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## Padma Purana:
**How can a householder who is devoted to the four vows be freed from sins? I wish to know this, please be pleased and explain it to me.** ||13||
**The Guru said: Compassion for living beings is considered Dharma. Those who are self-deprecating and insulting are freed from sins.** ||6||
**If you desire pure Dharma, do not consume flesh, which is a terrible cause of violence and arises from semen and blood.** ||65||
**The sinful man who fills his belly with the flesh of creatures who fear death, surely goes to hell.** ||66||
**Shaving the head, bathing, and wearing various ornaments, etc., do not protect the flesh-eater.** ||67||
**Bathing in holy places, giving charity, and fasting, etc., do not save the flesh-eater from hell.** ||68||
**All beings of all species are our relatives from past lives. Therefore, one should understand that the flesh-eater eats his own brothers and sisters.** ||69||
**The man who kills birds, fish, and animals, and acts against them, is more cruel than even the honey-eating animal, and attains a more terrible state.** ||70||
**Flesh is not born from trees, nor does it emerge from the earth, nor is it born from water like a lotus, nor is it produced from any other excellent substance like medicine. But wicked men produce flesh by killing birds, fish, animals, etc., who cherish their lives. Therefore, compassionate men never eat it.** ||71-72||
**How painful it is that wicked men eat the cow, whose milk nourishes their bodies, and who is like a mother!** ||73||
**The wicked man who eats flesh has eaten his mother, father, son, friends, and brothers.** ||74||
**From here, there are seven earths below Mount Meru. Among them, in the earth called Ratnaprabha, dwell the Bhavanavasi Devas. Those who perform austerities with kshaya (attachment) are born there. These Bhavanavasi Devas are the lowest among the Devas, being filled with evil deeds.** ||75-76||
**Is there no Dharma for a householder?** ||62||
**Or, how can a householder who is devoted to the four vows be freed from sins? I wish to know this, please be pleased and explain it to me.** ||63||
**Then the Muni Raja said the following: Compassion for living beings is Dharma, and by self-deprecating and insulting oneself, one is freed from sins.** ||64||