Exploring Vegetarianism

My wife and me strictly follow vegetarian diet, which eventually had also influenced my darling 3 year old daughter. However, I was curious to know her version of the reason for her not eating meat and asked her about it one day...

Her spontaneous reply was "coz we are all hindu's!"

While my immediate reaction was to laugh out loud, carry her in my arms and pour her with kisses in adortaion of her innocence, I then clarified her that being vegetarians, we refrain from eating meat.

However, I simply could not get out of my head if the answer I gave her was complete. Her accidental correlation between hinduism and vegetarianism indeed bothered me. I just wanted to do a bit of a google on this and bumped into the Bhagavad Gita, the holiest Hindu scripture. It read;

"He who sees that the Lord of all is ever the same in all that is -- immortal in the field of mortality -- he sees the truth. And when a man sees that the God in himself is the same God in all that is, he hurts not himself by hurting others. Then he goes, indeed, to the highest path" - Bhagavad Geeta 13.27-28

Furthermore, Thirukkural, one of the greatest tamil literature by Thiruvalluvar has an adhikaram (chapter) comprising of 10 kurals on "The renunciation of the flesh". One of it goes like this;

படைகொண்டார் நெஞ்சம்போல் நன்றூக்காது ஒன்றன்
உடல்சுவை உன்டார் மனம்

English translation: "Goodness is never one with the minds of these two: one who wields a weapon and one who feasts on a creature's flesh"

I just realised that my 3 year old daughter is indeed true on her supposition that hindu's are vegetarians!