The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume 2 (of 3)

Оглавление

Frazer James George. The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume 2 (of 3)

PREFACE

CHAPTER I. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE MAORIS

§ 1. The Polynesians

§ 2. The Maoris of New Zealand

§ 3. The Beliefs of the Maoris concerning the Souls of the Living

§ 4. The Beliefs of the Maoris concerning the Souls of the Dead

§ 5. Taboo among the Maoris

§ 6. Conclusion

CHAPTER II. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE TONGANS

§ 1. The Tonga or Friendly Islands

§ 2. The Tonga Islanders, their Character, Mode of Life, and Government

§ 3. The Tongan Religion: its General Principles

§ 4. The Primary or Non-human Gods

§ 5. The Temples of the Gods

§ 6. Priests and their Inspiration

§ 7. The Worship of the Gods, Prayers, and Sacrifices

§ 8. The Doctrine of the Soul and its Destiny after Death

§ 9. The Souls of the Dead as Gods

§ 10. Temples and Tombs: Megalithic Monuments

§ 11. Rites of Burial and Mourning

§ 12. The Ethical Influence of Tongan Religion

CHAPTER III. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE SAMOANS

§ 1. The Samoan Islands

§ 2. The Samoan Islanders, their character

§ 3. Houses, Agriculture, and Industries

§ 4. Rights of Property

§ 5. Government, Social Ranks, Respect for Chiefs

§ 6. Religion: Gods of Families, Villages, and Districts

§ 7. Priests and Temples

§ 8. Origin of the Samoan Gods of Families, Villages, and Districts: Relation to Totemism

§ 9. The High Gods of Samoa

§ 10. The Samoan Belief concerning the Human Soul: Funeral Customs

§ 11. The Fate of the Human Soul after Death

CHAPTER IV. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE HERVEY ISLANDERS

§ 1. The Hervey or Cook Islands

§ 2. The Islanders and their Mode of Life

§ 3. Social Life: the Sacred Kings

§ 4. Religion, the Gods, Traces of Totemism

§ 5. The Doctrine of the Human Soul

§ 6. Death and Funeral Rites

§ 7. The Fate of the Human Soul after Death

CHAPTER V. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE SOCIETY ISLANDERS

§ 1. The Society Islands

§ 2. The Islanders and their Mode of Life

§ 3. The Religion of the Society Islanders

§ 4. The Temples and Images of the Gods

§ 5. The Sacrifices, Priests, and Sacred Recorders

§ 6. The Doctrine of the Human Soul

§ 7. Disease, Death, and Mourning

§ 8. The Disposal of the Dead

§ 9. The Fate of the Soul after Death

§ 10. The Worship of the Dead

CHAPTER VI. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE MARQUESANS

§ 1. The Marquesas Islands

§ 2. Physical Appearance of the Natives

§ 3. Food, Weapons, Tools, Houses, Canoes, Fishing

§ 4. Polyandry, Adoption, Exchange of Names

§ 5. Amusements, Dancing-places, Banqueting-halls

§ 6. Social Ranks, Taboo

§ 7. Religion and Mythology

§ 8. The Soul, Death, and Funeral Customs

§ 9. Fate of the Soul after Death

CHAPTER VII. THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE HAWAIIANS

§ 1. The Sandwich or Hawaiian Islands

§ 2. The Natives and their Mode of Life

§ 3. Houses, Mechanical Arts

§ 4. Government, Social Ranks, Taboo

§ 5. Religion, the Gods

§ 6. Priests, Sorcerers, Diviners

§ 7. Temples, Images, Human Sacrifices

§ 8. Festivals

§ 9. Death and Funeral Rites

§ 10. Fate of the Soul after Death

NOTE

TABOO AMOUNG THE MAORIS

Отрывок из книги

The Polynesians are the tall brown race of men who inhabit the widely scattered islands of the Pacific, from Hawaii on the north to New Zealand on the south, and from Tonga on the west to Easter Island on the east.1 Down to the eighteenth century they remained practically unknown to Europe; the first navigator to bring back comparatively full and accurate information concerning them was our great English explorer, Captain James Cook. Thus at the date of their discovery the natives were quite unaffected by European influence: of our civilisation they knew nothing: of Christianity, though it had existed in the world for nearly eighteen hundred years, they had never heard: they were totally ignorant of the metals, and had made so little progress in the arts of life that in most of the islands pottery was unknown,2 and even so simple an invention as that of bows and arrows for use in war had not been thought of.3 Hence their condition was of great interest to students of the early history of man, since it presented to their observation the spectacle of a barbaric culture evolved from an immemorial past in complete independence of those material, intellectual, and moral forces which have moulded the character of modern European nations. The lateness of their discovery may also be reckoned a fortunate circumstance for us as well as for them, since it fell at a time when scientific curiosity was fully awakened among us, and when scientific methods were sufficiently understood to allow us to study with profit a state of society which differed so widely from our own, and which in an earlier and less enlightened age might have been contemplated only with aversion and disgust.

The question of the origin of the Polynesian race is still unsettled, but the balance both of evidence and of probability seems to incline in favour of the view that the people are descended from one of the yellow Mongoloid races of South-Eastern Asia, who gradually spread eastward over the Indian Archipelago and intermingling to some extent with the black aboriginal inhabitants of the islands formed the lighter-tinted brown race which we call the Polynesian.4 A strong argument in favour of this theory is drawn from the Polynesian language, which belongs essentially to the same family of speech as the Melanesian and Malay languages spoken by the peoples who occupy the islands that intervene between Polynesia and the south-eastern extremity of the Asiatic continent.5 The black Melanesian race occupies the south-eastern portion of New Guinea and the chain of islands which stretches in a great curve round the north-eastern coasts of New Guinea and Australia. The brown Malays, with the kindred Indonesians and a small admixture of negritoes, inhabit the islands westward from New Guinea to the Malay Peninsula.6 Of the two kindred languages, the Polynesian and the Melanesian, the older in point of structure appears unquestionably to be the Melanesian; for it is richer both in sounds and in grammatical forms than the Polynesian, which may accordingly be regarded as its later and simplified descendant.7

.....

In this curious story we may perhaps detect a tradition of a time when among the Tongans, as among the Semites, religion or superstition demanded the sacrifice of all first-born sons, a barbarous custom which has been practised by not a few peoples in various parts of the earth.226

The human soul after its separation from the body at death was termed a hotooa or atua, that is, a god or spirit, and was believed to exist in the shape of the body and to have the same propensities as in life, but to be corrected by a more enlightened understanding, by which it readily distinguished good from evil, truth from falsehood, and right from wrong. The souls dwelt for ever in the happy regions of Bolotoo, where they bore the same names as in life and held the same rank among themselves as they had held during their mortal existence. But their lot in Bolotoo was in no way affected by the good or evil which they had done on earth; for the Tongans did not believe in a future state of retribution for deeds done in the body; they thought that the gods punished crime in this present world, without waiting to redress the balance of justice in the world to come. As many of the nobles who passed at death to Bolotoo had been warlike and turbulent in their life, it might naturally be anticipated that they should continue to wage war on each other in the land beyond the grave; but that was not so, for by a merciful dispensation their understandings were so much enlightened, or their tempers so much improved, by their residence in Bolotoo, that any differences they might have between themselves, or with the primitive gods, they adjusted by temperate discussion without resort to violence; though people in Tonga sometimes heard an echo and caught a glimpse of these high debates in the rumble of thunder and the flash of lightning.227 In the blissful abode of Bolotoo the souls of chiefs and nobles lived for ever, being not subject to a second death, and there they feasted upon all the favourite productions of their native country, which grew also abundantly in the happy island.228

.....