill the animal just so you can eat it is very bad, you also receive the bad karma for "making" the man kill for you which means you "made" him create more negative karma for himself.
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Let's just think about how we would like to die ourselves. Do we want to have a quick death or a slow death while our bodies are being tortured?
Eating the animal alive or its body parts while it is still alive shows the person wants more out of his/her "food" than mere taste and freshness. It's for a culinary experience. With the lack of insight to be able to see the animal's pain while you are eating the cooked parts or alive shows one truly disregard the pain one instilled on another being. Whilst many people are brought up from childhood to eat meat, eating animals live is something purely out of choice.
Personally, I feel it's worst karma to eat an animal's body parts whilst it's still alive.
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Of course the karma will be heavier if we eat an animal alive, because the pain and agony that the animal has to go through will be much, much more than what it has to go through if it was killed beforehand. So logically, it would be a lot worse for us to eat an animal while it is alive as the law of karma dictates that the cause resembles the result, and therefore that will how our deaths will be.
The best thing to do is to avoid meat altogether in my personal opinion, so that there is less unnecessary suffering.
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I think in terms of karma, they are all roughly the same as the animal has to endure intense suffering before its death. I believe that these forms of eating animals does have more negative effects than eating pre-made food which is also very bad. I would never eat these sorts of things, it is just plain wrong.
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I think in terms of karma, they are all roughly the same as the animal has to endure intense suffering before its death. I believe that these forms of eating animals does have more negative effects than eating pre-made food which is also very bad. I would never eat these sorts of things, it is just plain wrong.
Not really. An animal that is executed i.e does not see who it is killed for suffers a bit less. Now, lets imagine what the baby octopuses in the video on the first post of the thread have to go through: they get chewed by the teeth of the person, and get jabbed and beaten up by the tongue, and then they have to go down a narrow and constricting bath, right into a vat of acid and they are dissolved in it until they die. How can you compare this with just, maybe, a chop and they die?
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In general... killing to satisfy our taste buds is negative karma. Why? Because the act of eating or killing this animals causes us to be more attached to samsara... any action that causes us to fall deeper into samsara generates negative karma. Why is it so? Because we are not polishing our Buddha qualities that will potentially bring benefit to countless of beings.
In relation to the types of killing being done, there are sutras that explain how heavy one's karma will be in different scenarios. First of all, asking someone to kill for you... meaning you eat meat that has already been killed, the act of killing just this animal has caused the butcher and you to collect that negative karma equally. Just because we don't kill the animal does not mean we don't collect the negative karma. Take for example, for every second we breath, when we are not doing anything to improve ourselves so that we be of benefit to others, that is generating negative karma as well.
So, for the 3 scenarios, which will generate the worst karma? For every millionth of a second one causes suffering to another sentient beings, they collect the negative karma for doing so. Therefore, I would say that the worst of the 3 would be the third scenario... eating the animal's body while it is still alive.
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In general... killing to satisfy our taste buds is negative karma. Why? Because the act of eating or killing this animals causes us to be more attached to samsara... any action that causes us to fall deeper into samsara generates negative karma. Why is it so? Because we are not polishing our Buddha qualities that will potentially bring benefit to countless of beings.
Also dont forget that by killing we create more enemies, especially if we eat them alive, they will remember us as the person who has caused them much suffering and they will hold on to that grudge, and they will come back and make sure that we have enough obstacles to not get out of samsara.
In relation to the types of killing being done, there are sutras that explain how heavy one's karma will be in different scenarios. First of all, asking someone to kill for you... meaning you eat meat that has already been killed, the act of killing just this animal has caused the butcher and you to collect that negative karma equally. Just because we don't kill the animal does not mean we don't collect the negative karma. Take for example, for every second we breath, when we are not doing anything to improve ourselves so that we be of benefit to others, that is generating negative karma as well.
Yes you are correct. But for someone to point out which animal to kill will also incur something additional: the animal itself will hold a grudge.
So, for the 3 scenarios, which will generate the worst karma? For every millionth of a second one causes suffering to another sentient beings, they collect the negative karma for doing so. Therefore, I would say that the worst of the 3 would be the third scenario... eating the animal's body while it is still alive.
I like your points, Q. But the question is, if some of us have done this due to ignorance, what can we do to purify them? Also, what are the negative effects of such actions that we can observe in this very life itself?
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Whether the animal is eaten after death or alive, you chose to eat it. I feel the karma is the same, because, both ways, to satisfy your own curiosity, craving, want and desire, the animal is killed. Of course how heavy your karma depends on carrying completely your intention, motivation, feeling and result. If one takes joy in what they do, with the sole intention of killing and hurting the animals, then I guess the karma is far worse, than if one was forced to eat the animals against their will. Of course both instances would creative negative karma, with the difference on how heavy the negative karma is. I wonder what the resultant karma is for the person... when the karma ripes for him/her to experience the result of their cause, it must be one hell of an unplesant experience!
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Whether the animal is eaten after death or alive, you chose to eat it. I feel the karma is the same, because, both ways, to satisfy your own curiosity, craving, want and desire, the animal is killed. Of course how heavy your karma depends on carrying completely your intention, motivation, feeling and result. If one takes joy in what they do, with the sole intention of killing and hurting the animals, then I guess the karma is far worse, than if one was forced to eat the animals against their will. Of course both instances would creative negative karma, with the difference on how heavy the negative karma is. I wonder what the resultant karma is for the person... when the karma ripes for him/her to experience the result of their cause, it must be one hell of an unplesant experience!
I would like to disagree that the karma is the same. if we inflict more harm and horror to the animal before we eat it, obviously the negative karma that will come back to us would be a lot more compared to if we just duly kill it and let it die before we partake its flesh because that method would cause the animal less pain in the execution process. Result resembles the cause.
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I agree with what Ensapa wrote. It's completely different for a being to watch themselves being eaten alive as opposed to being dead and then eaten (and hopefully already in the next rebirth). I assume that the consciousness is still in the body when they're being eaten... how freaky.
With this in mind, when I used to eat meat my parents would never allowed me to eat anything killed specifically to be eaten by us. They would only allow me to eat seafood that we frozen, or meat that has been already killed and chopped up into their different parts.
In that scenario, is the karma the same?
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All animals have the capacity to feel pain as all animals are sentient, ie they can experience pain and mental suffering, and there is now increasing scientific evidence that sea creatures, notably like squid, octopus, shrimp and lobster can as well - at least to some degree.
When we contribute to the suffering and to the shortened life of an animal, we create negative karma. This negative karma forces us to experience a similar result to the cause. If we have shortened the lives of others, then we must experience a shortened life in return.
The Yoga Sutras tell us that the karma we acquire from eating animals is the karma of stealing, because while we do not kill the animals ourselves, they are being killed for our consumption. The act of eating another’s flesh is a tremendously harmful karma, because we have preemptively taken away their vehicle for enlightenment.
So whether we eat them alive or indirectly when someone killed the animals for our consumption, it will reap negative karma but worst when we eat them alive as we are directly inflicting and prolonging their pain and sufferings.
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I am not a dharma scholar but my gut feel tells me it is DEFINITELY worse karma eating animals while they are still alive then after they were killed.
Why? My logic is simple - in the process of consuming the meat while the animal is still alive, we are inflicting much much more harm to them; the pain of being eaten bit by bit, suffering from a slow death, not to mention the mental agony and fear and hatred that the animals feel - this is much worse then killed and be done with.
I just dont understand why would a human being with perfect mental faculty would think of ways to inflict pain and agony upon other sentient beings!? Have they no feeling when they see the victim suffering in intense pain?
Find sources of protein in plants!
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Eating it alive or kill it and then eat it, both will result in bad karma. It is because the being that you have killed experienced pain and the person who have killed it having a improper motivation. If i were the animal to be eaten, i would rather be eaten by a buddha than a normal human being as buddha eats u up with pure compassion.
Our guru will scold and torture us using words but as students we must understand he is actually scoldng ur ego and attachments to your habits.
There are still buddhist traditions consuming flesh of animals but many other buddhist traditions including tibetan buddhism has in recent years promote and create awareness of not taking meat as food to sustain our bodily needs.
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... With this in mind, when I used to eat meat my parents would never allowed me to eat anything killed specifically to be eaten by us. They would only allow me to eat seafood that we frozen, or meat that has been already killed and chopped up into their different parts.
In that scenario, is the karma the same?
Jessica Jemeson, I believe your parents are Buddhists of Theravada tradition, thus the practice of eating only frozen seafood or meat that already been slaughtered and chopped into their different parts.
Theravada Buddhists believed the Buddha allowed his monks to eat pork, chicken and beef if the animal was not killed for the purpose of providing food for monks.
"... meat should not be eaten under three circumstances: when it is seen or heard or suspected (that a living being has been purposely slaughtered for the eater); these, Jivaka, are the three circumstances in which meat should not be eaten, Jivaka! I declare there are three circumstances in which meat can be eaten: when it is not seen or heard or suspected (that a living being has not been purposely slaughtered for the eater); Jivaka, I say these are the three circumstances in which meat can be eaten." —Jivaka Sutta
In my own opinion the karma should be different if we eat the meat of animals that already dead for sometime as compared to those eaten alive as described in many posts here. I especially like pgdharma's post as below:
All animals have the capacity to feel pain as all animals are sentient, ie they can experience pain and mental suffering, and there is now increasing scientific evidence that sea creatures, notably like squid, octopus, shrimp and lobster can as well - at least to some degree.
When we contribute to the suffering and to the shortened life of an animal, we create negative karma. This negative karma forces us to experience a similar result to the cause. If we have shortened the lives of others, then we must experience a shortened life in return.
The Yoga Sutras tell us that the karma we acquire from eating animals is the karma of stealing, because while we do not kill the animals ourselves, they are being killed for our consumption. The act of eating another’s flesh is a tremendously harmful karma, because we have preemptively taken away their vehicle for enlightenment.
So whether we eat them alive or indirectly when someone killed the animals for our consumption, it will reap negative karma but worst when we eat them alive as we are directly inflicting and prolonging their pain and sufferings.