The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead Volume I Part 7

The Wemba of Northern Rhodesia relate how G.o.d in the beginning created a man and a woman and gave them two bundles; in one of them was life and in the other death. Most unfortunately the man chose "the little bundle of death."[100] The Cherokee Indians of North America say that a number of beings were engaged in the work of creation. The Sun was made first.

Now the creators intended that men should live for ever. But when the Sun pa.s.sed over them in the sky, he told the people that there was not room enough for them all and that they had better die. At last the Sun's own daughter, who was with the people on earth, was bitten by a snake and died. Then the Sun repented him and said that men might live always; and he bade them take a box and go fetch his daughter's spirit in the box and bring it to her body, that she might live. But he charged them straitly not to open the box until they arrived at the dead body.

However, moved by curiosity, they unhappily opened the box too soon; away flew the spirit, and all men have died ever since.[101] Some of the North American Indians informed the early Jesuit missionaries that a certain man had received the gift of immortality in a small packet from a famous magician named Messou, who repaired the world after it had been seriously damaged by a great flood. In bestowing on the man this valuable gift the magician strictly enjoined him on no account to open the packet. The man obeyed, and so long as the packet was unopened he remained immortal. But his wife was both curious and incredulous; she opened the packet to see what was in it, the precious contents flew away, and mankind has been subject to death ever since.[102]

[Sidenote: Baganda story how death came into the world through the forgetfulness and imprudence of a woman.]

As these American Indians tell how death came through the curiosity and incredulity of one woman, the Baganda of Central Africa relate how it came through the forgetfulness and imprudence of another. According to the Baganda the first man who came to earth in Uganda was named Kintu.

He brought with him one cow and lived on its milk, for he had no other food. But in time a woman named Nambi, a daughter of Gulu, the king of heaven, came down to earth with her brother or sister, and seeing Kintu she fell in love with him and wished to have him for her husband. But her proud father doubted whether Kintu was worthy of his daughter's hand, and accordingly he insisted on testing his future son-in-law before he would consent to the marriage. So he carried off Kintu's cow and put it among his own herds in heaven. When Kintu found that the cow was stolen, he was in a great rage, but hunger getting the better of anger, he made s.h.i.+ft to live by peeling the bark of trees and gathering herbs and leaves, which he cooked and ate. In time his future wife Nambi happened to spy the stolen cow among her father's herds and she told Kintu, who came to heaven to seek and recover the lost animal. His future father-in-law Gulu, Lord of Heaven, obliged him to submit to many tests designed to prove his fitness for marriage with the daughter of so exalted a being as the Lord of Heaven. All these tests Kintu successfully pa.s.sed through. At last Gulu was satisfied, gave him his daughter Nambi to wife, and allowed him to return to earth with her.

[Sidenote: The coming of Death.]

But Nambi had a brother and his name was Death (_Walumbe_). So before the Lord of Heaven sent her away with her husband he called them both to him and said, "You must hurry away before Death comes, or he will wish to go with you. You must not let him do so, for he would only cause you trouble and unhappiness." To this his daughter agreed, and she went to pack up her things. She and her husband then took leave of the Lord of Heaven, who gave them at parting a piece of advice. "Be sure," said he, "if you have forgotten anything, not to come back for it; because, if you do, Death will wish to go with you, and you must go without him." So off they set, the man and his wife, taking with them his cow and its calves, also a sheep, a goat, a fowl, and a banana tree. But on the way the woman remembered that she had forgotten the grain to feed the fowl, so she said to her husband, "I must go back for the grain to feed the fowl, or it will die." Her husband tried to dissuade her, but in vain.

She said, "I will hurry back and get it without any one seeing me." So back she went in an evil hour and said to her father the Lord of Heaven, "I have forgotten the grain for the fowl and I am come back to fetch it from the doorway where I put it." Her father said sadly, "Did I not tell you that you were not to return if you had forgotten anything, because your brother Death would wish to go with you? Now he will accompany you." The woman fled, but Death saw her and followed hard after her.

When she rejoined her husband, he was angry, for he saw Death and said, "Why have you brought your brother with you? Who can live with him?"

[Sidenote: The importunity of Death.]

When they reached the earth, Nambi planted her garden, and the bananas sprang up quickly and formed a grove. They lived happily for a time till one day Death came and asked for one of their daughters, that she might go away with him and be his cook. But the father said, "If the Lord of Heaven comes and asks me for one of my children, what am I to say? Shall I tell him that I have given her to you to be your cook?" Death was silent and went away. But he came back another day and asked again for a child to be his cook. When the father again refused, Death said, "I will kill your children." The father did not know what that meant, so he asked Death, "What is that you will do?" However, in a short time one of the children fell ill and died, and then another and another. So the man went to the Lord of Heaven and complained that Death was taking away his children one by one. The Lord of Heaven said, "Did I not tell you, when you were going away, to go at once with your wife and not to return if you had forgotten anything, but you let your wife return to fetch the grain? Now you have Death living with you. If you had obeyed me, you would have been free from him and not lost any of your children."

[Sidenote: The hunt for Death.]

However, the man pleaded with him, and the Lord Heaven at last consented to send Death's brother Kaikuzi to help the woman and to prevent Death from killing her children. So down came Kaikuzi to earth, and when he met his brother Death they greeted each other lovingly. Then Kaikuzi told Death that he had come to fetch him away from earth to heaven.

Death was willing to go, but he said, "Let us take our sister too."

"Nay," said his brother, "that cannot be, for she is a wife and must stay with her husband." The dispute waxed warm, Death insisting on carrying off his sister, and his brother refusing to allow him to do so.

At last the brother angrily ordered Death to do as he was bid, and so saying he made as though he would seize him. But Death slipped from between his hands and fled into the earth. For a long time after that there was enmity between the two brothers. Kaikuzi tried in every way to catch Death, but Death always escaped. At last Kaikuzi told the people that he would have one final hunt for Death, and while the hunt was going on they must all stay in their houses; not a man, a woman, a child, nor even an animal was to be allowed to pa.s.s the threshold; and if they saw Death pa.s.sing the window, they were not to utter a cry of terror but to keep still. Well, for some days his orders were obeyed.

Not a living soul, not an animal, stirred abroad. All without was solitude, all within was silence. Encouraged by the universal stillness Death emerged from his lair, and his brother was just about to catch him, when some children, who had ventured out to herd their goats, saw Death and cried out. Death's good brother rushed to the spot and asked them why they had cried out. They said, "Because we saw Death." So his brother was angry because Death had again made good his escape into the earth, and he went to the first man and told him that he was weary of hunting Death and wished to return home to heaven. The first man thanked him kindly for all he had done, and said, "I fear there is nothing more to be done. We must only hope that Death will not kill all the people."

It was a vain hope. Since then Death has lived on earth and killed everybody who is born into the world; and always, after the deed of murder is done, he escapes into the earth at Tanda in Singo.[103]

[Sidenote: In the preceding story Death is distinctly personified. Death personified in a West African story of the origin of death. Death and the spider and the spider's daughter.]

If this curious tale of the origin of death reveals no very deep philosophy, it is at least interesting for the distinctness with which Death is conceived as a personal being, the son of the Lord of Heaven, the brother of the first man's wife. In this personification of Death the story differs from all the others which we have examined and marks an intellectual advance upon them; since the power of picturing abstract ideas to the mind with all the sharpness of outline and vividness of colour which are implied by personification is a faculty above the reach of very low intelligences. It is not surprising that the Baganda should have attained to this power, for they are probably the most highly cultured and intellectual of all the many Bantu tribes of Africa. The same conception of Death as a person occurs in a story of the origin of death which is told by the Hos, a negro tribe in Togoland, a district of West Africa. These Hos belong to the Ewe-speaking family of the true negroes, who have reached a comparatively high level of barbarism in the notorious kingdom of Dahomey. The story which the Hos tell as to the origin of death is as follows. Once upon a time there was a great famine in which even the hunters could find no flesh to eat. Then Death went and made a road as broad as from here to Sokode, and there he set many snares. Every animal that tried to pa.s.s that way fell into a snare. So Death had much flesh to eat. One day the Spider came to Death and said to him, "You have so much meat!" and she asked if she might have some to take home with her. Death gave her leave. So the Spider made a basket as long as from Ho to Akoviewe (a distance of about five miles), crammed it full of meat, and dragged it home. In return for this bounty the Spider gave Death her daughter Yiyisa to wife. So when Death had her for his wife, he gave her a hint. He said, "Don't walk on the broad road which I have made. Walk on the footpath which I have not made. When you go to the water, be sure to take none but the narrow way through the wood."

Well, some time afterwards it had rained a little; the gra.s.s was wet, and Yiyisa wished to go to the watering-place. When she tried to walk on the narrow path through the forest, the tall damp gra.s.s wet her through and through, so she thought to herself, "In future I will only go on the broad road." But scarce had she set foot on the beautiful broad road when she fell into a snare and died on the spot. When Death came to the snare and saw his wife in it dead, he cut her up into bits and toasted them on the fire. One day the Spider paid a visit to her son-in-law Death, and he set a good meal before her. When she had eaten and drunk her fill and had got up to go home, she asked Death after her daughter.

"If you take that meat from the fire," said Death, "you will see her."

So the Spider took the flesh from the fire and there, sure enough, she found her dead daughter. Then she went home in great wrath and whetted her knife till it was so sharp that a fly lighting on the edge was cut in two. With that knife she came back to attack Death. But Death shot an arrow at her. She dodged it, and the arrow whizzed past her and set all the forest on fire. Then the Spider flung her sharp knife at Death, but it missed him and only sliced off the tops of the palms and all the other trees of the wood. Seeing that her stroke had failed, the Spider fled away home and shut herself up in her house. But Death waited for her on the edge of the town to kill her as soon as she ventured out.

Next morning some women came out of the town to draw water at the watering-place, and as they went they talked with one another. But Death shot an arrow among them and killed several. The rest ran away home and said, "So and so is dead." Then Death came and looked at the bodies and said, "That is my game. I need go no more into the wood to hunt."

That is how Death came into the world. If the Spider had not done what she did, n.o.body would ever have died.[104]

[Sidenote: Death personified in a Melanesian story of the origin of death.]

Again, the Melanesians of the Banks Islands tell a story of the origin of Death, in which that grim power is personified. They say that Death (_Mate_) used to live underground in a shadowy realm called Panoi, while men on earth changed their skins like serpents and so renewing their youth lived for ever. But a practical inconvenience of immortality was that property never changed hands; newcomers had no chance, everything was monopolised by the old, old stagers. To remedy this state of things and secure a more equitable distribution of property Death was induced to emerge from the lower world and to appear on earth among men; he came relying on an a.s.surance that no harm would be done him. Well, when they had him, they laid him out on a board, covered him with a pall as if he were a corpse, and then proceeded with great gusto to divide his property and eat the funeral feast. On the fifth day they blew the conch sh.e.l.l to drive away the ghost, as usual, and lifted the pall to see what had become of Death. But there was no Death there; he had absconded leaving only his skeleton behind. They naturally feared that he had made off with an intention to return to his home underground, which would have been a great calamity; for if there were no Death on earth, how could men die and how could other people inherit their property? The idea was intolerable; so to cut off the retreat of the fugitive, the Fool was set to do sentinel duty at the parting of the ways, where one road leads down to the underworld, Death's home, and the other leads up to the upper world, the abode of the living. Here accordingly the Fool was stationed with strict orders to keep his eye on Death if he should attempt to sneak past him and return to the nether world. However, the Fool, like a fool as he was, sat watching the road to the upper world, and Death slipped behind him and so made good his retreat. Since then all men have followed Death down that fatal path.[105]

[Sidenote: Thus according to savages death is not a necessary part of the order of nature. A similar view is held by some eminent modern biologists.]

So much for savage stories of the origin of death. They all imply a belief that death is not a necessary part of the order of nature, but that it originated in a pure mistake or misdeed of some sort on somebody's part, and that we should all have lived happy and immortal if it had not been for that disastrous blunder or crime. Thus the tales reflect the same frame of mind which I ill.u.s.trated in the last lecture, when I shewed that many savages still to this day believe all men to be naturally immortal and death to be nothing but an effect of sorcery. In short, whether we regard the savage's att.i.tude to death at the present day or his ideas as to its origin in the remote past, we must conclude that primitive man cannot reconcile himself to the notion of death as a natural and necessary event; he persists in regarding it as an accidental and unnecessary disturbance of the proper order of nature. To a certain extent, perhaps, in these crude speculations he has antic.i.p.ated certain views of modern biology. Thus it has been maintained by Professor August Weissmann that death is not a natural necessity, that many of the lowest species of living animals do in fact live for ever; and that in the higher animals the custom of dying has been introduced in the course of evolution for the purpose of thinning the population and preventing the degeneration of the species, which would otherwise follow through the gradual and necessary deterioration of the immortal individuals, who, though they could not die, might yet sustain much bodily damage through hard knocks in the hurly-burly of eternal existence on earth.

[Sidenote: Weissmann's view that death is not a natural necessity but an adaptation acquired in the course of evolution for the advantage of the race.]

On this subject I will quote some sentences from Professor Weissmann's essay on the duration of life. He says, "The necessity of death has been hitherto explained as due to causes which are inherent in organic nature, and not to the fact that it may be advantageous. I do not however believe in the validity of this explanation; I consider that death is not a primary necessity, but that it has been secondarily acquired as an adaptation. I believe that life is endowed with a fixed duration, not because it is contrary to its nature to be unlimited, but because the unlimited existence of individuals would be a luxury without any corresponding advantage. The above-mentioned hypothesis upon the origin and necessity of death leads me to believe that the organism did not finally cease to renew the worn-out cell material because the nature of the cells did not permit them to multiply indefinitely, but because the power of multiplying indefinitely was lost when it ceased to be of use.... John Hunter, supported by his experiments on _anabiosis_, hoped to prolong the life of man indefinitely by alternate freezing and thawing; and the Veronese Colonel Aless. Guaguino made his contemporaries believe that a race of men existed in Russia, of which the individuals died regularly every year on the 27th of November, and returned to life on the 24th of the following April. There cannot however be the least doubt, that the higher organisms, as they are now constructed, contain within themselves the germs of death. The question however arises as to how this has come to pa.s.s; and I reply that death is to be looked upon as an occurrence which is advantageous to the species as a concession to the outer conditions of life, and not as an absolute necessity, essentially inherent in life itself. Death, that is the end of life, is by no means, as is usually a.s.sumed, an attribute of all organisms. An immense number of low organisms do not die, although they are easily destroyed, being killed by heat, poisons, etc. As long, however, as those conditions which are necessary for their life are fulfilled, they continue to live, and they thus carry the potentiality of unending life in themselves. I am speaking not only of the Amoebae and the low unicellular Algae, but also of far more highly organized unicellular animals, such as the Infusoria."[106]

[Sidenote: Similar view expressed by Alfred Russel Wallace.]

A similar suggestion that death is not a natural necessity but an innovation introduced for the good of the breed, has been made by our eminent English biologist, Mr. Alfred Russel Wallace. He says: "If individuals did not die they would soon multiply inordinately and would interfere with each other's healthy existence. Food would become scarce, and hence the larger individuals would probably decompose or diminish in size. The deficiency of nourishment would lead to parts of the organism not being renewed; they would become fixed, and liable to more or less slow decomposition as dead parts within a living body. The smaller organisms would have a better chance of finding food, the larger ones less chance. That one which gave off several small portions to form each a new organism would have a better chance of leaving descendants like itself than one which divided equally or gave off a large part of itself. Hence it would happen that those which gave off very small portions would probably soon after cease to maintain their own existence while they would leave a numerous offspring. This state of things would be in any case for the advantage of the race, and would therefore, by natural selection, soon become established as the regular course of things, and thus we have the origin of _old age, decay, and death_; for it is evident that when one or more individuals have provided a sufficient number of successors they themselves, as consumers of nourishment in a constantly increasing degree, are an injury to their successors. Natural selection therefore weeds them out, and in many cases favours such races as die almost immediately after they have left successors. Many moths and other insects are in this condition, living only to propagate their kind and then immediately dying, some not even taking any food in the perfect and reproductive state."[107]

[Sidenote: Savages and some men of science agree that death is not a natural necessity.]

Thus it appears that two of the most eminent biologists of our time agree with savages in thinking that death is by no means a natural necessity for all living beings. They only differ from savages in this, that whereas savages look upon death as the result of a deplorable accident, our men of science regard it as a beneficent reform inst.i.tuted by nature as a means of adjusting the numbers of living beings to the quant.i.ty of the food supply, and so tending to the improvement and therefore on the whole to the happiness of the species.

[Footnote 57: H. Callaway, _The Religious System of the Amazulu_, Part i. pp. 1, 3 _sq._, Part ii. p. 138; Rev. L. Grout, _Zululand, or Life among the Zulu-Kafirs_ (Philadelphia, N.D.), pp. 148 _sq._; Dudley Kidd, _The Essential Kafir_ (London, 1904), pp. 76 _sq._ Compare A. F.

Gardiner, _Narrative of a Journey to the Zoolu Country_ (London, 1836), pp. 178 _sq._, T. Arbousset et F. Daumas, _Relation d'un voyage d'Exploration au Nord-Est de la Colonie du Cap de Bonne-Esperance_ (Paris, 1842), p. 472; Rev. J. Shooter, _The Kafirs of Natal and the Zulu Country_ (London, 1857), p. 159; W. H. I. Bleek, _Reynard the Fox in South Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 74; D. Leslie, _Among the Zulus and Amatongas_, Second Edition (Edinburgh, 1875), p. 209; F. Speckmann, _Die Hermannsburger Mission in Afrika_ (Hermannsburg, 1876), p. 164.]

[Footnote 58: J. Chapman, _Travels in the Interior of South Africa_ (London, 1868), i. 47.]

[Footnote 59: E. Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), p. 242; E.

Jacottet, _The Treasury of Ba-suto Lore_, i. (Morija, Basutoland, 1908), pp. 46 _sqq._]

[Footnote 60: H. A. Junod, _Les Ba-Ronga_ Neuchatel (1898), pp. 401 _sq._]

[Footnote 61: W. A. Elmslie, _Among the Wild Ngoni_ (Edinburgh and London, 1899), p. 70.]

[Footnote 62: H. A. Junod and W. A. Elmslie, _ll.cc._]

[Footnote 63: C. W. Hobley, _Ethnology of A-Kamba and other East African Tribes_ (Cambridge, 1910), pp. 107-109.]

[Footnote 64: Fr. Muller, "Die Religionen Togos in Einzeldarstellungen,"

_Anthropos_, ii. (1907) p. 203. In a version of the story reported from Calabar a sheep appears as the messenger of mortality, while a dog is the messenger of immortality or rather of resurrection. See "Calabar Stories," _Journal of the African Society_, No. 18 (January 1906), p.

194.]

[Footnote 65: E. Perregaux, _Chez les Achanti_ (Neuchatel, 1906), pp.

198 _sq._]

[Footnote 66: E. Perregaux, _op. cit._ p. 199.]

[Footnote 67: Sir J. E. Alexander, _Expedition of Discovery into the Interior of Africa_ (London, 1838), i. 169; C. J. Andersson, _Lake Ngami_, Second Edition (London, 1856), pp. 328 _sq._; W. H. I. Bleek, _Reynard the Fox in South Africa_ (London, 1864), pp. 71-73; Th. Hahn, _Tsuni-Goam, the Supreme Being of the Khoi-Khoi_ (London, 1881), p. 52.]

[Footnote 68: W. H. I. Bleek, _A Brief Account of Bushman Folk-lore_ (London, 1875), pp. 9 _sq._]

[Footnote 69: W. H. I. Bleek, _Reynard the Fox in South Africa_, pp. 69 _sq._]

[Footnote 70: A. C. Hollis, _The Masai_ (Oxford, 1905), pp. 271 _sq._]

[Footnote 71: A. C. Hollis, _The Nandi_ (Oxford, 1909), p. 98.]

[Footnote 72: Captain W. E. H. Barrett, "Notes on the Customs and Beliefs of the Wa-Giriama, etc., British East Africa," _Journal of the R. Anthropological Inst.i.tute_, xli. (1911) p. 37.]

[Footnote 73: Th. Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_, Second Edition (London, 1860), i. 205.]

[Footnote 74: _Lettres edifiantes et Curieuses_, Nouvelle edition, xv.

(Paris, 1781) pp. 305 _sq._]