We now arrive at a theory of the Supreme Being among a certain African race which would be entirely fatal to my whole hypothesis on this topic, if it could be demonstrated correct in fact, and if it could be stretched so as to apply to the Australians, Fuegians, Andamanese, and other very backward peoples. It is the hypothesis that the Supreme Being is a 'loan-god,' borrowed from Europeans.
The theory is very lucidly set forth in Major Ellis's 'Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast.'[21] Major Ellis's opinion coincides with that of Waitz in his 'Introduction to Anthropology' (an opinion to which Waitz does not seem bigoted)—namely, that 'the original form of all religion is a raw, unsystematic polytheism,' nature being peopled by inimical powers or spirits, and everyone worshipping what he thinks most dangerous or most serviceable. There are few general, many local or personal, objects of veneration.[22] Major Ellis only met this passage when he had formed his own ideas by observation of the Tshi race. We do not pretend to guess what 'the original form of all religion' may have been; but we have given, and shall give, abundant evidence for the existence of a loftier faith than this, among peoples much lower in material culture than the Tshi races, who have metals and an organised priesthood. They occupy, in small villages (except Coomassie and Djuabin), the forests of the Gold Coast. The mere mention of Coomassie shows how vastly superior in civilisation the Tshis (Ashantis and Fantis) are to the naked, houseless Australians. Their inland communities, however, are 'mere specks in a vast tract of impenetrable forest.' The coast people have for centuries been in touch with Europeans, but the 'Tshi-speaking races are now much in the same condition, both socially and morally, as they were at the time of the Portuguese discovery.'[23]
Nevertheless, Major Ellis explains their Supreme Being as the result of European influence! A priori this appears highly improbable. That a belief should sweep over all these specks in impenetrable forest, from the coast-tribes in contact with Europeans, and that this belief should, though the most recent, be infinitely the least powerful, cannot be regarded as a plausible hypothesis. Moreover, on Major Ellis's theory the Supreme Beings of races which but recently came for the first time in contact with Europeans, Supreme Beings kept jealously apart from European ken, and revered in the secrecy of ancient mysteries, must also, by parity of reason, be the result of European influence. Unfortunately, Major Ellis gives no evidence for his statements about the past history of Tshi religion. Authorities he must have, and references would be welcome.
'With people in the condition in which the natives of the Gold Coast now are, religion is not in any way allied with moral ideas.'[24] We have given abundant evidence that among much more backward tribes morals rest on a religious sanction. If this be not so on the Gold Coast we cannot accept these relatively advanced Fantis and Ashantis as representing the 'original' state of ethics and religion, any more than those people with cities, a king, a priesthood, iron, and gold, represent the 'original' material condition of society. Major Ellis also shows that the Gods exact chastity from aspirants to the priesthood.[25] The present beliefs of the Gold Coast are kept up by organised priesthoods as 'lucrative business.'[26] Where there is no lucre and no priesthood, as among more backward races, this kind of business cannot be done. On the Gold Coast men can only approach gods through priests.[27] This is degeneration.
Obviously, if religion began in a form relatively pure and moral, it must degenerate, as civilisation advances, under priests who 'exploit' the lucrative, and can see no money in the pure elements of belief and practice. That the lucrative elements in Christianity were exploited by the clergy, to the neglect of ethics, was precisely the complaint of the Reformers. From these lucrative elements the creed of the Apostles was free, and a similar freedom marks the religion of Australia or of the Pawnees. We cannot possibly, then, expect to find the 'original' state of religion among a people subdued to a money-grubbing priesthood, like the Tshi races. Let religion begin as pure as snow, it would be corrupted by priestly trafficking in its lucrative animistic aspect. And priests are developed relatively late.
Major Ellis discriminates Tshi gods as—
1. General, worshipped by an entire tribe or more tribes. 2. Local deities of river, hill, forest, or sea. 3. Deities of families or corporations. 4. Tutelary deities of individuals.
The second class, according to the natives, were appointed by the first class, who are 'too distant or indifferent to interfere ordinarily in human affairs.' Thus, the Huron god, Ahone, punishes nobody. He is all sweetness and light, but has a deputy god, called Okeus. On our hypothesis this indifference of high gods suggests the crowding out of the great disinterested God by venal animistic competition. All of class II. 'appear to have been originally malignant.' Though, in native belief, class I. was prior to, and 'appointed' class II., Major Ellis thinks that malignant spirits of class II. were raised to class I. as if to the peerage, while classes III. and IV. 'are clearly the product of priesthood'—therefore late.
Major Ellis then avers that when Europeans reached the Gold Coast, in the fifteenth century, they 'appear to have found' a Northern God, Tando, and a Southern God, Bobowissi, still adored. Bobowissi makes thunder and rain, lives on a hill, and receives, or received, human sacrifices. But, 'after an intercourse of some years with Europeans,' the villagers near European forts 'added to their system a new deity, whom they termed Nana Nyankupon. This was the God of the Christians, borrowed from them, and adapted under a new designation, meaning 'Lord of the sky.' (This is conjectural. Nyankum = rain. Nyansa has 'a later meaning, "craft."')[28]
Now Major Ellis, later, has to contrast Bosman's account of fetishism (1700) with his own observations. According to Bosman's native source of information, men then selected their own fetishes. These are now selected by priests. Bosman's authority was wrong—or priesthood has extended its field of business. Major Ellis argues that the revolution from amateur to priestly selection of fetishes could not occur in 190 years, 'over a vast tract of country, amongst peoples living in semi-isolated communities, in the midst of pathless forests, where there is but little opportunity for the exchange of ideas, and where we know they have been uninfluenced by any higher race.'