Nonviolence against humans cannot take firm hold in society as long as brutality and violence are practiced toward other animals.
Interpretation
True nonviolence includes compassion for all living beings, not just humans.
In this quote, Robert Thurman emphasizes that a society cannot genuinely embody nonviolence and compassion if it continues to practice brutality towards animals. The inherent contradiction of promoting peace among humans while inflicting harm on other sentient beings undermines the moral foundation required for a truly peaceful coexistence.
In practice
In a speech advocating for animal rights, one could use this quote to highlight the connection between human violence and our treatment of animals.
The tradition of nonviolence, optimism, concern for the individual, and unconditional compassion that developed in Tibet is the culmination of a slow inner revolution, a cool one, hard to see, that began 2,500 years ago with the Buddha's insight about the end of suffering. What I have learned from these people has forever changed my life, and I believe their culture contains an inner science particularly relevant to the difficult time in which we live.
It took me forty years of dealing with buddhism to finally realize that actually Buddha's discovery was happiness and bliss.
People are afraid that if they let go of their anger and righteousness and wrath, and look at their own feelings-and even see the good in a bad person-they're going to lose the energy they need to do something about the problem. But actually you get more strength and energy by operating from a place of love and concern. You can be just as tough, but more effectively tough.
Thich Nhat Hanh is one of the greatest teachers of our time. He reaches from the heights of insight down to the deepest places of the absolutely ordinary.
Those caught in the cycle of self-concern suffer helplessly, while the compassionate are more free and, implicitly, more happy.
The Buddhists think that, because we've all had infinite previous lives, we've all been each other's relatives. Therefore all of you, in the Buddhist view, in some previous life ... have been my mother - for which I do apologize for the trouble I caused you.
Is it not enough that 'things are cruel and blind'? Must we also be cruel and blind?
Not even the lichen of the tundra is at peace. All is struggle, all is war for dominance. Those who lose, vanish. -And we’re no different you’re saying- We are, soldier. We possess the privilege of choice. The gift of foresight. Though often we come too late in acknowledging responsibilities….
I have a hatred of habit and routine. And what dogs love is just that. They like regular everything, and I don't have regular anything. I have a timetable, but no routine.
A man who says that no patriot should attack the war until it is over... is saying no good son should warn his mother of a cliff until she has fallen.
The reveries of youth, in which so much energy is wasted, are the yearnings of a Spirit made for what it has not found but must forever seek as an Ideal.
With some notable exceptions, businessmen favor free enterprise in general but are opposed to it when it comes to themselves.
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