Depending on the context, they could be perceived as annoying, filthy, or useful. They were associated with improper behavior, seen as helpful or even indispensable, or viewed as the innocent victims of human misbehavior. Yet, all these considerations were overshadowed by the Buddhist proscription against harming or killing any sentient being.

Would we be nearly as intelligent without animals to teach us about ourselves?

Therefore, since it is extremely incongruous to kill and offer up sentient beings to pure gods who are kind and caring, it is only right and proper that you renounce such practices and worship these deities with abundant clean offerings instead.

In addressing Hindu worshippers who engage in animal sacrifice, Jamyang Khyentse highlights the karmic repercussions of taking life and challenges the notion that compassionate deities would ever endorse such a practice.

Tibetan Buddhism has long argued for the sanctity of life, condemning the killing of humans and animals alike. For just as long, however, meat has been a staple of the Tibetan diet. Individual religious leaders have dealt with this tension in different ways, but few have done so as revealingly as the eighteenth century master Jigmé Lingpa (‘jigs med gling pa, 1730-1798).

In his religious and autobiographical writings, Jigmé Lingpa draws on Buddhist ideals promoting compassion towards all beings and his own unusually strong love of animals to praise vegetarianism and condemn the killing of animals for meat. Jigmé Lingpa also recognizes, however, that vegetarianism is a difficult ideal. Rather than insisting on vegetarianism, therefore, he offers his students a variety of means through which to moderate the negativity of eating meat without fully abandoning it.

Drawing on the ideas of 19th-century naturalist John Arthur Thomson, Story suggests that animals primarily repay karmic debts by following their inherent nature. However, through interactions with humans, they do have the ability to learn higher behaviors.

Early Buddhist literature depicts the animal rebirth as a most “unfortunate destiny” (durgati), won through negative karma and characterized by violence, fear, suffering, and a lack of wisdom, moral agency, or spiritual potential. … major animal characters within the life-story of the Buddha [however] can be seen as “doubles” of the Buddha…

For an interview with the author about this book, see The New Books Network Episode.

three sets of omen verses from the Śārdūlakarṇāvadāna, which offers the earliest account of Astral Science (jyotiḥśāstra) in Buddhist literature

Mutually they devour each other’s flesh,
Locked in an endless chain of combat…

A series of poems, quotes, and stories encouraging vegetarianism and a compassionate stance towards animals.

Western philosophers did not hand down a rich tradition of thinking about animal consciousness. But Eastern thinkers have long been haunted by its implications— especially the Jains…

The fact that narratives have the potential to be an “act of social imagination” and serve as the foundation for moral agency fits well into Shabkar’s own understandings of the functions of Buddhist life stories.

This essay explores how Shabkar’s autobiography makes an indirect case for vegetarianism and ethical treatment of animals. By portraying animals as important participants in his stories, Shabkar shifts the focus from a human-centered view to one of impartiality. This approach, an example of the “act of social imagination,”  subtly encourages a vegetarian lifestyle and stands out from other Tibetan Buddhist arguments for vegetarianism. Shabkar’s storytelling invites readers to imagine a more ethical way of living, which helps build the foundation for moral choices.

According to our Buddhist sutras, the way things were handled in the age of the Buddha, we can’t act in a spirit of revenge. We cannot treat animals in a hateful or angry spirit.

In this brief question and answer, Master Sheng-yen discusses different contexts of taking life and their moral valence. Throughout the interview, Sheng-yen repeatedly points out that there are usually other options in common situations other than taking a life.

Then, when King Brahmadatta had released the elephant, he said in verse:
‘You should now leave, O king of elephants!
Serve your parents and be filial (towards them)!’

To ask whether Buddhism accepts the instrumental use of animals, whether human or otherwise is, again, to look for Western concepts and ideas, and perhaps even specifically modern ones, in an ancient, Asian tradition. I do not want to take sides on the issue at all; my concern, rather, is to identify any hidden assumptions that may prevent us from judging the tradition on its own terms.

This article defends Buddhism against Paul Waldau’s accusation of speciesism, arguing that Waldau incorrectly attributes certain Western moral concepts to Buddhism. It suggests that these concepts, such as intrinsic moral value based on specific traits and ethical treatment of humans, may not be inherent to Buddhism. Additionally, it highlights that Pāli texts do not seem to grant intrinsic value to any life form, suggesting that Buddhists should seek explanations within their own tradition for ecological concerns.

Since fear discourages the aspirant and dissuades him from seeking seclusion, staying in the wild was a proven method for reducing and eventually eliminating this kilesa (defilement).

This is the first part of chapter three from “Forest Recollections” focusing on Thudong monks of the early 20th century who used their fear of animals in the jungle to train their minds and overcome their attachments.

Lacking understanding, merely hearing the Dhamma may only grant a better rebirth, but even a better rebirth provides the condition for future enlightenment.

This article delves into the question of whether animals can benefit from hearing the Dharma. The author examines how animals might be influenced by the Dharma and explores broader questions related to the practice and impact of “hearing the Dharma.”

Crested peacocks…

The following lines intend to sketch dogs’ relation to humans and their fellow quadrupeds and birds from the ancient Indian sources, as was done exhaustively for Greek and Latin literature long ago.

Buddhism perceives animals as if they were young children who do not have the intellectual capacity to understand the world as intelligently as humans and just like children need to be protected by humans. As human are the most intelligent beings on planet earth and control almost everything, they have a responsibility toward rest of the flora and fauna.

In this article I argue that the jātakas are able to tell us interesting things about the capabilities of animals. By using stories of another key animal character—namely Devadatta, the Buddha’s nemesis—I explore what might be distinctive about the ability of animals to misbehave.

Since Devadatta appears 28 times as an animal and 46 as a human, he allows us to probe whether or not the text’s compilers saw a difference between human and animal capacities for evil. In the process, I raise questions about how we should view animal tales in the Jātakas more broadly, and highlight the productive tension between animals as unfortunate fellow travellers in the cycle of rebirth, and animals as literary devices that shed light on human behaviour.

Conversing with human-animal relationships within other Buddhist traditions, this article explores the resonances between the presence of animals and ideas of successful labour, both physical and contemplative, amongst Australian Buddhists in a time of ecological crises. In conversation with notions of ecological health and renewal, native animals are often seen as companions, tutelary beings, and as being indicative of successful practice.

… a translation of a small section of the first Bhāvanākramah (The Process of Meditation), a well-known Mahayana meditation manual written by Kamalasila (740-795 CE). This passage, appearing early in the text, allows us to gain a good sense of the context within which Mahayana concern for the well-being of animals arises.

Against the background of guidelines on non-killing and developing ideas on the release of captured or domesticated animals, this study focuses on how vinaya (disciplinary) texts deal with dangerous and/or annoying animals, such as snakes, mosquitoes, and flies. Are there any circumstances in which they may be killed, captured, or repelled? Or should they be endured and ignored, or even protected and cherished, at all times? This paper discusses the many guidelines relating to avoiding—and, if necessary, chasing away—dangerous and annoying animals.

All of these proposals call for meticulous care to reduce the risk of harming the creature. In this sense, animals, such as snakes and mosquitoes, seem to be assured a better life in comparison with domesticated or hunted animals. This distinction reflects the somewhat uncomfortable balance that Buddhist monastics must achieve between respecting the life of individual sentient beings, including all animals, and adhering to social conventions in order to safeguard their position in society.

He thinks and he feels, but—as far as I can tell—he does not speak, nor is he simply the previous animal rebirth of an eventual human being. There is something powerful, I contend, about the mute presence of such an animal—its noble silence, its freedom from the glibness of human language

On how Pali and other Indian literature used animals as both stand-ins for and foils of its human characters.

The snake, the scorpion, the centipede, the mongoose, the cat, the mouse, and the owl, or any other animals that creep away when they see people. Thus a being is reborn from a being; one is reborn through one’s deeds.

Those who do the ten kinds of bad deeds are like creepy creatures and are reborn as such.

As meat-eating has become normative in modern Japan and among the Japanese Buddhist clergy, a sacrificial rationale has replaced anti-meat-eating discourses that have remained a central feature of Buddhist identity in other parts of East Asia.

This article provides a close reading of Partaking of Life: The Day That Little Mii Becomes Meat, followed by historical contexts for Buddhist vegetarianism and discrimination against professions that rely on killing animals, particularly as these themes pertain to Jōdo Shin Buddhism. The essay ends on an analysis of Team Ichibanboshi’s sermon on Partaking of Life.

What kind of person does not torment himself, not being interested in self-torture, and does not torment others, not being interested in torturing others?

Contrasting the openness of animals with the duplicity of humans, The Buddha explains how to lead the religious life in a way that is truly admirable.

In examining how Buddhist depictions of the natural world and native Chinese taxonomies mutually enriched each other, I offer a special perspective for understanding how Buddhism as a religious culture took root in Chinese society.

An unfortunately dull book about an interesting topic, the author will likely succeed in his stated goal of encouraging others to write about it more eloquently.

a field mouse
racing
across fallen leaves…

… the jackal is used to suggest that heretics, heterodox teachers, and other negatively perceived figures should be condemned not merely because of the actions they engage in or the teachings they propagate, but also because they are constitutionally inferior

It was very gratifying to watch the fish slip over the side of the boat and quickly swim away.

A traditional explanation of ceremonial animal freeing: a popular, pan-Buddhist ritual.

The worst thing, worse than the physical danger, is the emotional toll.

Set aside all the social norms we have, the expectations we have about who animals are or what is appropriate to do for animals and just ask: What would you do—what do you think the right thing to do is—if you saw an animal suffering?

A long and emotional interview with the founder of Direct Action Everywhere on why he cares so much about animal suffering and what drove him to risk so much fighting it.

… animals are not passive objects for humans to ignore or argue over–or collect–but “individuals with their own perspectives on life,” and members of communities with which our species coexists. That animals are in this sense political actors is an underrecognized and, to my mind, potentially powerful point

What can we learn, and what kind of world would we build, if we learned how to listen to animals?