When Prometheus fashioned the first man out of clay and stole fire from the gods to give to mankind, he was punished by Zeus by being chained to a rock where an eagle came every day to feed on his liver. A gruesome fate for a hero who was in time adopted by Christian writers as a prefiguration of Christ; however the story does not end there. He was eventually rescued by Hercules, who epitomises both the human and divine.

Man and fire have had a long and equivocal relationship. Since Prometheus, man has used the gift of fire for purposes that are both good and evil in equal measure. Fire consumes and purifies, it warms but it also destroys. No doubt the all-knowing Olympians knew how dangerous the gift of fire was when put into the hands of mere weak and febrile mortals and how fire, in capricious human hands, could be used against them threatening the very essence of their divinity.

When fire is used as a terrorist weapon as it has been in Malta of late, it cannot be dismissed as just another arson attack but is simply an attempted murder. Nobody who attacks with an element as volatile as fire can be exonerated from this. There is no control over fire once it has started to spread with the blithest of winds and fed with petrol and rubber tyres. This is why it is essential that the arson attacks must be treated as attempted murders no less. Had we now attended, God forbid, the funerals of Saviour and Ebba Balzan, Peter and Daphne Caruana Galizia and their three young sons, unparalleled tragedies had not Providence decreed otherwise, we would not have been so lackadaisical about what is becoming a deadly menace.

We are told that the investigations have reached a delicate stage. Interesting when a letter appearing in this newspaper clearly stated that the arsonists should not be attacking the Jesuits but all those journalists who attack the Church; even more interesting when the fascist websites and other blog sites like Maltafly carry such hatred and viciousness for people who speak their mind in print. For people like these free speech is a mere cipher. The fact that these writers are anonymous, hiding under pseudonyms that have the same "liberating" effect as masks, allows them to vent their spleen in the most spine-chilling way.

Now that the threats have been translated into action do the authorities and the police need a human sacrifice to take the matter seriously once and for all? The abuse of fire is a crime. The magi, devout Zoroastrians, worshipped it and would never allow it to be contaminated, still less used as a deadly weapon. This backhanded gift of the gods has also been our curse as man, in time-honoured fashion, has tried to play god by abusing the power of fire. Fire consumes and annihilates and, as such, becomes a weapon that is the ultimate symbol of hatred and despair; hell!

I find it odd indeed that while many people seem to dislike and disagree with what journalists report and columnists opine they do not use their own right to free speech and use the newspapers to state what they think and why they disagree. Malta is a democracy and free speech is entrenched in our Constitution. It is only when free speech is abused that it becomes subversive. This is why there are editors, editorial boards and, if necessary, legal counsellors who can determine whether an article can be deemed as libellous or over-provocative. Instead, these people prefer to use the blog sites on the internet and feel they can be as provocative and subversive as they like because of the site's anonymity. Reading these blogs has the same sickening effect of reading an anonymous letter. While the sender is nothing but a bully and a coward s/he is capable of great malice and we now know that what is said can, in the twinkling of an eye, be translated into action; action that all but crippled Yves Mbotu, an 18-year-old Congolese who was run over deliberately last week outside the Marsa open centre. It is not the first time that I have received an e-mail where the sender disagreed with what I stated in my column. I make it a point to reply to all my e-mails and have always, with punctilious courtesy, debated the point.

At times I have even apologised when I realised that I may have been unclear about something. I am not proud or vain and I know that I am as liable to make mistakes as everyone else is. Insult and abuse is as foreign to my nature as trying to make a cow lay an egg.

I sometimes am at a loss as to why I write this column in the first place. The fact that it keeps me on my toes and stimulates the grey cells is what immediately comes to mind. The assurances of people who tell me that they enjoy reading it come second. Anybody who creates needs feedback. One cannot live in a solitary hiatus; whether one paints, writes or composes, what is created must be viewed, read or listened to by "the public". It is they who are the ultimate critics. When people literally stop me in the street to tell me how much they enjoy reading me and how they look forward to Tuesdays, that appreciation alone, besides making me blush violently, becomes the fuel that helps me carry on.

There are columnists of far greater clout than I, of far greater intelligence than mine, of far greater erudition than mine, whose columns are of far greater readability and whose way with words is nothing short of fascinating. Possibly the difference may be that I write from the heart and I am just a simple man in the street who was taught to write well by teachers to whom I owe a great deal of gratitude. This is why I fail to understand why journalists have become such a target and why there is a section of Malta that wishes to put an end to free speech at all costs; even murder!

I forget who said that "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" but it appears that there are those who violently dislike opinions other than their own and are afraid; afraid of constant reminders that we are Christians with moral responsibilities and obligations and who, for reasons best known to themselves, perniciously foment fear of the unknown, fear of the new and fear of change, that life, inevitably and inexorably, brings with it; a cold-blooded tactic that has in our sad and fraught history brought even more misery and sorrow to an already troubled world than it deserves.

kzt@onvol.net

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