William Shakespeare’s famous play, “Merchant Of Venice” is amazingly still pertinent in the modern context, despite being crafted centuries long before and yet we are amazed to comprehend his unique capacity of understanding human faculty. Precisely, when a character of the play, Bassanio visited Shylock for borrowing money, who was a moneylender, and invited him to dine with him, Shylock resolutely refused, citing the food habit contrary to him. Being a Jew, he was opposed to Christian’s food habit and he resorted to an alibi, being ignorant of the livelihood of the people and undermined it, not exactly knowing perhaps, that animal rearing was the only profession human first resorted to out of nature’s endowment.
But the hard reality to date is, people do believe that eating habits largely determine one’s behavior and it can cause harm to a section of people who do not align with the same food habit. No longer they are in a frame of mind to understand the history of peoples food habit and how it has changed in the passage of time. Superstitions and cultural practices which are being navigated to serve the interests of merely few have changed the whole narrative of religious texture, making it vile for many and facilitate few to overbear many out of their nefarious ploy which they successfully capable to craft and forced many to follow.
Surprisingly, across the world, even today, when a fatal pandemic is taking toll of numerous life, still religious fanaticism and bigotry are eclipsing the majority, and they tend to justify that the killing of people out of his food habit is no longer a crime and not an act against humanity! Poor victims, who are of different religions are being forced to conclude that their untimely death to being their destiny!
I wonder, still after so many advancements of science, which has unveiled us the truth, yet forced to take a backseat and allowing religion to become predominant! Shylock was no longer a representative of the ordinary mass in Shakespeare’s play. He was from the business community. But he symbolizes the common mass too out of the prevailing impulses of the majority who were largely dominated and dictated by the religious dogmas.
All religions across the world having an objective with singularity to do betterment for mankind. Surprisingly, in the passage of time, it has become the only weapon to dominate and subjugate poor masses, infusing them to entangle war among themselves. The poor majority are utterly confused about who is their enemy and why they are consistently becoming victims, being used as cannon fodder only to facilitate a few privileged, who are capable to eclipse them with false prejudices and beliefs to amass huge wealth for themselves only. Even in the case of the “Merchant Of Venice” of Shakespeare, the play is concluded with the confiscating wealth of Shylock out of sheer religious persecution!
Despite the substantial development in the field of science and technology, still we are largely engulfed by religious doctrine, which we consider as the only solace! Sadly the truth being eclipsed with false propaganda largely disseminated with its utmost strength to hoodwink the majority and still vigorously prevailing in the society we are dwelling.
We are now fully aware that food habit is primarily dictated by the geography and topography of a place. The external conditions largely influence us and accordingly, we are habituated to sustain and enjoy our livelihood.
But religion is like a sword with its both sharp sides and sadly it is cutting and shedding blood for myriad who are innocents. Before the innocent majority could comprehend the heinous devise of few to annihilate many to only establish their hegemony, the nefarious few are consistently resorting to numerous ploy to hoodwink the majority and by all means, they are supporting all religious fanatics across the globe to sustain and carry their network only to ensure the few for their profits and wealth.
Even today, when the advancement of science and technology reached its zenith, just because of different food habits, we are still tending to kill people? We are resorting to religion and justifying our misdeeds?
I once more need to resort to Shakespeare’s play “Merchant Of Venice”, where ultimately merchants are only focusing on wealth and profits of their own. But, if they tend to ignore the mass continuously and their exploit their innocent’s beliefs, what would be the eventual destination of mankind? The continuous oppression and atrocity will lead inevitably to a path where bloodshed and agony will equally become a consistent tune and cause huge detriment to mankind. “History repeats itself” is a common adage we usually come across. But we must not forget that if the first one is “Comedy” then the subsequent one will be surely “Tragedy”, enabling the so-called “Merchant Community” to go into oblivion perpetually.
I guess, no religion can save the merchant community as they religiously follow their nefarious traits to garner wealth and profits only, hardly caring about the welfare of the majority. Lastly, I strongly feel the pertinence of another common adage that, “If wishes were horses, then beggars would ride”, and we can comfortably concur what could be the fate of such poor beggars!
