Let me start by saying I am not a vegetarian. I have been looking at what steps I can take to move closer to a higher-vegetable diet but in all honesty, I had chicken for lunch. However, One of my favorite games is where did it start. I love comparing religious beliefs, and since Christianity and Buddhism are where I spend most of my time, I thought I’d look at early vegetarianism in each. In a world increasingly conscious of diet and its ethical implications, the practice of vegetarianism has found a renewed spotlight. While often seen as a modern phenomenon, its roots run deep in some of the world’s most ancient religious traditions. This blog post explores the surprising and sometimes parallel journeys of vegetarianism in the earliest writings of both Buddhism and Christianity.
The Buddhist Path: Compassion for All Sentient Beings
From its very inception, Buddhism has placed a profound emphasis on ahimsa, the principle of non-harming. The Buddha’s teachings, as recorded in the Pali Canon, repeatedly underscore the importance of compassion not just for humans, but for all sentient beings. This ethical framework forms the bedrock of Buddhist vegetarian practice. This can be seen in the rules King Ashoka sets for the respect of all life and stopping the eating of meat in the royal household.
While the Buddha himself was not a strict vegetarian (he died after eating bad pork) the early monastic rules and subsequent Mahayana teachings moved decisively towards a meat-free diet. The Vinaya Pitaka, the collection of texts on monastic discipline, outlines a key rule: a monk may eat meat only if it is “pure in three aspects”—that is, the monk did not see, hear, or suspect that the animal was killed specifically for them. This pragmatic approach was a response to the alms-gathering tradition, where monks relied on the generosity of laypeople and couldn’t always dictate their food.
However, the Mahayana tradition, which emerged a few centuries later, took a more radical stance. Texts like the Lankavatara Sutra present a powerful and unequivocal argument for vegetarianism, explicitly forbidding the consumption of meat. This sutra frames the eating of meat as an act that obstructs the path to enlightenment and argues that it is a manifestation of cruelty. This shift reflects a deepening of the ethical inquiry within Buddhism, where the direct act of consuming an animal’s flesh, regardless of who killed it, was seen as a violation of the core tenet of compassion.
The Christian Story: From Creation to Controversy
Christianity’s relationship with vegetarianism is far more complex and less unified than that of Buddhism. While the Old Testament contains no explicit command for vegetarianism, the creation narrative in Genesis provides a powerful initial framework. In Genesis 1:29, God gives humanity a diet of “every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit.” This initial, idyllic vision of a vegetarian diet is often interpreted as God’s original intention for humanity.
However, after the Great Flood, a new covenant is established. Genesis 9:3 grants humanity the right to eat “every moving thing that lives.” This shift has been a point of debate for centuries. Some Christians also take Acts 10 where Peter is told to eat even unclean animals as a sign for not being vegetarian.
Despite this, some early Christian groups and figures practiced vegetarianism. The writings of the early Church Fathers reveal a fascinating views. Figures like Clement of Alexandria, John Chrysostom, and Origen, while not advocating a universal vegetarianism, often wrote about the virtues of a simple, meat-free diet, connecting it to asceticism and spiritual purity. The Desert Fathers, the early hermits and monks of the 3rd and 4th centuries, often subsisted on a diet of bread, vegetables, and water, viewing it as a way to discipline the body and focus on prayer.
Limit yourself to plants if you want to eat well and healthily.
— John Chrysostom
Perhaps most compelling is the evidence from certain early Christian communities, such as the Ebionites, a Jewish-Christian sect. Their writings and traditions suggest a strict adherence to vegetarianism, which they believed was the original and true way of life for followers of Christ. They saw Jesus as the fulfillment of the original covenant, and his message as a return to the pre-fall, vegetarian state.
A Shared Thread of Compassion
While the paths of early Buddhist and Christian vegetarianism diverged and took on different forms, a common thread unites them: a deep-seated recognition of the connection between diet, ethics, and spiritual practice.
For the Buddhists, vegetarianism was a direct and logical extension of the principle of ahimsa, a tangible way to manifest compassion for all living beings. For early Christians, the practice was tied to asceticism, a return to an original, pure state, and a way to live in greater harmony with God’s creation.
These ancient traditions remind us that the choice of what we eat is not merely a personal one. It can be a profound ethical and spiritual act, rooted in a history of compassion that stretches back over two millennia. Whether through the lens of ahimsa or the search for a return to a paradisiacal state, the earliest writings of these two great traditions offer a rich and interesting history of why we might choose to eat with intention.
My Thoughts
While I don’t think vegetarianism is or should be mandated, I believe that a cleaner diet helps with brain, heart, and other body functioning. The Eastern Orthodox Church spends about a third of the year fasting, which my family practiced as an oilless vegan fast. However, most people practice pescatarian, not vegetarian fasting during those times. This is a topic I will explore further.
What Are Your Thoughts?
