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Isaac Bashevis Singer

Isaac Bashevis Singer

Although I vaguely knew his name, it was really Isaac Bashevis Singer's "Eternal Trablinka" quote, which I found on a vegetarian website, and originally posted on my vegan/vegetarian page, that made a very profound in impression on me. Later I quoted him in my Integral Ethics essay. I knew in my inner being that he was expressing a profound Truth. I was inspired to buy the book of the same name, which is also inspired by that quote, and which I would recommend that anybody with any moral consciousness should read.

In Isaac Bashevis Singer, as in Mahatma Gandhi, we find a rare being, a great soul whose sensitivity and feelings for universal justice were such that he was able to go beyond the merely anthropocentric standards of current religious and secular morality. Thus their words are of great importance in showing us what we have to do to Heal the Earth



From Wikipedia link Wikipedia, slightly edited

Introduction

Isaac Bashevis Singer (November 21, 1902 – July 24, 1991) was a Nobel Prize-winning Polish-born American author and one of the leading figures in the Yiddish literary movement.

Some links

external link Isaac Bashevis Singer - Biography

external link Isaac Bashevis Singer - short intoduction including a roundtable discussion and illustrated biography dedicated to Singer's life and works.

external link Isaac Bashevis Singer - biography



Vegetarianism

From Wikipedia link Wikipedia, slightly edited

Singer was a prominent vegetarian for the last 35 years of his life and often included such themes in his works. In his short story, The Slaughterer, he described the anguish that an appointed slaughterer had trying to reconcile his compassion for animals with his job of slaughtering them. He felt that the eating of meat was a denial of all ideals and all religions: "How can we speak of right and justice if we take an innocent creature and shed its blood". When asked if he had become a vegetarian for health reasons, he replied: "I did it for the health of the chickens."

In The Letter Writer, he wrote "In relation to [animals], all people are Nazis; for the animals, it is an eternal Treblinka" .

In the preface to Steven Rosen's "Food for Spirit: Vegetarianism and the World Religions" (1986), Singer wrote, "When a human kills an animal for food, he is neglecting his own hunger for justice. Man prays for mercy, but is unwilling to extend it to others. Why should man then expect mercy from God? It's unfair to expect something that you are not willing to give. It is inconsistent. I can never accept inconsistency or injustice. Even if it comes from God. If there would come a voice from God saying, "I'm against vegetarianism!" I would say, "Well, I am for it!" This is how strongly I feel in this regard."


More information

external link History of Vegetarianism - Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904-1991)



Child node: Eternal Treblinka


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page by M.Alan Kazlev, Wikipedia page url
page uploaded 12 November 2008