Comment by Owl Do you have a Swiss Card? Owl was presented with one by a student after joking that he, being Swiss, must be carrying a Swiss Army knife. He was. The gift, a credit-card-sized flat version, ingeniously incorporates miniaturised useful tools: toothpick, tweezers, pen, scissors, and a sharp knife, excellent for peeling an apple in inconvenient circumstances.
On the plastic casing are mini-rulers by which the knife blade can be measured: 4cm or 11/2 ins. The Card fits snugly into my wallet, the one in my handluggage. Oops! Yet disturbingly Owl’s Card has travelled undetected on baggage checks, flight after international flight. So full marks to Ryanair, who presented the ultimatum: ‘that knife, those miniscissors – in the hold, or in the bin’.
What then about the kirpan, the symbolic curved blade worn as an article of faith by observant Sikhs?
Googling kirpan airport security certainly opens a fat can of worms, currently the subject of more and deeper debate, not to mention litigation, than jewellery crosses or adolescent ‘chastity’ rings. One earlier entry was spot on the topic: The Panthic Weekly reported that on 13th March 2005 the Director of United Sikhs, Mejindarpal Kaur, was prevented from wearing her kirpan when travelling by Eurostar from Brussels, whereas in London she’d had no problem with this ‘ceremonial’ item. Cruelly, the official who detained her remarked in a throwaway moment that the Swiss Army knife (real, not the card version) was allowed on Eurostar by the Belgians, ‘because of the way it’s made’ – though Victorinox, the manufacturer, is also authorised to make kirpans. ‘Symbol’ is a concept found in every analysis of human behaviour, but we’re used to symbols sitting about quietly, happy to be pinned on, emblazoned, waved or celebrated in song. Even twodimensional symbols can, of course, spell danger, as history has proved. Seeing the original of Dali’s The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus has made me uneasy ever since about singing Lift High the Cross, even with the purest of intent.
The combination of flying fears and the Sikh sword, however, is exercising rulemakers and rule-observers worldwide in an unprecedented way. Some Sikhs are willing to compromise by packing their ‘normal’ kirpan in their suitcase and wearing a miniature ‘travel’ version. But how small is safe? Authorities can’t agree.
I daren’t google ‘fetish’ in case the morals police ever find my computer. But Conference-goers will recall that grandfather Don Cupitt reflected interestingly the other day on the sheer power of the comfort-blanket, or the snotcovered toy dog, from which the child will not be parted. Perhaps as adults we currently face a moral imperative to cut back on our symbols, just as we’re exhorted to cut back on our attachment to and consumption of ‘real’ materials. An odd thought. We realise we have to economise on the luxury of symbols in times of war, flood, any crisis. Our holy objects get packed away. So how much do we really need them? Devoid of symbols, by necessity or choice, we fall back on the ‘performative utterance’. It is perfectly possible to say: ‘With absolutely nothing I thee wed’ and still be married, maybe even to be baptised without water or flame. ‘In the name of . . .’ – the spoken formula – should do it. Yet people, ‘spiritual’ people, still cling to things.
As we go to press, poor Shambo, the consumptive bullock, sad-eyed symbol of something profound to his mourners, wrested from them, rests in peace, no longer a perceived threat to man or beast. Words fail?