Pagan views on hunting

[ChainLightning]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I'm in Canada. A lot of us hunt. Government restricts certain species and we all enter the 'limited entry' draws each year and sometimes we get a draw, sometimes we don't. Certain species/genders are 'open', so we can hunt those without draws throughout the hunting season.

My family has hunted mule deer, white-tail deer, elk, moose and black bear. We eat all the meat. Earlier on we would hire a butcher, but, over the years we've learned to do the butchering ourselves. Sometime we use the deer hair to tie flies.

My favorite is the deer. Bear wasn't so great so we don't hunt it anymore. It's a good feeling to know that you stocked your freezer with meat by your own hand -- knowing it hasn't been pumped up with steroids and antibiotics. We know where and how they lived -- we know what they've eaten.

For us, hunting affords us a few different benefits including healthy food, a healthy respect for nature by taking only what we need, and a deeper connection to nature and our food sources.

Yeah, it's in that sense that I kind of think that hunting is FAR more "pagan" than many give it credit for.

[Jembru]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I'm not sure why anyone would assume hunting isn't pagan. How many deities of 'the hunt' have there been throughout the world? I'm starting to repeat a bit too much now, but I could agree that intensive farming is unpagan: it is an absolute rape of nature, a violation and disrespect of the very animals we (collective 'we'; did nothing for me) owe our survival to. Hunting is definitely not very good behaviour for a vegetarian, but is, in my opinion, a very pagan activity, if done with the right respect.

[Anaconda]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

My family has hunted mule deer, white-tail deer, elk, moose and black bear. We eat all the meat. Earlier on we would hire a butcher, but, over the years we've learned to do the butchering ourselves. Sometime we use the deer hair to tie flies.

My favorite is the deer. Bear wasn't so great so we don't hunt it anymore. It's a good feeling to know that you stocked your freezer with meat by your own hand -- knowing it hasn't been pumped up with steroids and antibiotics. We know where and how they lived -- we know what they've eaten.

For us, hunting affords us a few different benefits including healthy food, a healthy respect for nature by taking only what we need, and a deeper connection to nature and our food sources.

I share this same sentiment. Growing up, my family hunted White Tail, and Wild Turkey (bow hunting primarily). We've fished up Perch, Blue Gill, Carp, and Catfish (oh gods...how my grandfather loved him some catfishin'). We dressed and cleaned the carcasses, butchered and cleaned the meat, skinned and tanned hides and learned how to make every bit we could not go to waste.

The hunt is best way to teach about the interconnectedness of nature and the creatures that live in it, and I can see no better medium to teach some of the core values a number of pagan religions share than in the hunt.

[anunitu]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I myself can see no reason to hunt,unless it is for food. The idea of killing an animal "Just for fun" seems to me to be barbaric(in the sense wasting food,disrespecting nature) Native Americans used to thank their animals they hunted,apologizing for having to kill them,and saying "But my family must eat" Never wasting anything from the kill,and honoring the animal and its place within nature.

[Celtic Tiger]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I see it like this. If you hunt for necessity, okay as long as you
show respect for the fallen animal and thank it for it's sacrifice.

If you hunt for "sport" It's not okay in the slightest.
Needlessly killing an animal for "fun" shouldn't be done ever.

I'd answer with my own words, but this sums it up perfectly for me.

Also, I do not see this as a pagan/non-pagan issue. If one has respect for creation, regardless of one's religious background, then hunting should be for sustenance only. And then only as much as is needed.

[SCoyote]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

My grandfather hunted and fished often. I never ate store bought meat untill I was a teenager for the first time. But he was really respectful, would refuse to even say he was going hunting as he felt it would sound to the animals like he was bragging. He never bragged about his catch, but he never came home empty handed, either.

I feel that its a better alternative to eating meat then the factory farmed creatures who have suffered thier entire life. (how could a suffering creature be good to your body to consume anyway?) I feel people on a whole eat far too much meat. I eat meat but it is what I can hunt or forage for and sometimes it is even roadkill. We eat meat very little, maybe once every couple of weeks or so we will have a meat meal. As long as it is done respectfully, as my grandfather did, I see no wrong in it.

[TheTeddy]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I'll put in my two cents.

I view hunting for sport, like many it seems, to be wrong. But for food, I see it as natural. We as humans, while people will say that we have become "less animalistic", are still predators. We hunt and gather to keep us from dying, and learning to hunt will do you good if this "less animalistic" way of life happens to fall.

With a spiritual view, the way I see things, the Goddess is the Earth and the God is the fauna on the Earth. So asking before killing another part of the God would be common courtesy.

Just my opinion,
Teddy

[Willow]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

Because I'm bored waiting for class to start....

I dislike the idea of hunting, but I absolutely love the venison and duck my cousin (who does hunt) brings me once in awhile.

As far as I'm concerned, as long as the hunting is done for food (ie. nothing is wasted), there is no risk to endangered species, and it is carried out in a humane way, I have no problem with it. I do have a problem with shark fishing (and finning of course), however. But the chances of this one person being able to ever do anything about that without oodles of connections in high places and a massive treasury... I've learned to accept there are things in this world that I won't like.

[Pellethie]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

My people have hunted on this continent for tens of thousands of years and it is entwined in our spiritual being. There is much ritual that is associated with the hunt. Not much of the kill is wasted.

[PhoenixMask]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I have mixed feelings about hunting to be honest. I am a meat eater so I understand that end of it. I know I can get meat from a store and don't have to kill anything. I guess for me it all boils down to needs/wastefullness. The meat at the store has already been killed. If I can afford it, it is better for me to get that and not kill an animal. If I were in a situation where I was hungry and shooting an animal to eat was the best option I would do that. I could not do it for sport. I will admit that I know some hunters who hunt in my area support natural areas and follow regulations. These people I have no issue with. The one problem I would have is with the sickos that just want to shoot an animal for fun and not even use any of the meat/leather.

[thalassa]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I know I can get meat from a store and don't have to kill anything. I guess for me it all boils down to needs/wastefullness. The meat at the store has already been killed. If I can afford it, it is better for me to get that and not kill an animal.

From an ecological standpoint, its better to hunt and eat hunted meat. When you factor in the resources used and the relatively inhumane treatment of factory farming livestock, hunting is the better option.

Its sort of like puppymill puppies...if you don't buy them, you aren't contributing to the breeder's pocketbooks. In comparison, you, not buying a package of steaks, isn't going to effect the waste stream.

[Oden_son]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

some of the people on here seem REALLY out of touch with nature.. i hunt not because i need to but because i enjoy it and i made a choice to take my meat from nature, the way the gods intended. meat you buy in a store came from an animal that most likely never met its mother, spent its life in a living hell, being fed growth hormones so it can be slaughtered at just a few months of age and hung upside down while it bleeds out. the meat you eat when you hunt or fish came from an animal that lived its life in the green world, lived wild and free and was taken for food at an appropriate time. i will NEVER kill a species that's threatened in any way. if i take a deer, turkey, duck, fish or anything i always use as much of it as possible, down to selling the leather and making decorations out of the bones.
many may hate me for this, but i do kill certain animals any chance i get and leave them. i live in upstate ny and there's a big problem with invasive starlings brought from europe around 100 years ago out competing native species. while i don't enjoy taking the life of an innocent animal, i will kill any starling i can to do my part to preserve the adirondack mountains i was born in and love with everything i am.

[volcaniclastic]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I agree with most of what you say, except...

some of the people on here seem REALLY out of touch with nature.. i hunt not because i need to but because i enjoy it and i made a choice to take my meat from nature, the way the gods intended. meat you buy in a store came from an animal that most likely never met its mother, spent its life in a living hell, being fed growth hormones so it can be slaughtered at just a few months of age and hung upside down while it bleeds out. the meat you eat when you hunt or fish came from an animal that lived its life in the green world, lived wild and free and was taken for food at an appropriate time. i will NEVER kill a species that's threatened in any way. if i take a deer, turkey, duck, fish or anything i always use as much of it as possible, down to selling the leather and making decorations out of the bones.
many may hate me for this, but i do kill certain animals any chance i get and leave them. i live in upstate ny and there's a big problem with invasive starlings brought from europe around 100 years ago out competing native species. while i don't enjoy taking the life of an innocent animal, i will kill any starling i can to do my part to preserve the adirondack mountains i was born in and love with everything i am.

this doesn't happen most places. It's a stupid misnomer PETA would have you believe. I've never once in my LIFE met a farmer who doesn't care for his livestock properly.

And...

a big problem with invasive starlings brought from europe around 100 years ago out competing native species. while i don't enjoy taking the life of an innocent animal, i will kill any starling i can to do my part to preserve the adirondack mountains i was born in and love with everything i am.

It's not your job to kill something that invaded 100 years ago. In fact, it's nobody's job. Do you kill squirrels, too? What about the sparrow? They were willingly brought into NY state because someone wanted Central Park to have all of Shakespeare's animals in it. Hundreds of years ago.

How about horses? Would you kill a horse? Cuz they didn't exist in North America before the land bridge.

[Oden_son]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

you misunderstand the meaning of the word invasive and just because a problem has existed for a long time doesn't mean we should ignore it. i feel it IS my job as a pagan who loves my homeland to do my part to take care of it. and back to the abuse in farms thing, we can argue about that all day and not convince each other the others sources are lying, so why don't we look at facts that no amount of personal experience can argue. it creates FAR more pollution to raise a domestic cow, slaughter it, process it and ship it than it does to go into the woods and shoot a deer. there's also no arguing the fact that they're pumped with growth hormones and slaughtered at a ridiculous young age.

[iflewoverthecuckoosnest]

Re: Pagan views on hunting

I've never personally killed an animal, but I've been around hunting. I don't have an issue with killing reasonable amounts of game. The cycles of life and death are a natural part of living on this planet; animals eat each other to survive. As long as the life is taken out of purposeful need and with as little pain as possible, I see nothing wrong with it.