Bhaktivinoda Thakur's meat eating - the complete story
Bhaktivinoda Thakur's meat eating has been a subject of some interest on this blog. The article I wrote in 2007 has been one of the most read on this site and still regularly attracts readers. As I have been revising the translation of Sva-likhita-jīvanī , I have been asked by certain people to censor any mention of meat-eating in the book. I have said emphatically, "absolutely not," because it is my feeling that this would completely destroy one of the principal themes of the book itself. Bhaktivinoda Thakur's autobiography is an extremely interesting work, especially to one who is directly in disciplic succession from him. It was written as a letter to his son and disciple, my guru Sri Lalita Prasad Thakur, when he was only a boy of 15. It is hard to understand what the purpose of such a confession would have been in that context. Lalita Prasad was born and brought up in a household where there was a shuddha sattvika diet of prasad. He had feelings of hero-wor...