Free Ardor by Roberto Calasso Page B

this upheaval was the sacrifice, in its many forms. Nothing else can explain why such uncharacteristic behavior, in comparison with anything else in the animal kingdom, occurred more or less everywhere, in a wide variety of forms but invariably sharing certain essential features. The sacrifice, before it assumed any other meaning, was a response to that immense upheaval within the species—and an attempt to redress a balance that had been upset and violated forever.
    Only in this way can sacrifice be understood: not just a way of covering up guilt, a pia fraus that enables the world to continue thanks to priestly stratagem. But a daring speculation that above all exalts guilt. It exalts it to the point of persuading the victim to become favorably disposed to being immolated. This, obviously, is not what happens. No one imagines that the goat or the horse let themselves be persuaded to be killed and butchered. None of the ritualists could have believed that. But to carry out a gesture in that direction, to express words with that intention: this is the supreme effort granted to thought, granted to action, where we come face to face with the irreconcilable. An illusory, transitory attempt. And yet that conscious illusion is the only force that makes it possible to establish a distance, albeit minimal, from the plain act of killing.
    Nowhere else in antiquity (later the question would no longer be raised, since man was so convinced of his moral superiority) did anyone ever dare to suggest that animals originally walked upright and became four-legged only because they were terrified of something: of a solitary octagonal post, crowned with a bundle of grass to cover its bareness. The discovery of the post was not attributed to man, but to the gods, as if the post were indeed the axis mundi —and as if life were inconceivable without it. And yet the post is not enough: it forces animals to walk on four legs, in terror, but it does not persuade them to allow themselves to be slaughtered. The gods now had to propose a theological nicety: they explained to the animals that the sacrifice was an offer of “fire in fire.” Mysterious words: but the whole of the Ś atapatha Br ā hma ṇ a , and in particular the sections on the fire altar, is devoted to describing it. That “thunderbolt” which is the sacrificial post was therefore not enough. The terror was overcome, but the animals still did not yield. Theory, lofty liturgical speculation, then took over. Only then did the animals give in. Or at least it was said that the animals gave in.
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    The terror is not only in the animals. It is in man. As soon as he saw the appearance of the “post,” the y ū pa , man understood that he would have to kill those creatures who, until a moment before, were walking with him and by his side. He would have to take hold of the rope that is invariably tied to the post. It is a moment of paralysis. The liturgy then says: “Be bold, O man!” The man then continues, tries to be brave. Once again, he clings to theology: the knot his hands are already inadvertently preparing is none other than “the noose of world order.” As for the rope, it is “Varu ṇ a’s rope.” It is as if the gods themselves were acting. And with this the guilt is offloaded onto the gods. At the critical moment—the moment when the officiant ties the animal to the post—every part of his body is taken over by a god, limb for limb. Even the impulse that makes him act is attributed to Savit ṛ , who is the Impeller. So he says: “At the impulse of the divine Savit ṛ , I tie you with the arms of the A ś vins, with the hands of P ūṣ an, you who are liked by Agni and Soma.” The one who acts is like a sleepwalker. How can he be guilty?
    But nothing—not even the gods—is ever sufficient to offload the guilt. So a few moments later, the sacrificer will feel the need to ask the victim’s mother and father for permission to kill: “And may