Hacker News Reader

Comment by hyp0 | Hacker News Reader

Buddhism includes reincarnation as animals

I was waiting for that one. But animals are just vessels for humans souls while waiting for another reincarnation, as far as I understand. So animals are not given much soul on their own.

Put another way: "animals are vessels for souls while waiting for reincarnation". It now applies to everything souls (possibly) reincarnate into, while still being true. I think that viewed in this way, it is obvious that the Buddhist concept of a soul is not human centric. The soul would be an entity trying to escape a cycle of reincarnation (and one of the potential candidates for reincarnation is a human). Aliens could fit right in there as just another vessel.

If I recall correctly (and this depends somewhat on the school of Buddhism), all sentient beings are thought to have the potential to attain enlightenment by virtue of possessing Buddha nature. People can be reborn as animals and animals can be reborn as people. As I recall there isn't really the concept of animals being "containers." Instead, they're sentient beings that could be people from past lives or could be animals progressing through the cycles of death and rebirth.

So why are not all Buddhists vegetarian then ?

It depends on the school of Buddhism. What I wrote about mostly comes from my readings of Mahayana Buddhist texts. As I recall, Mahayana Buddhism generally requires a vegetarian diet. I don't remember Theravada thought as well, but a quick search online is telling me that it allows meat eating but with a number of rules (and differing interpretations of those rules).

"In three cases meat may not be eaten by a monk if he has : (1) seen (2) heard, or (3) suspected that the meat has been especially acquired for him by killing an animal (i.e. the animal has been killed specifically for the monk). This rule is called the Rule of Tikotiparisuddha (Pure in Three Ways).

However, the meat of the following ten beings is forbidden to be eaten by the monks : human, elephant, horse, dog, snake, lion, tiger, leopard, bear, and hyena. (Vinaya, Mahavagga, Book 4)"

http://www.dhammasara.webs.com/JivakaSutta.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_vegetarianism#Views_of...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com