Legal Brief: Animal Sacrifice
“Brief Regarding Animal
Sacrifice”
CLBA Journal 2001-05
Author: Oba Ernesto Pichardo
The purpose of this presentation
is to provide references regarding religious animal sacrifice based on Supreme
Court of the United States no. 91-948, 1993 ruling, in favor of petitioner
Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye and Ernesto Pichardo v. City of Hialeah.
Statement of Facts from the Church
The Church and its members practice an ancient African religion variously known as Ayoba, Yoruba, Santeria, Regla de Ocha, or Lukumi. Yoruba originated at least five thousand years ago in the country of Nigeria. It arrived in the island of Cuba with slavery and to the United States with refugees from the Cuban revolution. Santeria and Regla de Ocha are Cuban misnomers for the religion. There are an estimated one million adherents and ordained priest members in the United States. Estimates from Cuba range between 75 to 78% of the approximate 11.5 million population that are members of African based religions. Catholic statistics claim 40% of the total population is baptized. However, this is no measurement for active membership in the Catholic faith, many are simply nominal Catholics at best, while others have renounced membership and are members of Lukumi.
General Description of Priesthood
1. Oluwo: Male ordained to the priesthood of his patron divinity and further ordained to the order of Ifa.
2. Babalawo: Male not ordained to his patron divinity and ordained to the order of Ifa.
3. Iyanifa: Female ordained to her patron divinity and ordained in the order of Ifa.
4. Apetebi: Female ordained to her patron divinity and serves the Ifa order.
5. Oriate: Male or female ordained to his or her patron divinity and master of orisha ordination rites, central dogma, rites of passage, all major ceremonies. Description for this level is as follows: Oga Ogo Oriate; Oba/Italero; Akilakua; Alakisa.
6. Alagba/Alagba lagba: Male or female seniors ranked by priesthood years and numbers of performed ordinations.
7. Babalosha: Male ordained to his patron divinity and has ordained others.
8. Iyalosha: Female ordained to her patron divinity and has ordained others.
9. Ojigbona: Male or Female, ordained, that serve as secondary elders.
10. Olosha: Male or female ordained to their respective patron divinity.
11. Iyawo: Male or female newly ordained to their respective patron divinity.
12. Aboku: Male or Female in early stages of being ordained to their patron divinity.
General Description of Adherents
1. Omorisha: Male or female that is baptized in Lukumi and has partial ordination.
2. Aborisha: Male or female that has been Lukumi baptized constituting membership.
3. Abofaka: Male that has been baptized and has received the divinity Orunmila.
4. Ikofa: Female that has been baptized and has received the divinity Orunmila.
All stipulated forms of membership are accepted based on divine instruction independent from human free will. There is no limitation of age, gender, race, or ethnicity.
Animal Sacrifice
An integral part of Lukumi is animal offerings of chicken, rooster, hen, guinea fowl, pigeon, dove, quail, turtle, goat, ram, and sheep. Animals are offered for birth, marriage, and death rites, for the cure of physical and spiritual malady, for the priesthood ordination of new members, the consecration of objects, and for annual celebration. The faith could not survive without animal offering, because the offering is essential to the ordination of new priests and consecration of objects. Specialized trained priests’ perform animal offerings whereby an animal’s carotid arteries are suddenly severed with a sharp ritual knife in accordance with religious methodology. Communion is established through the consumption of the prepared and cooked animal meat, with exception to rituals for the cure of physical and spiritual malady. Unlike Jewish kosher purposes, the animals do not have a commercial use.
“The practice of animal offering, though contrary to the religious convictions of some, is an ancient, long-standing, well-established, sincere religious practice. The Church practice is not dissimilar to practices ordained for the people of Israel by the Holy Bible and the people of Islam by the Koran, although the underlying theological bases for the practices are different.”
References used in the Case
Leviticus 1-7 (the requirements in Torah for animal sacrifice; I Kings*:62-66 (animal sacrifice at the dedication of Solomon’s temple); see Roland deVaux, Ancient Israel: Its life and Institutions 415-23 (1961); Studies in Old Testament Sacrifice (1964); Gaster, “ Sacrifices and Offerings, OT,” 4 Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible 147-59 (1962) collecting and discussing Biblical text referring to animal sacrifice; see Day, Sacrifice, 14 Encyclopedia Judaica 614-15 (1971). In the Islamic faith the festival known as Id al-Adha; Qur’an 37:102; see Glasse, Id al-adha, Sacrifice, The Concise Encyclopedia of Islam 178-340 (1989); Schimmel, Islamic Religious Year, 7 Encyclopedia of Religion 456 (Mircea Eliade ed. 1987); see Federal Humane Slaughter Act of 1958, (7 U.S.C. 1902 (b)), that recognizes the Jewish shehitah method as complying with federal public policy; see Jones v. Butz 374 F. Supp. 1284 (S.D.N.Y.), aff’d, 419 U.S. 806 (1974); See Lewin, Munk & Berman, Religious Freedom: The Right to Practice Shehitah, pp. 15, 73-77 (1946).
“Theological developments make many in the Christian and Jewish faiths reluctant to defend a practice today that is so foreign to their own doctrines. But the sensibilities of the majority are no test of religious truth, and members of minority religions have not less right to practice their faith merely because others recoil from it” (page 6-7, Supreme Court of the United States October term, 1991 no.91-948 (Supreme Court ruling 1993), Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye and Ernesto Pichardo (petitioners) v. City of Hialeah, On Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, Brief Amicus Curiae Of Americans United For Separation of Church and State, General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, Christian Legal Society, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Evangelical Lutheran Church In America, First Liberty Institute, General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, Home School Legal Defense Association, Mennonite Central Committee, National Association Of Evangelicals, People For the American Way, In Support of Petitioners.
Statement of Facts from the Church
The Church and its members practice an ancient African religion variously known as Ayoba, Yoruba, Santeria, Regla de Ocha, or Lukumi. Yoruba originated at least five thousand years ago in the country of Nigeria. It arrived in the island of Cuba with slavery and to the United States with refugees from the Cuban revolution. Santeria and Regla de Ocha are Cuban misnomers for the religion. There are an estimated one million adherents and ordained priest members in the United States. Estimates from Cuba range between 75 to 78% of the approximate 11.5 million population that are members of African based religions. Catholic statistics claim 40% of the total population is baptized. However, this is no measurement for active membership in the Catholic faith, many are simply nominal Catholics at best, while others have renounced membership and are members of Lukumi.
General Description of Priesthood
1. Oluwo: Male ordained to the priesthood of his patron divinity and further ordained to the order of Ifa.
2. Babalawo: Male not ordained to his patron divinity and ordained to the order of Ifa.
3. Iyanifa: Female ordained to her patron divinity and ordained in the order of Ifa.
4. Apetebi: Female ordained to her patron divinity and serves the Ifa order.
5. Oriate: Male or female ordained to his or her patron divinity and master of orisha ordination rites, central dogma, rites of passage, all major ceremonies. Description for this level is as follows: Oga Ogo Oriate; Oba/Italero; Akilakua; Alakisa.
6. Alagba/Alagba lagba: Male or female seniors ranked by priesthood years and numbers of performed ordinations.
7. Babalosha: Male ordained to his patron divinity and has ordained others.
8. Iyalosha: Female ordained to her patron divinity and has ordained others.
9. Ojigbona: Male or Female, ordained, that serve as secondary elders.
10. Olosha: Male or female ordained to their respective patron divinity.
11. Iyawo: Male or female newly ordained to their respective patron divinity.
12. Aboku: Male or Female in early stages of being ordained to their patron divinity.
General Description of Adherents
1. Omorisha: Male or female that is baptized in Lukumi and has partial ordination.
2. Aborisha: Male or female that has been Lukumi baptized constituting membership.
3. Abofaka: Male that has been baptized and has received the divinity Orunmila.
4. Ikofa: Female that has been baptized and has received the divinity Orunmila.
All stipulated forms of membership are accepted based on divine instruction independent from human free will. There is no limitation of age, gender, race, or ethnicity.
Animal Sacrifice
An integral part of Lukumi is animal offerings of chicken, rooster, hen, guinea fowl, pigeon, dove, quail, turtle, goat, ram, and sheep. Animals are offered for birth, marriage, and death rites, for the cure of physical and spiritual malady, for the priesthood ordination of new members, the consecration of objects, and for annual celebration. The faith could not survive without animal offering, because the offering is essential to the ordination of new priests and consecration of objects. Specialized trained priests’ perform animal offerings whereby an animal’s carotid arteries are suddenly severed with a sharp ritual knife in accordance with religious methodology. Communion is established through the consumption of the prepared and cooked animal meat, with exception to rituals for the cure of physical and spiritual malady. Unlike Jewish kosher purposes, the animals do not have a commercial use.
“The practice of animal offering, though contrary to the religious convictions of some, is an ancient, long-standing, well-established, sincere religious practice. The Church practice is not dissimilar to practices ordained for the people of Israel by the Holy Bible and the people of Islam by the Koran, although the underlying theological bases for the practices are different.”
References used in the Case
Leviticus 1-7 (the requirements in Torah for animal sacrifice; I Kings*:62-66 (animal sacrifice at the dedication of Solomon’s temple); see Roland deVaux, Ancient Israel: Its life and Institutions 415-23 (1961); Studies in Old Testament Sacrifice (1964); Gaster, “ Sacrifices and Offerings, OT,” 4 Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible 147-59 (1962) collecting and discussing Biblical text referring to animal sacrifice; see Day, Sacrifice, 14 Encyclopedia Judaica 614-15 (1971). In the Islamic faith the festival known as Id al-Adha; Qur’an 37:102; see Glasse, Id al-adha, Sacrifice, The Concise Encyclopedia of Islam 178-340 (1989); Schimmel, Islamic Religious Year, 7 Encyclopedia of Religion 456 (Mircea Eliade ed. 1987); see Federal Humane Slaughter Act of 1958, (7 U.S.C. 1902 (b)), that recognizes the Jewish shehitah method as complying with federal public policy; see Jones v. Butz 374 F. Supp. 1284 (S.D.N.Y.), aff’d, 419 U.S. 806 (1974); See Lewin, Munk & Berman, Religious Freedom: The Right to Practice Shehitah, pp. 15, 73-77 (1946).
“Theological developments make many in the Christian and Jewish faiths reluctant to defend a practice today that is so foreign to their own doctrines. But the sensibilities of the majority are no test of religious truth, and members of minority religions have not less right to practice their faith merely because others recoil from it” (page 6-7, Supreme Court of the United States October term, 1991 no.91-948 (Supreme Court ruling 1993), Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye and Ernesto Pichardo (petitioners) v. City of Hialeah, On Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, Brief Amicus Curiae Of Americans United For Separation of Church and State, General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, Christian Legal Society, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Evangelical Lutheran Church In America, First Liberty Institute, General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, Home School Legal Defense Association, Mennonite Central Committee, National Association Of Evangelicals, People For the American Way, In Support of Petitioners.
