Precept of Animal Sacrifice on Eid-ul-Azha In the Abrahamic Tradition Is an Indispensable Part of Islam
By
Nizam Pasha
10 August
2020
Of late, a
new fad has caught the imagination of those around the world, Muslim and
non-Muslim alike, who are trying to re-interpret the animal sacrifice that marks
the festival of Eid-ul-Zuha as an expression of charity that is more
appropriately expressed in money terms in today’s day and age. In their own
understanding, this is an attempt to make Islam more compatible with what they
perceive to be the demands of the ‘modern’ world. Unfortunately, this fad
proceeds on a mistaken understanding of both Islam as well as the ‘modern’
world.
A boy wears a mask as sheep and goats are seen in a truck at a livestock
market ahead of Eid uz-Zuha, in Nablus in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Photo: REUTERS/RaneenSawafta
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To begin
with, let me straightaway clarify that this is not an attempt to argue with
animal rights activists. If you believe that animals are not meant to be eaten
and advocate vegetarianism, then all I can do is to quote the Quran where it
says “to you be your way and to me be mine”. Though I will say this in fairness
– at least your philosophy is internally consistent and does not contradict
itself. But if you enjoy steaks and kababs and Naharis all year round and save
your animal rights and environmental activism for this one day of the year,
then this article is for you. To begin with, I would like to inform you that
the processed meat you buy from the frozen foods section of your local
supermarket was once a frisky lamb or a fluffy chick that had its throat cut
open by a Gutka chewing man in a Banyaan. I just wanted you to know
that.
A study
conducted by the Institute of Management Sciences, Peshawar in 2009 found that
the sacrifice of animals on Eid-ul-Zuha constituted a direct transfer of
money to rural households with fewer intermediaries and generated employment
for thousands of opportunistic animal rearers, livestock traders, butchers and
leather industry workers among others, who look to Eid for a small annual
windfall.
Further, as
per the numbers of livestock sales in Pakistan annually and during Eid for the
year 2016 quoted in a Dawn article, the total sales of goats and cattle around
Eid work out to around 5% of the total annual sales, and given that there is a
sharp drop in meat sales in the days following Eid since most families are
well-stocked for days to come, the total deviation from normal, month on month,
for the livestock industry is probably a lot less than we imagine. But these are
matters that can be debated endlessly and which require a lot more facts and
figures than are available. In any event, the arguments being made for
dispensing with the ritual are more …what’s the word for someone who’s talking
through their hat?…philosophical.
It is well
known that animal sacrifice is performed on this day following the Abrahamic
tradition that is common to both the Quran and the Old Testament where Ibrahim
(Abraham) has a vision the he is to sacrifice his own son. Abraham
unquestioningly follows the command of God and takes his son to the place of
slaughter. Just as Abraham is about to slit his son’s throat, God speaks to him
and tells him that he has fulfilled his vision. God replaces the son with a ram
which Abraham proceeds to sacrifice. God is pleased with Abraham’s
unquestioning adherence to His command and so bestows His blessings on Abraham
and promises to grant his descendants glory and multiply them throughout the
earth.
The first
thing to understand is that the entire import of the story is about
unquestioningly following the command of God. Abraham could well have argued
that his son’s sacrifice served no purpose and there were many things he could
sacrifice instead that would be far more environment friendly and beneficial to
the people around him. Therefore, coming up with alternatives of what else can
be sacrificed instead of an animal is to miss the entire point of the Biblical
and Quranic tradition.
There is no
doubt that Islam provides room for contextual interpretations through ijma
(consensus of scholars) and qiyas (self-reflection and study) when confronted
with a situation not contemplated in the Quran or authentic traditions of the
Prophet known as hadees. But none of these applies where the text of the Quran
or the hadees on the subject are abundantly clear and unequivocal. The verses
of the Quran that deal with Eid-ul-Zuha leave no manner of doubt that God’s
command is to sacrifice an animal, to eat its meat and to distribute it amongst
those who are in need (Surah Al-Hajj 22: 34-37). The verse which is misquoted
in this context is verse 22:37, which says “It is not their meat nor their
blood (of the animal) that reaches God; it is your piety”. This is only to
dispel the pre-Islamic custom according to which the blood and meat of the
sacrificed animal was brought to the Kaaba and placed before the idols housed
in it, or the Jewish tradition according to which the sacrificial meat was
completely burnt at the altar in the temple and was not consumed. It is to
completely distort the evident meaning of the text to suggest that the idea
here is to substitute animal sacrifice with other forms of piety, as the verses
immediately prior to it describe in detail how the animal is to be sacrificed
and divided. Hadees on the subject too are abundantly clear and the Prophet is
reported in Sahih Bukhari, the most authentic source of Hadees for Sunni
Muslims, to have said,
“The first
thing to do on this day (Eid-ul-Zuha) is to offer the Eid prayers and on
returning from the prayer, we slaughter our sacrificial animals, and whoever
did this, he acted according to sunnat (Prophetic tradition)”.
In Sunan
Ibn Majah, another collection of Hadees, the Prophet is reported to have said
“As for the
Day of Fitr, it is the day when you break your fast, and on the Day of Azha you
eat the meat of your sacrifices.”
So, this is
definitely not one of those instances where there is any room for doubt or need
for creative re-interpretation.
Which
brings us to the alternatives being suggested. It is being said that livestock
was merely representative of wealth in seventh century Arabia, and that is why
animals were sacrificed on this day, and money as the new form of wealth may be
given in charity as a modern-day replacement of the offering. As a recent article
in The Wire put it, “Real sacrifice requires us to give up some of what is dear
to us. Today, the most cherished possession is money”. Again, this proceeds on
a completely mistaken understanding of Arabian society at the time of the
Prophet.
Mecca,
where Islam was born, thrived in the pre-Islamic period as an important
pilgrimage centre that trade caravans from far and wide altered their routes to
visit to pay homage and obtain blessings. The Kaaba, said to have been built by
Abraham at a spot ordained by God and having embedded in it a stone that had
descended from heaven, was a pantheon of gods containing idols of the followers
of many faiths and was consequently holy to all of them. The economy of the
city was centred around trade with these caravans and the tribute that the
faithful brought to the site. While rearing of animals, particularly camels,
was important to the lives of people, it was far from a universal occupation.
So, while it is true that livestock was a far more important asset in those days
than it is today, it was by no means what the wealth of a person was calculated
in. This was not the age of the barter system and money, represented by the
dinar and dirham, was very much in vogue. Monetary transactions are, in fact,
discussed in several Prophetic traditions. Trade with foreign caravans was in
terms of silver and gold, the universal currency.
In fact,
the tradition of sacrifice on Eid itself clearly does not presuppose that every
person would own livestock, as is evident from the fact that one of the
conditions of sacrifice is that one person may sacrifice a goat or sheep
whereas seven people may get together and sacrifice a larger animal like a
camel, buffalo or cow. If every person was merely sacrificing a part of their
own livestock, there would be no question of seven people obtaining shares in
one animal to perform a joint sacrifice.
Secondly,
and more importantly, Islam has an entire system of charity in money terms
known as Zakaat, which is one of the five fundamental tenets of Islam.
Each year, every person who has money or assets that are unused for an entire
year has to give 2.5% of their value in charity. This form of compulsory
charity is both denominated in money terms and distributed as such. And Zakaat
is just one form of charity in Islam. There are many more such as Sadaqawhich
are not bound by any percentage and depend on the inclination of the giver.
Just the first 2.5% is Zakaat, and for that too, the Sufi saint revered
by Indian Muslims and Sikhs alike, Baba Fariduddin Ganjshakar has said – there
are several kinds of Zakaat. Zakaat-e-Shariyat is those who spend 2.5%
and keep 97.5%. Nobody is generous for giving Zakaat-E-Shariyat. That is
your religious duty and is bound by religious precepts. Spending more than 2.5%
is generosity, till Zakaat-E-Tariqatis when you spend 97.5% and keep
2.5% for yourself. And finally, Zakaat-E-Haqiqatis those who spend all
they have for others and have faith that Allah will look after their own needs’
tomorrow. There is also a Hadees reported by Sahih Bukhari where the Prophet is
reported to have said “do not withhold your money by counting and hoarding;
spend towards charity as much as you can afford”.
Whether you
call it Zakaat-E-Tariqator Sadaqa, all of these are Islamic
principles that advocate giving up more of your wealth than is mandated towards
charity in the hope of pleasing your maker. In fact, even on Eid-ul-Fitr, the
other major annual feast for Muslims worldwide, every Muslim who has wealth in
excess of his or her day’s need is required to give Zakaat-Al-Fitr,
which is 2 or 3 kg of the staple food-grain of the area or its money equivalent
given for every man, woman and child in the household. This charity has to be
given before the Eid prayer so that the poor too can enjoy Eid.
So those
who feel they have come up with a brilliant new idea not contemplated in Islam
of giving money in charity need to first study and understand Islam before they
speak. It is abundantly clear that the precept of sacrificing an animal in the
Abrahamic tradition exists independently of all other forms of charity that are
dealt with at length separately, and cannot be substituted by them.
In fact,
the entire set of practices around the Hajj, which Eid-ul-Zuha celebrates, are
a re-enactment of Abrahamic traditions. Whether it is circumambulation of the
Kaaba that Ibrahim constructed, offering Namaz at the spot where he prayed
after completing the construction, throwing pebbles at the spot where he chased
away Satan by throwing stones at him, or sa’ee, which involves running between
two hills, Safa and Marwa seven times in honour of the seven times Ibrahim’s
wife, Hajra, ran up and down the hills looking for water for her crying son
Ismail after Ibrahim left them in the valley upon God’s command. Today, Safa and
Marwa are housed within a large building that has been constructed over them
with marble floors, air conditioning and water dispensers every few yards.
Slaughtering an animal is just the last in this series of Abrahamic traditions
around Hajj. If you wish to question traditions for contemporary relevance, you
may as well question them all. And if you start questioning each of the
traditions of Hajj as mindless emulations of a bygone era, then to you be your
way and to me be mine.
And this
issue is all the more important because it is much larger than just
slaughtering an animal. The outcome of vilification of the Islamic faith in
popular discourse has reduced educated Muslims to apologists trying to distance
themselves from their religious practices or attempting to portray them in a
“modern” light in the hope that critics of the faith will be more forgiving of
them. The need of the hour is for Muslims to take pride in the precepts of
their faith, to first study and understand Islam and then see for themselves
what religious practices are about, how much room there is for interpretation,
whether there is actually any need to ‘modernize’ and how much controversy is
created by ignorance and deliberate misinformation.
No
resurrection of a beleaguered community is possible until they begin to take
pride in the identity that is under fire and embrace it. Until you take pride
in who you are, you cannot command the respect of others. The Jews remained a
scattered persecuted lot while they were trying to be invisible. The Sikhs
could emerge from the vilification they faced in public discourse during the
heyday of the Khalistan movement only because of the pride they take in their
Sikh identity. Today, the Muslim identity is under attack more than ever
before. A lot of Muslims who have been through the western education system
react by expending their efforts in trying to become invisible and effacing
whatever makes them stick out. Unfortunately, it seems to take very little for
us to start believing that we have risen above our Shariyat and are living in
times that God did not contemplate when revealing the last verse of the Quran
“This day I have perfected your religion for you”.
Everyone
begins by trying to improve upon religion without first understanding it. There
is no doubt there are certain practices and interpretations that have crept
into Islam that need to be reformed out. But one can never reform that which
one does not understand. And if you try, you will merely succeed in distancing
yourself from adherents of the faith and will not have their ear even when you
are saying something that is actually relevant.
PS: And
just for the record, while we are on the subject, for us in the sub-continent,
its Eid-ul-Zuha, not Eid-al-Adha, because we pronounce the ض in Azha as ‘z’ and because we read the Arabic
Eid-al-Azha as Eid-ul-Zuha or a continuous Eiduzzuha. Just like we read
Farid-al-din as Fariduddin and Moin-al-din as Moinuddin. Let’s stick to that
please. This one is a little too personal. I have no desire to be known as
Nizam-al-din Pasha (which is how it’s spelt in Arabic ad Urdu. by the way).
Mohammad
Nizamuddin Pasha is a Delhi-based lawyer.
Original
Headline: Why Animal Sacrifice on Eid-ul-Zuha is an Indispensable Part of Islam
Source: The Wire
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-culture/precept-animal-sacrifice-eid-ul/d/122589