The Invisible Facade, 58th Day of Autumn, 525 M.E. (Aldebaran): I've known many Buddhists who are adamant that Buddhists shouldn't eat any meat. It you're not a vegetarian, they insist, you're not a Buddhist. 

Zen Master Eihei Dogen (1200-1253), the man who established the Soto school of Zen in Japan, was a little more equivocal on this matter. In his Shobogenzo Zuimonki (Book One, Chapter 3), he said the matter of eating meat should be "carefully considered." He noted that Chinese Rinzai Zen master Goso Hoen allowed the practice in his monastery. Chinese Zen master Bussho considered monks who wanted to eat meat to be possessed by a demon, and so allowed them to because it was the demon, he reasoned, and not the monk who ate the meat. 

Whether allowing or forbidding the eating of meat, Dogen said, all the ancient masters had their own deep considerations, and we should all carefully consider the matter in our own lives. 

In your own consideration, however, don't turn a blind eye to the cruelty inherent in meat production, especially in modern industrial food production. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know, but there's a reason we're rarely shown the insides of slaughterhouses and chicken-rendering plants. If you saw how the sausage was made, you wouldn't have the appetite for more sausage.

The common alibi I hear is, "but I need my protein." That's a myth - you don't need animal protein to thrive. There are plenty of useable proteins in fruits, nuts, and vegetables. I've been a near vegetarian, or let's say an imperfectly practicing vegetarian, for some 18 months now, and don't suffer from any shortage of energy during my alternating-day seven- to ten-mile walks. I had a physical exam a couple weeks ago, and the protein level in my blood was 7.5 g/dL (normal range is 6.4 to 8.9 g/dL). Blood protein level isn't totally dependent on diet, but my level doesn't suggest that I'm suffering any protein shortage in my diet.

Don't overlook the ecological impact of meat production. As fresh water becomes a scarcer and scarcer commodity, we use staggering amounts of water in livestock production and to irrigate fields of grain that we feed to livestock. As Frances Moore Lappé pointed out, it takes 16 pounds of grain to produce one pound of beef - if we just consumed the grain ourselves and cut out the beef middleman, we'd move much closer to solving the global famine problems. Not to mention the carbon footprint of meat production. 

On the other hand, for better or worse there's huge amounts of readily available meat protein out there being sold in our stores and served in restaurants. Would it not be a shame to just let it rot after all the cost, economic, environmental, and spiritual, that went into producing it? 

My personal solution is to prepare all of my foods at home - a good 90% plus of my diet - without meat. The meat that I do consume usually comes as small quantities in processed foods, such as soup, or when dining out. 

As Dogen says, you should carefully consider your own solution to this matter.