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Pagan and Christian creeds: their origin and meaning

Edward Carpenter

IV. TOTEM-SACRAMENTS AND EUCHARISTS

Much has been written on the origin of the Totem-system
--the system, that is, of naming a tribe or a portion of a
tribe (say a CLAN) after some ANIMAL--or sometimes--also
after some plant or tree or Nature-element, like fire or
rain or thunder; but at best the subject is a difficult one
for us moderns to understand. A careful study has been
made of it by Salamon Reinach in his Cultes, Mythes et
Religions,[1] where he formulates his conclusions in twelve
statements or definitions; but even so--though his suggestions
are helpful--he throws very little light on the real
origin of the system.[2]

[1] See English translation of certain chapters (published by
David Nutt in 1912) entitled Cults, Myths and Religions, pp.
1-25. The French original is in three large volumes.

[2] The same may be said of the formulated statement of the
subject in Morris Jastrow's Handbooks of the History of Religion,
vol. iv.

There are three main difficulties. The first is to understand
why primitive Man should name his Tribe after an
animal or object of nature at all; the second, to understand
on what principle he selected the particular name (a lion, a
crocodile, a lady bird, a certain tree); the third, why he should
make of the said totem a divinity, and pay honor and worship
to it. It may be worth while to pause for a moment
over these.

(1) The fact that the Tribe was one of the early things
for which Man found it necessary to have a name is interesting,
because it shows how early the solidarity and psychological
actuality of the tribe was recognized; and as to the
selection of a name from some animal or concrete object of
Nature, that was inevitable, for the simple reason that there
was nothing else for the savage to choose from. Plainly to
call his tribe "The Wayfarers" or "The Pioneers" or the
"Pacifists" or the "Invincibles," or by any of the thousand
and one names which modern associations adopt,
would have been impossible, since such abstract terms had
little or no existence in his mind. And again to name it
after an animal was the most obvious thing to do, simply
because the animals were by far the most important
features or accompaniments of his own life. As I am
dealing in this book largely with certain psychological
conditions of human evolution, it has to be pointed out that
to primitive man the animal was the nearest and most closely
related of all objects. Being of the same order of consciousness
as himself, the animal appealed to him very
closely as his mate and equal. He made with regard
to it little or no distinction from himself. We see this very
clearly in the case of children, who of course represent the
savage mind, and who regard animals simply as their mates
and equals, and come quickly into rapport with them, not
differentiating themselves from them.

(2) As to the particular animal or other object selected
in order to give a name to the Tribe, this would no doubt
be largely accidental. Any unusual incident might superstitiously
precipitate a name. We can hardly imagine
the Tribe scratching its congregated head in the deliberate
effort to think out a suitable emblem for itself. That is
not the way in which nicknames are invented in a school
or anywhere else to-day. At the same time the heraldic
appeal of a certain object of nature, animate or inanimate,
would be deeply and widely felt. The strength of the lion,
the fleetness of the deer, the food-value of a bear, the
flight of a bird, the awful jaws of a crocodile, might easily
mesmerize a whole tribe. Reinach points out, with great
justice, that many tribes placed themselves under the
protection of animals which were supposed (rightly or
wrongly) to act as guides and augurs, foretelling the future.
"Diodorus," he says, "distinctly states that the hawk,
in Egypt, was venerated because it foretold the future."
[Birds generally act as weather-prophets.] "In Australia
and Samoa the kangaroo, the crow and the owl premonish
their fellow clansmen of events to come. At one time the
Samoan warriors went so far as to rear owls for their
prophetic qualities in war." [The jackal, or 'pathfinder'
--whose tracks sometimes lead to the remains of a food-
animal slain by a lion, and many birds and insects, have
a value of this kind.] "The use of animal totems for
purposes of augury is, in all likelihood, of great antiquity.
Men must soon have realized that the senses of animals
were acuter than their own; nor is it surprising that
they should have expected their totems--that is to say, their
natural allies--to forewarn them both of unsuspected
dangers and of those provisions of nature, WELLS especially,
which animals seem to scent by instinct."[1] And again,
beyond all this, I have little doubt that there are subconscious
affinities which unite certain tribes to certain animals
or plants, affinities whose origin we cannot now trace, though
they are very real--the same affinities that we recognize
as existing between individual PERSONS and certain
objects of nature. W. H. Hudson--himself in many
respects having this deep and primitive relation to nature--
speaks in a very interesting and autobiographical
volume[2] of the extraordinary fascination exercised upon
him as a boy, not only by a snake, but by certain trees,
and especially by a particular flowering-plant "not more
than a foot in height, with downy soft pale green leaves,
and clusters of reddish blossoms, something like valerian."
. . . "One of my sacred flowers," he calls it, and insists on
the "inexplicable attraction" which it had for him. In
various ways of this kind one can perceive how particular
totems came to be selected by particular peoples.

[1] See Reinach, Eng. trans., op. cit., pp. 20, 21.

[2] Far away and Long ago (1918) chs. xvi and xvii.

(3) As to the tendency to divinize these totems, this arises
no doubt partly out of question (2). The animal or
other object admired on account of its strength or swiftness,
or adopted as guardian of the tribe because of its keen
sight or prophetic quality, or infinitely prized on account
of its food-value, or felt for any other reason to have
a peculiar relation and affinity to the tribe, is by that
fact SET APART. It becomes taboo. It must not be
killed--except under necessity and by sanction of the whole
tribe--nor injured; and all dealings with it must be
fenced round with regulations. It is out of this taboo
or system of taboos that, according to Reinach, religion
arose. "I propose (he says) to define religion as: A
SUM OF SCRUPLES (TABOOS) WHICH IMPEDE THE FREE EXERCISE OF
OUR FACULTIES."[1] Obviously this definition is gravely
deficient, simply because it is purely negative, and leaves
out of account the positive aspect of the subject. In
Man, the positive content of religion is the instinctive
sense--whether conscious or subconscious--of an inner unity
and continuity with the world around. This is the stuff
out of which religion is made. The scruples or taboos
which "impede the freedom" of this relation are the
negative forces which give outline and form to the relation.
These are the things which generate the RITES AND CEREMONIALS
of religion; and as far as Reinach means by religion MERELY
rites and ceremonies he is correct; but clearly he only covers
half the subject. The tendency to divinize the totem
is at least as much dependent on the positive sense
of unity with it, as on the negative scruples which limit
the relation in each particular case. But I shall return to
this subject presently, and more than once, with the view of
clarifying it. Just now it will be best to illustrate the nature
of Totems generally, and in some detail.

[1] See Orpheus by S. Reinach, p. 3.

As would be gathered from what I have just said, there
is found among all the more primitive peoples, and in all
parts of the world, an immense variety of totem-names.
The Dinkas, for instance, are a rather intelligent well-grown
people inhabiting the upper reaches of the Nile in the
vicinity of the great swamps. According to Dr. Seligman
their clans have for totems the lion, the elephant,
the crocodile, the hippopotamus, the fox, and the hyena,
as well as certain birds which infest and damage the
corn, some plants and trees, and such things as rain,
fire, etc. "Each clan speaks of its totem as its ancestor,
and refrains [as a rule] from injuring or eating it."[1] The
members of the Crocodile clan call themselves "brothers of
the crocodile." The tribes of Bechuana-land have a very
similar list of totem-names--the buffalo, the fish, the
porcupine, the wild vine, etc. They too have a Crocodile
clan, but they call the crocodile their FATHER! The
tribes of Australia much the same again, with the differences
suitable to their country; and the Red Indians of
North America the same. Garcilasso, della Vega, the
Spanish historian, son of an Inca princess by one of the
Spanish conquerors of Peru and author of the well-known
book Commentarias Reales, says in that book (i, 57), speaking
of the pre-Inca period, "An Indian (of Peru) was not
considered honorable unless he was descended from a fountain,
river or lake, or even from the sea, or from a wild
animal, as a bear, lion, tiger, eagle, or the bird they call
cuntur (condor), or some other bird of prey."[2] According
to Lewis Morgan, the North American Indians of various
tribes had for totems the wolf, bear, beaver, turtle, deer,
snipe, heron, hawk, crane, loon, turkey, muskrat; pike, catfish,
carp; buffalo, elk, reindeer, eagle, hare, rabbit, snake;
reed-grass, sand, rock, and tobacco-plant.

[1] See The Golden Bough, vol. iv, p. 31.

[2] See Andrew Lang, Custom and Myth, p. 104, also Myth, Ritual
and Religion, vol. i, pp. 71, 76, etc.

So we might go on rather indefinitely. I need hardly
say that in more modern and civilized life, relics of the totem
system are still to be found in the forms of the heraldic
creatures adopted for their crests by different families,
and in the bears, lions, eagles, the sun, moon and stars
and so forth, which still adorn the flags and are flaunted
as the insignia of the various nations. The names may
not have been ORIGINALLY adopted from any definite belief
in blood-relationship with the animal or other object
in question; but when, as Robertson says (Pagan Christs,
p. 104), a "savage learned that he was 'a Bear' and that
his father and grandfather and forefathers were so before
him, it was really impossible, after ages in which totem-
names thus passed current, that he should fail to assume that
his folk were DESCENDED from a bear."

As a rule, as may be imagined, the savage tribesman
will on no account EAT his tribal totem-animal. Such
would naturally be deemed a kind of sacrilege. Also it
must be remarked that some totems are hardly suitable for
eating. Yet it is important to observe that occasionally,
and guarding the ceremony with great precautions, it
has been an almost universal custom for the tribal elders
to call a feast at which an animal (either the totem or
some other) IS killed and commonly eaten--and this in order
that the tribesmen may absorb some virtue belonging to
it, and may confirm their identity with the tribe and with
each other. The eating of the bear or other animal, the
sprinkling with its blood, and the general ritual in which
the participants shared its flesh, or dressed and disguised
themselves in its skin, or otherwise identified themselves
with it, was to them a symbol of their community of life with
each other, and a means of their renewal and
salvation in the holy emblem. And this custom, as the reader
will perceive, became the origin of the Eucharists and Holy
Communions of the later religions.

Professor Robertson-Smith's celebrated Camel affords an
instance of this.[1] It appears that St. Nilus (fifth century)
has left a detailed account of the occasional sacrifice in
his time of a spotless white camel among the Arabs of the
Sinai region, which closely resembles a totemic communion-
feast. The uncooked blood and flesh of the animal had to
be entirely consumed by the faithful before daybreak. "The
slaughter of the victim, the sacramental drinking of the
blood, and devouring in wild haste of the pieces of still
quivering flesh, recall the details of the Dionysiac and
other festivals."[2] Robertson-Smith himself says:--"The
plain meaning is that the victim was devoured before
its life had left the still warm blood and flesh . . . and
that thus in the most literal way, all those who shared in
the ceremony absorbed part of the victim's life into
themselves. One sees how much more forcibly than
any ordinary meal such a rite expresses the establishment
or confirmation of a bond of common life between the
worshipers, and also, since the blood is shed upon the
altar itself, between the worshipers and their god. In this
sacrifice, then, the significant factors are two: the
conveyance of the living blood to the godhead, and the
absorption of the living flesh and blood into the flesh and
blood of the worshippers. Each of these is effected in the
simplest and most direct manner, so that the meaning of the
ritual is perfectly transparent."

[1] See his Religion of the Semites, p. 320.

[2] They also recall the rites of the Passover--though in this
latter the blood was no longer drunk, nor the flesh eaten raw.

It seems strange, of course, that men should eat their
totems; and it must not by any means be supposed that
this practice is (or was) universal; but it undoubtedly
obtains in some cases. As Miss Harrison says (Themis,
p. 123); "you do not as a rule eat your relations," and as a
rule the eating of a totem is tabu and forbidden, but
(Miss Harrison continues) "at certain times and under certain
restrictions a man not only may, but MUST, eat of
his totem, though only sparingly, as of a thing sacrosanct."
The ceremonial carried out in a communal way by the tribe
not only identifies the tribe with the totem (animal), but
is held, according to early magical ideas, and when the
animal is desired for food, to favor its manipulation.
The human tribe partakes of the mana or life-force of the
animal, and is strengthened; the animal tribe is sympathetically
renewed by the ceremonial and multiplies exceedingly.
The slaughter of the sacred animal and (often) the
simultaneous outpouring of human blood seals the compact
and confirms the magic. This is well illustrated
by a ceremony of the 'Emu' tribe referred to by Dr.
Frazer:--

"In order to multiply Emus which are an important article
of food, the men of the Emu totem in the Arunta tribe proceed
as follows: They clear a small spot of level
ground, and opening veins in their arms they let the blood
stream out until the surface of the ground for a space of about
three square yards is soaked with it. When the blood
has dried and caked, it forms a hard and fairly impermeable
surface, on which they paint the sacred design
of the emu totem, especially the parts of the bird which
they like best to eat, namely, the fat and the eggs. Round
this painting the men sit and sing. Afterwards performers
wearing long head-dresses to represent the long neck and
small head of the emu, mimic the appearance of the bird
as it stands aimlessly peering about in all directions."[1]

[1] The Golden Bough i, 85--with reference to Spencer and
Gillen's Native Tribes of Central Australia, pp. 179, 189.

Thus blood sacrifice comes in; and--(whether this has
ever actually happened in the case of the Central Australians
I know not)--we can easily imagine a member of the Emu
tribe, and disguised as an actual emu, having been ceremonially
slaughtered as a firstfruits and promise of the expected
and prayed-for emu-crop; just as the same certainly
HAS happened in the case of men wearing beast-masks of Bulls or
Rams or Bears being sacrificed in propitiation
of Bull-gods, Ram-gods or Bear-gods or simply in pursuance
of some kind of magic to favor the multiplication of
these food-animals.

"In the light of totemistic ways of thinking we see plainly
enough the relation of man to food-animals. You need or
at least desire flesh food, yet you shrink from slaughtering
'your brother the ox'; you desire his mana, yet you respect
his tabu, for in you and him alike runs the common
life-blood. On your own individual responsibility you
would never kill him; but for the common weal, on great
occasions, and in a fashion conducted with scrupulous care, it
is expedient that he die for his people, and that they feast
upon his flesh."[1]

[1] Themis, p. 140.

In her little book Ancient Art and Ritual[1] Jane Harrison
describes the dedication of a holy Bull, as conducted in
Greece at Elis, and at Magnesia and other cities. "There
at the annual fair year by year the stewards of the city
bought a Bull 'the finest that could be got,' and at the
new moon of the month at the beginning of seed-time
[? April] they dedicated it for the city's welfare. . . . The
Bull was led in procession at the head of which went the
chief priest and priestess of the city. With them went a
herald and sacrificer, and two bands of youths and
maidens. So holy was the Bull that nothing unlucky
might come near him. The herald pronounced aloud a
prayer for 'the safety of the city and the land, and the
citizens, and the women and children, for peace and wealth,
and for the bringing forth of grain and all other fruits,
and of cattle.' All this longing for fertility, for food and
children, focuses round the holy Bull, whose holiness is
his strength and fruitfulness." The Bull is sacrificed.
The flesh is divided in solemn feast among those who take
part in the procession. "The holy flesh is not offered to
a god, it is eaten--to every man his portion--by each and
every citizen, that he may get his share of the strength of
the Bull, of the luck of the State." But at Athens the Bouphonia,
as it was called, was followed by a curious ceremony.
"The hide was stuffed with straw and sewed up, and
next the stuffed animal was set on its feet and yoked to
a plough as though it were ploughing. The Death is
followed by a Resurrection. Now this is all important.
We are accustomed to think of sacrifice as the death, the
giving up, the renouncing of something. But SACRIFICE
does not mean 'death' at all. It means MAKING HOLY,
sanctifying; and holiness was to primitive man just special
strength and life. What they wanted from the Bull was
just that special life and strength which all the year long
they had put into him, and nourished and fostered. That
life was in his blood. They could not eat that flesh nor
drink that blood unless they killed him. So he must
die. But it was not to give him up to the gods that they killed
him, not to 'sacrifice' him in our sense, but to have him,
keep him, eat him, live BY him and through him, by his
grace."

[1] Home University Library, p. 87.

We have already had to deal with instances of the
ceremonial eating of the sacred he-Lamb or Ram, immolated
in the Spring season of the year, and partaken of in a kind
of communal feast--not without reference (at any rate in
later times) to a supposed Lamb-god. Among the Ainos
in the North of Japan, as also among the Gilyaks in
Eastern Siberia, the Bear is the great food-animal, and
is worshipped as the supreme giver of health and strength.
There also a similar ritual of sacrifice occurs. A perfect
Bear is caught and caged. He is fed up and even
pampered to the day of his death. "Fish, brandy and
other delicacies are offered to him. Some of the people
prostrate themselves before him; his coming into a house
brings a blessing, and if he sniffs at the food that brings a
blessing too." Then he is led out and slain. A great feast
takes place, the flesh is divided, cupfuls of the blood are
drunk by the men; the tribe is united and strengthened, and
the Bear-god blesses the ceremony--the ideal Bear that has
given its life for the people.[1]

[1] See Art and Ritual, pp. 92-98; The Golden Bough, ii, 375
seq.; Themis, pp. 140, 141; etc.

That the eating of the flesh of an animal or a man conveys
to you some of the qualities, the life-force, the
mana, of that animal or man, is an idea which one often
meets with among primitive folk. Hence the common
tendency to eat enemy warriors slain in battle against
your tribe. By doing so you absorb some of their valor
and strength. Even the enemy scalps which an Apache
Indian might hang from his belt were something magical
to add to the Apache's power. As Gilbert Murray says,[1]
"you devoured the holy animal to get its mana, its swiftness,
its strength, its great endurance, just as the savage now
will eat his enemy's brain or heart or hands to get
some particular quality residing there." Even--as he explains
on the earlier page--mere CONTACT was often considered
sufficient--"we have holy pillars whose holiness consists
in the fact that they have been touched by the
blood of a bull." And in this connection we may note
that nearly all the Christian Churches have a great belief
in the virtue imparted by the mere 'laying on of hands.'

[1] Four Stages of Greek Religion, p. 36.

In quite a different connection--we read[1] that among the
Spartans a warrior-boy would often beg for the love of the
elder warrior whom he admired (i. e. the contact with
his body) in order to obtain in that way a portion of the
latter's courage and prowess. That through the mediation
of the lips one's spirit may be united to the spirit of another
person is an idea not unfamiliar to the modern mind; while
the exchange of blood, clothes, locks of hair, etc., by lovers
is a custom known all over the world.[2]

[1] Aelian VII, iii, 12: . See also E. Bethe on "Die Dorische
Knabenliebe" in the Rheinisches Museum, vol. 26, iii, 461.

[2] See Crawley's Mystic Rose, pp. 238, 242.

To suppose that by eating another you absorb his or her
soul is somewhat naive certainly. Perhaps it IS more native,
more primitive. Yet there may be SOME truth even
in that idea. Certainly the food that one eats has a
psychological effect, and the flesh-eaters among the human
race have a different temperament as a rule from
the fruit and vegetable eaters, while among the animals
(though other causes may come in here) the Carnivora
are decidedly more cruel and less gentle than the Herbivora.

To return to the rites of Dionysus, Gilbert Murray, speaking
of Orphism--a great wave of religious reform which
swept over Greece and South Italy in the sixth century
B.C.--says:[1] "A curious relic of primitive superstition
and cruelty remained firmly imbedded in Orphism,
a doctrine irrational and unintelligible, and for that very
reason wrapped in the deepest and most sacred mystery: a belief
in the SACRIFICE OF DIONYSUS HIMSELF, AND THE PURIFICATION OF MAN
BY HIS BLOOD. It seems possible that the savage
Thracians, in the fury of their worship on the mountains,
when they were possessed by the god and became
'wild beasts,' actually tore with their teeth and hands
any hares, goats, fawns or the like that they came
across. . . . The Orphic congregations of later times, in
their most holy gatherings, solemnly partook of the blood
of a bull, which was by a mystery the blood of Dionysus-
Zagreus himself, the Bull of God, slain in sacrifice for the
purification of man."[2]

[1] See Notes to his translation of the Bacch of Euripides.

[2] For a description of this orgy see Theocritus, Idyll xxvi;
also for explanations of it, Lang's Myth, Ritual and Religion,
vol. ii, pp, 241-260, on Dionysus. The Encyclopdia Brit.,
article "Orpheus," says:--"Orpheus, in the manner of his death,
was considered to personate the god Dionysus, and was thus
representative of the god torn to pieces every year--a ceremony
enacted by the Bacchae in the earliest times with a human victim,
and afterwards with a bull, to represent the bull-formed god. A
distinct feature of this ritual was (eating the
flesh of the victim raw), whereby the communicants imagined that
they consumed and assimilated the god represented by the victim,
and thus became filled with the divine ecstasy." Compare also the
Hindu doctrine of Praj

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The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan

W.S. Gilbert

Category: Plays

Sections: 50
What's this?

Table of Contents

Fiction

Non Fiction

Short Stories

Poetry

Plays

Sci Fi

Philosophy

Biography


The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan W.S. Gilbert Category: Plays Sections: 50 What's this? Table of Contents		Fiction Non Fiction Short Stories Poetry Plays Sci Fi Philosophy Biography