Thus all artificial barriers of race, caste, colour, langauge which are manmade, disappear when one views things from such a broad perspective. We should not only refrain from taking life but also cultivate a loving heart within ourselves. It ought to be borne in mind that benevolence as taught in Buddhism is not merely a negative virtue, but also a positive one. It lays great stress upon its positive side as upon its negative. It teaches us not to hurt or kill beings, and at the same time to love and protect them.
Man is biologically one species.
We also find the Buddha arguing with Brahmins who claimed caste purity, showing them that some of their ancestors did not marry within the caste and that the claim to purity was therefore a myth and not a fact. It also follows from the biological unity of mankind that intermarriage between castes or races is both possible and not necessarily undesirable. This was again a point on which the caste theorists, like the racists, held strong views - severely condemning intermarriage between castes on the ground that this would have disastrous consequences. The Buddha on the other hand not only argued against claims to caste purity in view of the fact that intermarriage between castes was both a possibility and a historical fact, but even seem to have held that it was not necessarily undesirable. The products of such caste mixture would resemble both parents and in such situations we cannot say from observing the physical or genetic constructions to which caste the child belongs.