Hi, Nina (and Chris) -
In a message dated 12/1/2007 6:22:08 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,
vangorko@xs4all.
Dear Christine,
we have to look into the Vinaya, where the Buddha said that certain
kinds of meat are not allowed, such as monkey, and also when you know
that the animal (or fish) was especially killed for you.
We were discussing this before. I am careful in a restaurant where I
see fish swimming in an aquarium.
Nina.
============
At home I'm entirely (lacto-ovo-)
restaurant I will often eat seafood. Like you, though, Nina, I would not have
lobster if there is a lobster tank in evidence. I also would not go fishing (or
hunting, of course).
I always find these abstentions of mine from eating lobster and from
fishing, though, slightly hypocritical, because in a modern market society,
rarely is an animal especially killed for one, but it is a fact that my eating of
fish and shellfish is a clear condition for them being killed. I do allow
myself seafood, assuming that fish, and especially shellfish, are "lower" on
the awareness scale than "higher animals", but it is still, IMO, an act of
violence against sentient beings.
With metta,
Howard
/Thus is how ye shall see all this fleeting world: A star at dawn, a bubble
in a stream, a flash of lightning in a summer cloud, a flickering lamp, a
phantom, and a dream/
(From the Diamond Sutra)
__,_._,___
