One major Buddhist precept is prana-atipatad. Often, it is translated as "abstention from killing". But the Sanskrit word “prana” which is commonly translated as “breath” doesn’t help convey any notion of not killing beings or creatures.
Pranatipatad really has more to do with the intent to neglect or destory (pâta) spirit (prana) so as to devitalize oneself and possibly others. Threats, fear mongering, incarceration, punishment, torture, and war, despiritualize (pranatipata) beings, leading even to disease, sickness and premature death.
Turning to war, the precept of prana-atipatad is perhaps even more limiting than just the abstention from killing. In the Bodhisattva-avadana-kalpalata, this precept understands that the Bodhisattva condemns and shuns the barbarous custom of war among nations. The Bodhisattva understands that war has it origin in hatred, avarice, cruelty and selfishness. Bodhisattva believes that it is better for a leader to resign his or her office than wage war. Being a pacifist is called for. (It should be kept in mind that 'Bodhisattva' is purely a spiritual entity and should not be taken as having a physical body.)
One should not even devitalize animals insofar as the animative principle runs through all creatures—not just humans.
The ultimate pranatipatad, or spiritual destruction, is nihilism: that beings are nothing more than autonomous, soulless things. One, indeed, could argue that modern biological science is attempting to destroy the very idea of prana which may set the future stage for even more merciless forms of spiritual barabarism.
It is important to bear in mind that prana is that part of us that that is bound down to the temporal body without which the body dies. Incidentally, this may explain why breath or prana meditation is so important in Buddhism being key to liberation. By it we return to the non-individualized absolute since mind or citta (which is animative) is outside of prana although it faces it and seems bound up with it.
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