History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v3.c40.76.5

v3.c40.76.5

7-8) which is to the Vaiṣṇavas what the Bible is to the Christians. In medieval and modern times all brāhmaṇas avoid flesh (except some brāhmaṇas in northern and eastern India that hold that fish may be eaten); so also do many vaiśyas, particularly those who are Vaiṣṇavas and even among śūdras there are many who do not touch flesh and regard abstention from flesh as meritorious. From ancient times the kṣatriyas have been meat-eaters. The Mahābhārata has in several places to say a great deal on flesh-eating. In the Vanaparva 50. 4 it is stated that the Pāṇḍava heroes killed with unpoisoned arrows deer and first offered venison to brāhmaṇas and partook of it themselves. In Sabhā 4. 1-2 king Yudhiṣṭhira on the opening of Mayasabhā feasted ten thousand brāhmaṇas with various delicacies including the flesh of wild boars and deer. Vanaparva 208. 11-12¹⁸⁶⁸ offers the consoling thought (that is conveyed by the Ṛgveda itself) that animals killed in sacrifices to the accompaniment of Vedic mantras went to heaven and it narrates the story of king Rantideva in whose sacrifices two thousand animals and cows were killed every day. Anuśāsana 116. 8 contains the view that there is nothing so nourishing as meat for those who are wounded or weak or worried or who are given up to too much sexual gratification and those exhausted by long travel. Anuśāsana 116. 16-19 allows flesh of animals killed by hunting to kṣatriyas.