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Everyone is in ignorance. Any sinful activity is done out of ignorance. So ignorance is no excuse. The butcher is killing animal because he does not know what is the effect of this killing

Expressions researched:
"Everyone is in ignorance. Any sinful activity is done out of ignorance. So ignorance is no excuse. The butcher is killing animal because he does not know what is the effect of this killing"

Lectures

Festival Lectures

He is killing an animal, but he is killing his self. Ātma-hā. Ātma-hā, self-killing, out of ignorance. Everyone is in ignorance. Any sinful activity is done out of ignorance. So ignorance is no excuse. The butcher is killing animal because he does not know what is the effect of this killing. Similarly, persons who do not know what is the value of this human form of life and simply spoiling it just like animals, they are also butchering themselves.

Just like if there is a murder case and there is a conspiracy, so it is not the man who has directly killed some person he is arrested, but everyone who is in the conspiracy, they are all arrested. That is the common law. So in that sense everyone is butcher.

Besides that, because a person is killing some cow or some animal, we are calling butcher. But mostly they are killing their soul. Anyone who is unconscious, who is ignorant of his spiritual identity, identifying himself with this body and misusing this opportunity of human form of life simply for animal sense gratification, they are also butchers. If killing of some living entity is butchery, then how great a butcher is he who is killing himself?

He is killing an animal, but he is killing his self. Ātma-hā. Ātma-hā, self-killing, out of ignorance. Everyone is in ignorance. Any sinful activity is done out of ignorance. So ignorance is no excuse. The butcher is killing animal because he does not know what is the effect of this killing. Similarly, persons who do not know what is the value of this human form of life and simply spoiling it just like animals, they are also butchering themselves.

There is a nice instructive verse in Sanskrit. One saintly person was giving his blessings to different kinds of persons. So he first of all saw one boy, he was a prince, son of a king. So he blessed him, rāja-putra, "My dear prince," ciraṁ jīva, "you live forever." Then he saw one brahmacārī, a disciple of a spiritual master, he said, mā jīva muni-putraka, "Oh, you are the disciple of a saintly person. You do not live. You die immediately."

Rāja-putra ciraṁ jīva. "Oh, the prince, son of a king, you live forever; and you are a brahmacārī, muni-putra, a son of a saintly person, so you die immediately." Then there was a saintly person, and he said to the saintly . . . he offered his blessings to the saintly person, jīva vā mara vā sādhoḥ. Sādhoḥ means saintly person, sādhu. "My dear saintly person, either you live or you die, as you like." And there was a butcher. He told for the butcher, mā jīva mā mara iti: "You neither live nor die."

Page Title:Everyone is in ignorance. Any sinful activity is done out of ignorance. So ignorance is no excuse. The butcher is killing animal because he does not know what is the effect of this killing
Compiler:Anurag
Created:2022-09-07, 15:23:26
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=1, Con=0, Let=0
No. of Quotes:1