Jain Journal 1980 07

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 12

JULY, 1980
We must know that the vibrations of our food and the vibrations of our thoughts are deeply connected. The atoms and molecules we take in as food can increase our physical health and mental clarity, or they can cause restlessness, nightmare, and disease. The difference may not be seen by the eye; it is felt on the level of inner vibrations.
It is the food we take that sustains the body and it is the body which houses the mind and the mind which transmits our thoughts. If we want to generate thoughts which are pure and noble, first we have to see what kind of vibration we are inviting into our body. If the body is sustained by food which is the product of violence and bloodshed, it will imbibe the vibrations of fear and terror into the system as well. What an animal feels at the moment of slaughter, you know, is no different from what a man feels who is about to be sliced or hanged. All his cells pulsate with panic and fear. The capacity for pain in animals is the same as ours. The look in their eyes as they are dragged away from their dear ones is enough to melt a heart of stone into love.
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That is why the great Jaina saint and scholar Hemcandracarya in the Yogaśāstra wrote:
ātmavat sarvabhūteṣu sukhaduhkhe priyapriye cintayannätmano'niṣṭām hinsāmanyasya nacaret//
आत्मवत् सर्वभूतेषु सुखदुःखे प्रियाप्रिये । चितयन्नात्मनोऽनिष्टां हिंसामन्यस्थ नाचरेत् ।।
Its meaning in English is as follows:
"All living beings have souls like you. As you like to be happy and do not like to be unhappy, so all beings like to be happy and do not like to be unhappy or in pain./
"If you remain in this awareness, dwelling in your soul, you will not be able to harm, hurt, kill, or cause pain to any living beings. So you will do to others only that which you would like others to do to you.//"
Man is Nature's eldest son. It is our responsibility and our joy to love helpless living beings as the eldest loves and cares for his younger brothers and sisters, with tenderness and a feeling of protection. Unlike animals, we have a voice and a choice. We have the voice to speak out in our own defence. They do not. And we have the choice to be kind or cruel, to protect life or to destroy it.