A common feature of ancient religions and really, the ancient world is human sacrifice. It does not matter what the place or who the people in question is, for paganism inevitably bifurcates along one of two paths- either to a search for the true God (which culminates in Christ and His revelations, which is why so many ancient peoples converted to Christianity when it was presented to them, for it explained the errors in their paganism that could not be answered), or it leads to a rejection of God and the manifestation of a darwinistic power struggle that is a reflection of hell, for as many a saint has noted throughout history, all of the various pagan “gods” are just demons under different names.
Hinduism is no exception to this rule, and for all of the talk about “culture” and nationhood, Hinduism is at its core a form of ancient Iranian paganism brought to India and imposed on the people there as a means of social control, and it involves human sacrifice when one pursues it to its natural end. While some practices are better known (such as suttee), it can involve things such as beheadings or other gruesome actions. Such an example of this recently took place in India, where the UK Daily Mail reports that a Hindu priest, seeking to end the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic that has devastated the world, ritually beheaded another man in a human sacrifice to the pagan Hindu ‘gods’.
A drunk 70-year-old priest decapitated a man as a sacrifice to end the coronavirus pandemic after smoking marijuana in India.
Sansari Ojha from the Brahmani Devi Temple under Narasinghpur police station in Cuttack cut off 52-year-old Saroj Kumar Pradhan’s head.
The Hindu priest from the Bandhahuda area in Odisha killed the man to appease a goddess, he claimed.
He beheaded Pradhan with an axe at 1am in the morning in the temple’s shrine after an argument.
Detective Ashish Kumar Singh said Ojha was heavily drunk at the time and surrendered to police the same day after coming to his senses.
e said Ojha claimed he was ordered by a goddess in his dream to sacrifice a human in order to bring an end to the pandemic.
Alok Ranjan Ray, Athagarh sub-divisional police officer, said: ‘The priest claimed that he saw a goddess in his dream and was asked to sacrifice a human’s life to bring an end to coronavirus.
‘Hence, to appease the goddess, he decapitated the man,’ he told Gulf News. (source)
Certainly, as the story notes, alcohol and drugs were central to his behaviors as also was his disagreements with the other man. It is very possible he used the excuse of a “sacrifice” to Hindu dieties as an excuse for his own bad actions because of personal grievances. While one can debate either position, the general point is that the concept of human sacrifice in Hinduism is something that is too often overlooked and not given the attention it deserves.
India is rising in power, and as part of this attempt to assert herself on the world stage she is seeking to promote a religious revival in her nation. This is a very serious matter, for Hinduism is not only paganism that hates Christianity, but also cannot divest herself from the more gruesome aspects of the religion, such as human sacrifice.
There is a significant amount of human sacrifice in the name of Hinduism that goes on in India. Most of it seems to go underreported, and only comes up when a legal case such as this forces it to be exposed.
It will be interesting to see, as a trend, if this becomes a more prominent trend for the future, i.e. human sacrifice gains a sort of social legitimacy as a religious practice in the name of “culture” and “tolerance” in India. This would likely take time, but the potential for this to rise should not be ruled out.