Humans have had a mixed and a changing relationship with the animals with whom they have coexisted on this planet for millions of years. Our place in the animal kingdom’s genus of Homo gave us a body that could digest plant material. Yet times of scarcity, changing landscapes, our conquest over fire, and our development of hunting tools might have come together and compelled and allowed us to prey upon other animals to eat their flesh. But while other hunters like the lion and the tiger did not change over the tens of millions of years that they have existed on this plant, we on the other hand developed feelings towards our prey. Feelings of unease, of guilt, of sympathy, kinship, and brotherhood… feelings that make us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom. We became the only species that simultaneously consumed animal flesh and felt bad about the experience of the animal which we had to kill to obtain its flesh.

Our spiritual evolution is enriched by deep thought on what constitutes appropriate behavior towards those whom we have full might to lord over.