Worshipping in Beauty
by Rose Moloney
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I was opened in 1971 and this was a wonderful time to
be part of Subud, with Bapak visiting the UK many times. Most of us were
baby-boomers wanting to live a more spiritual life. But within our chosen path
was something ugly that we chose not to see.
Meanwhile, friends of mine went east on the India trail and embraced a
vegetarian life and teachings which we in Subud felt superior to. The latihan,
we were told, was on a higher level than anything else.
During the past forty years I have practised the latihan
and have received from it a unique voice training which allows me to sing an
octave higher. Yet I have several times gone away, alienated by members or
testing fiascos. When I have returned to group latihans, I have always left
disillusioned. For example, I was offered a job at the Congress in Innsbruck in
2005 but withdrew when I saw to my disgust veal on the menu every day. The veal
trade is horribly cruel. Subud seems to be like mainstream society, only caring about companion animals. In the last ten years I
have observed a worrying decline in life force around the groups. After spending time in vibrant
vegetarian centres I return to Subud gatherings where red meat is served and I
am struck by the contrast — a darker atmosphere, a heavier vibration.
On one of my
explorations of other spiritualities I spent time in an Indian ashram where the
sumptuous buffets were vegetarian. This was another way of life. There was
light and beauty around those meals and I felt lighter. So, fifteen years after
being opened in Subud I went vegetarian. My grandfather was a butcher-farmer;
we had meat every day growing up. Even now my favourite meal would be roast
chicken. Devouring corpses or ‘the relish for blood’, as the life-long
vegetarian Gandhi described it, is deeply embedded in our genes. But if we are
‘natural meat eaters’ descended from hunters, then we are also descended from
cannibals, as archaeologists have concluded after examining, on every
continent, human bones with cut marks and marrow removed. We have left
cannibalism behind and must, I believe, progress beyond corpse eating. Even if
we eat cellophane-packed organic meat, we are still predators taking the
babies, baby milk, body-parts and blood of our fellow animals. Moving to a
life-based diet can be gradual — giving up red meat first, then fowl, then
fish, then eggs and cheese. A vegan diet is the most harm-free, but most
important is to cease to eat our fellow mammals or to exploit them.
But weren’t we
blinkered from seeing animal suffering in the vision we accepted in Subud? This
bias comes from the religions of the Middle East — Judaism, Christianity and
Islam — which have upheld the statement in Genesis, where God told Adam and
Eve: ’Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and
have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over
every living thing that moveth upon the earth.’ A Subud Catholic doctor who
read this article informed me that this is the clinching factor as to why we
are entitled to devour the animals in our Eden. I challenge this and ask you to
consider another mind-set in which the latihan could flourish in beauty by
being vegetarian or vegan based. This
is not something I have chosen for the sake of my
health or longevity nor to save the planet for ecological reasons. I live this
way of life for spiritual advancement out of compassion for the animals.
A stag will climb a
high hill when he is about to die. A pig gambols about playfully when he is
returned to his natural habitat — the forest — for pannage (acorns). Chickens
roost up trees. Cows, bulls and calves have a family and social order of which
forlorn adolescent groups in fields today are bereft. All species need to make
their journey and long to roam. Every single one has a unique character. But
progressive farming is only a sop to our consciences. Ceasing to exploit them
is the only enlightened thing to do.[1]
Behind the objections
to liberating animals, I notice two factors:
Firstly, addiction. I
too am an addict. The taste of blood and flesh is addictive; we are no
different from other craving addicts.
Secondly, there is a
lack of empathy for our fellow creatures, a denial that all animals long to
live. Could you eat the pig on your plate if you had seen him eye to eye or
known him as a piglet, more playful and intelligent than a dog? The tricks of the piglets who played in the movie
‘Babe’ were not computer generated; sausage sales went down after that when
children realised who was on
their plate.[2] Most of us have superseded the way of life of our parents, the
old way of thinking and working. Yet we cling to the outmoded diet which was
part of that old-world way of life. If our life depends on causing suffering to
animals, then we truly have landed in a kind of Hell. But I don’t accept that
life has to depend on slaughter.
Bapak’s beliefs were
partly derived from Islam and partly from shamanic Indonesian folk practices.
Reading Susila Budhi Dharma, his book, I was struck that he promotes
the shamanic idea found in many cultures that you eat goats to be virile, cows
to be docile, cockerels to be polygamous etc. Such shamanic beliefs have had a
huge hold on humanity, to our detriment, along with animal sacrifice. Eat as
many bulls as you like — it won’t make you strong. The strongest creatures —
elephants, gorillas etc — are vegetation eaters. Gladiators were called
‘barley-eaters’ and the graves excavated at Ephesus, where I lived last year,
yielded eighty skeletons of these arena veterans, whose bone analysis revealed
they were vegans. Probably they ate this way for strength, not ethics.[3]
When I was given a
Winston Churchill History Fellowship to travel to ancient Greek cities from
Athens to Amman and Alexandria to Pergamon, I found out that Hellenic
sanctuaries demanded much higher standards of purification in diet, fasting and
washing than the Abrahamic religions which supplanted them. Apollonius of Tyana
lived at the same time as Jesus. He travelled all over the Greek world and to
India reforming the practices of the holy places to correct one error — animal
sacrifice. In all other ways I have found the religion of Ancient Greece
superior. Their diet too was better; the Mediterranean Diet — olive oil,
salads, vegetables, fruit and fish — is now recommended as the healthiest, and
reduces cancer risk.[4]
I never heard Bapak
speak about the appalling plight of animals with whom we share the planet. He
spoke of animal forces within us, serving us — human beings — the
most important species on the Earth. I was in the kitchen where Bapak was
staying on one visit to the UK; he had at least two types of meat at every main
meal. Bapak taught that meat eating is good, by example and in his talks.
Therefore I have few hopes that I can persuade Subud members to switch their
mind-set; it is easier to attract existing vegetarians to the latihan.
I now feel that
speciesism, the exclusive focus on human importance, is
a major injustice. Small children too imagine life revolves around them. It is
immature. Are we prepared to share the planet with our fellow life-forms? We
have long held back their intelligence,[5] but, worse, 20th century Westerners
have reduced them to objects: we speak of a ‘crop of lambs’; a chicken is
actually called a ‘product’.
I now see two types of
creatures on this planet: the carnivore-predators and the
herbivore-vegetarians. Interestingly, the chimpanzees evolved into two groups:
the Chimps who will gang-murder their own, make war on other Chimp groups,
seize their territories and keep their females, and eat other mammals; and,
secondly, the Bonobos who are vegetarian and do not invade or murder. (In the
last ten years humans have eaten almost all the Bonobos.)[6]
Do you want to align
with violent, fear-makers like snakes and tigers and stay a human predator by
eating flesh? Or become a divine being who causes little harm by eating fresh?
Instead of top predator preying on the weaker species, we can be Guardians of
the animals, Gardeners of the Earth.
Animals are turning on their human enemy: a seal drowns a scientist
deliberately; foxes have started to attack children. Why are we outraged? We
have destroyed their children and taken their lives for centuries. Those of us
attempting vegetarianism are, in the West, breaking millenia-old patterns of
predatory behaviour.
Solar rich foods are
filled with light and Vitamin D; the Sun is our purest form of energy. I sleep
less, feel lighter, more energetic, closer to the Divine. I feel at peace
knowing no animal has died miserably for me. I feel cleaner without decomposing
flesh in my intestines and never get constipated ever. I am more attuned. I
frequently go into bliss. I need less purification, though the latihan still
gives my talents a tune-up. A five-minute latihan first thing opens up my day
and everything synchronises. Yet the latihan has not generated empathy with
other species in more of us.
We must not forget
Bapak’s indictment either: that if Anugraha failed, Subud would fail. Doesn’t
that give us permission now to create new contexts for the Latihan other than
Islam, with its Koranic endorsement for devouring red meat and other flesh?
Halal abattoirs are spreading over the UK; they are cruel and barbaric. I have
spent months in Muslim countries — Jordan, Egypt and Turkey — and the awareness
of animals’ needs in those countries is zero. Animals are either used as
objects or baited for cruel fun. The Koran has doomed animals to eternal hell
on Earth. The Bible is no better. Religions which allow meat eating also endorse
war.[7] When stranded in remote places, meat eaters will often eat each other.
Meat eating is a consciousness which can be extended to killing, war and
cannibalism. Vegetarianism/veganism is a consciousness based on honouring all
life. I now read instead the great Greek philosophers, many of whom, like
Pythagoras, were vegetarian.
In Subud terms vegetarianism is a form of prihatin, giving up something for a higher purpose, and
therefore close to fasting. In Greek Orthodox Christianity, Lent was originally
kept by giving up all blood foods including
dairy and eggs. However, we must look to Eastern spirituality for examples. All
Hindu holy men are vegetarian or vegan.
I am vegetarian at the moment but when I was vegan I had the most exalted
spiritual experiences, including ascending to heaven and on another occasion
meeting Jesus in a night journey. Angelic beings assisted me. But must we look
for personal gain in this when a small sacrifice in giving up meat helps free
the animals from being on death row? They sense when they are being sent to the
abattoir and dread an unnatural death as much as we do. Author Betty Eadie and
others who have written of death experiences report that, as they went upwards
with other human souls who had died that day, there were animals going up to
the Light alongside them. Vegetarianism does not need to justify itself; it is
killing to eat which is indefensible.
I am starting an
experimental latihan group which will be for those who accept or aspire to a
cruelty-free vegetarian way of life, way of beauty. Vegetarianism is not a
diet; it is higher consciousness. It is surely the next stage of evolution.
Notes:
1. Prof. Peter Singer, author of Animal Liberation, on ‘speciesism’, from a 2006 interview
with Salon:
The argument,
in essence, is that we have, over centuries of history, expanded the circle of
beings whom we regard as morally significant. If you go back in time you'll
find tribes that were essentially only concerned with their own tribal members.
If you were a member of another tribe, you could be killed with impunity. When
we got beyond that there were still boundaries to our moral sphere, but these
were based on nationality, or race, or religious belief. Anyone outside those
boundaries didn’t count.
Slavery is
the best example here. If you were not a member of the European race, if you
were African, specifically, you could be enslaved. So we got beyond that. We
have expanded the circle beyond our own race and we reject as wrongful the idea
that something like race or religion or gender can be a basis for claiming
another being’s interests count less than our own.
So the
argument is that this is also an arbitrary stopping place; it’s also a form of
discrimination, which I call ‘speciesism’, that has parallels with racism. I am
not saying it’s identical, but in both cases you have this group that has power
over the outsiders, and develops an ideology that says, Those outside our
circle don’t matter, and therefore we can make use of them for our own
convenience.
That is
what we have done, and still do, with other species. They’re effectively
things; they’re property that we can own, buy and sell. We use them as
convenient and we keep them in ways that suit us best, producing products we
want at the cheapest prices. So my argument is simply that this is wrong, this
is not justifiable if we want to defend the idea of human equality against
those who have a narrower definition. I don’t think we can say that somehow we,
as humans, are the sole repository of all moral value, and that all beings
beyond our species don’t matter. I think they do matter, and we need to expand
our moral consideration to take that into account.
2. A BBC2 program looks
at farm animal character and intelligence:
3. Vegetarian athletes
and vegan body builders:
http://www.veganbodybuilding.com/
Gladiators were vegan:
http://bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2007/05_may/02/gladiator.shtml N.B. High levels of strontium from their
vegan diet healed gladiators’ wounds and broken bones.
4.http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v99/n1/full/6604418a.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60E58N20100115
5. See Note 2.
6. On Bonobos and
Chimps’ closeness to us:
6. George Bernard Shaw:
Living
Graves
We are the
living graves of murdered beasts
Slaughtered
to satisfy our appetites
We never
pause to wonder at our feasts
If animals
like men also have rights.
We pray on
Sunday that we may have light
To guide
our footsteps on the path we tread
We’re sick
of war we do not want to fight
The thought
of it now fills our hearts with dread
And yet we
gorge ourselves upon the dead.
Like
carrion crows we live and feed on meat
Regardless
of the suffering and pain
We cause by
doing so. If thus we treat
Defenseless
animals for food or gain
How can we
hope in this world to attain
The PEACE
we say we are so anxious for?
We pray for
it over abattoirs of pain
To God,
while outraging the moral law
Thus
cruelty begets its offspring: WAR.
(Other great
vegetarians: Leonardo da Vinci, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Pythagoras, Apollonius of
Tyana, Confucius, Albert Einstein, Albert Schweitzer, Brigitte Bardot. N.B. Hitler wasn’t; he ate
sausages!!)
Appendix — Counter
arguments:
1. My doctor told me to go back to/continue to
eat meat.
Doctors are entrenched
in conventional living. You will scarcely find one clergyman or doctor who
recommends cruelty-free eating or who has even attempted it! Like most people
they have not overcome their addictions. They also believe in the protein
fictions broadcast in the 20th century.
2. I
need protein from
meat.
All info promoting
protein was spread first by governments supporting business —farming and food
industries — or from ignorance. There is protein in legumes, grains,
vegetables, fruit, nuts and seeds.
http://www.happycow.net/vegetarian_protein.html
3. I
used to be vegetarian. I now feel better back on meat.
The soil is so depleted
now you need to get vegetables full of minerals; rock dust provides mega
vitamins. You probably needed to work out a better vegetarian meal plan.
Joining in the prevailing meat fest is to join the human race as it is and I
know it’s easier.
4. Vegetables are alive too — what’s the difference?
Go to an abattoir where
they are cutting up cows then go to a vegetarian kitchen where they are cutting
veg. Feel the difference. Ideally we could live on fruit, avocados, seeds nuts,
grains, beans and pulses which do not destroy a plant, only the fruit casing or
excess seeds. Such a diet was given in Genesis to Noah — I am loath to admit!
There is a ladder of ascent in consciousness. Animals are more evolved than
plants.
5.
Diet is a matter of choice.
So are all crimes!
6. We have the teeth of omnivores.
We don’t have the short
gut of carnivores, but the long gut of herbivores. However, humans have
adapted. We can eat human flesh with no physical ill effects, yet is this
right?
--------------------
On the health benefits of vegetarian eating there are
many web-sites — see www.vegsoc.org
UN calls for World to go vegan www.viva.org.uk