The new moon signifies the return to a clean slate. With no imperfections (like an incomplete lunar phase) or a perfection like the round full moon to possibly taint, the few nights of a new moon are used as a time for repentance for sins and transgressions. The nights of the full moon are seen as too sacred and perfect to confess imperfect sins during it, so the new moon is generally meant to be more of a relaxed affair that allows for more tolerance across the different castes of the Balady. This three day period, like clockwork, is treated more like a period of observance rather than one concrete event.

 

Much like the shutting of an eye, the priests say that the new moon is the only time the gods are not watching the balady’s every move and weeding out the sinful, so this is the best time to absolve yourself of wrongdoing. Young kits are taught to scrawl out their sins on scale-thin bark and soft leaves, and then bury their wrongdoings in the desert sand. When Balady cats grow, many still practice this tradition, but instead they couple it with a blood sacrifice of an already deceased prey animal. Pain from a blood sacrifice is seen as imperfect. 

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However, despite the supposed intention behind this quasi-ceremony, the higher ranks have twisted this tradition into a way to further cull dissent from lower classes. It has been a long-held belief that killing another Balady cat, even for the sake of punishment for a sin or sacrifice is far too close to murder for the gods to consider it perfect (sacrifice or sanctioned death is seen as an imperfect justice rather than an imperfect sin like murder). So, the judges use the new moon to perform executions. And only public executions are seen as legitimate.

 

Judges use the Balady gathering area, one of the most actively used areas in the Balady system, to perform them. 
 

If nothing else, the Balady is certainly washed clean during those times. With blood.