According to popular Islam, there is a "narrow bridge" that all must cross is they wish to get to Paradise and receive Al'lah's mercy. From what I can gather from the Qur'an and from other Muslims, this mercy is based upon what Muslims do to prove themselves faithful (the "five pillars": Ramadan fasting, daily ritual prayer, almsgiving, confession of their monotheistic faith, and pilgrimage to Mecca) and what they do to please Al'lah. One thing many people believe is that a way across this narrow bridge includes animal sacrifice. The sacrificed animal will carry you on its back across the bridge, and so you will safely make it across.
For the holiday, Muslims will purchase either a "large-headed" animal (cows and camels) or a "small-headed" one (rams and goats). All I've seen here are rams, althought I've seen what I think are cow legs on the ground. Then, while holding the animal's head to the ground facing Mecca, its throat is slit, and its meat is cut up and given to families who've purchased it. At least one-third of the meat is to be given to the poor and needy, much like during the Ramadan fasting.
At Christmastime I was talking about candy canes with a friend of mine here. I told him how the thick red stripe represents Jesus' shed blood, and the stripes are the whipmarks, a constant reminder that Jesus came into this world not only to preach the kingdom of God, but also to be a kurban, a lamb slaughtered to bear our pains and bring us healing:
Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
And our sorrows He carried;
Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten of God and afflicted.
But He was pierced through for our transgressions,
He was crushed for our iniquities;
The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,
And by His scourging we are healed.
All of us like sheep have gone astray,
Each of us to his own way;
But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all
To fall on Him. (Isaiah 53.4-6)
"Blood? That's disgusting! How can you give candy canes to children?" The cross will always be a stumbling block. "Well, isn't the Sacrifice Festival awful bloody?" "Yes, but we don't let little children watch it, and it's not a human."
Isaac laboring up Mount Moriah, bearing the wood for the sacrificial pyre upon his back ... His father willing to bring down the knife on his only son ... An innocent Jewish rabbi laboring up Skull Hill, bearing his wooden cross ... His Father, no substitute ram in sight this time, putting to death his only Son ...
* * *
"Now [Caiaphas] did not say this on his own initiative, but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but in order that He might also gather together into one the children of God who are scattered abroad" (John 11.51-52).
How on Earth can Islam claim to be the final revelation of God for all peoples? Goats, camels, rams, and sheep don't live everywhere on the earth. How can the natives of Borneo or the Pacific Northwest obtain such animals to please Al'lah and cross the bridge? How can they make the hajj to Mecca? I don't care what they try to say, Islam is a religion which, in its purest expression, is geographically limited. God destroyed Jerusalem in A.D. 70 to prove that his kingdom would not be only for the Jews, but rather for all the nations of the world. The gospel knows no geographical or ethnic boundaries, for the risen Christ is Lord over the whole world, not a local moon-god like Al'lah (hence the crescent as the symbol of Islam). Praise God for his mercy upon the world.
1 comment:
Thank you for posting the pictures. What captures my attention is the blood - wasted blood - a caricature of the original, which was, at best, a shadow of what was to come. How incredibly sad that they miss the whole point.
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