Spiritism and the cult of the dead in antiquity

Front matter

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Preface

During the last quarter of a century interest in the phenomena of Spiritism, or Spiritualism as it is popularly called, has been growing steadily throughout the Western world. The Societies of Psychical Research in England, Germany, France, and America have gathered a vast body of data, and have subjected these to searching criticism. The results of these investigations have been published in the journals of the various societies, and have been popularized in the writings of such authors as Mr. Andrew Lang, Mr. F. W. H. Myers, Professor James Hyslop, Professor William James. Whereas formerly an attitude of Sadducean scepticism toward all the alleged facts of Spiritism was maintained by religion and by rationalism alike, at the present time no doubt is felt concerning the existence of hypnosis, somnambulism, automatic action, ecstasy, significant dreams, visions, auditions, telepathy, telesthesia, mind-reading, foreboding of the future, and all the other abnormal phenomena of the psychical life. The only difference of opinion is in regard to the interpretation of these phenomena. Many scientific investigators think that they can be explained completely by the influence of living minds upon themselves and upon other minds; other equally scientific investigators hold that this explanation is unsatisfactory, and that the ancient theory of the activity of disembodied spirits alone accounts for all the facts.

The events of the recent world-war have awakened widespread popular interest in the discussion of this question. Millions of choice young men of all civilized

vii viii PREFACE

lands have died in the conflict ; and their mourning families and friends have had to> face anew the ancient question, "If a man dieth, shall he live again?" Many who are destitute of religious faith, or who have found their faith unequal to the strain, have sought eagerly for psychical evidence of the continued existence of their beloved after death. Accordingly, the last five years have witnessed a wave of popular enthusiasm for the study of Spiritism. The lectures and the writings of such literary men as Sir Oliver Lodge, Sir A. Conan Doyle, and Mr. Maurice Maeterlinck, have been received with enthusiasm on both sides of the Atlantic. The planchette, the gazing-crystal, and the seance have been cultivated by multitudes with extraordinary assiduity, in the hope of obtaining through them scientific proof of immortality.

Under these circumstances it has seemed to the present writer that it would be both interesting and timely to present a study of similar psychical manifestations in antiquity. All the occurrences that are associated with modern Spiritism have been known from the earliest times, and have been interpreted as due to the influence of discarnate spirits. The great historic religions of China, India, Babylonia, Assyria, Egypt, Israel, Greece, and Rome are full of so-called "spiritistic" phenomena, of beliefs based upon these facts, and of rites of worship based upon these beliefs. No scientific study of the subject can be complete without taking into consideration the ancient as well as the modern evidence. The aim of the present work is to present in outline the main elements of the ancient evidence.

In the fields of Semitic religion and of the religions of Israel, Greece, and Rome, the author has been able to work at first hand from the sources ; in the cases of the religions of China, India, Egypt, and some of the Indo- European races, he has been obliged to depend upon the researches of others. He has endeavoured to follow the best authorities, whose works are cited in the footnotes;

PREFACE ix

and he has submitted his results to the criticism of specialists. In the chapter on Spiritism in China he gratefully acknowledges the assistance of Rev. Lewis Hodous, B.D., Professor of Chinese in the Kennedy School of Missions of the Hartford Seminary Foundation, and of Edward K. Thurlow, B.D., missionary of the Protestant Episcopal Church in Wuhu, China. In the chapters on the Indo- Europeans he has had the expert aid of Leroy Carr Barrett, Ph.D., Professor of Sanskrit in Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut. The chapter on Spiritism in Egypt would have been impossible without constant use of the Ancient Records of Egypt, and the Development of Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt, by James Henry Breasted, Ph.D., Professor of Egyptology in the University of Chicago. Dr. Breasted has also kindly given the author the benefit of his criticism of this chapter before publication. Thanks also are due the editors of the Biblical World for permission to use certain material on the Hebrew conception of the future life, by the author of the present book, that appeared in successive numbers of this journal from January to May, 19 10.

In matters connected with Armenian religion and Armenian equivalents of Indo-European words much help has been received from Professor Mardiros Harootioon Ananikian, S.T.M., of the Kennedy School of Missions. The chapters on "Immortality in Judaism" and "Immortality in the Teaching of Jesus" have received the valuable criticism of Professor Edward Everett Nourse, D.D., and of Professor Melanchthon Williams Jacobus, D.D., of Hartford Theological Seminary. In all stages of the work the author has been assisted by his wife, and without her aid this book could never have been completed.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Spiritism in Primitive Religion .... i

III. Spiritism among the Indo-Europeans 60

Chapter I Spiritism In Primitive Religion

From the earliest period of human history no literary records have come down to us. In lack of direct historical evidence, accordingly, we are compelled to turn to the indirect testimony of comparative religion. Beliefs and rites that existed among all ancient peoples, and that still exist among savages, may safely be regarded as primitive. Applying this method to the study of the earliest conception of the future life, we reach the following conclusions :

a. The Distinction between Soul and Body. — Death is the "king of terrors," yet it is the greatest teacher of our race. Without it men could never have learned the difference between body and spirit; and without the idea of spirit, God could not have been conceived, and religion would have been impossible. When men first began to think, they were confronted with the fact of death. Their companion, felled by a blow, or smitten by a disease, lay prostrate before them. In outward appearance he was the same, but he was unconscious of all that they did, and he could not respond either by word or by motion. It was evident even to the most rudimentary intelligence that an invisible something had gone out of the man. This intangible element the Zulus, some tribes of American Indians, and other savages identify with the shadow cast by the body during life ; similarly the Greeks and the

Romans spoke of the "shades." Closely allied is the Egyptian conception of the ka, or "double," that accompanied the body during life as its exact counterpart. The Andaman Islanders and some other equally low races identify the immaterial part of man with the reflection seen in still water, or with the image formed in the pupil of another person's eye. The Australian bushmen regard it as a sort of fog or smoke. Most primitive peoples observed the fact that breathing ceases at death, and therefore identified the vital principle with the breath. In many languages the words for "spirit" denote primarily "breath," or "wind," e.g., Skr., prana; Gr., pneuma, anemos; Lat., spiritus, anima; Germ, and Eng., Geisty ghost, which are etymologically connected with gust.

b. The Continued Existence of the Disembodied Soul. — Primitive man believed not only in the distinction between soul and body but also in the ability of the soul to survive the catastrophe of death. The Paleolithic cave-dwellers of the Quarternary period in Belgium and France were contemporary with the mammoth, the cavelion, and the cave-bear. Their skulls show that they were nearer the apes than any existing race of man. They were dressed in skins, and armed only with the rudest undressed stone implements; yet they placed with their dead ornaments, tools, arms, and food for use in the other life, and celebrated funeral feasts in their honour.

The same was true of the cave-dwellers of the Neolithic age. 1 They buried their dead in caves ; or when these were lacking, made dolmens, or box-like structures of stone slabs to receive them. In the stone that covered the entrance a small hole was drilled to allow the spirit access to the tomb and egress from it. The corpse was placed in the contracted position of an unborn child, with its head resting upon its knees, thus perhaps expressing the belief that death is birth into another life. In the

1 D'Alviella, Hibbert Lectures, pp. 14-19.

caves of Mentone the bones are painted red with oligist or cinnabar, probably as a substitute for blood, the idea being widespread that blood infuses new energy into the dead. In the Neolithic caves of France the skulls of the dead are trepanned. Whether this was intended to facilitate the entrance and egress of the spirit, or to make an amulet for the survivors, it bears witness to some sort cf cult of the dead. In the Neolithic caves of Palestine, that were inhabited by a pre-Semitic race, offerings of food and drink were deposited with the dead and their bones were used as amulets. 2 Anthropologists are agreed that no savage race exists which does not believe in some sort of immortality and practise some rites in honour of the dead. 3 In view of these facts, it is evident that immortality was one of the original beliefs of our race.

In the creation of this belief the phenomena of sleep and of dreams must have played a large part. In sleep, as in death, the soul apparently leaves the body; yet it presently returns, and consequently must have continued to live during the interval of unconsciousness. In dreams one seems to visit distant regions. The universal savage interpretation of this experience is that the soul actually leaves the, body and journeys to these places, for to the savage dreams are just as real as waking experiences. It is dangerous to waken one suddenly, for the absent spirit may not have time to get back to the body. In swoons also, or unconsciousness resulting from disease, the soul apparently leaves the body; yet it returns, if the man recovers. If the soul can survive such temporary separations from the body, why may it not survive a permanent . ^^ separation? The savage believes that it does. When * death occurs, he at first refuses to recognise anything different from sleep or a swoon. He tries to coax the

7 Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement, 1902, pp. 347ff. *Brinton, Religions of Primitive Peoples, p. 69; Hastings, Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, art. "Ancestor Worship."

soul back; and only when dissolution begins, does he at last admit that death has occurred. From this point of view death differs from sleep or swoon only in the fact that the soul has lost the power, or the wish, to return to its body. It does not perish through death any more than through transient states of unconsciousness. Primitive man was unable to think of himself as ceasing to exist; and, strictly speaking, it is impossible even for us of today. In many languages there is no word for "die," only for "be killed." In dreams also one saw the forms of those who had died, and the inference was natural that their spirits survived and returned to visit friends. All the phenomena of apparitions, levitation, hypnotism, clairvoyance, etc., that are known to modern psychical research, and that are given a spiritistic interpretation by many today, were known to primitive man, and doubtless helped also to give support to the belief in the continued existence of the disembodied spirit. 4

c. Powers Retained by the Soul in Death. — Although, according to the antique conception, the dead lost their physical powers, they lost none of their higher spiritual powers of knowledge, feeling, and will. Ancestors retained a keen interest in their posterity and actively intervened in their affairs. Enemies preserved their original hostility to their foes. The dead were conscious of events that occurred on earth. Those who had met an untimely fate remembered that fact and were unhappy in the other world. The spirits of murdered men, of those that had died in youth, of women that had died in childbirth, and of those that had left no descendants, could not rest.

The belief was universal that, under certain conditions, the dead had the power of appearing to the living. 5 When thus appearing, the spirits were believed to retain the semblance of their bodies at the time of death. In

4 Lubbock, Prehistoric Times,* pp. 144ff. ; Tylor, Primitive Culture, ch. xi-xvii; Jevons, Introduction to the History of Religion, p. 43ff. ; Frazer, Golden Bough, 2 i. p. 225 ff.

6 Lang, The Making of Religion, p. 138.

the Odyssey (xi. 40) those who have fallen in battle appear to Ulysses "mangled by the spear and clad in bloody armour." The same belief lingers in the ghost-lore of modern Europe, and even the most enlightened Christian finds it impossible to think of his beloved dead otherwise than as they last appeared in life. Returning spirits could speak in audible tones, though with weak and trembling voices that corresponded to their ethereal nature. Thus in the Odyssey (xi. 43) the ghosts approach Ulysses "with gibbering cries."

d. Powers Gained by the Soul in Death. — Spirits, although haunting their bodies, were not restricted to them. They could move at will with lightning-like rapidity to any place where they wished to manifest themselves. They also possessed the extraordinary power of entering new bodies.

1. They Could Occupy Inanimate Objects. — According to primitive theology, spirits could use as their instruments material things, such as sticks and stones, causing in them motion, or endowing them with magical powers. In this case a talisman was produced. They could also animate an object by taking up their abode in it. In this case the result was a fetish. The idea was widespread that they preferred to occupy images made in the likeness of their former bodies. Thus in Egypt statues of the deceased were multiplied in tombs that his ka, or "double," might find abundant opportunity to take up its abode.

2. Spirits Could Take Possession of Animals. — So widespread was this belief among primitive peoples that Wilken, Tylor, and other anthropologists have conjectured that it is the explanation of totemism, or the worship of animals as the ancestors of tribes. 6

3. Spirits Could Occupy the Bodies of Living Men. — This might take the form either of obsession, resulting

6 Crooke, in Hastings, Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, art. "Ancestor Worship," p. 430.

in disease or insanity, or of possession, resulting in the imparting of the higher knowledge, skill or power of the spirit. Among all ancient peoples, it was believed that spirits of the dead not only retained the knowledge possessed by them in life, but also acquired new and greater knowledge. The abnormal powers of the sub-conscious soul, such as crystal-gazing, motor-automatism, thought-transference, telepathy, telesthesia, and foreboding of the future, were ascribed to their influence. 7 They were therefore believed to be far wiser than mortals, and they were consulted for guidance in the affairs of life and for oracles concerning the future.

e. Powers Lost by the Soul in Death. — The identification of the soul with the breath, shadow,, reflection, or echo of the living man, led naturally to the conception that it was vague and unsubstantial. Early races and savages have uniformly regarded the soul as a small, feeble being, ordinarily invisible, inaudible, and intangible, that is unable to take care of itself, and that needs to be sheltered and guarded until, so to speak, it "finds itself" in the spirit-world. The sorcerers of Greenland describe the soul as a pale, soft thing, without nerves, without bones, without flesh; when one would seize it, one feels nothing. 8 When Achilles would embrace the shade of Patroclus, it passes through his hands like smoke.

" 'Dost thou command me thus? I shall fulfil Obediently thy wish; yet draw thou near, And let us give at least a brief embrace, And so indulge our grief.' He said, and stretched His longing arms to clasp the shade. In vain; Away like smoke it went with gibbering cry, Down to the earth. Achilles sprang upright, Astonished, clapped his hands, and sadly said, 'Surely there dwell within the realm below Both soul and form, though bodiless.' " 9

7 See Lang, The Making of Religion, chaps, iv-v.

• D'Alviella, Hibbert Lectures, p. 78.

• Iliad, xxiii. 95-104 (Bryant's translation).

In like manner Ulysses finds the shade of his mother wholly unsubstantial.

"She spake; I longed to take into my arms The soul of my dead mother. Thrice I tried, Moved by a strong desire, and thrice the form Passed through them like a shadow or a dream.

• ••••••

I spake, and then my reverend mother said: — 'Believe not that Jove's daughter Proserpine Deceives thee. 'Tis the lot of all our race When they are dead. No more the sinews bind The bones and flesh, when once from the white bones The life departs. Then like a dream the soul Flies off, and flits about from place to place.' " 10

Even the souls of heroes are so feeble that they cannot be roused to activity until they have drunk the fresh, hot blood of victims poured into the sacrificial trench. 11 According to iElius Spartianus, 12 the Emperor Hadrian shortly before his death described his soul as "a dear little wandering being, the guest and companion of the body." The belief that spirits are pale, unsubstantial phantoms still lingers in the modern idea of ghosts.

/. Relation of the Disembodied Soul to Its Body. — Another general belief of primitive peoples is that the soul continues to maintain a relation to the dead body. When the flesh has disappeared, the ghost clings to the skull or the bones; and when these have vanished, it haunts the grave where its ashes are buried. Survivals of these ideas are seen in the veneration of relics of the saints in Buddhist and Roman Catholic countries, and in the belief that ghosts appear chiefly in graveyards, or in places where murders have been committed. The idea is wide-spread that an injury to a dead body is also an injury to the departed spirit. Hence the universal cus-

10 Odyssey, xi. 204-221 (Bryant's translation).

11 Odyssey, xi. 95.

33 Hadrianus, Cap. 25, in Scriptores Historic Augusta.

torn among primitive peoples and savages of mutilating the corpses of enemies. Thus every one of the Greeks who passes the body of Hector inflicts a blow upon it, 13 and Achilles drags it in the dust at the tail of his chariot. 14

This connection of the spirit with the corpse explains the vast importance attached by primitive races to burial. The Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans, and all other ancient peoples believed that the soul could not rest unless its body was properly entombed. 15 Refusal of burial was an injury that was inflicted only upon criminals, or upon the most hated enemies. Violation of a tomb insured the disquieting of the spirit that dwelt within. 16

Closely connected with the idea that the ghost haunts the corpse is the idea that it still needs food, drink, and other necessities of life, and that these must be placed either in the grave or upon it. From the earliest times such offerings were deposited with the dead, and the custom still lingers in civilised lands in modified forms such as jewelry, lights, flowers and wreaths.

g. The General Estimate of Death. — From the foregoing survey it appears that primitive man believed that the soul survived death, and that it gained such superhuman powers that it was to be classed with the gods rather than with men, and was entitled to receive divine homage ; yet in spite of these facts, he did not look forward with any satisfaction to death as an enlargement of his powers. On the contrary, it was regarded by him as an unmixed evil. So important was the body that existence without it seemed shadowy and worthless. Thus in the Odyssey (xi. 487ft. ) Achilles says: "I would be a labourer on earth, and serve for hire some man of mean estate who makes scant cheer, rather than reign o'er all who have gone down to death." Death was not a going

18 Iliad, xxii. 371.

"Ibid. 395ff.

18 Odyssey, xi. 72.

16 De la Saussaye, Manual of the Science of Religion, p. 1 14.

to the gods whom one had loved and honoured in life, but a passing out of the sphere of their care and interest. Their rewards and punishments were distributed in this world. In the other world moral distinctions vanished, and all were reduced to one common level of misery. The primitive belief in spirits, accordingly, was not a belief in immortality in any true sense. It was a belief in* the continued existence of the soul, but that existence was so vague and shadowy that it was destitute of value. To become a ghost could not be an object of desire for any man. The conception of God needed to be deepened and broadened immensely before an adequate idea of immortality could be formed; nevertheless, these crude beginnings were the foundation on which the structure of a better faith was destined to rise.

h. The Cult of the Dead. — Because of the powers that have just been described the dead were regarded by all ancient peoples as supernatural beings, to whom the same sort of worship should be paid that was rendered to the gods and to other classes of spirits. 17 Veneration of spirits of the dead is seen in rites of mourning, in care of the corpse, in bringing of sacrifice, and in offering of prayers.

1. Removal of Garments. — The custom was widespread in antiquity, and is still found among savages, of removing the garments entirely, or in part, as a sign of mourning. As to the meaning of this custom there is a difference of opinion. Ewald, Leyrer and Kamphausen regard it as a spontaneous expression of grief; but it is hard to see any psychological connection between grief and nakedness. Schwally thinks that it was the costume of slaves and of captives, and hence was a token of humility toward the spirits. Frey takes it as a sign of submission to the gods who have sent death into the

17 See Spencer, Principles of Sociology, I. chaps, xx, xxv; Tylor, Primitive Culture, chap, xiv; De la Saussaye, Manual of the Science of Religion, pp. 112 ff.; Jevons, Introduction to the History of Religion, chap, xv; Hastings, Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, arts. "Ancestor-Worship," "Animism."

io SPIRITISM i

family. Frazer holds that it is< intended to disguise the survivors from the ghost of the dead, or to awaken its pity, so that it will do no harm. Far more likely is the view of Stade, Benzinger and Jastrow that nakedness, or a simple loin-cloth, was the primitive dress of man that was retained in mourning because it was a religious exercise. Religion is naturally conservative, and the sacred costume of the present is the everyday dress of the past. In Egypt the priests of the Middle Empire wore the dress of the Old Empire, and those of the New Empire, that of the Middle Empire. The vestments of the Roman Catholic clergy of today are the common garments of the later Roman Empire. Modern savages perform their religious rites in less clothing than they wear on ordinary occasions, the reason being that this was the sacred dress of their forefathers.

2. Covering the Head. — In singular contrast to the custom of stripping the body was the other custom of covering the head or mouth, or laying the hand upon the mouth. The theory that this was due to a desire to conceal one's grief from bystanders presupposes a modern Occidental point of view. Others think that it was intended to disguise one from the spirits, or to protect one's mouth and nose so that they might not enter into one's body; but this assumes less intelligence in the spirits than primitive man believed them to possess. Still others regard it as a conventional substitute for cutting the hair. 18 The most natural interpretation of this ceremony is that it was designed originally to protect one from inadvertently seeing the ghost that lingered near

/ the corpse. Death might ensue if one saw a ghost just as if one saw a god. 19

3. Cuttings in the Flesh. — As W. Robertson Smith has shown 20 cuttings in the flesh, whether practised in the

18 See below, 4. 18 Cf. Ex. 33:20. 20 Religion of the Semites, pp. 322ff.

i SPIRITISM IN PRIMITIVE RELIGION n

name of gods or of spirits, were designed to make a sacrifice of blood, and so to establish a covenant. In the case of ghosts such offerings were peculiarly acceptable as supplying strength to their feeble forms. 21 Tattooing, which often accompanied the letting of blood, was designed to mark one as a permanent worshipper of the spirit to which the blood was offered.

4. Cutting the Hair. — This rite cannot be regarded as a natural expression of grief, nor can it have been designed to deceive the ghost so that it would not molest one, nor can it have been, as Frazer and Jevons think, a process of disinfection from taboo, since it occurred before the funeral. It can only be interpreted as an act of worship to the dead. 22 Hair-offerings to deities are common throughout the world, and are analogous to blood-offerings, the strength being supposed to reside in the hair. 23

5. Covering with Dust or Ashes. — In this case also the theories of natural emotion, of humiliation, and of disguising one's self from the spirits, are all inadequate. This can be only a symbolic act designed to express the thought that one wishes to be buried with the dead and so to maintain communion with them. Jastrow 24 thinks that dust or earth put on the head is a survival of the custom of carrying earth on the head in baskets in order to cover the corpse with a mound, but this will not explain the frequent practice of wallowing in the dust as an act of mourning.

6. Fasting. — Fasting as part of the ritual of mourning is another primitive human custom. Its origin is difficult to trace. A natural reluctance to take food when one is sorrowing does not explain the fasting of people

21 Cf. Jevons, Introduction to the History of Religion, pp. 191ff.

22 Cf. Iliad, xxiii, ISOff., where Achilles shears his hair as an offering to Patroclus.

24 "Dust and Ashes as Symbols of Mourning," Journ. Am. Orient. Soc, xx. pp. 133ff.

who are in no way related to the deceased, nor does it explain the feast which often follows the burial. Frey thinks that it is an act of humility, like the ritual fasts, designed to propitiate the wrath of the gods who have sent death into the family; but among most peoples the uncleanness of death prohibits the worship of the gods in connection with funeral ceremonies. Others think that it is designed to awaken the pity of the spirits so that they will not harm the survivors, but fear of the spirits of relatives is by no means universal. Frazer, Jevons and Griineisen hold that death in a house rendered everything taboo, so that food could not be eaten until the corpse was removed. W. R. Smith suggests that fasting was a ritual preparation for the sacrificial feast that followed, like the Roman Catholic fasting before communion. Spencer, Lubbock, Tylor, and Buhl regard it as a means of inducing ecstasy, in which one held intercourse with the spirits. 25 In any case it is unquestionable that fasting was a ritual act.

7. Disposal of the Corpse. — The belief noted above in the continued connection of the disembodied soul with its dead body led all primitive peoples to care for the corpse as an act of homage to the departed spirit. Inhumation, mummification, and cremation were the chief methods of disposal of the dead. The first protected the body from being devoured by beasts or birds, the second preserved it as a permanent dwelling for the spirit, the third etherealized it so that it might become a more fitting habitation for its former tenant. With the dead were buried, or burned, his food, clothing, utensils, weapons and ornaments that he might use them in the other world. The graves of ancestors were regarded as holy spots where their descendants met at stated times to perform religious rites in their honour.

8. Sacrifice. — By all primitive peoples sacrifices were offered upon the grave in addition to the gifts of food, drink, etc., that were buried with the corpse. Thus in the Odyssey (xi. 28-46) Ulysses pours out to the shades the blood of sheep, and makes libations of milk, honey, wine, and water, on which white meal is sprinkled. 26

Intimately connected with sacrifices to the dead were funeral feasts, in which one partook of the offerings, and thus sealed one's communion with the spirits of the departed. Such feasts have lasted down to modern times in many countries where their original connection with sacrifice has been forgotten.

Sacrifice to the dead explains the importance attached by all ancient peoples to male descendants. Among the Chinese, the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans, and other patriarchally organised races, the duty of sacrificing to a father devolved upon his oldest son. If there were no son, there would be no offerings, and the ghost could not rest.