Summarize the religious ceremony that Lenina and Bernard witness. What do you think the purpose of the ceremony is? Which religions does it seem to be based on?

Bernard and Lenina watch a ritual dance of sacrifice to the gods Pookong and Jesus, where a young man slowly proceeds around a pile of snakes in the center of the Pueblo square. While walking, the young man receives a whipping until he falls and dies. The other Indians worship a statue of a man on a cross and an eagle. The tribal dance shows that although their culture differs entirely from Bernard and Lenina’s, it is also imperfect because it too enforces the suppression of emotion. The tribe worships a hybrid of Pookong and Jesus as their deity, which shows how the Indian culture fuses religion and superstition.