Today is a good day to think about the
causes of war. Especially because a lot
of us are feeling skittish about multiple recent attacks on people seen as ‘symbol’s
of the West, done by members of a certain religion (actually a religion with
multiple strands but all lumped together into one pot.) As I read The
Song of Kahunsha, by Anosh Irani, I am again reminded how nationalistic bigotry is begun.
People may claim they are committing their acts of violence
to prove their own god is better than their enemy’s, but when their god forbids
violence, questions of their piousness arise.
In this novel, an imaginative and kind boy, Chamdi, lives in
lonely despair in an orphanage.
Surrounded by images of Hindu gods and Christian saints, attended to by
a Muslim woman, he wishes she were his mother, but although she does her best,
she can’t mother him when the demands on her are so high. Her eyes are red from weeping, as the
orphanage no longer has a sponsor and will be sold by the descendants of the
original sponsor. She and the children
will be turned out. He runs away,
believing himself to be a bad boy breaking her rules, especially when he must
turn to begging and thievery to survive on the Mumbai streets.
Although the matron had quietly told Chamdi that gods like
Ganesha were probably made up, he chooses to believe they are real, although he’s
puzzled that the life size Jesus statue doesn’t ever answer him, and the Hindu
gods don’t seem to be protecting the innocent as well as he hoped.
Living with other beggar children, he becomes ‘owned’ by Anand
Bhai, a filthy thug who treats his parents badly. Chamdi is appalled by the thug’s cruelty
toward his beggars and spies, and his disregard for his parents, whom Chamdi wishes
were his own. Anand justifies his
nastiness by telling Chamdi that when he began his lifestyle, he too was
shocked by what he saw, but once he damaged his first victim, his heart
hardened, so he was free after that.
Although Anand’s mother makers her living by creating tiny
statues of Hindu gods to be sold on the street, she has not been able to influence
Anand to be a better human. She
intercedes on behalf of the children, but fearfully, and without success.
Although Anand is clearly without morals and performs nary a
poojah, he works for the worst underside of a supposedly religious but clearly
nationalistic front. To the chants of “Jai
Maharashtra” he murders a young Muslim family, on orders from above. He arranges the job cheerfully and tells his
co-conspirators they must retaliate against the killing of a Hindu family by
Muslims a few days earlier. He looks
forward to the rash of further killings these revenge killings will cause. Thoughts of religion, compassion, morals
never enter his picture. “Jai” is
usually followed by something to be revered, such as a god, or a guru, not a
national state. That these people place
their national state above their religion is telling of the philosophy that
allows people to kill in the name of their god.
Can you imagine shouting “Hail Alberta” or “Honour
Missouri” and going on to kill neighbors who don’t seem Albertan or Missourian enough?
Just because they don’t belong to the
majority’s religion? We would wonder
what kind of religion would promote such behavior…
So how does all this fit into Remembrance Day? If we can remember that people who commit
violent acts to spread religion really aren’t religious at all, we are less
likely to blame the wrong people.
Blaming the religion for nationalistic behaviors is unfair, and leads
only to further bloodshed. Lest we
forget.
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