How can I call myself a Buddhist?

[RichardH]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

I have known a few Buddhists who are meticulous in their empathy for little animals, and who dwell in a rich (and sentimental) "oneness with all beings" , yet can be downright cruel to the intimate people that they take for granted. It is easier to be patient and kind with creatures that don't talk back and know all our crap..

[Jundo]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Hi,

I thought to find out what some other flavors of Buddhist might have to say on the topic of killing insects. I found a couple of particularly interesting posts.

Shravasti Dhammika is an Australian born Theravadan priest who has done some very honest writing on the realities of Buddhism in South Asia today. Here, he confesses to intentionally killing some bedbugs. What is most interesting to me is the diversity of responses in the comments to his posting, some taking a very hard line on the Karmic ramifications of his having done so.

http://sdhammika.blogspot.jp/2010/03/ca ... ified.html

also

http://sdhammika.blogspot.jp/2010/03/mo ... -bugs.html

A Tibetan teacher takes a very strict approach to not killing insects. All I can say is, remind me not to eat in the kitchen of their Buddhist Center! :shock:

If you have cockroaches, you can do Sur offering for them. There is a reason why they have come to the center. It’s because you have a karmic debt with them. They didn’t come intentionally; it’s not like all the cockroaches had a meeting and decided to move into the center, it happened by the force of karma. So, you need to do Sur offering to repay your karmic debts with them. If you didn’t have a karmic debt with them, they wouldn’t come. It’s the same with mice or insects that eat crops and flowers, or woodworm in a house. It’s because there are some karmic debts. So, one thing you can do is to offer them what they want, offer charity to them, because we never get the opportunity to offer things to sentient beings. The other thing is to do Sur practice and the 100 torma offering. I can also give you mantras to recite.

One of my students spoke to a mouse and asked it to move outside the house and it went. She also spoke to some insects and told them to leave and they went. There are some other stories like that. So, it seems that if you talk sincerely to these creatures, with some it works.

You can put the cockroaches in a small part of the house. Otherwise, make a house out of a paper box, find out what they eat and put that in the box, and then after they have gone in the box, put the box outside. Then, sometimes, go and give them food. By putting them in the box they are protected. If food is given regularly, it becomes charity.

Me, I am just one Buddhist offering my views on this. I simply do not see the killing of insects in the same light as the killing of dogs and horses, let along people. Apparently, the consensus in the Buddhist world is that, even if there are Karmic ramifications, the size of the animal matters.

http://www.dhammawiki.com/index.php?tit ... st_control

I believe that the vast majority of Buddhist clergy I know, anywhere in Asia in any Buddhist tradition, would kill insects in their bed or food ... even if they would not talk about it. I do not have a formal survey on the issue, but I am very sure.

Gassho, J

[RichardH]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Generally, seeing karma as a cosmic ledger... with a one-to-one correspondence between doing something bad and getting something bad (killing bug, getting a sty).. It is too neat. Causality is murky, and I always saw karma and the fruit of karma in a less clockwork way.. more about the world we create and carry around. IMHO.



Gassho, kojip.

[alan.r]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Generally, seeing karma as a cosmic ledger... with a one-to-one correspondence between doing something bad and getting something bad (killing bug, getting a sty).. It is too neat. Causality is murky, and I always saw karma and the fruit of karma in a less clockwork way.. more about the world we create and carry around. IMHO.

Yeah, I agree. Otherwise, Karma is just Santa: do good, get a present, do bad, get a coal. I think Karma has to do with our mind states. If one kills in a state of anger, violence, hatred, well, that is a seed and that seed grows, that mind state is planted there and will grow again and the more it happens, the more powerful it becomes. The angrier one is internally, the more that person encounters anger externally, brings out anger in others, hurts others, creates tension. Another way of looking at it: this is why, for many people who may be power hungry or "greedy" or something, these people can be terribly "successful" or something, in their own minds and even from the perspective of others. Yet ever more things are needed to fulfill that greed, that mind state, and often there is a huge fall from a place of power built by greed, but sometimes there isn't, and yet the mind is still certainly poisoned in some way, addicted. Likewise, if one approaches others with openness and a caring attitude, that same thing is often returned. It's really very beautiful, too, when that happens. It's weird and really lovely. Like openness greeting openness.

I've heard a monk say, to a friend who was having some cats spayed (they were producing kittens upon kittens and many of those kittens were getting run over), that my friend would be castrated in the next life, and all I could think was: he's doing this out of kindness, compassion, and to reduce suffering, that can't possibly be. I could be wrong, but it seems to be the mind state, the intention, coupled with the action that is of utmost importance.

Gassho,
Alan

[Patrick]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Hi !

This topic made me think about something :

How about the samurais ?

They were killing people. They had to do it.

They were in charge of the death penalties.

They were practicing zen buddhism.

They called themselves buddhists.


Sometimes we have to be like the samurais.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzuki_Sh%C5%8Dsan

[Khalil Bodhi]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Hi everyone,

While I certainly agree that killing a bed bug is nowhere near as heavy an act of kamma as killing a human the first precept is pretty clear about killing any being. I also agree that our vihimsa has to extend to all the beings in our lives and, as lay people with families, we should be practicing the paramitas just as much with our loved ones as with insects. I guess I'm trying to get a hold on how this community views the training rules as my involvement and commitment deepen. Metta.

Gassho,

Mike

[Jundo]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Hi everyone,

While I certainly agree that killing a bed bug is nowhere near as heavy an act of kamma as killing a human the first precept is pretty clear about killing any being. I also agree that our vihimsa has to extend to all the beings in our lives and, as lay people with families, we should be practicing the paramitas just as much with our loved ones as with insects. I guess I'm trying to get a hold on how this community views the training rules as my involvement and commitment deepen. Metta.

Gassho,

Mike

Hi,

Well, I certainly don't view my wife as equivalent to a bedbug (how she feels about me is another story! :? )

However, I certainly agree that we should reflect on all the harms we cause in this life, both those avoidable and those not, even the small. We should reflect, seek to do better, atone ... and 'at one' in a moment of Zazen.

If that is insufficient, may I be reborn as a Kafkaesque cockroach in a future life.

Gassho, Jundo

[Khalil Bodhi]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Gassho _()_

[Taigu]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Our dear Ryokan, the Zen poet and wanderer, used to cover his whole body with a net just putting a leg out so mosquitoes could feast on it...This is a compromise, I would say.

I humbly have to admit not having that kind of compassion. Every time I can I free the insect, moth, spider or anything creeping and flying. When it is not possible I kill. My compromise. Could do better.
Because I eat meat it is just fair that they make a meal of my blood every so often.

gassho


Taigu

[Mp]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Wonderful views we are getting here. I know for myself that I try to ensure I have good intensions not to kill those little bugs ... but I know walking, driving my car, working in the garden, etc those bugs might get killed ... but I try my best not too.

Hope this helped.

Gassho,
Michael

[Kaishin]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Everyone kills.

Some do it as a simple byproduct of living.

Some do it wantonly, gleefully.

I think you are safely in the first category! If you look through the Precepts threads, you'll see that in Zen the precepts are not seen as black-and-white. Life is not black-and-white. Rigidity will lead you straight into the face of suffering. The precepts are to be taken seriously, but as a lifelong dance and not a set of commandments sent down from the mountain.

All the best!

[Kyonin]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Hi Mark

Being alive means to take life, even if you are a vegetarian. In my opinion you are a Buddhist from the moment you even think about life forms we normally wouldn't even consider.

You are mindful. And that's a lot.

I think you are a Buddhist when you live and experiment with the dharma and the precepts. But most of all, you are a Buddhist when you just let go and let go attachments, even if it's really difficult.

I am really new here as far as posting but I try to read here everyday and really value everyone's opinion. I see myself as part of this community and TRY to sit zazen twice daily, and genuinely try my best to follow the precepts and be a good Buddhist. However I think my profession, which I love and have have a great passion for, is responsible for the death and destruction of many beings. I am a Nurseryman and a very good one if I might say so, and have made it a career and for which my family depends on my income from.

I think I have put it out of my mind- all the insecticides that I sell to everyone to save their plants...I sell allot of destruction and death...

I also kill tons of insects that are on the plants that we sell to keep them sellable...what am I to do?

I thought that when I became a Buddhist and most recently a Zen Buddhist, that I had the perfect life for this...my job was Zen like in most respects as I saw it anyway...Now, almost like I had been ignoring it subconsiously I realized that im selling to customers a way for them to kill...

We do sell organic insecticides, but that is still killing...we even sell lady bugs and praying mantids and beneficial nematodes and beneficial wasps to do the killing in a natural way...but that is a small percentage of total sales...

This realization of mine is a big breakthrough In my practice but at the same time a brick wall. Im very confused as to how I can call myself a Buddhist now.

If anyone has any opinions on this that would be great to hear...I value everyone's opinion here.

Thank you very much,
Mark

[Mp]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Being alive means to take life, even if you are a vegetarian. In my opinion you are a Buddhist from the moment you even think about life forms we normally wouldn't even consider.

You are mindful. And that's a lot.

I think you are a Buddhist when you live and experiment with the dharma and the precepts. But most of all, you are a Buddhist when you just let go and let go attachments, even if it's really difficult.

Nicely put Kyonin ... I am a vegetarian and someone once said to me. "Even when you dig up the veggies from the ground, you are taking life. Be kind, mindful, and thankful for the great opportunity to practice.

Gassho,
Michael

[Jundo]

Re: How can I call myself a Buddhist?

Being alive means to take life, even if you are a vegetarian. In my opinion you are a Buddhist from the moment you even think about life forms we normally wouldn't even consider.

You are mindful. And that's a lot.

I think you are a Buddhist when you live and experiment with the dharma and the precepts. But most of all, you are a Buddhist when you just let go and let go attachments, even if it's really difficult.

Nicely put Kyonin ... I am a vegetarian and someone once said to me. "Even when you dig up the veggies from the ground, you are taking life. Be kind, mindful, and thankful for the great opportunity to practice.

Gassho,
Michael

Even though, on the one hand, Dogen and various other Mahayana Buddhists said "everything is a sentient being" when seen with a Buddha's eyes ... from the mountains to the stars to the trees to you and me ...

... in fact, most Buddhists do not really think of carrots as sentient beings, and that we "kill" them in the same way as self-aware animals or people. No, killing a head of lettuce is not the same as killing your wife ,,, in either the criminal law or Buddha's law.

Bedbugs, earhtworms, termites ... somewhere in between, but not really considered a sentient being either.

But, yes, we should be mindful and thankful for the fruits and vegetables we receive even if not sentient.

Gassho, J