In Buddhism, there are two kinds of food to avoid: one is pungent vegetable and the other is meat product.
There are five kinds of vegetables that Buddhists avoid and they are onions, garlic, scallions, chives and leeks. Why are vegetables forbidden? According to the Buddha, the odors of these vegetables repel gods and attract hungry ghosts and demons.
So, what did the Buddha say about no meat eating? Now, I am going to read you some sutras. There might be some words that you don’t understand. It’s O.K. You would understand in a later time if you follow this channel.
In Volume VI of Shurangma Sutra, the Buddha said, “Ananda, if living beings in the six paths of any mundane world had no thoughts of killing, they would not have to follow a continual succession of births and deaths.
”Your basic purpose in cultivating samadhi is to transcend the wearisome defilements. But if you do not renounce your thoughts of killing, you will not be able to get out of the dust.
“Even though one may have some wisdom and manifestation of Chan samadhi, one is certain to enter the path of spirits if one does not cease killing. At best, a person will become a mighty ghost; on the average, one will become a flying yaksha, a ghost leader, or the like; at the lowest level, one will become an earth-bound rakshasa.
”These ghosts and spirits have their groups of disciples. Each says of himself that he has accomplished the Unsurpassed Way.
”After my extinction, in the Dharma-ending Age, these hordes of ghosts and spirits will abound, spreading like wildfire as they argue that eating meat will bring one to the Bodhi Way.
”Ananda, I permit the Bhikshus to eat pure meat with five kind of characters. This meat is actually a transformation brought into being by my spiritual powers. It basically has no life-force. You Brahmans live in a climate so hot and humid, and on such sandy and rocky land, that vegetables will not grow; therefore, I have had to assist you with spiritual powers and compassion. Because of this kindness and compassion, what you eat that tastes like meat is merely said to be meat; in fact, however, it is not. After my extinction, how can those who eat the flesh of living beings be called the disciples of Shakya?
”You should know that these people who eat meat may gain some awareness and may seem to be in samadhi, but they are all great rakshasas. When their retribution ends, they are bound to sink into the bitter sea of birth and death. They are not disciples of the Buddha. Such people as these kill and eat one another in a never-ending cycle. How can such people transcend the Triple Realm?
”When you teach people in the world to cultivate samadhi, they must also cut off killing.”
So, what did the Buddha say about no pungent vegetables?
In Volume VIII of Shurangama Sutra, the Buddha said, “Ananda, the twelve categories of living beings in this world are not complete in themselves, but depend on four kinds of eating; that is, eating by portions, eating by contact, eating by thought, and eating by consciousness. Therefore, the Buddha said that all living beings must eat to live.
”Ananda, all living beings can live if they eat what is sweet, and they will die if they take poison. Beings who seek samadhi should refrain from eating five pungent plants of this world.
”If these five are eaten cooked, they increase one’s sexual desire; if they are eaten raw, they increase one’s anger.
”Therefore, even if people in this world who eat pungent plants can expound the twelve divisions of the sutra canon, the gods and immortals of the ten directions will stay far away from them because they smell so bad. However, after they eat these things the hungry ghosts will hover around and kiss their lips. Being always in the presence of ghosts, their blessings and virtue dissolve as the days go by, and they experience no lasting benefit.
”People who eat pungent plants and also cultivate samadhi will not be protected by the Bodhisattvas, gods, immortals, or good spirits of the ten directions; therefore, the tremendously powerful demon kings, able to do as they please, will appear in the body of a Buddha and speak dharma for them, denouncing the prohibitive precepts and praising lust, rage, and delusion.
”When their lives end, these people will join the retinue of demon kings. When they use up their blessings as demons, they will fall into the Unintermittent Hell.
”Ananda, those who cultivate for Bodhi should never eat the five pungent plants. This is the first of the gradual stages of cultivation.”
Eating meat generates killing karma and eradicate the mind of compassion. The five pungent vegetables would strengthen the mind of lust and anger and also they are the smell not favored by the buddhas, bodhisattvas and protecting guards, but by the ghosts and demons.
By Nancy Yu