Mood Swings: Necessary violence By Youssef Rakha The prospect of Eid Al-Adha remains by and large a vision of sacrifice. And political correctness notwithstanding, the ancient biblical tale retains its appeal. One feels sorry for the sheep, it is true -- though it must be conceded that they are irresponsive little creatures, aren't they, more inane than innocent -- but equally one feels vaguely purified, as if, like Abraham, one has renewed the right to keep one's children alive. More importantly, perhaps: plenty of protein for the poor. Blood on the asphalt may well upset the children, but it no doubt gives plenty of people their only opportunity to eat meat. And regional instability abiding, the children might as well get a tiny inoculation of what sacrifice, that essential human drive, is all about. Vedic accounts of the origin of the universe, I have found out while researching Hiduism, hold that it was through an act of self-sacrifice by the quintessential god- like being who existed in the absolute void, prior to the universe, that the latter came into being. Dying, we provide the earth with the nutrients that permit the life cycle to continue. And the monotheistic tradition agrees with the Vedas insofar as the destiny of humanity is concerned: from dust to dust; humours embodying elements; no living without dying. That we should acknowledge this unseemly yet inevitable aspect of human existence seems, contrary to the notion of animal rights, merely less hypocritical. And however repulsive the sight of sheep, goat and gamousa carcasses -- this year, in one instance, decorated with balloons -- it is a sight that the more carnivorously minded among us should endeavour to endure. That the killing of animals for nutritional purposes is, after all, a legitimate practice need hardly be pointed out, yet it often sounds arguable in such ludicrously politicised times. Many to whom it would never occur to object to human massacres in Arab and Muslim countries will raise hell about the inappropriate treatment of street cats by Arabs and Muslims in these countries. One street human, by contrast -- a ruffled octogenarian, homeless by the look of it, who this week appeared among the balloons outside the aforementioned butcher's -- evidently decided to stay there. "For the meat ya basha," he supplied, sniggering. "Wait till the day of the slaughters and you will end up with the bones." At this level the Eid functions as an occasion for traditionally voluntary charity -- social integration at its religiously inspired best. "Kull sana wenta tayeb," the octogenarian added as I passed. Another, a Westernised electronic engineer who is not particularly religious, expressed this view on his own family's custom of slaughtering a sheep -- a task undertaken by the eldest male family member, in the outdoor courtyard of the family's 100-year-old provincial house -- every Eid: "If you don't do it yourself, you or your father or whoever, it doesn't feel right. The point, of course, is that it is no easy thing. It is not as if willingly taking a life, even an animal life, even on a festive occasion like the one I'm talking about, will ever be done so effortlessly as people suggest. Controlling the animal is one practical consideration, but the issue is controlling your own emotions, those impulses towards mercy that you normally exhibit. There is something incredibly purifying about this kind of violence, the gesture by which you are announcing to the universe that you too can kill, but that you choose to do it legitimately within the prescribed circumstances of a specific world view. Religion notwithstanding, such a world view is something human beings cannot do without." Pausing, he took a sip of French wine. Nor does the aforementioned worldview end at violence, legitimate or not: Eid Al-Adha is equally an occasion for (optional) early-morning prayers, group recitations of ancient formulae of invocation relating to the Muslim pilgrimage, kahk-free congregations in which all present are dressed in white, meat-filled breakfasts, seasonal greetings and dreams of undertaking the Hajj. Here too the urge to sacrifice one's material comforts, embarking on a hazardous journey to answer God's call, is central to the celebration at hand. The process, many report, is similarly one of inner purification and spiritual reawakening. It was only by acknowledging the omnipotence of God (or the fates, or history) that the life of Ibrahim's son -- a symbol of all that humanity could hold dear -- was spared; such, precisely, is the point of the sacrificial orgy. Doubtless people, too many people who undertake the annual sacrifice, I suspect, tend to remain oblivious to the Eid's essential metaphor of thanks: that in taking the life of an animal, with the sole purpose of giving other people food, you are in effect recognising God's plenty, and in this sense, to put it in more secular terms, celebrating (economic as well as physical) consciousness. It remains as well to remember that, through historical vanity and the failure to abide by (human) life-affirming principles, not only the sheep are being slaughtered but millions upon millions of fellow human beings. Unlike the animals on which they have collectively agreed to feed, they have that most valuable of God's gifts, consciousness. Their only fault is that they do not happen to subscribe to a worldview other than their own, to one which, in striving after an apolitical veneer of so-called political correctness, will increasingly place namby-pamby above all else.
