by Brian Griffith.
In most Eastern religions, animals are taken as souls like us, who are on a common journey, although presently at different levels of awareness. In that case we might all be kindred, and treat each other like cousins twice removed. However, if animals are lower on the ladder of being, then their beastly incarnations seem to indicate a lack of virtue. And many traditional believers feel it is obvious that people who live an immoral life are bound for rebirth as animals. So we read in the Tibetan Book of the Dead: “A priest who drinks liquor enters [the womb] of a worm, bug, or moth, of birds who eat excrement, and of vile creatures. … A priest who is a thief [is reborn] thousands of times in spiders, snakes, and lizards.ˮ The Vedic Laws of Manu also affirm that “people of darkness always become animals.” And it is not only Easterners who have felt this way. In Plato’s Phaedo, we read that “Men who have followed after gluttony, and wantonness, and drunkenness … will pass into asses and animals of that sort … And those who have chosen the portion of injustice and tyranny and violence, will pass into wolves or hawks, and kites—whither else can we suppose them to go?ˮ
All this could indicate either that lower beings deserve our contempt, or that our karmas depend on mutual help. Among village people, the message of accountability for compassion is usually a bit more popular. For example, in the Book of Good Deeds, a scripture from rural Yunnan, China, we are informed what the locals expect for those who abuse their fellow creatures:
When spring arrives, the wild creatures are pregnant, birds lay their eggs, and so do bugs and ants. When we hunt wild animals or shoot flying birds, fires are set in the wilds to capture the animals. They burn in the hills and burn in the valleys, burning tens of thousands of bugs and ants. This should not be. Therefore, it is said that those who set many fires in the wilds have no hidden virtue and their descendants will get leprosy.
But of course the Eastern world has featured both compassionate and cruel brands of morality. In the cruel versions, female birth was a punishment for sin, and animals were doing penance by serving their masters. The cruel versions of religion usually prevailed among the rulers.