Introduction to the History of Religions Part 27

CHAPTER X

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION

+1014+. Religion is social because man is a social animal. This does not exclude individual religion--in fact religion must have begun with individuals, as is the case with all social movements. Morality, indeed, understood as a system of conduct among human beings, could not exist except in a society which included at least two persons; but if we could imagine a quite isolated rational being, he might be religious if, as is perfectly possible, he conceived himself as standing in relation with some supernatural being or beings. This question, however, is not a practical one--there is no evidence of such isolation, and no probability that there ever has been a time when man was not social.

+1015+. It is generally agreed that men lived at first in small detached groups, gradually forming tribes and nations, and finally effecting a social fusion of nations. Religious worship has followed these changes.

Religion is simply one line of social growth existing along with others, science, philosophy, art; all these, as is remarked above,[1830] go on together, each influencing and influenced by the others. Human life has always been unitary--no one part can be severed from the others; it is a serious error, impairing the accuracy of the conception of religion, to regard it as something apart from the rest of human life.

+1016+. The external history of religion, then, is the history of social growth in the line of religious organization; that is, it has been determined by religious outward needs in accordance with the growth of ideas. In the consideration of this history we have to note a growth in ritual, in devotional practices, and in the organization of religious usages, first in tribal or national communities and then in religious communities transcending national and racial boundaries.

EXTERNAL WORSHIP

+1017+. We a.s.sume a human society recognizing some supernatural or extrahuman object or force that is regarded as powerful and as standing in some sort of effective relation with human life. It is possible that societies exist that do not recognize any such object or force or, recognizing them, do not employ any means of entering into relation with them. Such cases, if they exist (and their existence has not been fully established), we may pa.s.s by with the remark that the absence of worship need be taken to show only that ritual has been a slow growth.

Our information regarding the least-developed communities indicates that with them religion, when it exists, is an affair of custom, of tradition and usage, handed down during a period the history of which we have no means of knowing. Worship as it first appears consists of ceremonies, generally, perhaps always, regarded as having objective effectiveness.[1831] The ritual act itself, in the earliest systems, is powerful, in a sort magical, but tends to lose this character and take on the forms of ordinary human intercourse.

+1018+. The precise ways in which extrahuman Powers were first approached by men it is not possible now to determine--these procedures lie far back in a dim prehistoric time. Coming down to our first knowledge of religious man it may be a.s.sumed that the superhuman Powers recognized by him were of varying sorts: a quasi-impersonal energy which, however, must probably be ascribed ultimately to a personal being; animals; ghosts; spirits resident in objects; anthropomorphic beings. With all these it was necessary to establish relations, and while the methods employed varied slightly according to the nature of the object of worship, the fundamental cultic principle appears to have been the same for all. Several different methods of approaching the Powers appear in the material known to us, and these may be mentioned without attempting exact chronological arrangement.

+1019+. One of the earliest methods of establishing a relation with the Powers is by certain processes--acts or words. The most definite example of a mere process is that found among the Central Australians, the nature of which, however, is not yet well understood. They perform ceremonies intended to procure a supply of food. It is not quite clear whether these ceremonies are merely imitations of animals and other things involved, or whether they contain some recognition of a superhuman Power. In the former case they are magical, not religious in the full sense of the term. But if they involve a belief in some force or power with which man may enter into relation, however dim and undefined this conception may be, then they must be regarded as belonging definitely in the sphere of religion. A certain direct effect is in many cases supposed to issue from ritualistic acts, a belief that is doubtless a survival of the old conception of mana.[1832]

+1020+. In many cases efficacy is attached by savages to singing--the word "sing" is used as equivalent to "exert power in a superhuman way."

It is not the musical part of this procedure that is effective--the singing is simply the natural tendency of early man--the power lies in the words which may be regarded as charms. A charm is primarily a form of words which has power to produce certain results with or without the intervention of the G.o.ds.[1833] In the form of an invocation of a deity the charm belongs to a comparatively late stage of religion; but where its power lies wholly in its words, it involves merely some dim sense of relation, not necessarily religious. Obviously the idea of law underlies all such procedures, but the law may be a sort of natural law and the charm will then not be religious. Religious charms are to be sharply distinguished from prayers; a prayer is a simple request, a charm is an instrument of force.[1834] The history of the growth of savage charms it is impossible for us to recover; it can only be supposed that they have grown up through a vast period of time and have been constructed out of various signs and experiences of all sorts that appeared to connect certain words with certain results. There is no evidence that they came originally or usually from prayers that had lost their pet.i.tionary character, petrified prayers, so to speak, of which there remained only the supposition that they could gain their ends, though bits of prayers, taken merely as words, are sometimes supposed to have such potency.

Charms and prayers are found side by side in early stages of religion; the former tend to decrease, the latter to increase. Charms are allied to amulets, exorcism, and to magic in general.[1835]

+1021+. Certain processes and words are supposed to have power to summon the dead and to gain from them a knowledge of the future. This is a case of coercion by magical means. Nonmagical coercion belongs to a relatively late period in religious history and may be pa.s.sed over at this point. It is not in itself incompatible with religion; a G.o.d is subject to caprice and ill humor, and may have to be controlled, and we know that coercion of the G.o.ds has been practiced by many peoples, with the full sanction of the religious authorities.[1836] But coercive procedures do not accord with the general line of social development.

The natural tendency is to make friends with the G.o.ds, and coercive methods have died out with the growth of society.

+1022+. The methods of establishing friendly relations with the supernatural Powers are the same as those which are employed to approach human rulers, namely, by gifts and by messengers or intermediaries.

_Gifts._ The custom of offering gifts to the dead is universal.[1837]

Among low tribes and in highly civilized peoples (the Egyptians and others) things are placed by the grave which it is supposed the spirits of the dead will need. Food and drink are supplied, and animals and human beings are slain and left to serve as ministers to the ghosts in the other world. Possibly these provisions for the dead are sometimes suggested by sentiments of affection, but more commonly the object in making the provision appears to be to secure the favor of the deceased: ghosts were powerful for good or for evil--they were numerous, always hovering round the living, and the main point was to gain their good will. For a similar reason such gifts were made to spirits and to G.o.ds.

It was a common custom to leave useful articles by sacred trees and stones, or to cast them into rivers or into the sea. The food and drink provided was always that in ordinary use among the worshipers: grain, salt, oil, wine, to which were often added cooking and other utensils.

It was common also to offer the flesh of animals, as, for example, among the Eskimo, the American Indians (the p.a.w.nees and others), the Bantu, the Limbus, and the Todas of Southern India.[1838] It was supposed that the G.o.d, when he was in need of food, sometimes used means to stimulate his worshipers on earth to make him an offering.

+1023+. Since it was obvious that the food set forth for the spirit or deity remained untouched, it was held that the G.o.ds consumed only the soul of the food. This conception, which is found in very early times, was natural to those who held that every object, even pots and pans, had its soul. The ascending smoke carried with it the essence of the food to spirits and deities--they smelled the fragrance and were satisfied.[1839] The visible material part of the offering, thus left untouched by the G.o.d, was often divided among his worshipers, and generally it furnished a welcome meal. These communal feasts are found in various parts of the world, among the Ainu of the j.a.pan Archipelago, the American Indians, and others.[1840] They were social and economical functions. It was desirable that the good food not consumed by the deity should be utilized for the benefit of his worshipers. There was also the natural desire and custom of eating with friends. To this was added the belief that the bodies of such animals possessed powers which the worshiper might acquire by eating. The powers and qualities of the animal were both natural and sacred, or divine. The devotion of the dog, the courage and physical power of the bear, the cleverness of the fox--all such natural powers might be a.s.similated by the worshiper; and since the animal was itself sacred, its body, taken into the human body, communicated a certain special capacity. Thus the virtue of the communal feast was twofold: it placated the supernatural Power, and it procured for the worshiper a satisfactory meal and probably also an infusion of superhuman power. The favor of the deity was gained simply by the presents offered him; in these early times there is no indication of the belief that there was a recognized sacramental sharing of sacred food by the G.o.ds and their worshipers.

+1024+. _Messengers._ The supernatural Power was sometimes approached by a messenger who was instructed to ask a favor. The messenger was an animal regarded as sacred, akin to men and to G.o.ds, and therefore fitted to be an intermediary. Examples of such a method of approaching a deity are found among the Ainu, in Borneo, and among the North American Indians. The Ainu, before slaying the bear who is to serve as messenger, deliver to him an elaborate address in which he is implored to represent to his divine kinsfolk above how well he has been treated on earth and thus gain their favor; he is also invited to return to earth that he may be again captured and slain. His flesh is eaten by the worshipers, and his head is set up as an object of worship. Thus, he is after death a divine Power and a portion of his own flesh is offered to his head, but this is simply to gain his good will, and there is no suggestion of a joint feast of G.o.ds and men.[1841] Somewhat like this is the procedure in Borneo, where on special occasions when some particular favor is desired, a pig is dispatched with a special message to the G.o.ds.[1842]

In America the sacred turtle, regarded as a brother to the tribe and affectionately reverenced by his human brethren, is dispatched with tears to the other world to join his kinsmen there and be an amba.s.sador and friend.[1843] A similar conception is to be found perhaps in the great Vedic animal sacrifice in which the victim was likewise made ready by ceremonies to go to the heavenly court and there stand as the friend of the worshipers.[1844]

+1025+. In all these cases there was a certain identification of the victim with men on the one side and G.o.ds on the other. This is simply a part of the general belief in the kinship existing between all forms of being. Early men in choosing animal gifts for the G.o.ds, or an animal as messenger to them, could not go astray, for all animals were sacred. The effective means of procuring the favor of the supernatural Powers is always a friendly gift or a friendly messenger. When animals lost their religious prestige, their amba.s.sadorial function gave way to the mediatorial function of G.o.ds and men.

Incense, tobacco, and other such things that were burned before the deity are also to be regarded as food, though in the course of time, when the recollection of this primitive character was lost, a conventional significance was attached to the act of burning. A more refined period demanded more refined food for the G.o.ds, such as ambrosia and nectar, but these also were finally given up.

+1026+. Food was conveyed to the G.o.ds either by simply laying it down at some sacred place (where it was devoured by beasts, but more generally taken by official ministers of the G.o.d), or by burning it.[1845] In the body of the victim the blood came to play the most important part as an expiatory force. Early observation, as is pointed out above,[1846]

showed that the life was in the blood, and so a principle of economy naturally suggested that it would be sufficient to offer the blood to the deity, though this was generally supplemented by some choice portion of the flesh. Thus, the opinion arose that blood had a special expiatory power, and this conception remained to a late period.[1847]

But the expiatory power rested finally on the fact that the blood was a gift of food to the G.o.ds. The gift was most effective, apparently, when the whole of the animal was burned, since thus the greatest honor was shown the deity and the most ample satisfaction of his bodily needs was furnished. The holocaust proper appears in religious history at a comparatively late stage, but the essence of it is found in all early procedures in which the whole of any object is given to the deity.

+1027+. _Human sacrifice._ That taste for human flesh on the part of men is not unnatural is shown by the prevalence of cannibal customs in many parts of the world. When such customs existed, it was natural that the flesh of human beings should be offered to the supernatural Powers.

The slaying of human beings at the graves of deceased clansmen or friends has prevailed extensively, though apparently not among the lowest tribes; it represents a certain degree of reflection or intensity; it is found in the midway period when religious customs were fairly well organized and when manners were not yet refined. Not every slaughter at a grave, however, is an act of religious offering to the dead. It is sometimes prompted by the spirit of revenge, to ease the mind of the slayer, or perhaps by desire to do honor to the deceased--doubtless there was a sentiment of piety toward the dead.

+1028+. The slaughter of slaves and wives to be the attendants of the deceased in the other world is of the nature of an offering--it is intended to procure the good will of the ghost. The self-immolation of widows and other dependents was in some cases a selfish act. It was supposed that the persons thus offering themselves up would procure certain advantages in the other world, while at the same time they would there minister to the manes of their husbands or lords.

As there was no practical difference between ghosts and spirits or G.o.ds in respect of power and influence in human life, the offering of human beings to these last came as a matter of course. Their bodily appet.i.tes were the same as those of men--they were fond of human flesh. Wherever it was necessary to invoke their special aid this sort of offering was presented: for the success of crops; to insure the stability of houses and bridges[1848]; to avert or remove calamities, such as pestilence and defeat in battle.

+1029+. While in the simpler societies human sacrifice was simply an offering of food to the Powers, in later times it came to be conceived of as the devotion of an object to the deity, and thus as a sign of obedience and dependence. The offering of first-born children was a recognition of the fact that the G.o.d was the giver of children as of crops. The sacrifice of the dearest object, it was supposed, would soften the heart of the deity. In some cases the person who was supposed to be the occasion or source of misfortune was offered up. In general, human sacrifice followed the lines of all other sacrifices and disappeared when it became repugnant to humane and refined feelings.

+1030+. The testimonies to its existence are so numerous that we may suppose it to have been universal among men.[1849] There is a trace of its early existence in Egypt.[1850] In the Semitic region it is known to have been practiced by the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Moabites, Hebrews, Arameans, and some Arabs.[1851] There is no evidence of the practice in Babylonia; an indication of its existence in a.s.syria is possibly found in an Old Testament pa.s.sage.[1852] Its existence in early times in India is held to be implied in the Rig-Veda.[1853] It appears in the Brahmanic period also: a man (who had to be a Brahman or a Warrior) was bought, allowed liberty and the satisfaction of all his desires (except that s.e.xual intercourse was forbidden) for one year, and then ceremonially slain.[1854] It is only recently that the sacrifice of children in the New Year festival at the mouth of the Ganges has been abolished; and it is doubtful whether, in spite of the efforts of the British Government, it has been completely put down among the wild tribes, as the Gonds and the Khonds.[1855] The records of China, from the eighth century B.C. onward are said to prove the existence of human sacrifice.[1856] Among the ancient Scandinavians and Germans it was frequent.[1857] In more recent times the practice is known either to exist or to have existed in Polynesia (Fiji, Samoa), Melanesia (Florida Islands), Borneo (formerly),[1858] and North America (the Iroquois, the Natchez, the Florida peninsula, and the Southwest coast).[1859] Nowhere does it appear on so large a scale as in Mexico; and it existed also in Peru.[1860] In Africa it was practiced to a frightful extent in Ashantiland and Dahomiland and more guardedly in Yoruba.[1861]

+1031+. Its gradual disappearance (a result of increasing refinement of feeling) was marked by the subst.i.tution of other things for human victims or of aliens for tribesmen. In early times indeed it seems to have been slaves and captives taken in war that were commonly sacrificed. In more civilized times the blood of a tribesman, as more precious than other blood, was regarded as being more acceptable to the deity, and it was then a sign of advance when aliens were subst.i.tuted for tribesmen. Lower animals were sacrificed in place of men: in India, where the recently sown fields had been fertilized with human blood, it became the practice to kill a chicken instead of a human being; and so in the story of Abraham (Gen. xxii) a ram is subst.i.tuted for the human being.[1862] Elsewhere paste images are offered to the deity as representing men; an interesting development is found in Yoruba, where the proposed victim, instead of being sacrificed, becomes the protector of the sacrificer; that is, he is regarded as substantially divine, as he would have been had he been sacrificed.[1863]

+1032+. Along with gifts, which formed perhaps the earliest method of conciliating divine beings, we find in very early times a number of procedures in honor of the deity, and intended in a general way to procure divine favor. Among these procedures dances and processions are prominent. The dance, as is observed above,[1864] is simply the transference to religious rites of a common social act. It is, however, often supposed to have been communicated supernaturally, and in some cases it attains a high religious significance by its a.s.sociation with stories of divine persons. This organized symbolic dance has been developed to the greatest extent among certain North American Indian tribes.[1865] Here every actor and every act represents a personage or procedure in a myth, and thus the dance embodies religious conceptions.

This sort of symbolism has been adopted also in some sections of the Christian church, where it is no doubt effective in many cases as an element of external worship.

+1033+. While human sacrifice continued to a comparatively late period, it was the ordinary sort of sacrifice that const.i.tuted the main part of the ancient religious bond of society.[1866] In the course of time the apparatus of sacrifice was elaborated--altars, temples, priests came into existence, and an immense organization was built up. Sacrifices played a part in all the affairs of life, took on various special shapes, and received different names. They were all placatory--in every case the object was to bring men into friendly relations with the G.o.d.

They were _expiatory_ when they were designed to secure forgiveness for offenses, whether by b.l.o.o.d.y or by unb.l.o.o.d.y offerings, or by anything that it was supposed would secure the favor of the deity. They were performed when it was desired to procure some special benefit, for on such occasions it was necessary that the deity should be well disposed toward the supplicant; such _supplicatory_ or _impetratory_ sacrifices have been among the most common--they touch the ordinary interests of life, the main function of religious exercises in ancient times being to procure blessings for the worshiper. These blessings secured, it was necessary to give thanks for them--_eucharistic_ sacrifices formed a part of the regular worship among all civilized peoples. When the crops came in, it was felt to be proper to offer a portion, the first fruits, to the deity, as among the Hebrews and many others, and, this custom once established, the feeling naturally arose that to partake of the fruits of the earth before the deity had received his part would be an impious proceeding likely to call down on the clan or tribe the wrath of the G.o.d. When a gift was made to a temple, since it was desirable that the deity should accept it in a friendly spirit, a sacrifice was proper.

In the numerous cases in which some person or some object was to be consecrated to the deity a sacrifice was necessary in order to secure his good will; the ordination of temple-ministers, or the initiation of the young into the tribe, demanded some _consecrative_ sacrifice. And, on the other hand, there was equal necessity for a sacrifice, a _deconsecrative_ or _liberative_ ceremony, when the relation of consecration was to be terminated (as in the case of the Hebrew n.a.z.irite) or when a person was to be relieved from a taboo--in this latter case the ceremony of cleansing and of sacrificing was intended to secure the approval of the deity in whose name and in whose interest the taboo had been imposed.

+1034+. Sacrifices might be individual or communal, occasional or periodical. The early organization of society into clans made the communal sacrifice the more prominent[1867]--the clan was the social unit, the interests of the individual were identical with those of the clan, and there was rarely occasion for a man to make a special demand on the deity for his individual benefit. Such occasions did, however, arise, and there was no difficulty in an individual's making a request of the tribal G.o.d provided it was not contrary to the interests of the tribe. If the pet.i.tioner went to some G.o.d or supernatural Power other than the tribal G.o.d, this was an offense against tribal life.

+1035+. The great communal sacrifices were periodical. They were determined by great turning-points in the seasons or by agricultural interests. Sowing time; when the crops became ripe; harvest time; midsummer and midwinter--such events were naturally occasions for the common approach of the members of the tribe to the tribal deity. The same thing is true of military expeditions, which were held to be of high importance for the life of the tribe. War was, as W. R. Smith calls it, a "holy function,"[1868] and its success was supposed (and is now often supposed) to depend on the supernatural aid of the deity. The particular method of conducting the ceremonies in such cases varied with the place and time, but the purpose of the worshiper and the general methods of proceeding are the same among all peoples and at all times.

Occasions connected with the individual, such as birth, initiation, marriage, death, and burial, are also affairs of the family or clan, and the same rule applies to sacrifices on such occasions as to the great communal periodical offerings.

+1036+. It was inevitable that the ritual, that is, the specific mode of procedure, should receive a great development in the course of history.

As colleges of priests were established, ceremonial elaborateness would become natural, and precise methods of proceeding would be handed down from generation to generation. Thus in many cases the worshiper had to be prepared by purificatory and other ceremonies, and the priest had to submit to certain rules before he could undertake the sacrifice. The victim was selected according to certain prescriptions: it had to be of a certain age or s.e.x, of a certain color, generally free from impurities and defects, and sometimes it was necessary that it should show itself willing to be sacrificed.[1869] These details do not at all affect the essence of the sacrifice. They are all the result of the ordinary human tendency to organization, to precise determination of particulars, and while certain general features are easily understood (those, for example, relating to the perfectness of the victim) others are the result of considerations which are unknown to us. It would be a mistake to seek for the origin of sacrifice in such ritualistic details.

THEORIES OF THE ORIGIN OF SACRIFICE

+1037+. Up to a very recent time the inst.i.tution of sacrifice was generally accepted either as a natural human custom, due to reverence for the G.o.ds, or as of divine prescription. In very early doc.u.ments, as, for example, in the Iliad and in certain parts of the Old Testament, it is a.s.sumed that the material of sacrifice is the food of the G.o.ds--a fact of interest in the discussion of the origin of sacrifice, never, however, in ancient times formulated as a theory. In the Graeco-Roman and later Jewish periods sacrifices seem to have been conceived of in a general way as a mark of respect to the deity and fell more and more into disuse as the ethical feeling became distincter. In the New Testament there is a trace of the view that the victim is a subst.i.tute for the offerer: in the Epistle to the Hebrews it is said that the blood of bulls and goats could never effect the remission of sin--a n.o.bler victim was necessary.[1870] A similar conception is found in the later Greek and Roman literature, but there is still no distinct theory. In the third century of our era Porphyry, who was greatly interested in religious matters and, doubtless, represents a considerable body of thoughtful current opinion, says simply that sacrifices are offered to do honor to a deity or to give thanks or to procure favors.[1871] The early Christian writers make no attempt to explain the origin of the custom, nor do we find any such attempt in the European philosophy of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It was not until the spirit of historical inquiry had entered the sphere of religious investigation that the question as to the historical beginning and the significance of sacrifice was fairly put.

+1038+. In discussions of this question a distinction is sometimes made between b.l.o.o.d.y and unb.l.o.o.d.y offerings--they are supposed to differ in placatory or expiatory virtue, and one or the other of them is held to precede in order of time. The facts seem, however, not to warrant this distinction. Everywhere the two sorts of offering have equal power to please and placate the deity; the special prominence that may be given to the one or the other is due to peculiar social conditions that do not affect the essential nature of the rite.[1872] As to precedence of one or the other in time the available data offer nothing definite beyond the fact that choice between them is determined by the circ.u.mstances of a community--the material of an offering is whatever (food or other thing) seems natural and appropriate in a particular place and at a particular time, and this may vary, of course, in the same community at different stages of culture.

+1039+. Current theories of the origin and significance of sacrifice divide themselves into two general groups, the one laying stress on the idea of gift, the other on the idea of union with the deity. Both go back ultimately to the same conception, the conviction, namely, that man's best good can be secured only by the help of the supernatural Powers; but they approach the subject from different points of view and differ in their treatment of the rationale of the ritual.

+1040+. The conception of an offering as a gift to a deity is found in very early times and is common in low tribes. In Greece the word for "gift," as offering, occurs from Homer on, and in Latin is frequent, and such a term is employed in Sanscrit. The common Hebrew term for sacrifice (_min?a_) has the same sense; it is used for both b.l.o.o.d.y and unb.l.o.o.d.y offerings, though from the time of Ezekiel (sixth century B.C.) onward it became a technical term for cereal offerings.[1873] The details of savage custom are given by Tylor,[1874] who proposes as the scheme of chronological development "gift, homage, abnegation." This order, which is doubtless real, embodies and depends on growth in social organization and in the consequent growth in depth and refinement of religious feeling. The object of a gift is to procure favor and protection; homage involves the recognition of the deity as overlord, and, in the higher stages of thought, as worthy of reverence--always, however, with the sense of dependence and the desire for benefits; abnegation is the devotion of one's possessions and, ultimately, of one's self; this idea sometimes a.s.sumes a low form, as if the deity were pleased with human loss and suffering, or as if human enjoyment were antireligious,[1875] sometimes approaches the conception of the unity of the worshiper with the object of worship.[1876]

+1041+. A special form of the gift-theory, with a peculiar coloring, is that which holds that some object is subst.i.tuted for the worshiper who has fallen under the displeasure of the deity and is in danger of punishment. This conception, however, is found only in the most advanced religions. The cases in which an animal is subst.i.tuted for a human victim[1877] are of a different character--they are humane reinterpretations of old customs. In early popular religion the only examples of a deity's deliberately inflicting on innocent persons the punishment of another's wrongdoing are connected with the old conception of tribal and national solidarity--OEdipus, Achan, David, and others, by their crimes, bring misfortune on their peoples; when the guilty have received their punishment the innocent are relieved. A real vicarious suffering is not found in these cases or in any ancient sacrificial ritual--the victim is not supposed to bear the sin of the sacrificant.[1878] It is only in comparatively late theological constructions that vicarious atonement occurs. Some Jewish thinkers were driven to such a theory by the problem of national misfortune. The pious and faithful part of the nation, the "Servant of Yahweh," had shared in its grievous sufferings, and, as the faithful did not deserve this punishment, the conclusion was drawn that they suffered for the iniquities of the body of the people;[1879] their suffering, however, was to end in victory and prosperity. In this conception the theory of solidarity is obvious, but it differs from the old tribal theory in that the suffering of the innocent brings salvation to the whole ma.s.s. In the prophetic picture there is no explanation of how this result was to be brought about--there is no mention of a moral influence of the few on the many--only there is the implication that the nation, taught by suffering, would in future be faithful to the worship of the national deity. It does not appear wherein the ethical and religious significance of the unmerited suffering of the pious consisted; apparently the object of the writer is merely to account for this suffering and to encourage his countrymen. In another pa.s.sage,[1880] suffering is represented as having in itself expiatory power; the view in this case is that a just deity must punish sin, forgives, however, when the punishment has been borne.

+1042+. The view that the efficacy of sacrifice is due to the fact that it brings about a _union between the deity and the worshiper_ has been construed in several different ways according as the stress is laid on one or another of the elements of the rite. One theory represents atonement, the reconciliation of G.o.d and man, as effected by the physical act of sharing the flesh of a sacred animal; another finds it in the death of an animal made sacred and converted into an intermediary by a series of ceremonies; a third holds that union with the divine is secured by whatever is pleasing to the deity.

+1043+. _Reconciliation through a communal meal._ Meals in which the worshipers partook of the flesh of a sacred animal (in which sometimes the dead animal itself shared) have probably been celebrated from an immemorial antiquity. Examples of such customs among savages are given above.[1881] A familiar instance of a communal meal in civilized society is the Roman festival in which the shades of the ancestors of the clan were honored (the _sacra gentilicia_)--a solemn declaration of the unity of the clan-life.[1882] A more definite act of social communion with a deity seems to be recognizable in the repasts spread in connection with the Eleusinian mysteries, which appear, however, to have been merely a social attachment to the mysteries proper.[1883] In the feasts of the Mithraic initiates, in which mythological symbolism is prominent, a more spiritual element becomes visible: the partic.i.p.ant absorbs something of the nature of the G.o.d--power to overcome evil, with hope of immortality.[1884]

+1044+. In the ancient records of these ceremonies there is no theory of the means by which man comes into friendly relations with the deity. The meal is an act of friendly intercourse--it doubtless involves the ancient belief that those who eat together thus absorb a common life and are bound together by a strong tie. In the earliest and simplest instances the feeling apparently is that the communion is between the human partic.i.p.ants--the divine animal is honored as a brother; but, even when, as among the Ainu,[1885] he receives a part of the food, the tie that binds him to them rests on the fact of original kinship rather than on the communal eating. Later the view that the G.o.d was pleased and placated by the nourishment offered him a.s.sumed more definite form;[1886] but it is doubtful whether on such occasions man was regarded as the guest of the deity.[1887]

+1045+. However this may be, it is the effect of the food on the G.o.d that has been made by W. Robertson Smith the basis of an elaborate theory of sacrifice;[1888] his view is that the a.s.similation of the flesh and blood of the kindred divine animal strengthens the deity's sense of kinship with his worshipers, and thus, promoting a kindly feeling in him, leads him to pardon men's offenses and grant them his protection. Smith's argument is mainly devoted to ill.u.s.trating the ancient conception of blood-kinship between G.o.ds, men, and beasts. He a.s.sumes that sacrifice is the offering of food to the deity (the blood of the animal, as the seat of life, coming naturally to be the most important part of the offering), the sacredness of the victim, and the idea of communion, and further that the victim is a totem--the existence of totemism in the Semitic area, he holds, though not susceptible of rigid proof, is made practically certain by the wide diffusion of the totemic conception elsewhere.[1889] As evidence that the effective thing in sacrifice is the sharing of sacred flesh and blood, he adduces a great number of offerings (such as the shedding one's own blood and the offering of one's hair) in which there is no death of a victim, and no idea of penal satisfaction of the deity. In the Israelite ritual he lays special stress on the common clan-sacrifice (the _zeba?_) in which a part of the victim is given to the G.o.d and a part is consumed by the worshiper; this he contrasts with offerings that are given wholly to the G.o.d, and, leaving aside piacula and holocausts, this distinction he makes correspond to that between animal and vegetable offerings, the latter, he holds, being originally not conciliatory. Thus, he concludes, the expiatory power lies in the sharing of animal flesh. Here the theory is confronted by the holocaust and the piaculum, expiatory sacrifices in which there is no communal eating. Smith meets this difficulty by suggesting that these two sorts of sacrifice belong to a relatively late period, when, in the progress of society, the original conception had become dim. As time went on, he says, the belief in kinship with animals grew fainter. Sacrificial meals became merely occasions of feasting, and at the same time the establishment of kingly government familiarized men with the idea of tribute--so sacrifice came to be regarded as a gift and the victim was wholly burnt (holocaust); the same result was reached when the feeling arose that the victim was too sacred to be eaten--it must be otherwise disposed of (piaculum). The piacula he refers to times of special distress, when recourse was had to the sacrifice of ancient sacred animals, old totems (Hebrew: "unclean" animals), supposed to have special potency.[1890] It is true that in the course of time certain old conceptions grew dim, but this does not set aside the fact that expiatory power was supposed to attach to animal sacrifices in which there was no communal eating; though some of these were late, they doubtless retained the old idea of the nature of the efficacy of sacrifice.