English

Alternative forms

• non-killing

Adjective

nonkilling ‎(not comparable)

1. Not engaging in killing.
   • 1976, Kenneth Evan Moyer, The psychobiology of aggression, page 146:

     Hunger does not normally induce frog killing in a nonkilling laboratory rat. However, if that rat has had the experience of watching a rat kill frogs, ....

   • 2001, Jeff Evans, Undoing time: American prisoners in their own words, page 149:

     I'm a nonkilling accomplice in a felony murder — a robbery-murder. ... It's a defense to felony murder, for nonkilling accomplices

   • 2007, 8th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates, Charter for a World Without Violence:

     (...) we encourage scientific research (...) to aid us in the transition to nonviolent, and nonkilling societies

Noun

nonkilling ‎(usually uncountable, plural nonkillings)

1. A precept or worldview that affirms the possibility of a society where killing is absent.
   • 1896, Swami Vivekananda, Oxford English Dictionary:

     yama, n.2: Yoga Philos. ii. 17 Râja Yoga is divided into eight steps. The first is Yama—non-killing, truthfulness, non-stealing, continence, and non-receiving of any gifts.

   • 1944, Louise Saxe Eby, The quest for moral law, page 46:

     One element which is valid without reference to this Indian triad of premises is the emphasis upon ahimsa, nonkilling and noninjury of any living creature

   • 1963, Howard Thurman, Disciplines of the Spirit, page 103:

     Nonviolence and nonkilling mean, therefore, essentially the same

   • 1999, Suwanna Satha-Anand, “Looking to Buddhism to Turn Back Prostitution in Thailand”, in Joanne R. Bauer, Daniel A. Bell, editors, The East Asian challenge for human rights, page 194:

     In the latter's opinion, the first precept of nonkilling is but another expression of the right to life.

   • 2002, John F. Kavanaugh, Who count as persons?, page 123:

     The principle of nonkilling is not a recommendation of passivity

   • 2002, Glenn D. Paige, Nonkilling Global Political Science, page 82:

     The spirit and reality of nonkilling is the basic law of human life

   • 2004, Norman Fischer, Taking Our Places: The Buddhist Path to Truly Growing Up, page 155:

     Speaking about this precept of nonkilling, he told us about all the killing that he had done that very day as he drove his mower through a thick field of

   • 2008, Mairead Maguire, Global Nonkilling Leadership First Forum Proceedings, page 61:

     A world of love, compassion, forgiveness and nonkilling

2. Lack of killing; permitting to live.
   • 1993, Ven. S. Dhammika, Seven Pillar Edicts, 7, translation of original by Ashoka the Great:

     […] respect of harmlessness to living beings and nonkilling of living beings.

   • 1994, Grolier Incorporated, Academic American encyclopedia, page 165:

     Buddhist belief inculcates nonkilling of sentient life […]

   • 2002, Glenn D. Paige, Nonkilling Global Political Science, page 1:

     […] but nonkilling of humans is a minimum characteristic

3. (countable) An action or occurrence other than a direct killing (but possibly having a similar effect).
   • 1991, Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice, page 105:

     ... then its death is a moral wrong even if the result of "nonkillings" will be a marked decrease in the population of that part of the animal kingdom.

   • 1994, Ray Jackendoff, Patterns in the mind: language and human nature, page 200:

     But actions in the world don't come neatly dividing into killings and nonkillings: the gray area of the concept shades smoothly

   • 2008, Heinz Duthel, Guilty as Charged! A Case for the International Criminal Court, page 20:

     This also includes nonkillings that in the end eliminate the group, such as preventing births or forcibly transferring children out of the group

See also

• ahimsa
• nonlethal
• nonviolence
• satyagraha

Translations

References

Wikiversity

• "Nonkilling: A New Paradigm" International Encyclopedia of Peace. Oxford University Press, New York (2009)
• "Nonkilling Political Science" Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace and Conflict, 2nd Edition. Elsevier, San Diego (2008)
• "Nonkilling Global Society" Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS). EOLSS Publishers, Oxford (2004)
• Glenn D. Paige, Nonkilling Global Political Science, 1st ed. (2002); 3rd ed. (2009)