Superstition – What are You and Whom have You Sacrificed?

In today’s (2024-07-19) newspaper The Hindu there is an opinion piece about superstition  and how the Indian legal system can provide the scaffolding (unfortunately behind a pay-wall, the article is!). Knowing the name of the authors may help you get to the article – Mr. Alok Prasanna Kumar and Mr. Avinash Patil.

As I get the paper delivered at my doorstep, I get to read it as it appears (some items are abridged to accommodate it in the space available) in the newspaper.

I just would like the few readers to know that I am writing under the above constraint.

Now, to the title of this post: an effort to copy unabashedly from the title of the “sung-through rock opera” by Andrew Lloyd Webber with lyrics by Tim Rice – Jesus Christ Superstar  and one of the lines ,”Who are you and what have you sacrificed?”

Yet, there is more to the connection between the titles. Without giving up on what I would end the post with, let me just say that in the opera the question does not get answered definitively, my non-Christian thoughts intruding here.

The recent stampede with multiple fatalities in Hathras in Uttar Pradesh is not a one-off. It – any one or in multiples like stampede, bus falling into a gorge, trek to Vaishno Devi shrine, vehicle collisions, landslides along the routes to the abodes of Gods in the Himalayas – happens repeatedly. We pray (actually prey might be the right word, and I will come to it in due course) for the dear departed souls that they rest in peace.

And, someone in the hierarchy of governance is also sacrificed, but never the personalities who profit enormously.

This guiding of the soul to its rightful place – Heaven or Hell – isn’t this the job of St. Peter who guards the Pearly Gates in Christianity, or Chitragupta, the accountant for Lord of Death, Yamadharma Raja? Why should we pray at all as the gatekeepers have already entered the death into their account books and closed it?

We are supposed to pray because it is a superstitious act, perhaps at the highest level. Check that, it is a descending scale and hence the lowest level. On the way to the bottom the soul meets many horrors – like a river of blood, Vaitarna and you can cross it only with the help of a cow, to be gifted after crossing – to whom, you ask. To the brahmin who is guiding you in carrying out all the rituals over twelve days and the thirteenth day – even if it be a Friday – things are back to normal for the next 11 months and some days (per the astrological calendar). Tamil Brahmins know how to scare their herd.

The above is only for a Brahmin souls. Souls of other castes have their own tomfoolery. None excepted. The atheist has to register his so-called living will, and catch this: (s)he said that her/his body be donated to a teaching hospital. They may also state that their eyes shall be donated to give eyesight to someone blind, if biologically the donor and the receiver match. This was done by my mother’s eldest brother who had no progeny. Good for his soul (that was only in a manner of speaking ... do not accuse me of invoking the soul and simultaneously denying is existence)!

One of the writers in the opinion piece says that over the past two decades, his organization has been demanding “the enactment of a central law to combat superstitious practices.”

In my opinion, this writer has not understood the nature of a superstition: It is decidedly and very narrowly focused and varies between villages, not to mention regions/districts/states. In the states of north India, it is dried wood heaped over the body to catch fire and burn the body. In Tamil Nadu, at least among Brahmins, it is layers of cakes of dried cow dung. Can one of these be religiously accepted as the other goes into the “Recycle Bin” of MS Windows?

The same writer bemoans the ineffective, “Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954” in which loopholes galore. Therefore, he argues that state laws in Maharashtra and Karnataka should be taken as models for the national law he longs for.

The other writer says that the Karnataka law uses broad definitions of “evil practices”. Hence, any particular issue that comes up before a court is liable to fall between stools. While I agree broadly, I blame that no one has yet defined what is to be penalized before taking up discussions on the punishments to be meted out. This non-definition helps fudging the issue of distinguishing between religious beliefs and superstitions.” The next line is the crux of the issue – acts such as donations to churches/temples/mosques are religious practices or superstitions. Ouch!

Answering his rhetorical question, he gives us the response: “State governments are more attuned to the needs and traditions of the local population”. Hence, a loud NO! to a national law. Here, he has slipped. He takes the “traditions” avoid “superstitions”. He just kicks the can down the street.

The first writer puts the issue very clearly, but shies away from further analyses, when he says, “There will never be one commonly acceptable definition of what a superstition is”.

In my opinion, the article given in Q & A form must have ended at this point. There was no need to go any further once you have given up on the core of the issue – among many practices, which of the following are religious, and which are superstitions. No answer is forthcoming in the rest of the article as it changes track to go on how it can be implemented. An earlier judgment is quoted, ethically quite strong yet legally very weak, “[W]hat is morally unconscionable, cannot be theologically right”.

This is a bad sentence in a judgment for the simple reason, for any forthcoming case, it falls on the judiciary to define whether the particular instance is theologically correct or not, and if decided it is, then whether it is morally correct. Double Whammy!

So, is there a solution? Yes, there is, however, that is bound to be non-acceptable.

Give up religion and depend only on one’s own conscience. It would take time – may be generations – but better late than never.

The answer to the question posed in the title:

(i)                 – An off-shoot of religion

(ii)         – Preys on the fear of humanity

(ii)               – Deprives humans of their humanitarian feelings – no loss to superstition.

Jesus fought against the priests (as the story goes), gathers a crowd around him, religion is running scared, goes to the king and murders Jesus. But, whether Jesus was resurrected or not, the Jewish Temple practices must have re-emerged, if they had changed at all. In fact, other sets of superstitions have blossomed in Christianity, like Sacraments.

I know, because I was highly superstitious, but after at least the age of 30, I have discarded most (I never claim 100% in anything). I will share one secret with you – I cannot climb up or down a flight of stairs without counting the steps. I do not know where and how this compulsion (superstition) took hold of my mind.

Raghuram Ekambaram