What if buddah was born in the middle east where most of the people were normads raising livestock and killing and eating wild and domesticated animals.
The land is arid and unsuitable for farming and people depend on hunting and the main source of food is meat contrary to the situation in india in the time of the buddha where the it was primerily a agricultural economy and people could actually afford not to kill animals for food as they had other sources of food.
Therefore buddha's message of prohibition of killing of animals was accepted as it was practical and was in line with the livelyhoods that were prevalent at the time.
But I dought his message would have been accepted if he had preached in the middle east, well if he had made a following they would soon learn that they would proberbly have to starve if they are refuse to kill animals for food, or will have to (conveniently!!) have the Infedels kill the animels and then eat the meat !!!
If you conside all the successful religions they all have one thing in common, that is the core consepts of each religion were practical and acceptable (to a major degree..) to the socio-economic and moral principals that were prevelant in the the geographic region that religon originated, in that particular time. The religions that differd from this principal proberbly died out as it was not appealing to the masses.
therefore I see all religions as a scheme deviced by their authors to enhace and achieve whatever goal (moral, social, power, personel ect..) but all of them took care to be practical and stay within the "accepted" social order, as they all knew that if they departed from the "accepted order" at the time their message would be rejected.
Therefore I beleive all religions are reflections, morphed images of the core values prevalent at the time and place of the author of the religion infused with his own interpretation , or "spin" if you would call it. I beleive that all religions threfore have nothing to do with devine knowlege or enlightenment but reflects the ground realaties, aspirations of the people at the time of its origin modified over the years by the deeds of the ever changing social circumstances.
would appriciate a rational discussion...
The land is arid and unsuitable for farming and people depend on hunting and the main source of food is meat contrary to the situation in india in the time of the buddha where the it was primerily a agricultural economy and people could actually afford not to kill animals for food as they had other sources of food.
Therefore buddha's message of prohibition of killing of animals was accepted as it was practical and was in line with the livelyhoods that were prevalent at the time.
But I dought his message would have been accepted if he had preached in the middle east, well if he had made a following they would soon learn that they would proberbly have to starve if they are refuse to kill animals for food, or will have to (conveniently!!) have the Infedels kill the animels and then eat the meat !!!
If you conside all the successful religions they all have one thing in common, that is the core consepts of each religion were practical and acceptable (to a major degree..) to the socio-economic and moral principals that were prevelant in the the geographic region that religon originated, in that particular time. The religions that differd from this principal proberbly died out as it was not appealing to the masses.
therefore I see all religions as a scheme deviced by their authors to enhace and achieve whatever goal (moral, social, power, personel ect..) but all of them took care to be practical and stay within the "accepted" social order, as they all knew that if they departed from the "accepted order" at the time their message would be rejected.
Therefore I beleive all religions are reflections, morphed images of the core values prevalent at the time and place of the author of the religion infused with his own interpretation , or "spin" if you would call it. I beleive that all religions threfore have nothing to do with devine knowlege or enlightenment but reflects the ground realaties, aspirations of the people at the time of its origin modified over the years by the deeds of the ever changing social circumstances.
would appriciate a rational discussion...
