Thirukkural on Vegetarianism
- In Religion
- 11:45 AM, Oct 20, 2017
- Saiganesh Sritharan
We are living in the era, where iniquitous ideas and practices triumph the virtuous ones and Non-vegetarianism is one such practice. Numerous ancient Indian texts support vegetarianism and one of the most priceless texts, which absolutely stresses on Vegetarianism is Thirukkural, authored by Thiruvalluvar. This Tamil text is dated twenty centuries before but the relevance of this text is increasing day by day. Many people are unaware of the teachings of this text and this is one of the many texts which is misinterpreted and manipulated by westerners for their own sake. Eminent scholar Rajiv Malhotra has coined the term “Digestion” to denote such consumption of Indian culture and texts into the western worldview by misconstruction of Indic values. Thirukkural emphasizes the Indic value of Vegetarianism than the western value of meat consumption. Denoting “Non-vegetarianism” as a western idea doesn’t imply that people didn’t consume meat in historical India but it implies that ancient Indians are the people who recognized the evils of “Non-vegetarianism” and thus Indic thought never values Non-vegetarianism but instead values Vegetarianism. Thiruvalluvar has written ten verses on this topic under the twenty-sixth chapter “Abstaining from consumption of Meat” and the verses are as follows:
- பெருக்கற்குத் தான்பிறிது ஊனுண்பான்
எங்ஙனம் ஆளும் அருள்
Translation: How can the consumer of flesh of another being for the sake of increasing his own flesh possess kindness?
Implication: People who respect other beings and show concern towards them are considered virtuous by Indian traditions. Thus, there were numerous voices against the people who consider themselves superior to other creatures. This view of Thiruvalluvar is reflected here and thus he voices for the upholding of our “Dharma” by voicing against meat consumption. This is contrary to the western scientific “Survival of the fittest” theory of Darwin, which is a prime example that western science fails to address societal views.
- போற்றாதார்க் கில்லை அருளாட்சி
ஆங்கில்லை ஊன்றின் பவர்க்கு
Translation: If one doesn’t protect his wealth and loses them, he won’t be called as a wealthy person and similarly if one consumes meat, he won’t be called as kind person.
Implication: Thiruvalluvar again stresses the lack of kindness in the meat consuming people. He develops an analogy for kindness with capital wealth one possesses. He says when a person loses his wealth; he would never receive the benefits of the wealth and similarly he conveys that a person would never be respected as a kind person, if he consumes meat. Thiruvalluvar emphasizes about the respect one would get in society for being kind and he conveys that he would lose this respect by consuming meat. This shows the respect given by great scholars like Thiruvalluvar towards vegetarian people in classical India.
- நெஞ்சம்போல் நன்றூக்கா தொன்றன்
உடல்சுவை யுண்டார் மனம்
Translation: The mind of a person who carries murderous weapon to kill another person is same as the mind of the one who consumes meat.
Implication: Thiruvalluvar conveys that killing an animal and consuming meat is no different from killing another human being and thus he stresses how the life of other animals are as important as human lives. This reflects the state of Indian society at that time where many humans considered animals like cow as a part of their family, which is seldom to see in contemporary times.
- தியாதெனிற் கொல்லாமை கோறல்
பொருளல்ல தவ்வூன் தினல்
Translation: Kindness is preserving and protecting lives and unkindness is killing other lives. Thus consuming meat by killing other lives is an immoral activity.
Implication: Again Thiruvalluvar stresses on lack of kindness in meat consuming people. He has used similar (not equivalent) word to “Dharma” in Tamil to emphasize that consumption of meat is a non-Dharmic activity.
- யுள்ள துயிர்நிலை ஊனுண்ண
அண்ணாத்தல் செய்யா தளறு
Translation: Not consuming meat results in the continuation of existence of many lives in earth. Those who consume meat will go to hell and they can’t come out of it.
Implication: Thiruvalluvar talks about the ancient Indian concept of heaven and hell. He says that those who consume meat would go to hell and thus highlighting the amount of sin, one would add by consuming meat.
- கொல்லா துலகெனின் யாரும்
விலைப்பொருட்டால் ஊன்றருவா ரில்
Translation: If people do not kill other lives to eat, there won’t be people who sell meat for money.
Implication: This is more relevant in today’s world because of the presence of huge number of slaughter houses and marketplaces to sell meat compared to historical times. Thiruvalluvar is absolutely against the presence of such shops, which sell meat for money and he says this can only happen if all the people stop consuming meat. This also reflects that in his era, there were similar shops selling meat but the only difference we had highly acclaimed scholars like Thiruvallivar to condemn this unlike today.
- வேண்டும் புலாஅல் பிறிதொன்றன்
புண்ண துணர்வார்ப் பெறின்
Translation: If one realizes that meat is the wound of an organism, the person would abstain from consuming meat.
Implication: Thiruvalluvar highlights the ignorance of meat consuming people, where they even fail to realize that meat came from the wound of another organism. He says that meat consumption can be stopped only if consumers realize that Meat is the wound of another organism and wounding other creatures is a sinful activity.
- தலைப்பிரிந்த காட்சியா ருண்ணார்
உயிரின் தலைப்பிரிந்த ஊன்
Translation: Only people with pure mind would abstain themselves from consuming meat, which comes from killing of another creature.
Implication: Thiruvalluvar talks about the purity of mind of people who don’t consume meat and thus highlights the filthiness of minds of meat consuming people.
- தாயிரம் வேட்டலின் ஒன்றன்
உயிர்செகுத் துண்ணாமை நன்று
Translation: Not consuming meat is a purer activity than sacrificing products like ghee to god through fire.
Implication: Thiruvalluvar highlights the greatness of activities like sacrificing ghee to god through fire and also stresses that not consuming meat is a far greater activity than sacrificing things to god.
- புலாலை மறுத்தானைக் கைகூப்பி
எல்லா உயிருந் தொழும்
Translation: All creatures in the world will join their hands together and respect the people, who never consume meat.
Implication: Here the greatness of abstaining from meat is highlighted and Thiruvalluvar also emphasizes about the respect that one would earn by following vegetarianism.
Thiruvalluvar’s thoughts on Vegetarianism are more relevant today because of increase in consumption of meat in past centuries, which affects the individual, environment and society in numerous ways. Humans should be wise enough to judge the right and wrong but many fail to do in the case of meat consumption. Legends like Thiruvalluvar came up with such works to educate the people and bring them out of their ignorance. It’s an irony that people from the own state of Thiruvalluvar, Tamilnadu are against the vegetarian policies like beef ban. It’s hypocrisy from few politicians in state that they put garland for Thiruvalluvar one day and the very next day, they criticize the government’s activity of closing the slaughter houses. Thiruvalluvar has given numerous messages to the world through his text and following vegetarianism will remain the most important one for the world to prosper.
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