Why doesn't the law of Karma apply to animals? || Acharya Prashant, IIT-Kharagpur session (2020)

Acharya Prashant

Video Information: 25.09.20, IIT-Kharagpur - Webinar, Greater Noida  Context: ~ Why does the law of Karma not apply to animals? ~ What is the difference between man & animal? ~ Why does man suffer after entering bad Karma? ~ What is Bad Action? ~ What is reward and Punishment?   Music Credits: Milind Date ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Transcript

00:00It is said that human beings get bad results and punishment if they enter into bad actions.

00:28But nothing of this sort is said for animals.

00:36Why does the law of karma not apply to animals?

00:48The law of karma does not apply to animals because animals do not really have a choice

00:56in their actions.

01:00And when there is no choice, there is no question of reward or punishment.

01:06Human beings are in a peculiar situation.

01:12They can choose to side with their animalistic conditioning or they can choose something

01:24higher.

01:26They can choose freedom, joy, love, liberation, compassion.

01:33Therefore humans have a responsibility.

01:42Animals don't have that responsibility.

01:46Animals are dictated fully by their biological conditioning.

01:56If there is a road accident here, on the road outside,

02:15you do not really expect the street dogs to come to rescue and help the victims of

02:26the accident, do you?

02:33They are not supposed to.

02:36So you will not get angry at the dogs when they do not come to help the injured ones.

02:47A couple of bike riders have met an accident and they are lying on the road.

02:59And then there are birds on the trees and there are dogs roaming about.

03:12They will not take any special interest.

03:15There are so many insects around, aren't there?

03:23Some snake is there in the bush, right?

03:31They do not really care for these two creatures who are lying bleeding on the road.

03:43And they do not care and they will not attract any punishment because they are not supposed

03:50to.

03:51They just do not have the option to act in compassion.

03:59No animal can be compassionate really because an animal is completely just prakriti.

04:14Animal really does not have the option to be a liberated consciousness.

04:24The animal's consciousness is completely dominated by its physical conditioning, are you getting

04:32it?

04:33Therefore the animal gets neither reward nor punishment, which is comfortable in a sense

04:42because the animal lives in a secure zone.

04:55A dog is born a dog, lives as a dog and dies as a dog and no dog lives in a state of consciousness

05:08that is very different from that of another dog.

05:12Are you getting it?

05:16You cannot say one dog is liberated and the other dog is not.

05:19You cannot say one dog is joyful and compassionate and the other dog is not.

05:28Dogs can have varying external situations but internally all dogs are just dogs.

05:37This is not the case with human beings.

05:41Human beings can vary greatly in their internal states.

05:51One human being can be full of compassion and the other one can be spiteful, angry,

06:03vicious and violent, getting it?

06:13Therefore the one who is compassionate is rewarded, he made the right choice.

06:20The one who is vicious is punished by his viciousness itself, he made the wrong choice.

06:30So there is this great difference between animals and human beings, which also means

06:36that human beings must never justify their actions by taking examples of animals.

06:48For example, if you eat animal flesh, you cannot justify it by saying that a lion or

06:57a wolf too kills other animals to eat.

07:04A lion or a wolf has no option not to kill.

07:12You have that option.

07:16Man is not necessarily a herbivore.

07:21Man is more of an omnivore, therefore that option is there.

07:26You could have decided not to kill but you chose in favor of killing, therefore you will

07:31be punished.

07:33A lion is never punished because the lion had no option.

07:42A lion has done nothing wrong.

07:48In fact, even if a lion kills a human being, really it has not committed a crime.

07:57That's how lions are.

07:58They are supposed to kill to eat.

08:04But if a man needlessly kills an animal, then the man will be punished.

08:13If not by law, then by existence.

08:17Are you getting it?

08:21So that is a human being in the most clear terms.

08:31A human being is a decision maker.

08:34A human being is someone who has a choice.

08:37How do you define a human being?

08:42He is someone who has a choice.

08:46And how you exercise these choices decides your life.

08:54Use very, very carefully, right?

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