Doc

Its true, certain animals eat certain other animals- for survival.  Not because one got in their way or inconvenienced them.. that is generally the case anyway.  I'm aware that certain animals are territorial, but if that is their true nature, or generated by fear, I don't know. 

I agree that it's important to keep a clean and safe house- but if it is not neccessary to end the intruder's life, then it should not be done.  Simply removing the insect, like Ralph suggested, is a perfect way to rid yourself of the problem without being a terminator of life.

Killing someone in self defence is a tricky subject.  On the one hand, it is instinctive to protect yourself and your loved ones.  On the other hand, I don't agree with taking a human life, regardless of the circumstances.  Ideally one would be able to incompacitate the offender without doing serious harm.  An eye for an eye is a false concept in my book.

In the great words of Paul McCartney  "Hey Dude, don't make it bad.  Take a sad song and make it better."  Oh wait a minute, that was 'Hey Jude.'  My mistake.

As I said before, I agree and believe that I revere all life in general, but you can't always avoid taking life.  You certainly can have it be your intent not to kill.  Several real life examples come to mind.  Years ago, our house had a mouse problem.  Rather than kill the mice (which I was loathe to do), I bought "humane traps" where the mouse could breathe, and you could release them out into the wild.  I caught about a dozen mice that way over weeks.  But the best laid plans of mice and men.......well you get the idea.  What happened next was gruesome.  Many times the humane trap would be untouched for days or weeks.  And they were checked regularly.  Except once in a while, a mouse would wander into one and be terrified and die trying to escape.  Others would get caught if a trap fell by the mouse pushing it, and die a slow, agonizing death.  The bottom line - while I released more than a dozen that way, I felt the times the mice did die in there was more gruesome than any spring mouse trap made.  In situations like that infestation, you can't "just live with the mice," for they leave droppings in your pantry, carry disease and die in the walls, in hard to get to places.  My intent was not to kill, but there were few alternatives.  Living with the mice, and the consequences was not an option.  I didn't invite them in to begin with.

With regard to the attacker assaulting you and your family - I train in jiu jitsu, and there are techniques we train in to immobilize an attacker without killing.  Only advanced, extremely skilled individuals have that much control in random situations.  But.....
In the passion and moment of an unexpected attack, sometimes an attacker won't give up or cease as long as they have breath/fight in them.  If you are then saying that you would let you and/or your loved one (wife, mother, etc.) die, you are missing a bigger picture here.

Being a pacifist, and revering life does not mean that in the physical world, we should never defend ourselves.  We can cherish love - the driving force behind the universe, and defend ourselves or someone else for the sake of love.  Was it not correct to take up resistance and yes, arms against the Nazis in Germany?  Should the whole world have willingly walked into the gas chambers and succumb to them out of conscience, saying " I won't fight or take a life?"  Most would say, "no, of course they should have been opposed." 

I stand by my comments that one can believe that killing is wrong, but from a consciousness point of view, it is your intent that matters most.  If a person ends up killing insects, mice, or other animals, as a byproduct of a necessary situation in the physical plane, where one has no other reasonable choice, it is different than a person setting out to kill for the sake of killing. 

The same is true of defending oneself if attacked.  One can defend and have love in one's heart, and yet the attacker may have perished.  It is, to me not the same thing as attacking another person with the intent to do harm.

Matthew

I agree.

word up homie

BTW it does say "thou shalt not kill" not that thou shalt not murder a person.

I don't put much stake into the Bible, so it doesn't matter to me.

Diatomaceous earth is a wonderful product to put around plants and put into animal feed, keeps down fly population and is natural product.

Food grade is what you want. It is even good for people and dogs. Read up.

I believe in doing as little harm as possible. I try not to kill. But if some insect is eating more of my garden than I can afford, I use natural soap spray and diatomaceous earth. I even pick up stranded earthworms in the driveway. Hey, it's not hurting me to have a tender heart.

Coming in late as usual. Viewed from one perspective the situation is quite black and white - and not in the least a matter of shades of grey between right and wrong:

1. All beings command love, and that probably  includes Gaia/the earth - who knows what has consciousness, and what not?)

2. Realised beings are inacapable of anything except loving behavours.

3. Trouble is we all as a result of our belief in separate individuality have placed ourselves in an ego created reality of competing selves built on fear - with the result that we believe we can only survive by behaving aggressively towards others.

4. Even those of us who at some level have come to know that this view is mistaken have not so far been unable to shed our belief in this reality, and so we find ourselves 'between stools' - trying to be loving, but  'here' as a life form that needs to eat and otherwise use others to survive.

5. It's really not possible to be here, and to not be subject to/believe many the rules of this reality. (you could say the physics of it) So its pretty much impossible not to take life or do other harm at times. Even Jesus presumably trod on lots of insects by accident, and seems not to have been a vegetarian. (vegetables are life anyway)

6. The fix is to drop our attachment to/belief in self, and in the need to inhabit this self made reality to survive - the physical body and the intellect we think is 'me'. With that goes our fear of returning to God/the whole and we're out of here.

But that's realisation, and most of us are trapped by our beliefs/attachments. The key perspective for us seem to be how we relate to this situation.

Its important to minimise the suffering we cause, because otherwise we create karma that makes it even harder for us to step free - for example in the form of aggressive responses from those that as a result fear us, and as a result threaten us. Making it likely we will respond in like manner, thus escalating the cycle of fear, aggression and suffering.

It's very difficult to progress spiritually if we're so scared that we're driven to instinctively lash out in 'self' defence all the time.

The key perspective is forgiveness of others (for the above reason), and especially of ourselves for whatever we may do. Self blame and the resulting guilt and fear of retribution - whether from others, through karmic consequences that we ourselves actually create, or from an imaginary vengeful God for 'sin' inevitably drives us further into delusional perception, and blinds us to the voice of Spirit, and to love.

Even more so in the afterlife context when these guilt based beliefs, and the resulting fear drive us into ever less love filled rebirths and life circumstances.

Forgiveness (or the dropping of our attachment to this guilt and fear based belief system - a system which is not compatible with a loving God) builds  from the knowledge that only love is real, and that no matter how we feel we have 'sinned' or been sinned against, or done wrong or been done wrong that it's not for real except in our own mind - and that if it is to have consequences that can only be as a result of our own mistaken belief in it.

That viewed from reality or the perspective of Spirit that it never happened, and that any ersatz reality it appears to have is entirely of our own making.

When we truly transcend these beliefs it all falls away...