Quote:
Originally Posted by de.spin
I would love to understand more about the official position of Buddhism about vegetarianism. And I would love to understand what happens in reality in Buddhist countries.
In other words: did Buddha, according to the official Buddhist religion, teach about vegetarianism?
If so, why so many Buddhists are not vegetarians?
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I can only answer for Thailand, Lao and Cambodia
I've seen fliers put out by a monk in Nong Khai inspiring people to do the right thing and eat vegetarian diet, and there are a few places where monks mainly eat vegetarian food.
Then again, most of them excuse themselves by saying "as long as you don't kill the animal yourself, you can as well eat it". And I've seen many monks eating when they should not to, handling money, walking with their new blackberry in one hand and a cigarette in the other. At the moment there's even the problem of ladyboy monks tiing their robes as a a Japanese Kimono and acting all girlie (while a monk should be as asexual as possible to be considered a monk, specially in those Theravada countries).
The monasteries on those areas might hate me for this, but if you ever seen the movie Zen (made 2009, link here www imdb com/title/tt1156470/ ), then I would say the Thais in many cases are like the Japanese before the introduction of Zen by Dogen Zenji.
They seem to whitewash as much as they can of their behavior.
Secondly, while there are authentic Monks in Thailand truly striving for enlightenment many of the others seem to not really care for it, it's just a way of living.
And to speak of the believers. I've spent alot of time in South east Asia and so many times I've met people praying, I've asked them about their prayers and they answer me by saying they are praying for good luck and wealth, praying to Buddha.
It seems Muhammad once was kind of right, and that those huge beautiful Statues of Buddha has become the main object for prayers, something outside of the person praying. And so Buddha becomes like a God in many people's eyes. Which was what Muhammad wanted to prevent (with limited success since many now go crazy as soon as a small picture is drawn of him which I dont think he would personally mind, everything has limits...)
Many even sit and read the sutras in sanskrit (like heart sutra) not having a clue what it means, wouldn't it be so much better to translate it into Thai? Or whichever language spoken in the country of issue? A Mantra doesn't become more powerful in Sanskrit than in English, as long as you can get the whole understanding of the mantra translated and understood. And not let people blindly read lines that can not mean anything unless you truly understand and realize it with your wisdom and compassion?
As you can see I'm quite pessimistic against the Theravada practice in the SEA countries. I've nothing really against Theravada, but it feels to me that they've lost the true purpose of Buddhism.
And even some Buddhism like Vajrayana, which can seem overly magical with all the Deities, prayer wheels, flags and tantric practices, actually makes more sense to me. First of there's the very good explanation to the Deities, to quote someone, "In Buddhist practice the “deities” represent our own inner potential. We are all potentially Tara. We can all become Tara."
Just like Buddha means awaken and Buddhahood nothing more then becoming awakened.
Dharma Sangha has finished his 6 years of meditation, He's from Nepal and a great inspiration to me, not because of his miraculous Meditation without food and water for many years that Discovery made a documentary about (Buddha Boy www youtube com/watch?v=v29clGMWU84 ) and they try to debunk him without really succeeding.
But no matter you believe that or not what's more interesting is his teachings now after. And the purity of what he has to say is very simple, yet so hard to grasp for the Egotistic mind.
However, he, who practiced for so long and to many is nothing else than a new Buddha, he clearly states his wish for all religious practitioner to stop sacrifice animals, as well as not harming other sentient beings. This I see as a kind of statement for vegetarianism.
Personally I believe there's nothing wrong eating meat, as long as you are aware of that you are eating dead food. Living food is to me ofcourse the best when it comes to energy, vitality and spirituality and I try to stay on the diet explained in the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman.
I am not a Buddhist, yet I follow many of the practices of Vajrayana and Zen Buddhism. And I believe it's a very very good thing that in the past 40 years or so BUddhism has come to integrate with the West world so much, (specially Vajrayana since they don't have a country of their own anymore..) And I think that when we meet halfway there'll in a few years devolop a new form of Buddhism that may carry the original message untouched, and still easily translated into any language.
But that's future and now I feel I blablabla too much.
Just my 2 cents in Siam (and a bit more :P )