Special

por Eurípedes Kühl

The pain in animals

“Pain is a necessary warning, a stimulant to man's will, as it forces us to concentrate to reflect, and forces us to tame our passions. Pain is the path to improvement. Physical or moral, it is a powerful means of development and progress. It is supreme purification, it is the school in which patience, resignation and all austere duties are learned. It is the furnace where selfishness melts into which pride dissolves.”

(In: "After Death", 2nd part, 18th Ed., chap. 13, p. 140, FEB - RJ/RJ)

 

Stimulating questions:

- If animals, like men, have no conscience, why do they suffer? Is castrating animals a transgression of some Divine Law? Is it reprehensible to practice euthanasia on an animal suffering pain, having an illness without cure?

Here I will list some teachings of the Doctrine of the Spirits about it.

Suffering (pain) in plants and animals

In “The Genesis”, by Allan Kardec, chap. XVIII, no. 8, we find that plants and animals are affected by diseases.

Considering that plants have sensibility, nothing objects to inferring that this causes them suffering. There is no way to say that they feel pain, only that:

- a cut tree loses sap and dies;

- burnt branches, quickly wither away; rather, at the simple approach of fire, they withdraw;

- there are many pests that attack crops, in addition to parasites that cause damage to them, resulting in them to wither and die.

In the case of animals, there is no doubt that they suffer pain as much as humans.

But then, not a few people, most Spiritists, ponder:

— If man redeems debts contracted by mistaken actions, far removed from the Moral Laws, how to justify that animals and plants also suffer? What blame can be attributed to them if they do not, like us, have intelligence, free will and conscience?

Really, here is an apparent nonsense of Nature...

But, in fact, there is nothing wrong with that.

Sufferings in man

As for men, there is no doubt that Divine Justice - so that each being can climb the steps of progress through their own responsibility and effort - provides them with the mechanism of reincarnations and engendered the physical body susceptible to disease and pain. Initially placed them in primitive worlds and from there, always supported, progressively transfers them to worlds consistent with the individual evolution that each one has already achieved.

Diseases are characteristic of the evolutionary level of backward planets, such as Earth. They help man to develop intelligence, to remove them, which the blessed progress of Medicine makes sublime proof. It is that pain acts as a powerful warning that something isn't right, spiritually or physically.

Furthermore, the Law of Cause and Effect marks the balance of Justice, making good or evil return to the origin. In the case of evil — pain, suffering, illness —, still by the Supreme Goodness of God, the debtor, knowing why he suffers, without revolt and with resignation, can repay his debt through actions to help others. In this case, even though he is visited by sufferings, they do not weigh so much anymore, as Hope and Faith in the Father's Justice are powerful balms, in addition to being powerful energetic to overcome difficulties.

— Very well: And pain in animals?

 Having no intelligence, free will or conscience, their actions, necessarily instinctive, are only aimed at survival. And if so, how to impute guilt to them and the respective ransom?

Starting from the premise that God is the Supreme Perfection and the Absolute Love, under no circumstances can the slightest possibility be raised that this consists in injustice or misunderstanding of Nature. Another has to be the focus.

Here, the clarifying condition of Spiritism comes into play.

I'll linger a little longer on reflections on pain, on living beings:

a.     In “The Genesis”, chap. III, Allan Kardec philosophizes with great depth about good and evil, analyzing in detail instinct and intelligence and, particularly, the “destruction of living beings by each other”. In item 21, he clarifies that “true life, both animal and man, is not in the body wrapping, just as it is not in clothing. It is in the intelligent principle that pre-exists and survives the body”. (Emphasis added).

Here, there is already enough content to reflect that physical damage that destroys matter, that is, that results in death, does not destroy the spirit (naturally, clothed in perispirit, which animals also have, although of more rudimentary matter than the human).

Kardec continues, now in item 24: “in the inferior beings of creation, in those who still lack moral sense, in whom intelligence has not yet replaced instinct, the fight is for the satisfaction of the imperative need — food; they struggle only to live; it is in this first period that the soul develops and rehearses for life”.

b. The Spirit Emmanuel clarifies, in a psychographic text in the Magazine O REFORMADOR, June, 1987 – FEB, in order to leave no doubts, that pain represents learning, in the evolutionary path of each living being, towards evolution; this information is textual, crystal clear and leaves no room for philosophical derivations. Here it is:

Nobody suffers, in one way or another, just to redeem the price of something. One suffers, too, raising the precious resources to obtain it. Thus it is that the animal goes through long ages of trial in order to domesticate itself, just as man goes through so many other long ages in order to educate himself. No spirit obtains elevation or culture through osmosis, but through patient and non-transferable work. In order to reach the aureole of reason, the animal must also know a worthy and long string of experiences that will end up integrating it into the definitive possession of reasoning. Physical pain in animals is a passport to broader resources in the domains of evolution”. (My italics)

Thus, even if it is painful for many to accept, it would be prudent to reflect a lot on the subject and on how much man still ignores the things of God — Father who never abandons any of His children. With this certainty, it is immediately ruled out that the cruelty that victimizes animals is indifferent to the Life and Love of God, present in the infinitely perfect Plan of Creation.

ç. Juvanir Borges de Souza (1916-2010), late former president of the Brazilian Spiritist Federation, in “Tempo de Renovaçao”, cap. 20, p. 164, Ed. FEB, 1989, concludes: “to understand the role of pain well, it will be necessary to situate it as the great educator of living beings, with different functions in plants, animals and humans, but always as a driver of the evolutionary process, one of the levers of the progress of the spiritual principle”. (My italics)

In view of the above statements, I reflect:

- animals suffer so that they register in their spiritual, eternal memory, that pain hurts, it is bad; thus, as they evolve, reaching intelligence, they will already bring in their cognitive baggage, that pain should be avoided - the pain itself, for self-preservation and that of others, embodied by Jesus, when He advised us not to do to others what we do not wish for ourselves;

- nothing prevents you from considering that pain, in animals, once learning is completed, will no longer be repeated, and it is very likely that when they disincarnate, under whatever conditions, the suffering is interrupted in the act of disincarnating and under charitable sponsorship of the Missionaries of Eternal Love;

- in fact, I imagine that more than one painful experience is needed to fix the learning process; as there are thousands of species and millions of dwellings in the Universe, there is a great probability that animals travel through many of these worlds, in adequate bodies, accumulating experiences;

- as the restoration of the perispirit is a reality of the Greater Plan, nothing prevents me from imagining that the perispirit of animals, if damaged, will be recomposed there by Sidereal Geneticists, the same ones who promote the changes that tend to the evolutionary scale of the species (see the chapter “A Grande Transição (The Great Transition)”, in the work A Caminho da Luz (On the Path to Light), by the Spirit Emmanuel, a psychographics by Francisco Candido Xavier, 13th Ed., 1985, FEB, RJ/RJ);

- if animals are "anesthetized" by Protective Spirits, at the time of slaughter, to avoid pain, there would not be fixation of evolutionary learning there; however, I have no objection to reasoning that in many, many cases even this occurs, but in other circumstances; for example: when human cruelty is present, inflicting suffering on animals whose reincarnation program did not provide for it;

- to the Spirits who love animals, they are probably delegated the role of guiding the animal species when on the spiritual plane, and of protecting them when on the material; in this one, they do it with selflessness and love, creating "habitats" and maintaining ecosystems; watching them in the difficult times they go through; I consider, for example, that when a predator of great offensive potential (I remember that it was the Promoters of Life who equipped it under Divine delegation...) attacks a defenseless prey (also of an organism engendered by the Guardians of Eternal Life), God is present in one animal and another; by the Law of Progress, certainly, in the course of time, the roles may be reversed and after such remarkable physical experiences, both will already have such memories well fixed in their spiritual memory (by biological-spiritual automatism); then, when they reach reason/intelligence, they will only commit violence by self-decision, on board of free will; and, based on free will, evolution is guided by the Law of Cause and Effect - Action and Reaction.

d. In due course, I will quote some excerpts from the always elucidating instructions of Allan Kardec, years after his death, clarifying the matter through a message contained in “O Diário dos Invisíveis” (“The Diary of the Invisibles)”, psychographed by Zilda Gama (pages 73 to 75 of the 1st Ed., 1927, Publisher O Pensamento):

(...) “You well know that pain, physical and moral, is the bleach that targets the stained soul of the conscious being responsible for his actions; it is the lamp that floods it with light, making it eternally radiant.

(...) If only man were susceptible to pain and illnesses and the irrational had an organism immune to suffering, insensitive as steel, the link that binds them by matter, which is similar in all animals.

(...) The animals, whether those with a constitution similar to that of man, those of imperfect organisms, do not suffer, like the rational ones, only to progress spiritually, as they are unconscious and irresponsible, but God, who foresees everything, does not made them insensitive to their own defense and conservation, as a means of being domesticated, making them useful to communities.

A horse that was indifferent to pain would be capable of rushing, with the rider, to the first abyss that it came across, trying to get rid of the saddle and the annoying load that hinder its movements, depriving it of living freely by the vastness of meadows or in the shade of forests. Why do they recoil, fearful, at the threat of a pebble or a barb, an enraged dog or bull? Afraid of the suffering they would have if they were hit by them.

(...) The irrationals need pain, so that they can, in a state of freedom, defend their own life, fear abuse, suffer the fierce impulses, seek rest and food, become less dangerous to man, maintain the instinct of conservation, which they would not have, if their bodies were devoid of sensibility. Man progresses more through moral sufferings than through physical ones; in the irrationals these predominate over those.

(...) Pain is useful to animals so that the weak and small can defend themselves from the strong and the cruel, looking for hiding places inaccessible to their opponents in the caves or in the highest fronds”.

I understand that, as paradoxical as it may seem, pain, in an analysis of understanding and respect for the Divine Laws, is actually a friend, since for man it acts as an inexorable warning that there is something personal to be reformed; and for animals, as an undoubted learning...

Animal castration

— As for the castration of animals, I cannot advise, neither yes nor no. There are several components to this question, both moral and material. The decision has to be individual, of each pet owner.

What I inform and affirm, only as an opinion, is that — between the cruel alternative of abandonment, or castration, I find this providence (castration) useful, a thousand times preferable to letting the multiplied offspring come into the world and then abandoning them, or what is worse, sacrifice them.

Nevertheless, an expressive meeting is supported by the answer in "The Spirits' Book", question 693, with excerpts that I reproduce:

Q.693 – Are human laws and customs that have the purpose or effect of creating obstacles to reproduction contrary to the law of Nature?

A: Anything that hinders Nature in its march is contrary to general law.

a) – However, there are species of living beings, animals and plants, whose indefinite reproduction would be harmful to other species and of which man himself would eventually be a victim. Does he practice a reprehensible act, preventing this reproduction?

A: God has given man, above all living beings, a power that he must use, without abusing it. He can therefore regulate the reproduction according to his needs.

Animal euthanasia

(Spiritism consigns with solar clarity that euthanasia (in humans) is a practice contrary to Divine Laws, recording "the value of the last thought" of a dying person in a desperate state, when he will be able to awaken to spiritual understanding and this minute "save many tears in the future.” As for animals, it does not specifically address the topic of “euthanasia”).

In 1995, an international meeting was held in Sao Paulo to debate abuse against pets — basically dogs and cats. Main themes: control of reproduction (by neutering or castration), animal welfare and education... of their owners. An activity to be reviewed worldwide is the way in which countries sacrifice animals abandoned on the streets: poisoning, electrocution or decompression in vacuum chambers. All these methods cause the animal to suffer for about one to three minutes before dying. If the holocaust is unavoidable, let it be by anesthetics that cause painless death, such as in London, where animals that are sacrificed are injected and die in less than a second, without suffering.

I dare not advise the euthanasia of any animal.

The theme is ardent and can raise a lot of controversy, as the owner's love for an animal is among the most beautiful pages of earthly existence. Therefore, such a decision will have to obey the impulses of the heart. Extremely advisable at these times to consult a veterinarian... and conscience!

For my part, I think that, exclusively in the case of animals in a terminal state, almost always suffering excruciating pain, if they are sacrificed for the cessation of suffering, those who love them have decided to do so out of love.

In these poignant cases, the owner's intention to opt for euthanasia is therefore based on love. And to God, intent is everything!

Jesus, the Good Shepherd, bless us all.


 

Translation:
Eleni Frangatos - eleni.moreira@uol.com.br

 
 

     
     

O Consolador
 Revista Semanal de Divulgação Espírita