Recently a link was posted on Facebook condemning the scheduled sacrificial slaughtering of 20,000 buffaloes by Nepalese Hindus. It is as it is tragic that we slaughter animals for daily consumption and it becomes more grotesque when they’re tortured and killed in the name of god. In some religions, Islam and Christianity for instance, the more the animals suffer, the better it is, because the blood needs to be drawn out drop-by-drop. In Islam since every animal slaughtered is in the name of god, every single animal goes through an agonizing death: gives you goose pimples when you sit quietly and think about the practice that has been going on centuries.
I’m glad in Sikhism no animal sacrifices are encouraged or tolerated and there are no ambiguities.
Then someone posted this nice link that explains what different Vedas say about animal sacrifice. For example,
The Rig Veda, the most ancient book of the Hindus, says One who partakes of human flesh, the flesh of a horse or another animal and deprives others of milk by slaughtering cows, O King, if such a fiend does not desist by other means, then you should not hesitate to cut off his head (Rig Veda, X. 87. 16).
Contemporary Hindu ritual is based on the Manusmruti and it is interesting to see that Manu lashed out against all forms of sacrifice and meat-eating. The Manu Samhita (5.48-52) recommends that since meat can never be obtained without injury to living creatures, and injury to sentient beings is detrimental to the attainment of heavenly bliss, let him therefore shun the use of meat. Having well considered the disgusting origin of flesh and the cruelty of fettering and slaying corporeal beings, let him entirely abstain from eating flesh.
