Mail Archive

Vegetarianism / Vegans

• Subject: Vegetarianism / Vegans
• From: Shelly <krishna@krishna.org>
• Date: Fri Oct 25 13:39:49 1996
• Message-Id: id7002

Dear Shelly

Hello, Hare Krishna.

Thanks for visiting the Sudarsana page. It's great you are a vegetarian, that 
means your mind is clear and you can understand spiritual life much more 
easily. That is the main point. Just being a vegetarian is not a great 
qualification, the rabbits are vegetarians too... But we have to question, 
"Whyu am I here?", "What's the purpose of life?", "Is there life after 
death?"...

Hare Krishna's are not actually vegetarians, we are "Krishnatarians", we only 
eat Krishna Prasadam, Krishna's mercy, the food which has been first tasted by 
Krishna. So we prepare nice vegetarian meals from veatables, grains, milk 
products and fruit and offer them to Krishna, then after it has been tasted by 
Krishna we eat the remnants. So because we are cooking for Krishna we have to 
cook what Krishna likes. So Krishna likes milk, he likes butter. In His 
childhood He was called "Markanchore", it means "the butter thief", because he 
used to steal the butter from the ladies of Vrndavana and eat it with His 
brother Balarama, They would also feed the butter to the monkeys of 
Vrndavana... So He likes butter.

It is true the modern dairy farms mistreat animals, and are involved in killing 
the cows also. So that should be corrected. Milk and milk products are very 
important foods and they help develop the brain and the ability to understand 
spiritual life, so we should not give up milk, we should make propaganda to 
correct the dairy industry.

Srila Prabhupada wanted us to have our own farms and protect the cows and bulls 
and produce all our own dairy products, grains, fruits and vegetables using the 
bulls to plow the fields. Unfortunately that instruction has not been taken 
very seriously and therefore we are not producing our own dairy products. It is 
a great pity...

In any case the dairy cows, even in the cruel modern dairies, benefit greatly 
if their milk is offered to Krishna. It is the natural occupation of everyone 
to serve Krishna, to give Krishna pleasure -- so if we offer the milk to 
Krishna the cows benefit. 

The vegan arguements are not very good. There is also much violence and killing 
involved in grain and fruit production. There are so many pestacides killing so 
many insects and small animals, the cultivating equipment kills so many mice, 
etc while cutting the grains. Here in Australia the grain farmers have just 
released a new virous to kill all the rabbits in the country so they won't eat 
the grain, they regually go out and shoot the kangroos so they won't eat the 
grain... So all this sinfull killing goes on to produce fruit, vegetables and 
grains also. There is no need to single out milk products for special 
attention... The whold food production industry is completely violent and 
inhumane.

There should be a plan to correct the whole system. Not that we stop drinking 
milk... that doesn't solve anything at all...

Anyhow, we have to please Krishna and He like milk...

So chant Hare Krishna and be happy!

Madhudvisa dasa


>Hello,
>
>I am a fellow vegetarian, actually I am vegan. I was really excited to
>find your web page. I started reading and was very happy to find others
>that share my beliefs but I soon became very upset. The info that you
>are giving people makes it seem that you must eat dairy products to be
>healthy. That is just not true. Humans can get every single neccesary
>nutrient from plant sources. Secondly, in saying that you  are against
>the cruel treatment of animals don't you realize that animals raised for
>milk, eggs, and cheese are just as inhumanely treated? You can purchase
>these products from local, organic, cruelty free farms. 
>
>Like I said before, I am glad to find another veggie, Earth loving page.
>
>Thanks,
>Shelly
>

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