Sacrifice to Appease the Merciful Allah!
By Syed Kamran Mirza
NYC, USA
[email protected]
The Eid-ul-Azha popularly known as Qurbani Eid in South
Asia is just over now. Like the change of the seasons this Qurbani comes
into the Islamic world every year and the Islamic folks go crazy over it
year after year after year. And this religious occasion had lead the
utopia of merciless slaughter of tens of millions of innocent animals
(cows, camels, sheep and goats) by devoted Muslims throughout the Muslim
world. All these merciless slaughters were performed to please the
merciful Allah!
The origin of this madness named sacrifice (killing animals) for Allah
was derived from the myth related to pre-biblical Prophet Abraham (Ibrahim
in Islam). This belief system of sacrifice is called burnt offerings in
Bible. This was the system of sacrifice discovered for Jews, and Bible
commanded this decree of God by hundreds of scriptures throughout the Old
Testament. Animal sacrifice was prescribed for Jews and Christians by very
strict Biblical injunction. Yet, Jews and
Christians stopped this mad practice longtime ago
once they realized that this is nothing more than an uncivilized and
inhumane practice. But sadly though, the Muslims are busy
killing animals to satisfy the angry Allah just the way ancient
uncivilized peoples used to sacrifice human life (Naro baali) to
appease their deity. Later in the course of human civilization, ancient
people used to sacrifice animals instead of human. Hindus and various
other tribal religions do occasionally practice this animal sacrifice even
today.
I was inspired to write this essay about
Kurbani by a marvelous essay (about Kurbani episodes) which I read last
weak in this forum. I will come back to that later in this essay. Just
when I started this essay, I got another sad story of real Kurbani (real
sacrifice) of Abrahamic style performed by a devout soldier of Allah in
Bangladesh. The daily star (Feb. 27) news was as follows:
‘THE Eid
mood got suddenly overcast with gloom and horror on February 23rd evening
as the television news caster served up a heart beat stopper for millions
in the country. And courtesy satellite television millions outside
Bangladesh learnt about it, too. What a shame! Golam Mostafa alias Tula
Mian put his seven-month old child Solaiman to sword in the delusion of
performing a religious duty 'directed by a voice heard in dream.' As his
progeny lay slaughtered, a non-chalant Mostafa with his barbaric zealotry
muttered the total nonsense about being dream-driven to act.’
This above mentioned mind-boggling
incident is not an isolated case. No, I do not consider it to be a case of
hallucination, or a psychotic case either. This is simply a case of
religious fanaticism. Madrassah educated Golam Mostafa alias Tula Mia was
not psychotic or schizophrenic. He may have hallucinated but that was due
to his religious fervor. He believed strongly and literally what he
learned from the Holy Quran about the incident of myth-related Kurbani
story of Prophet Ibrahim. He thought about it, day and night, and as a
result he dreamt that impossible episode. Result was the unbelievable
cruel demise of his 7-month-old son.
Big question is who is responsible? Where
was the most omnipotent, most Merciful Allah at the time of slaughtering
that poor 7-month-old innocent child? Who should be blamed for this
horrendous episode? I strongly believe it was the Islamic teachings solely
responsible for his mindset. It was the fanatic zealotry behind his
cruelty and madness. It is the same kind of religious zealotry makes a
believer kill another non-believing human being! A fanatic zealot inspired
by religion Islam is so strong and forceful selfish, that he has no regard
for a life of a human, or animal. Only thing he cares for is his deity
Allah. And to appease his blood thirsty Allah, this zealot can sacrifice
even his own child, as we have seen in the case of Tula Mia. Heavenly
pleasures (houries, wine, milk and honey) make these Islamic zealots
inhuman creatures.
It is the same kind of religious teachings which can turn a peaceful
and quite white American boy into a zealot Taliban (John Walker Lindh)
having bushy beard and turban. See my article: “How
one gets to be a Taliban”--in which I did prove how a
single human being can act differently with different beliefs and
education. Culpability of Golam Mostafa rest on the teachings and belief
of Islam. Had he not learnt about myth-story of the Abraham’s Kurbani—Golam
Mostafa may not commit such inhuman act of sacrifice in the name of
religion.
Now back to my original Eid story. The heartbreaking essay titled, “The
Eid Story” (NFB February 19) by Mr. Lutfur Rahman has opened my past
memory of similar cruel and horror stricken episodes during Qurbani not
once but twice. The same horrific scenarios (unborn calves inside the torn
opened gaping body cavity of the sacrificed cows) were seen by me in two
such occasions of animal sacrifice. Yet, there was not a slightest remorse
to those hungry meat eater pious Muslims and everything was just fine by
the fatwa of our merciful mullah Huzoor.
Again, heartfelt thanks to Mr. Lutfur Rahman for rewarding NFB readers
his well-written but tears rendering essay about his true experience of an
episode of Islamic sacrifice. Mr. Rahman left some painful heart touching
(Hridoy Bidarok) questions at the end of his marvelously described
essay, which should open the eyes and minds of the conscientious readers.
His questions were as follows:
Mr. Rahman wrote:
“Going to bed belly full in a scarlet cow
that night, Allah’s purpose did not appear too apparent to me. For a
long time before falling asleep I could here strange voices asking:
How could an omnipresent, omniscient,
ever merciful Allah sanction such torture and destruction of another one
of His own magnificent creation and its unborn fetus with, what appeared
to be, such callous disregard?
To which higher court of authority do a
mother cow and her unborn calf seek justice and deliverance? Are mother
cows and their fetuses exempt from coverage of mercy?
And whose sin, whose piety and whose
penance?”
Who will answer those intelligent questions asked by Mr. Rahman? I am
quite positive that none of the Islamists will ever come forward to answer
these questions! Immediately after the horrendous incident of September
11, Rev. Billy Graham was in the famous CNN Larry King show discussing the
day’s events. Rev. Graham told the audience that after that horrific Sep
11, many people asked him: “where was the all powerful and merciful
God when these Arab terrorists flew their aircraft and crashed them into
the WTC and Pentagon building? How God let such horrible things to happen?
Why can’t the almighty God not interfere with such a terrible episode?”
Mr. Graham said (nodding his head down) “I could not answer those
questions; I do not have any answer why God did not interfere.”
The fact of the matter is—God never could interfere to any dreadful
acts of human beings nor could he ever interfere with any such natural
devastation like cyclone, hurricane, earthquake, flood, etc. He never did
interfere when millions of human beings were gassed to death by Hitler or
when thousands of people were drowned with the sinking Titanic. Similarly,
God never did intervene when hundreds of men, women, and children were
perished when an Egyptian Aircraft went down in the icy water of Atlantic
Ocean! The truth is that God never could interfere—when millions of
human beings were perished by deadly diseases before the discovery of
medicine by humans. He never could interfere when one fourth of the world
populations were perished by bubonic plague!!! These are all documented
cases. Bubonic plague used to scare the ancient folks all over the world.
Similarly, small pox and cholera used to dread our grandfather’s
generation as the God’s rage (Allah’s Gazab) in the early twentieth
century. It was the discovery of antibiotics and other medicines that
conquered these pestilences. The God, who may have been too powerful at
one time, had nothing to do with the eradication of these deadly diseases.
And these are cold facts of the progress of human civilization.
If one analyzes all the facts and figures of the growth of human
civilization in a cool head, one will find out
quite easily that our God, Allah was never omnipotent, omniscient, all
mighty or Merciful!!! May be He never did exist in reality.
Only He exists in the human imagination! May be, we the humans actually
created Him and gave him all those mouthful adjectives only to make Him a
big thing worthy of worshipping! May be, Allah or God was never omniscient
or all-powerful. May be, Allah or God is completely a deaf and dumb
entity! He never hears anything, knows anything or does anything by
Himself! He never did talk with any Prophet, nor had He revealed Himself
to anybody! And that’s why Mr. Rahman’s questions will remain
unanswered forever. May be, we the humans shall have to find the answer of
those intelligent questions asked by Mr. Rahman in his essay of Eid
Story. We the humans should discover the way to love each other. We
the humans should stop this mockery of worshipping God by sacrifice at the
expense of others life. Only then, could there be any lasting peace on
earth.
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