Ahimsa Assignment

Name:____________________________ Due:____________________AhimsaAhimsa or ‘dynamic compassion’ is a principle of non-harming and nonviolence. Perhaps themost famous model for ahimsa was Mahatma Gandhi who was profoundly influenced by andpropagated the doctrine of ahimsa. Ahimsa says that we have no right to inflict suffering and deathonto another living creature and, if harmlessness were the keynote of our lives, this would do moreto produce harmonious conditions than any other discipline. The challenge of ahimsa is enormous. Itencourages an active inner state of being rather than merely a passive state of refraining fromviolence. Gandhi wrote, “Ahimsa is the highest duty. Even if we cannot practice it in full, we musttry to understand its spirit and refrain as far as humanly possible from violence.”Our society’s lack of understanding about the pain we directly or indirectly cause animals reflects adeep loss of connection between our species and others. The intention to hurt another living beingis in conflict with the principles of ahimsa for it reflects an absence of conscious integration ofcompassion into our lives. We acknowledge this situation intellectually yet we are sufficientlyculturally desensitized to ignore it, allowing it to continue by default.One philosopher that has not ignored the subject of the treatment of animals is E. F. Schumacher.He observed that “there have been no sages or holy men/women in our or anybody’s history whowere cruel to animals or who looked upon them as nothing but utilities and innumerable are thelegends and stories which link sanctity as well as happiness with a loving kindness towards thesecreatures.” There is no compassion in a science, philosophy or doctrine that ignores ourinterdependence with other species.Perhaps the last word should go to the animals, but since they do not speak our language they mustrely on us to speak for them.“We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical conceptof animals. Remote from universal nature, and living by complicated artifice,man in civilization surveys the creatures through the glass of his knowledgeand sees thereby a feather magnified and the whole image in distortion.We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fateof having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, we greatly err.For the animals shall not be measure by man. In a world older and more complete,gifted with extension of the senses we have lost or never attained,living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings.They are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time,fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth.”~Henry Beston~

Ahimsa Questions1. What is ahimsa and how do you perform it?2. What actions or thoughts does a person without ahimsa have?3. Summarize the quote by Henry Beston.