Spiritual vegetarianism

[Guest guest]

Hi all,

I was just curious if any of you are vegetarian for spiritual

reasons? This is the main reason that makes me want to be a

vegetarian. I was a Hindu monk for a while and was strict vegetarian,

though I was fat still, as we ate lot's of sugar and potatoes and

bread, but the ideal of karma free diet appeals to me.

 

Big Al

[Guest guest]

Hi Al,

I am vegetarian for spiritual and moral reasons, although the health

and environmental issues are important.

Karen

 

 

, " mr_cool_guy67 "

<tac828> wrote:

>

> Hi all,

> I was just curious if any of you are vegetarian for spiritual

> reasons?

[Guest guest]

Hi Al and All,

 

> I was just curious if any of you are vegetarian for spiritual

> reasons? This is the main reason that makes me want to be a

> vegetarian.

 

Welcome to the list Al! Yes I started off being a vegetarian for

environmental etc. reasons and this brought me in touch with people in a

spiritual community which was a branch of the dutch Rosicrucians and they

were strictly vegetarian, also took no tobacco nor alcohol. Though I didn't

stay with the group the principles stayed with me and have now become the

main reason for my vegetarianism.

 

Not so long ago we had a poll about reasons for being vegetarian and

although it's closed you can look up the results (see " Polls " on our group

website ) and see that

about 11% of those who voted gave " Religion and personal philosophy " as a

reason for taking up vegetarianism. You might be interested in looking at

the other pages on the website, there are many recipes in the " Files "

section and a collection of " Links " to other websites about vegetarianism.

 

Piers

[Guest guest]

ooooh Big Al...you have hit on my passion here..my story is based on a faith

and belief from a Christian standpoint, but I absolutely respect all other

spiritual viewpoints to vegetarianism.

 

I started out vegetarian because I felt it was a call from God. I felt very

strongly that I was being told that if I could put this area of my life,

which was in severe disorder, in order, that other areas of my life would

fall into place in accordance with the lifestyle I envisioned for myself and

my husband...that is a life of Voluntary Simplicity. When I began my

journey a few years back, I lacked the knowledge and discipline to stay on

track to keeping my diet in accordance with Gods plan. Last January, when I

hit an all time high weight of 263 lbs. God made is clear to me that now was

the time, and even showed me some tools to help me stay in the lifestyle I

was pursuing. I utilized those tools (I'd be happy to share more in depth

on these tools if anyone cares to hear them) and have not waivered for

nearly a year. The results healthwise have been nothing short of a miracle,

but what has happened along side of the health benefits, has been an

incredible spiritual benefit as well. My faith has increased, my prayer

life has increased, and my outlook on life has changed. What started out as

health reasons has turned into compassion for anything living. This

compassion transcends human, animal, and plant, and I have discovered a new

and wonderful awe in all things created. I feel a deeper sense of humility

towards my existance in the whole scheme of things, and I strive to make a

difference, if only in one area, idea, human, animal or plant at a time.

Life is precious and should not be wasted, squandered away, or demeaned in

anyway, and I attribute all my current feelings on being obedient to the

call God gave me just in my eating habits. Its been nearly a year since I

have gone cold " tofurkey " in my eating, faced my issues and disordered

thinking, and God could not have rewarded me in a better way than He has. I

so appreciate life now. To me, its no longer about losing weight, or being

healthy, it is purely a spiritual path.

 

...· ´¨¨)) -:¦:-

¸.·´ .·´¨¨))

((¸¸.·´ ..·´

-:¦:- ((¸¸.·´ Nancy

-

" mr_cool_guy67 " <tac828

 

Wednesday, November 17, 2004 9:53 AM

Spiritual vegetarianism

 

 

>

>

> Hi all,

> I was just curious if any of you are vegetarian for spiritual

> reasons?

>

 

[Guest guest]

wow. so amazing to see people that are spiritualy linked to

vegetarianism! i just left a Krsna consciousness community/farm (had

to leave to move overseas with my husband hes in the military and you

know how that goes)and it was amazing living there. i am the odd ball

though, im a vegan KC devotee. its odd b/c the religion puts lots of

emphasis on milk and butter.i was vegab before I became a devotee and

one of the reasons i was so drwan to the religion was b/c of how

highly they hold animalsand how you can not eat meat and eggs. i was

christian all my childhood years and never understaood 'thou shall

not kill' but its ok to eat meat! so strange.theen became a budhist

and discovered not everyone followed vegetarianism. that upset me.

anyways, this is so great to see!

Nicole

p.s. thanX for the invite to the group!!

[Guest guest]

Nancy,

What an awesome response! You have beautifully explained exactly how

I feel.

Karen

 

 

, " Nancy Kohn " <nkohn@c...>

wrote:

What started out as

> health reasons has turned into compassion for anything living. This

> compassion transcends human, animal, and plant, and I have

discovered a new

> and wonderful awe in all things created. I feel a deeper sense of

humility

> towards my existance in the whole scheme of things, and I strive to

make a

> difference, if only in one area, idea, human, animal or plant at a

time.

> Life is precious and should not be wasted, squandered away, or

demeaned in

> anyway, > >

> >

[Guest guest]

Yes, I was a Hare Krishna monk for a short while. Their teachings was

my 1st intoduction to ahimsa and vegrtarianism. Most Hinduist paths

are not vegan, and do eat milk items. I also like the Radha Soami

Sant Mat teachings that are like that too. Most Buddhism though does

not teach a vegetarian path, even Tibetan monks eat meat, which I

don't get, as they live in a temple and can decide more easily what

to eat, than most of us who live in Burger King world. There are some

Biblical verses that seem to espouse vegetarianism, but there are

many others that seem to condemn it. But to me, it just makes most

spiritual sense. Unless animals was all there was, there is no need

to eat them, and even if one is not directly involved in the

violence, one is indirectly connected. I have some nice Hare Krishna

Indian vegetarian cookbooks, and I know there are many sites of

recipes.

 

Big Al

 

" Gopi " wrote:

>

>

> wow. so amazing to see people that are spiritualy linked to

> vegetarianism! i just left a Krsna consciousness community/farm

(had

> to leave to move overseas with my husband hes in the military and

you

> know how that goes)and it was amazing living there. i am the odd

ball

> though, im a vegan KC devotee. its odd b/c the religion puts lots

of

> emphasis on milk and butter.i was vegab before I became a devotee

and

> one of the reasons i was so drwan to the religion was b/c of how

> highly they hold animalsand how you can not eat meat and eggs. i

was

> christian all my childhood years and never understaood 'thou shall

> not kill' but its ok to eat meat! so strange.theen became a budhist

> and discovered not everyone followed vegetarianism. that upset me.

> anyways, this is so great to see!

> Nicole

> p.s. thanX for the invite to the group!!

[Guest guest]

> I was just curious if any of you are vegetarian for spiritual

> reasons? This is the main reason that makes me want to be a

> vegetarian. . . . the ideal of karma free diet appeals to me.

 

Since you're doing a 'survey', I'll put in my response too ;=) No, I'm not

vegetarian for spiritual reasons - I have no religious beliefs whatsoever, for

that matter. I am vegetarian because I feel it is wrong to kill or harm our

fellow

animals. This is not so much out of 'sentiment' - although I dearly love my

household companion animals and am fond of all animals (with perhaps a

few many-legged exceptions, which I still would not harm), but out of a respect

for all life and a personal feeling that each of us is diminished by any cruelty

we cause.

 

I guess that would make me vegetarian for selfish, egotistic reasons. But it

saves the animals all the same.

 

Health issues are interesting but of much lower priority (ironic, eh?).

 

As for aesthetics, animal flesh as food is repugnant to me now. I'd rather eat

fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds. Again, as you see, I do it to please myself!

 

I should add, however, that I was originally led towards vegetarianism by the

example of Buddhist friends. I saw there was no need to eat animal flesh, so I

stopped.

 

Does that help?

 

Best, Pat ;=)

[Guest guest]

Pat wrote:

 

> [...] No, I'm not

> vegetarian for spiritual reasons - I have no religious beliefs whatsoever,

for

> that matter. I am vegetarian because I feel it is wrong to kill or harm

our fellow

> animals. This is not so much out of 'sentiment' [...] but out of a respect

> for all life and a personal feeling that each of us is diminished by any

cruelty

> we cause.

 

Maybe a semantic quibble, but it sounds fairly spiritual to me. Although

this is not of course a philosophical list it might be helpful to clarify

what we mean. It seems to me that there are certain " truths we hold to be

self-evident " - intuitions which everyone is aware of e.g. that we should

try to help or seek help for others in need, and the idea of respect for all

sentient life is one of them. Perhaps some feel it more than others, or feel

it but choose not to give it much priority - they know about abattoirs and

the bio-industry but shrug and dismiss it with the thought that that's the

way it always was, or it must (economically) be so, or it's not their

problem.

 

And this intuition is the essence of spirituality, in Deepak Chopra's words

the awareness " that at the deep level we are inseparably one " . Still you

don't have to be veg*an for spiritual reasons, I'd agree about that - what

you do need is a healthy disrespect for the conventional wisdom which says

we've always done things this way and so we should go on doing it and woe

betide anyone who doesn't fit in with the herd. And I suspect most of us

have this.

 

Piers

[Guest guest]

I would say that spiritual reasons are at the top of my list. I think

there is some kind of higher plan that makes a type of diet better for

your health, better for the environment, and more compassionate all at

once.

[Guest guest]

> Maybe a semantic quibble, but it sounds fairly spiritual to me.

 

I didn't want to start any kind of quibble ;=) I just answered the question as

best I could. You can make me into a spiritual person if you want - you can

make me into Mother Theresa or Doctor Doolittle if you want - but I would

prefer my self-description in that it makes no claims for anything except my

thought that it is contra-indicated to kill or cause harm to others. It demeans

rational thought to put it down to intuition, even if the matter is self-evident

;=)

(Well, not self-evident for everyone, but, as you say some choose not to see, I

say some choose not to think.)

 

Spiritual? Well, I'm not getting off my chair to go into the study to grab other

dictionaries, but the handy-dandy WorldBookEncyclopedia that comes

bundled with this computer has a dictionary. And I'll leave you with their

definition below. It says:

 

spiritual, adjective, noun.

adj. 1. of or having something to do with the spirit or soul.

Ex. an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace given unto us

(Book of Common Prayer).

2. caring much for things of the spirit or soul.

Ex. Great men are they who see that spiritual is stronger than any material

force (Emerson).

3. of or having to do with spirits; supernatural.

Ex. Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth unseen (Milton).

4. of or having to do with the church.

Ex. spiritual lords.

5. sacred; religious.

Ex. spiritual writings, a spiritual order. A minister is a spiritual leader.

 

pat - definitely not nor having to do with anything 'spiritual' ;=)