DR. Ahimsa. Vegetarianism

is a confirmed and verifiable fact that vegetarianism and Ahinsa were present in Hinduism before the birth of Gautama Buddha.

In the original tradition of the Vedas, meat was eaten only in context of having first been offered in Yagnya, and not otherwise. This is the conclusion even of Western academic scholars like Hanns-Peter Schmidt and Steven J. Rosen. Ethical consideration of animals was always in Hinduism. In the Rigveda, it is exhorted to prevent sacrificed animals from feeling pain and ensure that they go to Svarga. At least by the time of the Samaveda there were already some Vaidik peoples who did not practice any animal sacrifice.

Yajurveda, Kapisthala Katha Sanhita 31.11 makes explicit reference to “pashu-ahinsa” or non-violence to animals as a moral virtue. Shukla Yajurveda, Shatapatha Brahmana speaks against eating meat. Samaveda, Chandogya Upanishad says not to kill any living beings. These are all pre-Buddhist texts. The whole philosophy of Karma which underpins the importance of vegetarianism and Ahinsa was always in Hinduism, and was adopted from Hinduism by the Buddha.

Vegetarianism and Ahinsa were always in Hinduism, but they were not universally practiced. Some Hindus (by which I mean, people who would retroactively be considered Hindus; there was no such concept as “Hindus” at the time) did eat meat. But these ideas were current within the broad domain of Vaidik spirituality and philosophy. Jainism and Buddhism took them up.

Buddhism actually did not ever adopt vegetarianism nearly to the extent of Hinduism. Most lay Buddhists are not, and have never been vegetarians. Mahayana Buddhist monks are (at least supposed to be) vegetarian. Theravada Buddhist monks eat meat when offered to them, as long as they do not suspect that the animal was killed specifically for the purpose of feeding them.

I will give due credit to the Jains. While they did not introduce vegetarianism or Ahinsa to Hinduism, they did far more universally insist upon the importance of these principles, they took them farther and brought some influence to Hinduism in certain regions to more widely adopt these values. However, given that at no time were Jains anything more than a tiny minority of the population, I doubt that they had an enormousinfluence on rates of vegetarianism among the population; that is predominantly a natively Hindu phenomenon.