Buddhists free 534 lobsters to live another day

A group of Tibetan Buddhists released 534 lobsters into the Atlantic ocean on Wednesday, saving the creatures from certain death and earning themselves extra karma. Instead of being plunged into a pot of boiling water, the lobsters were taken out to sea on a whale-watching boat before being sprayed with blessed water and released one by one into the deep.



A group of Tibetan Buddhists flanked the sides of a whale-watching boat at dusk on Wednesday, sprayed the lobsters with blessed water, clipped the bands binding their dangerous claws. The 30 Buddhists travelled to the northern Massachusetts fishing hub of Gloucester to buy 272 kgs of lobster from a seafood wholesaler on 3 August, which is wheel turning day on this year's Tibetan lunar calendar – the anniversary of the first sermon Buddha taught, when the merit for positive actions is multiplied many times.

"Even if they get captured again, they've had a longer life," said Wendy Cook, former director at the Kurukulla Center for Tibetan Buddhist Studies in Medford, north of Boston. Buddhists from the centre liberate masses of lobsters a couple of times each year.



Cook, a yoga instructor, led a ceremony that included prayers, mantras and walking boxes of the lobsters in a circle around blessed objects. This develops a karmic connection for the animals' future lifetimes and help ease future suffering, she said. Monk Geshe Tenley, the Kurukulla Center's resident teacher, who was wearing a saffron robe, released the first lobster.