Blood Dues

Legs and arms and body and bone I pay in blood, but not my own.

― Bob Dylan

Though I'm all in, the willful ignorance of many involved in Black Lives Matter leads me to wonder, if guilt is collective, can't innocence be, as well?

Please stick with me a moment.

As the Bible made clear, the Israelites had zero tolerance for crime. 

A criminal automatically incurred blood guilt, guilt that dogged not only the perp, but for generations his family, city, and nation, until the crime was paid for in blood.

But the Israelites weren't the only crazies running about the ancient world.

Up north, the Celts believed that fairies owed blood dues to their partner, the devil; principle and interest payable in blood every seven years. 

To make good on the debt, fairies kidnapped and killed innocent babes―usually on Halloween―always careful to leave a changeling behind, so unsuspecting parents wouldn't get wise.

And the Ancient Greeks, too, believed in blood dues, blood-payments owed by the gods' children for the havoc the gods wreaked on mankind.

In Germany, at the end of World War II, psychoanalyst Carl Jung introduced the idea that every citizen shared collective guilt for the Nazis' atrocities, an idea our occupation forces exploited.

Philosopher Karl Jaspers doubled down on Jung's idea, claiming atonement was impossible without "acknowledgment of national guilt.”

So, if guilt can be blood guilt, sharable across generations, what about innocence?

Is there no such thing as blood innocence? 

And if blood dues were paid by generations past, aren't the living descendants off the hook for their crimes?

You might say, sure, that's what the whole Christianity thing is about.

But, closer to home, I wonder whether the 1.1 million Americans killed or wounded in the Civil War might have paid in blood for the sin of slavery, leaving their descendants debt free. 

My cousin, six times removed, Michael Folliard, was a New Jersey cavalryman who was captured at Buckland Mills and died from scurvy six months later as a POW in Andersonville. He was only 21.

Is Michael's sacrifice not an emolument that descends to me and my family? 

Or have the six generations separating us erased his blood-payment forever and all time?

What do you think?

Note to readers: As a rule, links embedded in my posts provide sources and facts omitted for brevity's sake.