since alcohol is anticeptic compared to water where there are alot of living microbes, is drinking beer better?
Are you also going to open a topic on whether Buddhists can eat bear?
I'm going to answer whether Buddhists can eat bear first just in case:
In Buddhism, the views on vegetarianism vary from school to school. According to Theravada, the Buddha allowed his monks to eat pork, chicken and beef if the animal was not killed for the purpose of providing food for monks. Theravada also believes that the Buddha allowed the monks to choose a vegetarian diet, but only prohibited against eating human, elephant, horse, dog, snake, lion, tiger, leopard, bear, and hyena flesh[1]. Buddha did not prohibit any kind of meat-eating for his lay followers. In Vajrayana, the act of eating meat is not always prohibited. The Mahayana schools generally recommend a vegetarian diet, for they believe that the Buddha insisted that his followers should not eat meat or fish.
Next. I think drinking water doesn't have much karma because first of all, you don't have the intention to kill any beings when you drink, and intention is a necessary factor for karma.
Secondly I don't think there are many sentient beings in water, especially in the clean water of Singapore. Microbes, germs, virus, don't necessary mean sentient beings -- sentient beings are beings that have consciousness. Since these single celled or multi-celled beings do not have a nervous system, I do not believe they are sentient beings, I do not think they feel pain, I doubt they have consciousness that can be reborn. My Master told us that eating medicine to kill off bacteria is blameless because these bacterias are not sentient beings.
As for beers: in Buddhism we are told to abstain from alcohol and other intoxicants because alcohol causes 'carelessness', i.e. stupidity and stupid actions you'll never think of doing while sober. I have personally witnessed this in my friends when sometimes they get dead drunk, even lapsing into unconsciousness (scary incident). Sad to say, I'm also guilty recently of frequenting clubs and binge drinking quite frequently and I am going to quit this habit. Haven't been a good Buddhist, haven't been a good example...
Refraining From Taking Intoxicants
By Ven Kumara
Venue: Residence of Lee Hock Seng
Special occasion: Dana upon moving into new house
When Buddhists move into a new house, they invite monks for dana in order to make merits. These merits are then shared with the devas who are around. In doing this, one is offering one of the highest dana possible to the devas. The devas are honoured and, in reciprocation, will protect the house and its residents. Those whom the devas have sympathy for are bound to meet with good fortune.
Ven Kumara then continues with the series of talks on ‘Blessings’.
The next blessing is that of refraining from taking intoxicants.
Here’s a story on the origins of intoxicating drinks. Long ago in a forest in the Himalaya Mountains, there was a big tree. The top branches grew such that they formed a receptacle-like depression where rain water collected. As a creeper plant climbed up the tree trunk, its fruits fell into the pool of rainwater. Sometimes birds also dropped fruits into it. They then fermented in the water.
The monkeys and birds that drank this fermented liquid became intoxicated and fell into a drunken stupor after which they woke up. A forester witnessed this. Curious, he tasted the fermented liquid. It made him feel good. A hermit came along and the two of them had a good time drinking and feeding on roasted birds.
The idea then came to them that they could make money by selling this fermented liquid. So they collected the drink and sold it to the people in a nearby city. As their business was good, it did not take long for them to realise that they had to find out how they could manufacture it themselves. They spent time studying the process and were able to mass-produce alcohol. The inhabitants of that city soon degenerated into drunkards who could not work. Consequently, they could not afford to buy the alcohol.
Seeing that their sales had dropped there, the two men moved to Savatthi, another city, to continue their business. The King himself was so taken with the alcohol that he bought 500 jars of it. Soon he was partying on the alcohol.
Sakka Devaraja (Thni Kong, the God of Heaven) saw this and decided that he must do something to prevent the world from being ruined by this evil habit. He came to earth in the guise of a Brahmin and levitated himself in front of the King, carrying a jar. The King was curious and asked the Brahmin what the jar contained. The Brahmin replied that if he wanted to know, he would have to drink it himself, but warned him of the consequences.
“You’ll be in a stupor, unable to control your mind, actions or speech. You will also be unable to discriminate between good and bad, and become shameless. Your reputation will suffer and you will lose the respect of others. You will also break your precepts. In doing so, you will also harm others as well as yourself.”
The King realised the folly of taking intoxicants and destroyed his store of alcohol. However, alcohol had already been discovered and continues to be made and drunk till this day.
During the time of the Buddha, a monk who was an accomplished meditator with psychic powers took intoxicants, became drunk and unmindfully laid on the ground with his feet pointing at the Buddha. The Buddha criticised the foolish act and set down a Vinaya rule prohibiting monks from consuming alcohol.
Here, we can see that taking intoxicants can bring about much evil. If one were to refrain from it, one could be free from all these evils. So, we can rightly say that refraining from taking intoxicants is a great blessing.
SBS
Just a note: Sakka Devaraja is Shakyamuni Buddha's previous incarnation.
Btw... I read that over the past 15 years, life expectancy in Russia has varied from roughly 58 years to 65 years for men, and roughly 71 to 74 years for women.
The reason why males have such lower life expectancy is because many Russians tend to be alcoholics and die early from alcoholism.
The harm of alcohol to health is much worse than tobacco... if abused on a long term. In fact scientists have ranked alcohol as more dangerous than many drugs like ketamine, ecstasy, tobacco, marijuana, LSD, etc (not that I recommend the other drugs).
The thing is i drink beer not eat beer
pedobear like to eat frozen beer cubes
Intention to live is part of drinking. You can always choose to die. I am not kidding, so please do answer my question of dying to live or living to die.You have to eat and drink to live, yet you can always choose to die to prevent oneself from creating bad karma.
Originally posted by Moka:pedobear like to eat frozen beer cubes
pedobear prefers to lick frozen beer cubes and he doesn't get drunk on them.
I don't know .. how to eat beer. Pedobear, can you .. teach us?
I drink beer.
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:Intention to live is part of drinking. You can always choose to die. I am not kidding, so please do answer my question of dying to live or living to die.You have to eat and drink to live, yet you can always choose to die to prevent oneself from creating bad karma.
You dont drink beer to survive you drink water, so your question is invalid.
Sucide is always bad.
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:Intention to live is part of drinking. You can always choose to die. I am not kidding, so please do answer my question of dying to live or living to die.You have to eat and drink to live, yet you can always choose to die to prevent oneself from creating bad karma.
Committing suicide is bad karma.
Originally posted by TTFU:You dont drink beer to survive you drink water, so your question is invalid.
Sucide is always bad.
You usually don't care what you drink when you want to survive. Urine, drainwater....
Originally posted by An Eternal Now:Committing suicide is bad karma.
Why is it bad karma when the intention is not to commit further bad karma by living?
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:
Why is it bad karma when the intention is not to commit further bad karma by living?
It is still an intentional action, and even though it is a not exactly 'evil' intention, it is an ignorant intention (think about those cultists who commit mass suicide as they think they're going to a heavenly dimension, or jihadists who think that by killing innocent people they go to heaven).
Why? Because, you think that by dying, you're finished. Whereas in reality, you will be reborn again and create further karma.
And the Buddha warned regarding those who harbour such false views:
'When a warrior strives & exerts himself in battle, if others then strike him down & slay him while he is striving & exerting himself in battle, then with the breakup of the body, after death, he is reborn in the company of devas slain in battle,' that is his wrong view. Now, there are two destinations for a person with wrong view, I tell you: either hell or the animal womb."
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:
You usually don't care what you drink when you want to survive. Urine, drainwater....
Thats when you have no choice...... because Commiting sucide is just very responsible ?
Originally posted by TTFU:Thats when you have no choice...... because Commiting sucide is just very responsible ?
At least you are responsible for not wasting time. Go where you should go and stop wasting time.
Originally posted by An Eternal Now:It is still an intentional action, and even though it is a not exactly 'evil' intention, it is an ignorant intention (think about those cultists who commit mass suicide as they think they're going to a heavenly dimension, or jihadists who think that by killing innocent people they go to heaven).
Why? Because, you think that by dying, you're finished. Whereas in reality, you will be reborn again and create further karma.
And the Buddha warned regarding those who harbour such false views:
'When a warrior strives & exerts himself in battle, if others then strike him down & slay him while he is striving & exerting himself in battle, then with the breakup of the body, after death, he is reborn in the company of devas slain in battle,' that is his wrong view. Now, there are two destinations for a person with wrong view, I tell you: either hell or the animal womb."
You can still choose to die again to prevent the cycle from repeating.
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:
You can still choose to die again to prevent the cycle from repeating.
Only humans commit suicide, and if you fall into the lower realms, like an animal, a ghost, or a being in hell, you can forget about it.
BTW your logic doesn't stand: if you die, you simply start a new cycle. You don't 'prevent the cycle from repeating'.
Originally posted by An Eternal Now:Only humans commit suicide, and if you fall into the lower realms, like an animal, a ghost, or a being in hell, you can forget about it.
BTW your logic doesn't stand: if you die, you simply start a new cycle. You don't 'prevent the cycle from repeating'.
So does your logic. It just doesn't stand.
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:
Why is it bad karma when the intention is not to commit further bad karma by living?
why is being alive a bad karma in the first place =.=?
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:
So does your logic. It just doesn't stand.
It stands because rebirth is proven scientifically and through meditation.
Looks like can close this liao.
Originally posted by we sacrifice:I don't know .. how to eat beer. Pedobear, can you .. teach us?
I drink beer.
i also wanna know how to eat beer
just wondering only...coz i don't take alcohol
and i'm not buddhist
Originally posted by cassie:
i also wanna know how to eat beerjust wondering only...coz i don't take alcohol
and i'm not buddhist
PedoBear's soberiety is in question.
Originally posted by An Eternal Now:It stands because rebirth is proven scientifically and through meditation.
It is also proven that living is intentional, so your logic doesn't stand.
Originally posted by cassie:
i also wanna know how to eat beerjust wondering only...coz i don't take alcohol
and i'm not buddhist
Cos bear bear chews and licks beer cubes. And may AEN mind your own business about pedobear's sobriety.
Originally posted by Herzog_Zwei:
It is also proven that living is intentional, so your logic doesn't stand.
No. Heart beating, breathing, all automatic non-intentional processes.
If you try to control your breathe, stop your breathe, that is intentional, but even without any intentions - you still breathe. Otherwise you will be dead when you are dreaming or in deep dreamless sleep.
The body is run by an intelligence greater than the conceptual mind.
In other words: suicide is intentional, living is natural and non-intentional.