Is owning a restaurant considered wrong livelihood?

Upvote:1

Wrong livelihood comes from killing animals. If the restauranteur buys meat from the supermarket and cook it , it's not wrong livelihood. However, if the restauranteur goes to a farm to order 500 kg of meat, it's wrong livelihood because the animals will be killed for the restaurant.

Upvote:2

From Mahayana of the Chinese Lineage, restaurant owner selling dishes with meat is considered not ideal livelihood; to say "wrong livelihood" perhaps too extreme.

The teachings of the Buddha, Prajna Paramita the wisdom is the highest, born from compassion and pure mind. With wisdom the practitioner should understand the spirit of precepts instead of practicing dogmatically, for words are easily hijacked to justify selfish purpose.

To illustrate, say, a restaurant owner is more ideal livelihood than a butcher. Therefore a butcher, in order to sustain himself and his family, he may consider to convert his knowledge and association (about meat) of his current career to perhaps work in or own a restaurant; then from there he can further convert his assets to perhaps work in or own a vegetarian restaurant. This way one accumulated knowledge of different business which added to his wisdom, meanwhile progresses towards the more ideal livelihood aligned with the precepts and teachings.

Upvote:3

It's not wrong livelihood unless you ask the butcher to kill for you.

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