Cheiraoba – A Meaningful New Year Feast

Fr. Paul Lelen Haokip *

Preparation for meal before Cheirao Ching Kaba on the occasion of Cheiraoba on April 13 2012 :: Pix - Banti Phurailatpam

Manipur recently witnessed the successful completion of its 10th Legislative Assembly Election on the 28th January 2012 with different political groups promising their own manifestos. If I am not mistaken, PEACE and CHANGE were the prime focus. Hope some of the noble manifestos come alive. The Election Commission of India (ECI) introduced a novel idea of photography of voters to identify and prevent commercial voters from casting proxy votes.

Life is cruel like the drudgery of those in slavery, boring as with the work of a hireling and swifter than a weaver's shuttle that moves quickly back and forth in ceaseless activity. The days of work and the nights of worry are all too long. Life is so without substance as to be like the wind. At the back drop of these stark realities, the celebration of New Year is still a godsend for our day.

Every morning when a Manipuri Hindu wife worships God in her portico/sumang with her choicest flower petals and the incense, the day opens with a hope for good. Each sunrise seems to roll a day of sanguinity without any certainty if one would end the day well. We live in a society where sickness is scorned, poverty is considered a crime, richness is extolled and the old are asked "What good are you now?"

Can a day like Cheiraoba be still meaningful? When Manipur reels under two sad notes of militanism and absence of peace, a day of celebration is fit. Instead of being locked up in our broken situation, it is heartening to see throngs of people flooding the markets to buy themselves or present something new to friends and relatives. Cheiraoba is not a pharmacological prescription to lift up our spirits but it rejuvenates our bones and marrows anyway.

IS CHEIRAOBA A DAY OF BLESSING?

Yearly, the 1st day of January is celebrated as the first day of the civil year. It's an occasion to look back on the past and wish each other well for the year to come. Actually, the extension of wishes for a "Happy New Year" goes back to the religious notion of blessing. A blessing in this sense is the verbal expression of a wish that good befall someone. As with a curse, it rests on a belief in the power of words – the power of a blessing to give life and happiness, and the power of a curse to bring misery and death. This is not to be confused with superstition or magic. Blessings come truly from God.

Blessing first recognizes people's dependence on God. Secondly, it wishes that God gives the blessing's recipients a sign of divine pleasure. Thirdly, it wishes "peace", that precious gift of not only internal tranquility, but of prosperity and happiness as well. People who celebrate or meet on Cheiraoba wish each other the compliments of the day. I hope this wish is to deliver good and throw out the bad with the ugly.

What has become known as the Irish Blessing is particularly beautiful "May the road rise to meet you. May the wind be always at your back. May the sunshine warm your face and the rain fall softly upon your fields. And until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hand."

DIFFERENT NEW YEAR CELEBRATIONS

Other people have devised their own New Year customs and timing. Rosh Hashanah for the Jews, around September or October, is a time of self-examination and penance that commemorates the creation of the world and the Jews' responsibilities to God. Scholars are not in agreement about whether the calendars used by the Jews before the Babylonian captivity were solar (based on the return of the same relative position between the sun and the earth) or lunisolar (based on months that corresponded to the cycle of the moon, with periodic additional months to bring the calendar back into agreement with the solar cycle) like the present-day Hebrew calendar.

The first month of the year was called Aviv, meaning the month of green ears of grain. It thus occurred in the spring. At about the time of the Babylonian captivity (587 BCE), the Jews adopted as the name for the month the term Nisan, based on the Babylonian name Nisanu. Thomas J Talley says that the adoption of the Babylonian term occurred even before the captivity. In the earlier calendar, most of the months were simply called by a number (such as "the fifth month").

Chinese New Year's Day (Tet) is celebrated in February or March; it is a time of great partying and firework displays. The Chinese symbolize their blessing, usually for long life and happiness, with the red and green colours that you see in all the Chinatowns of the world.

Western tradition, New Year's Day has not always been January 1st. The name of our months indicate that the year used to begin on March 1st. March means 'start/begin/proceed steadily'. September means the seventh month, October - the eighth month, November - the ninth month and December - the tenth month. We still add compensatory days during leap year in February, because originally that was the last month of the year.

In the book of Genesis, God sent the flood to destroy the evil age and permit a New Beginning with a New Creation. God's covenant with Noah assured humanity a future. 'And this' God said, 'is the sign of covenant which I now make between myself and you and every living creature with you for all ages to come. I now sent my bow (rainbow) in the clouds and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.'

Whatever we celebrate and whatever our customs, the key focus is NEWNESS – a time when we psychologically and spiritually put the old to rest and start afresh. The Manipuris celebrate this day with pomp and gaiety. Fittingly enough! New dress, well decorated self and lots of new fruits and colourful items to eat. So CHEIRAOBA is actually a day of renewal for Hindus, Christians and Muslims as well if we can grasp the concept and the implications it adheres to.

CHEIROABA vis-à-vis EASTER

While Cheiraoba is largely celebrated as the New Year Feast by the Vaishnavite Hindus of Manipur, the Christians (2.1 billion) all over the world celebrate Easter as a feast of Newness and change. The Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates Feast of Pascha (Easter) as the Feast of Feasts. The nature itself unfolds its beauty of spring season and the environment is teemed with life. Christmas and Easter are the two most important feasts of all Christians.

For some, the word "Easter" comes from the name "Isthtar" the goddess of spring in Babylonia. She was identified with the planet Venus which rises before the Sun or sets after it giving the impression that she loves the light. In Phoenicia, she became "Astarte" and in Germany, "Ostara" coming from the German word "Ost" meaning "East."

Thus the word EASTER derives from an Old German root, "ostern" for 'dawn' or 'east', which is the time and place of the rising sun. The celebration of Easter navigates us through the Season of Spring to enthuse us to walk the murky life in Manipur.

Bhagavad Geeta 10.8 reads "I am the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me. The wise who perfectly know this engage in My devotional service and worships Me with all their hearts."

Cheiroaba is a feast of spring, a renewal in life, freshness in nature and an appreciation to God for his creation. It is worth the celebration. This meaning filled feast also invites us to preserve and promote life at all stages. May this feast bring Meaningful Newness and Constructive Change in the hearts of the denizens in Sanaleipak.