Veganism: Moral Superiority?

[OneFaith]

No one actually has to read this, I just wanted to type it out and express my thoughts. Its pretty long, haha. Wanted to mull over it in my mind.

I'm too tired to read it tonight, maybe later. But I will share my thoughts...

Jesus never sinned. Jesus ate fish- therefore eating an animal is not sin. A vegan once told me "God never intended mankind to eat animals." Then I showed him the verse in Deuteronomy where God commanded the Israelites to eat from the flock and from the herd. Also a verse (I think it's Genesis 9:6) where God Himself prophesies that there will come a day (New Testament) when He will give us everything that crawls on the ground for food- just as He gave us the green herb. This means it won't be religiously wrong to eat it.

If they want to eat only vegetables, let them do so in their attempt to please God. But if they want to force this unnecessary burden on others as religious rules, that's teaching falsehood. Jesus fulfilled the Old law- that means He ate "from the flock and from the herd" without sinning.

 

[OneFaith]

Oops it's Genesis 9:3

 

[trofimus]

If we are talking about what is in the Bible, then we must accept that pre-flood no animals were given for food and that after the flood animals developed a fear of man; animals became acceptable prey for man and other animals. Nothing is said regarding whether animals ate other animals pre-flood. It does not matter that it does not sit well with your present world view or what you think must have had to happen for things to change, when we go by what Scripture says.

It would be pretty much literally impossible for us to imagine a world where there is no sin nor sorrow nor pain nor suffering nor death, but that is exactly what we are promised, and at the same time ALL creation will be restored, and animals will no longer eat each other. Even the lion will eat straw! See Isaiah 65 (as well as others)

17 “See, I will create
new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered,
nor will they come to mind.

18 But be glad and rejoice forever
in what I will create,
for I will create Jerusalem to be a delight
and its people a joy.

19 I will rejoice over Jerusalem
and take delight in my people;
the sound of weeping and of crying
will be heard in it no more.

20 “Never again will there be in it
an infant who lives but a few days,
or an old man who does not live out his years;
the one who dies at a hundred
will be thought a mere child;
the one who fails to reach[SUP]a[/SUP] a hundred
will be considered accursed.

21 They will build houses and dwell in them;
they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

22 No longer will they build houses and others live in them,
or plant and others eat.
For as the days of a tree,
so will be the days of my people;
my chosen ones will long enjoy
the work of their hands.

23 They will not labor in vain,
nor will they bear children doomed to misfortune;
for they will be a people blessed by the Lord,
they and their descendants with them.

24 Before they call I will answer;
while they are still speaking I will hear.

25 The wolf and the lamb will feed together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox,
and dust will be the serpent’s food.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,”


Not now, but they were before according to Scripture.

It is not a KJV translation error; you simply have a problem with what Scripture explicitly says. Every version says all with the breath of life was given every green plant (or something meaning the same thing) for food.

Animals were used for sacrifice. You assume they were being eaten before they were given as food.

Animal sacrifice prefigured the sacrificial lamb of God Unclean animals were never used.

You use so many color and font changes that it is almost impossible to divide your post into several quotes, so I will respond this way:

1. You did not answer any of my objections - you surely can see carnivors to be made for hunting, killing and processing meat. When did this happen? Why Bible says no word about it? Its like half of animals and whole ecosystem and food chain based on it. It would be like second creation, if added later.

2. Isaiah is an image of the kingdom of God, I do not accept millenium on this earth to be literal, its only your theological view.

3. You said that Bible says "I have given them green plants.... for meat" and that I should notice the word "meat" here. I said it is a KJV error, there is no "meat" in the text. So it is not significant in any way.

4. When you carefully read Abel and Cain story, you will see they were not doing sacrifices for sin as Moses commanded, they were offering first-fruit of their gain. Cain was given what the field produced and Abel was giving from fat and from sheep.

 

[Muzungu256]

if someone wants to be a vegan its all fine by me its pretty healthy i think............. i think also that walter veith is vegan??????

 

[trofimus]

if someone wants to be a vegan its all fine by me its pretty healthy i think............. i think also that walter veith is vegan??????

Its so healthy that they must use many food supplements to be able to live normally

 

[Huckleberry]

4. When you carefully read Abel and Cain story, you will see they were not doing sacrifices for sin as Moses commanded, they were offering first-fruit of their gain.

Carefully read further.

7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin
lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.

 

[Magenta]

Thanks, I'll look into this. Believe it or not, this has been on my mind for a while. Near where we live, a farmer raises black angus cows in a pecan field. Free range beef. When I drive past the farm on my way to work, it makes me feel good to see them happy and content. So I have been thinking about where meat comes from and how it is raised, I just haven't done anything about it (which is probably a worse sin- thinking about something, yet not doing anything to change my behavior).

You are welcome, and I am glad to hear that you are beginning to care more about the welfare of animals produced for livestock I wrote part of this last night after my previous post, before seeing your reply:

The wonderful thing is that there are people who care about the welfare of livestock wildlife air quality of life and killing the animal in an ethical manner as humanely as possible. This extends to all food production, and we can easily see that there has been an ongoing war on what constitutes health and proper nutrition and who is going to get the consumer dollars. The better educated you are the more sure you can be that you are literally putting your money for your values are and where your mouth is. You can do something to help the food industry as a whole by financially supporting the practices you find acceptable through purchasing the manufacturer's product for your own personal consumption.

The same can be said for all food production. Even if one cannot afford to shop organic all the time, buying organic, non GMO, and fair-trade etc when you can is better than never. Reputable grocers probably carry some kind of industry magazines for the consumer as well, which can help you in your gradual increase of awareness and knowledge of prevalent issues. They are often free; here we have the monthly alive, and also, Common Ground magazines. I used to read them religiously

 

[Magenta]

PS~ I do not understand those who mock and scoff others for caring
about animals. We are to be stewards of them, not abusers, regardless
of whether we are vegetarians or not. God's Word says He will destroy
those who are destroying the Earth.

The nations were angry, and your wrath has come. The time
has come for judging the dead, and for rewarding your servants
the prophets and your people who revere your name, both great
and small-- and for destroying those who destroy the earth.

 

[Corbinscam]

I think it is important, and it does bother me wondering how the animals were treated before being slaughtered. The problem I have is I don't know which meats, eggs, and dairy products were raised using humane methods and which ones were raised using cruel methods. I know God did not mean for us to cause animals to live in miserable conditions before we kill them for our consumption.

It is like foreign produced goods. I know many things we buy are made in developing countries where people are horribly exploited and work in miserable conditions. The problem is, we don't know which goods are made in factories where people are well treated and which ones are made in exploitative factories.

Depending on where you're located ask around and find local farmers. You'll pay more but it's well worth it. Look for grass fed or non-gmo feed raised beef. You can usually find pork and chicken raised off of gmo feed and typically when a person cares enough feed animals well they care enough to treat their animals in a humane way.

 

[Magenta]

The wonderful thing is that there are people who care about the welfare of livestock wildlife air quality of life and killing the animal in an ethical manner as humanely as possible.

This was not properly proof read. Because my post was mostly written last night, I needed to copy it before trying to post it, which I forgot to do, and I was going to have to type it all out again unless I used a speech-to-text editor to transcribe it for me, but of course they are never a perfect transmission... haha I am not even sure what that was supposed to say beyond the fact that there are people who do care about the quality of life their livestock enjoys before the livestock are humanely slaughtered for our consumption Personally I am grateful for such people. Thank you!!!

 

[oldethennew]

TY, Magenta...

look-up on the u-tube, 'scary dairy', oh it is truly the pits that our money-mongers
have fallen into.,

 

[Rockrz]

I do not accept millenium on this earth to be literal

You believe wrong... God's Word says Jesus will rule this world for 1000 years with His Saints, sounds like you won't be joining us

Funny thing... non of the ant-meat people even acknowledge what God says here:

1 Timothy 4:14
Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;
Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;
Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.
For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving:

 

[joyfullyhis]

Ah yes veganism, another cookie cutter movement for today's overly sensitive wishywashy weak dumb lazy generation. Its terrible, never saw a vegan who can do physical labor.
Jesus ate meat as you said, end of discussion on it being immoral. Animals are animals, and people are people and we are to rule over animals.

[h=1]1 Timothy 4:1-3King James Version (KJV)[/h][FONT=&quot]4 Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]2 Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]3 Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.[/FONT]
[h=3]History of vegetarianism - Wikipedia[/h][h=3]Vegetarianism in Hinduism | Alimentarium[/h]
God's word should come before the tradition of pagans.

 

[Magenta]

You use so many color and font changes that it is almost impossible to divide your post into several quotes, so I will respond this way:

I made my post all one colour and all one font, so I am not sure what the problem is. Though it is true the verse numbers changed color, I did not do that, it is what automatically happens when a link is put in. I copy and pasted those verses from a site that had the verse numbers hotlinked.

1. You did not answer any of my objections -

Baloney! Or perhaps you would prefer tofu. You are making things up and saying the Bible cannot be true because of what you think. I have supplied what the Bible says on the matter. You are allowed to have your objections to what the Bible says, but it does not change the fact that you are disagreeing with what the Bible explicitly states. I am not obliged to try to scientifically explain how animal digestion may have had to change in the event of certain animals becoming carnivores at some point. What I have repeated and what you are rejecting is what the Bible says. ALL creatures were originally given a vegetarian diet.

Did some eat meat? We are not told. It would be an assumption to say they did.

I think you seriously need to reconsider your thinking on this matter. Taken to its logical conclusions, the fact that you reject what Scripture says due to your understanding of what would have been required genetically from an explainable evolutionary scientific viewpoint, means you would also reject the virgin birth and every miracle Jesus performed, because there is no natural explanation given in scientific terms that we would find acceptable.

For instance: turning water into wine. Obviously that is a process that requires much more than just water as an ingredient, and also requires the passage of time, and yet we are not told how it was done, just the fact that Jesus did it fairly instantaneously, with nothing more than the cooperation of servants handling the water at the wedding banquet. Do you reject that too because it is not possible for any one of us to take an urn of water and instantly have it change into an urn of wine?

What about the virgin birth? From a scientific point of view, how would you explain this? Do you reject it also, since our understanding demands the use of a human sperm to fertilize a viable ovum? You know, from your present perspective, even creation itself is not possible: God spoke, and everything leapt into existence from nothing. The rabbit hole goes on and on...

you surely can see carnivors to be made for hunting, killing and processing meat. When did this happen? Why Bible says no word about it? Its like half of animals and whole ecosystem and food chain based on it. It would be like second creation, if added later.

Why ask me about something that is not explained in the Bible? You reject what is actually written. That is what I am talking about... need I say it again? ALL creatures were originally given a vegetarian diet. It is not my responsibility to try to explain how God may have accomplished this when nothing is written of it. Expecting me to speculate and explain it all scientifically (perhaps from an evolutionary perspective? you keep mentioning young earthers, as if they had anything to do with the discussion, though what is beyond me) is a bit much. I am discussing what the Bible says.

2. Isaiah is an image of the kingdom of God, I do not accept millenium on this earth to be literal, its only your theological view.

More rejecting what the Bible says. And the world to come? Do you reject that too? It is stated more than once that the earth is to be restored or made new. It is an overarching theme of Scripture, that this fallen world we live in is not our forever home. Do you think lions or hyenas or cougars will be hunters and meat eaters, when death is no more? Your view is illogical.

3. You said that Bible says "I have given them green plants.... for meat" and that I should notice the word "meat" here. I said it is a KJV error, there is no "meat" in the text. So it is not significant in any way.

BRB does also. There may be others but it is way too much trouble checking them all to see when you reject it anyways. To this day people call the part of the fruit we eat the flesh, or meat. The meat of the matter is an idiom used to indicate the most basic, fundamental, important elements. But hey, your complaint is with what the text actually says, in ALL versions. ALL creatures were originally given a vegetarian diet. That is the meat of the matter.

4. When you carefully read Abel and Cain story, you will see they were not doing sacrifices for sin as Moses commanded, they were offering first-fruit of their gain. Cain was given what the field produced and Abel was giving from fat and from sheep.

Cain and Abel predated Moses. However, they were still making offerings to God. Is that an issue? It is a prefiguring of the acceptable nature of Christ's sacrifice for us. Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission/forgiveness of sins (Hebrews 9:22).

 

[idaho_miner]

Ah yes veganism, another cookie cutter movement for today's overly sensitive wishywashy weak dumb lazy generation. Its terrible, never saw a vegan who can do physical labor.
Jesus ate meat as you said, end of discussion on it being immoral. Animals are animals, and people are people and we are to rule over animals.

I work in a small scale lead/silver mine. All jacklegs and hand tools in climates approaching 100 degrees fahrenheit with enough humidity that you can practically drink the air. Labor doesn't get much more physical than that. Somehow I manage this with my vegan diet. 29 years old, so I would consider myself to be apart of this 'wishywashy weak dumb lazy generation' as you so eloquently put it. God gave us dominion over animals along with His permission to eat them (Genesis 9:3 if I'm not mistaken?), and even that was only after the flood in the time of Noah. Presumably, because such a flood would have wiped out the majority of plant life for a period of time, making the consumption of meat necessary for survival. Up until that point God had mandated what would be considered today a vegan or plant-based diet, as we see in Genesis 1:29.

It's interesting to note that the life spans of the figures in the Bible decrease tremendously once man begins eating meat...

As it stands now, 99% of meat produced for human consumption is done so under conditions that even the most obstinate meat eaters regard as cruel when presented with video footage. To me this calls to mind Proverbs 12:10. Knowing that this is where your meat comes from, any time you pay for it be it eggs, fish, hamburger bacon, you are directly contributing to this unnecessary suffering. I can't imagine that if Jesus were to return tomorrow and saw the manner in which we care for God's creatures that he would approve with how we as a society have decided to exercise our 'dominion'.

 

[Jessie_1]

Idaho-miner... are you up in "Silver Valley"? Sunshine mine area?

 

[idaho_miner]

Idaho-miner... are you up in "Silver Valley"? Sunshine mine area?

Indeed I am! Small world, haha. I myself work up at the Galena Mine just outside of Wallace.

 

[Jessie_1]

Indeed I am! Small world, haha. I myself work up at the Galena Mine just outside of Wallace.

I love that area... spend a lot of time up there around Kellogg, Enaville and float the North Fork. Indeed, it is a small world. And by the way, I know you miners do labor intensive work....underground about a half mile or more... so the comment of Vegans not being able to do physical labor has been debunked. You have my respect...

 

[p_rehbein]

Why would it be morally superior?

Do Vegans actually believe plants DO NOT have FEELINGS? If so, they are seriously mistaken.

 

[idaho_miner]

Why would it be morally superior?

Do Vegans actually believe plants DO NOT have FEELINGS? If so, they are seriously mistaken.

Of course plant's don't have feelings. While it's true that they might react to light or touch in different ways, they don't posses a central nervous system. This argument against veganism (if that's even what you're attempting) is idiotic on 2 levels. Firstly, pulling a carrot out of the ground and cutting the tail off a dog are going to produce two very different reactions. That is because one is a sentient being with intelligence (less than say, a pig, but quantifiable), a will to live, and an aversion to pain....and the other is a carrot.

Secondly, if you really are concerned about plants feeling pain, the majority of plants grown are used to feed the animals bred for human consumption. So if that is the concern, you're essentially doubling the amount of suffering. Or you could just use a modicum of critical thinking and reasoning and acknowledge that a carrot wont be screaming and attempting to escape if you slice into it with a knife. Same can't be said for an animal though.

It really is an important distinction to make, and maybe I don't understand your point really. If we have to eat something (and we do, that is a fact) why wouldn't we choose the path of least harm as compassionate Christians?

To answer your question, I believe it is always the better choice from a moral perspective to avoid unnecessary pain and suffering to another living being. It's unnecessary to eat meat, eating meat causes unnecessary pain and suffering to other living beings, therefore yes veganism is inherently and objectively morally superior (based on those qualifications).

It's the same as saying it is morally superior to hug a dog than to torture a dog (or pay someone else to do the torturing). Just replace dog with pig, cow, chicken, lamb to fit your own current dietary choices.