And now let us ask what will happen when savages who call themselves " men," are conquered by savages otherwise called, but proved by the conquest to have that supe- riority which in the primitive mind is equivalent to divi- nity? Clearly, the names of the conquering and conquered will become equivalent in their meanings to "gods and i DirriBS. 429 men/^ In some cases^ indeed^ tlie name bj which the conqnerors call themselves will necessitate this. Sonthey tells ns of the Tapis that '^ Tapa is their word for father^ for the Supreme Being, and for thunder; it passed by an easy process from the first of these meanings to the last^ and the barbarous vanity of some tribes compounded from it a name for themselves/' So that if these children of Tupa, which means '^ children of God/' subjugate a people whose name is equivalent to '' men^'' the distinction of the two as '' gods and men *' becomes inevitable.
With such evidence before us^ what shall we think about the " gods and men '' that figure in the legends of higher races? On reading in Nilsson's Stone Age that in Scandi- navia there are distinct traces of the antagonism of ab- original races to colonists, as early as the stQge and bronze periods; and on then reading in Scandinavian traditions about Odin^ Frey^ Niort^ and the rest^ coming from Gt^dheim (god's-home or land) to Menheim (men's-home or land); ruling there and being worshipped; dying there be- lieving that they were going back to Godheim, just as all primitive races believe that they return after death to &ther- land; we shall conclude that these ''gods and men'' were simply conquering and conquered races: all mythological interpretations notwithstanding. When we find that, as given by Pausanias, a popular legend among the Greeks was that the ancient Arcadians ''were guests and table-com- panions of the gods "; we shall not set this down as a pure fiction devised after the gods had been created by personal- izing the powers of nature; but shall infer that the tradition had its root in those conquests of earlier races by later implied in Hesiod — conquests such as must certainly have been going on^ and must certainly have left exaggerated narratives. So^ too^ with " the sons of god and the daugh- ters of men" in the Hebrew story. When we remem- ber the reprobation that has everywhere been visited on the intermarriage of a conquering caste and a subject 430 THB DATA OF SOCfOLOOT.
oaste — when we remember that in Greek belief it waa a transgression for the race of g^ods to fall in love with the race of men — ^when we remember that in onr own feudal times nnion of nobles with serfs was a crime; we shall haye little difficolty in seeing how there originated the story of the fall of the angels.
Any one who, after considering this evidence, remembers that from the names and natures ascribed by existing sayage peoples to Enropeans, legends of ** gods and men'' are even now arising, will, I think, scarcely hesitate. Remaining donbt will be further diminished by reading the legend of the Qnich^, which gives, with sufficient clearness, the story of an invading race who, seisdng an elevated region, and holding in terror the natives of the lower lands, became the deities of the surrounding country, and their mountain residence the local Olympus. (See Appendix A.)
§ 201. This brings us once more to the Aryan gods, as seen from another peint. of view. That we may judge which hypothesis best fits the facts, let us first observe how the early Ghreeks actually conceived their gods: ignoring wholly the question how they got their conceptions. And let us compare their pantheon with the pantheon of another race — say that of the Fijians.
The Greek god is everywhere presented to us under the guise of a powerful man; as is the Fijian. Among the Fijians, gods ^' sometimes assume the human form, and are thus seen by men ''; and how common was a like theophany among the Ghreeks, the lUad shows us page after page. So like a man was the Ghreek god, that special insight, super- naturally given, was required to distinguish him; and, as we have seen, it is difficult to find what is the difference between a god and a chief among the Fijians. In the Fijian pantheon there are grades and divided functions — a chief god, mediating gods, gods over different things and places: thus paralleling the Greek pantheon, which was a hierarchy DEITIES. 431 with a distribation of ranks and duties. Fijian deities may be classed into gods proper and deified mortals — some whose apotheosis has dropped out of memory and some whose apotheosis is remembered; and there were apotheosized mortals, too, among the Greek deities. A descriptiye title of one of the Fijian gods is "the Adulterer *' — ^a title applicable to sundry Greek gods. Another name is " the Woman-stealer^^ — a name not nndeserred by Zens. Yet a farther sobriquet borne by a Fijian god is " Fresh-from- slaughter"; which would answer for Ares, who is called " the Blood-stainer.'' The Fijian gods love and hate, are proud and revengeful, and make war, and kill and eat one another; and if we include the earlier generations of Greek gods, kindred atrocities are told of them. Though canni- bfidism is not a characteristic, still Poseidon loves his cannibal son Polyphemus; and though fighting among them does not remain conspicuous, still there is the conspi- racy from which Zeus was saved by Thetis; and there is perpetual squabbling and vituperation: even Zeus being vilified by his daughter Athene, as well as by the divine shrew Here. The Fijian gods play one another tricks, as did also the gods of the Greeks. Sometimes the Fijians " get angry with their deities and abuse and even challenge them to fight ^'; and among the Greeks, too, there was abuse of the gods even to their faces, as of Aphrodite by Helen, and if there was not challenging to fight, still there was fighting with, and even victory over, gods, as of Diomede over Ares, and there was threatening of gods, as when Laomedon refusing to pay Poseidon his wages, said he would cut off his ears. The Fijians have a story of gods who tumbled out of a canoe, and, being picked up by a woman, were taken to a chiefs house to dry themselves — ^a story against which we may set that of Dionysus, who, frightened by the Thracian Lycurgus, took refuge in the sea, and who when seized by pirates was carried bound on board their vessel. Though Dionysus imbound himself, we are reminded that in I 432 TBS DATA Of SOCIOLOGY.
other cases gods remamed subject to men; as was Proteus^ and as was eren Ares^ when Otos and Epbialtes kept him in prison thirteen months^ and as was Apollo when a slare to Laomedon. Thos^ however material and hnman are the Fijian gods^ living, eating, acting as men do; the gods of the Greeks are represented as no less material and human. They talk, and banquet, and drink, and amuse themselres during the day, and go to bed at sunset: " the Olympian thunderer, Zeus, went to his couch '^ and slept. They are pierced by men's weapons. Ares' wound is healed by a ^' pain-assuaging plaster ''; and Aphrodite, after some loss of blood and being distracted with pain, borrows her brother's chariot and drives off to Olympus to be similarly doctored. All their attributes and acts are in keeping with this conception. In battle Here simulates Stentor in appearance and voice; Apollo shouts from Per- gamns to exhort the Trojans; Iris comes ''running down from Olympus"; and the celestial chariots, made in earthly &8hion of earthly materials, are drawn by steeds that are lashed and goaded, through the gates of Heaven which creak. The single fact that Zeus is on visiting terms with ''the milk-fed men of Thrace," suffices of itself to show how little the divine was distinguished from the human; and how essentially parallel were the Qreek conceptions to the con- ceptions which the Fijians now show us.
Here, then, is the question. Similar as these conceptions are, were they similarly generated f Beyond all doubt the Fijian pantheon has arisen by that apotheosis of men which was still going on when travellers went among them; and if we say that by the Greeks, who also apotheosized men, a pantheon was generated in like manner, the interpretation is consistent. We are forbidden to suppose this, however. These Greek gods, with their human structures^ dispositions, acts, histories, resulted from the personalization of natural objects and powers. So that, marvellous to relate, identical conceptions have been produced by diametrically opposite DSITIES. 433 processes 1 Here we see an ascending growth of men into gods; there we see a descending condensation of natural powers into gods; and the two sets of gods, created by these two contrary methods, are substantially the same 1 Even in the absence of all the foregoing chapters, those who are not wedded to an hypothesis will, I think, say that evidence widely different in amount and quality from that which the mythologists offer, is required to demonstrate so astonishing a coincidence.
§ 202. Must we recognize a single exception to the general truth thus far verified everywhere? While among all races in all regions, from the earliest times down to the present, the conceptions of deities have been naturally evolved in the way shown; must we conclude that a small clan of the Semitic race had given to it supematurally, a conception which, though superficially like the rest, was in substance absolutely unlike them?
Education, the social sanction, and an authority made overwhelming by antiquity, numbers, and imposing creden- tials, lead nearly all to assume that the genesis of their own idea of deity differs fundamentally from the genesis of every other idea. So unhesitatingly, indeed, do they assume this, that they think it impious to ask whether any parallelism exists. In the case of another creed they can see the mis- chief that arises from refusal to examine. From the warning of Euripides that " in things which touch the gods it is not good to suffer captious reason to intrude,'' they will readily draw the moral that, in this case, a faith profound enough to negative criticism, fosters superstition. Still more on finding that the cannibal Fijians, accepting humbly the established dogmas respecting their blood-thirsty deities, assert that " punishment is sure to overtake the sceptic ''; they will see clearly enough, in another case, how vile may be the superstition which defends itself by interdicting inquiry. But, looking at the outsides of other creeds, 434 THB DATA Of SOCIOLOGY.
antagonisticaUy^ and at their own creed from within^ sympathetically, they cannot think it possible that in their case a kindred mischief may result from a kindred cause.
On reading that when the Spaniards arrived in Mexico, the natives, thinking them gods, offered up human beings to them, it is allowable to ask whether the ideas and motives of these people were analogous to those of the Scandinavian king On, when he immolated his son to Odin; but it is not allowable to ask whether like ideas and motives prompted Abraham's intention to sacrifice Isaac. The above-cited fact that Dr. Barth was taken by the Fulahs for their god. Fete, may properly raise the question whether, if there had arisen a quarrel between his party and the Fulahs in which he was worsted by one of their chiefs, there might not have grown op a legend akin to that which tells how the god Ares was worsted by Diomede; but it is highly improper to raise the question whether the story of Jacob's prolonged struggle with the Lord had aa origin of allied kind. Here, however, pursuing the methods of science, and disregarding foregone conclusions, we most deal with the Hebrew conception in the same manner as with all others; and must ask whether it had not a kindred genesis.
What was really the primitive Semitic notion of a deity, we may prepare ourselves for seeing by conteqiplating the notion of a deity which is entertained by wandering Semites at the present. time. Already I have quoted from Mr.
Palgrave one illustration of it; and here is another.
" * What will yon do on coming into God's presence for judgmenl after so graceless a life?' said I one day to a spirited young Sheravat. 4e 41 4e ' What will we do? ' was his unhesitating answer, ' why, we will go up to God and salute him, and if he proves hospitable (gives us meat and tobacco), we will stay with him; if otherwise, we wiU mount our horses and ride off.' * 4^ * Were I not afraid of an indictment for profaneness, I might relate fifty similar anecdotes at least."
Clearly, then, the existing Semitic idea of deity, is no higher ihan that which other races have shown us; and DXITIB8. 435 tbe question is^ whether the ancient Semites had an ddea. not only absolutely unlike that of all other races but abso- lutely unlike that of their modem kindred.
To find a clear and consistent answer in traditions put on record by different writers at different dates — ^traditions with which are incorporated stories and conceptions derived from adjacent more civilized peoples; is of course difficult. The difficulty necessarily existing^ is increased by the estab- lished habit of carrying back developed ideas to the in- terpretation of early statements; as by commentators who explain away certain highly concrete descriptions of divine actions as '^natural anthropomorphic langua^ suited to the teaching of man in a state of simple and partial civiliza- tion.'' If, however, we reject all non-natural interpretations; and, taking the narrative literally, infer, as analogy war- rants, that the most crudely anthropomorphic descriptions are the original ones, we shall find the difficulty less.
Abraham is described as doing that which primitive men, and especially nomads, are continually compelled to do by increase of numbers — leaving his kindred and migrating to a new dwelling-place:* separating, as he afterwards sepa- rated from Lot, to get pasturage. That he thinks himself superuaturally prompted, apparently by a vision, reminds us of the doings of the uncivilized at large, who habitually look for such signs. The new territory to which he mi- grates, the story represents as made over to him; and the question is — Was Abraham dealing with a terrestrial potentate, or with the Power by which planets gravitate and stars shine?
The words applied to this giver of the territory are expressive simply of superiority. Elohim, in some cases translated gods, is applied also to powerful persons, kings, judges, and to other things great or high. So, too, Adonai is indiscriminately used, (as " Lord '' is among ourselves) to a being regarded as supernatural and also to a living man. Kuenen gives as the meaning of Sliaddai, '^ ' the mighty one^' VF 2 486 THE DATA OF SOCIOLOGY.
or perhaps still more exactly^ ' the violent one * ^': a title harmonizing with those of Assyrian kings^ who delight in comparing themselves to whirlwinds and floods. Even the more exalted titles find their parallels in those of neigh- bouring ralers. When, in the caneiform inscriptions, we find Tiglath-pileser called ''king of kings, lord of lords,'' we see that there is nothing exceptional in the title ''god of gods, and lord of lords, a great god, a mighty and ter- rible ": a description which implies that the Hebrew god is one of many, distinguished by a supremacy.
By this being who bears titles such as are borne by ter- restrial potentates, Abraham is promised certain benefits to be given in return for homage. And when he complains, fearing that the promise would not be fulfilled, he is paci- fied by renewed promises. Finally, a definite covenant is made — ^an agreement by which Abraham is to have " all the land of Canaan,'' while the giver is "to be a god unto" him. The s apposition that such an agreement was entered into between the First Cause of things and a shepherd chief, would be an astounding one were it admissible; but it is excluded by the words used: the very expression " a god " clearly negatives the conception on either side of a supreme universal power. If, however, instead of sup- posing that '' a god " is here used to mean a supernatural being, we suppose that it is used, as by the existing Arab, to mean a powerful ruler, the statement becomes consistent.
Still more clearly have we the same implications in the ceremony by which the covenant is established. Abraham, and each of his male descendants, and each of his male slaves, is circumcised. The mark of the covenant, observe, is to be borne not only by Abraham and those of his blood, but also by those of other blood whom he has bought. The mark is a strange one, and the extension of it is a strange one, if we assume it to be imposed by the Creator of the Universe, as a mark on a favoured man and his descendants; and on this assumption it is no less strange that the one DEITIES. 437 tFansgression for which every '' soul shall be cut oS," is not any crime, but the neglect of this rite. Bat such a cere- mony insisted on by a living potentate under penalty of death, is not strange; for, as we shall hereafter see, cir- cumcision is one of various mutilations, imposed as marks on subject persons by terrestrial superiors.
And now, passing from collateral to direct evidence, ob- serve the idea which Abraham is himself represented as forming of this being with whom he has covenanted. While he sat at his tent door ''three men stood before him ": nothing implies that they were unlike other men or much unlike one another. He '' bowed himself toward the ground,'^ and addressed one of them "my lord.'' Ask- ing them to rest and to wash their feet, he invited them to ''comfort ye your hearts with a morsel of bread." So that, regarding them as tired, travel-stained, and hungry travellers, Abraham treats these " three men " according to those rites of hospitality still observed by the Arabs. There is no indication that Abraham suspects supematuralness in any of the three; nor,.when Sarah laughs at the promise that she shall have a son, does it seem that she, either, imagines she is in the presence of anything more than a human being. It is true that Abraham, addressing this visitor with the title given to superior persons, believes him able to do things we class as supernatural — ascribes to him the character common to primitive potentates, who are very generally magicians as well as rulers — ascribes to him powers such as are ascribed by savages to Europeans at the present time. But though, while showing him the road to Sodom, Abraham talks in a way implying this beUef, he implies no more. The ques- tion, mark, is not that which theologians raise — Who actually were these " three men "? was the chief of them Jehovah f or his angel? or the Son? The question is what Abraham thought, or is described as thinking by those who preserved the tradition. Either alternative has the same ultimate implication. If this person to whom Abraham 488 THE DATA OF BOCIOUOQY.
Balaams as bis lord^ with whom he has made the covenant, is a terrestrial roler, as implied by the indirect evidence, the conclusion is reached that the ancient Semitic idea of a deity was like the modem Semitic idea cited above. And if, otherwise, Abraham conceives this person not as a local ruler but as the Maker of All Things, then he believes the Earth and the Heavens are produced by one who eats and drinks and feels weary after walking — ^his conception of a deity still remains identical with that of his modem repre- sentative, and with that of the uncivilized in general.
§ 203. And so the universality of anthropomorphism has the sufficient cause that the divine man as conceived, had everywhere for antecedent a powerful man as perceived. The abundant evidence given that the primitive mind frames the notion in this way, may be enforced by facts showing that it fails to frame any other notion.
When Burton, encamped among the Eesa, heard an old woman with the toothache exclaiming, *' O Allah, may th^ teeth ache like mine '* — ^when he further tells us that the wilder Bedouins will ask where Allah is to be found that they may spear him, ^' because he lays waste their homes and kills their cattle " — when, according to Moffat, the Hottentots, notwithstanding missionary instruction, re- gard the Christian god as ^'a notable warrior of great physical strength'^ — ^when, as Hunter narrates, a Santal, responding to a missionary's account of Ood's omnipotence, said, '' and what if that strong one should eat me;'' we are taught that not only does the undeveloped mind conceive Gk>d as a powerful man, but that it is incapable of any higher conception.
A like implication everywhere meets us in the aboriginal belief that gods are mortal. In a Quich6 legend, given by Bancroft, we read — " so they died like gods; and each left to the sad and wondering men who were his servants, his garments for a memorial." The writers of the Vedic hymns.
DBimEfl. 439 DBimEfl. 439 says Mmr^ ^'looked upon the gods '' as '' confessedly mere created beings /' and they, like men, were made immortal by drinking soma. In the legend of Buddha it is stated that the prince, inquiring about a corpse, was told by his guide ^'^ This is the final destiny of all flesh: gods and men, rich and poor, alike must die," We saw that the Scandinavian gods died and were burnt— returning there- after to Asgard. So, too, the Egyptian gods lived and died: there are frescoes at PhilaB showing the burial of Osiris. And though in the Greek pantheon, the death of gods is exemplified only in the case of Pan, yet their ori- ginal mortality is implied by the legends; for how could Apollo have been a slave to Laomedon, if he then had that power of assuming and throwing-off the material form at will, which is possessed in common by the Greek god and the primitive ghost f How deeply rooted are these ideas of deities, is further shown by the slowness with which culture has changed them. Down to civilized times the Greeks thought of their gods as material persons: about 550 b.c. they believed in a living woman palmed upon them as Athene; and in 490 B.C. to Phidippides on his way from Athens to Sparta, Pan, meeting him, complains of neglect. Mahomet had to forbid the adoration which certain of his followers offered him; and about A.D. 1000 the Caliph Hakem was worshipped while living, and is still worshipped by the Druses. Paul and Barnabas were treated as gods by the priest and people of Lystra, And the sculpture, painting, and literature of medisBval Europe, show how grossly anthropomorphic was the conception of deity which prevailed down to recent centuries. Only alluding to the familiar evidence furnished by the mystery-plays, it will suffice if I instance the Old-French verses which describe God's illness as cured by laughter at a dancing rhymer (see Appendix A). Nor among some Catholic peoples are things much better now. Just as the existing ■avage beats Ids idol if his hopes are not fulfiUed— just as the ancient Arcadian was apt " to scourge and prick Pan if he came back empty-handed from the chase ^'; so, an Italian peasant or artizan will occasionally vent his anger by thrashing a statne of the Madonna: as at Milan in Sept., 1878^ and as at Rome not long before. Instead of its being true that ideas of deity such as are entertained by cultivated people^ are innate; it is^ contrariwise^ true that they arise only at a comparatively advanced stage^ as results of ac- cumulated knowledge^ greater intellectual grasp, and higher sentiment.
§ 204. Behind the supernatural being of this order^ as behind supernatural beings of all other orders^ we thus find that there has in every case been a human personality.
Anything which transcends the ordinary^ a savage thinks of as supernatural or divine: the remarkable man among the rest. This remarkable man may be simply the remotest ancestor remembered as the founder of the tribe; he may be a chief famed for strength and bravery; he may be a medicine-man of great repute; he may be an inventor of something new; and then^ instead of being a member of the tribe, he may be a superior stranger bringing arts and know- ledge; or he may be one of a superior race gaining pre- dominance by conquest. Being at first one or other of these, regarded with awe during his life, he is regarded with in- creased awe after his death; and the propitiation of his ghost, becoming greater than the propitiation of ghosts which are less feared, develops into an established worship.
There is no exception then. Using the phrase ancestor- worship in its broadest sense as comprehending all worship of the dead, be they of the same blood or not, we conclude that ancestor-worship is the root of every religion.* * Impoitant additioiud UuciB and arguments, bearing directly and indirectly on tlus conclusion, will be found in tbe Appen^ces: Appendix A contuning fbrther illustrations, and Appendix B containing a criticism on tbe tbeoiy of the niytbolog^ts.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE PRIMITIVE THEORY OP THINGS.
§ 205. THiLT seeming chaos of puerile suppositions and monstrous inferences, making up the vast mass of super- stitious beliefs everywhere cki sting, thus takes an orderly form when, instead of looking back upon it from our advanced stand-point, we look forward upon it from the stand-point of the primitive man.
The interpreters of early conceptions err in the same way as do most teachers of the young. Never having studied Psychology, the pedagogue has but the dimmest notion of his pupil's mind; and, thinking of the undeveloped in- tellect as though it had conceptions which only the de- veloped intellect can have, he presents it with utterly in- comprehensible facts — generalizations before there exist in it the things to be generalized, and abstractions while there are none of the concrete experiences from which such abstractions arc derived: so causing bewilderment and an appearance of stupidity. Similarly, narrators of primi < tive legends and speculators about the superstitions of savages, carry with them the ideas and sentiments generated by civilization, and, crediting the savage with these, either express an unreasoning wonder that he should think as he does, or else, seeking to explain his thoughts, give explana- tions which ascribe to him conceptions he cannot have.
When, however, we cease to figure his mental processes 442 THE DATA OF 80CI0L00T.