Religions of Primitive Peoples

by Daniel G. Brinton

In this direction, we are powerfully aided by that close similarity of mental products in like stages of culture, to which I have referred, and shall often refer. By comparing a living tribe with one which ten thousand years ago was in a similar condition as shown by its relics, we can with the highest probability interpret the use and motives of the latter’s remains.

We are further assisted in such research by the critical analysis of the early forms of language, which is one of the achievements of modern linguistics. By establishing the identities of names, we can trace the diffusion of myths, and by tracing such names to their proper dialect and original meaning, we can locate geographically and psychologically the origin of given forms of religions. In fact, the value of linguistics to the study of religions cannot be overestimated. No one is competent to describe the sacred beliefs of a nation, its myths and adjurations, unless he has a sufficient knowledge of its tongue to ascertain the true sense of the terms employed in its liturgies.

But these so obvious applications are the least that language can furnish. Its impress on religions goes much deeper. It was well remarked by the Chevalier Bunsen that in primitive conditions the two poles of human life, around which all else centres, are language and religion, and that each conditions the other, that is, imparts to it special forms and limits.

For instance, those languages which have grammatic gender almost necessarily divide their deities according to sex[14]; those in which the passive voice is absent or feebly developed, will be led to associate with their deities higher conceptions of activity than where the passive is a favourite form: those which have no substantive verb cannot express God as pure being, but must associate with Him either position, action, or suffering.

In the speech of the Algonquin Indians, there is no grammatic distinction of sex; but there is broad discrimination between objects which are animate and those which are inanimate. When the Catholic missionaries brought to them the rosary, the natives at first spoke of it as inanimate; but as their reverence for it grew, it was transferred to the animate gender, and was thus on its way to a personification.[15]

The third source of information is that which is called folk-lore. Its field of research is to collect the relics and survivals of primitive modes of thought and expression, beliefs, customs, and notions, in the present conditions of culture. It is, therefore, especially useful in a study like the present, the more so on account of the extraordinary permanence and conservative character of religious sentiments and ceremonies. Among the peasantry of Europe, the paganism of the days of Julius Cæsar flourishes with scarcely abated vigour, though it may be under new names. “The primitive Aryan,” writes Professor Frazer,[16] “is not extinct; he is with us to-day.” And another English writer does not go too far when he says: “There is not a rite or ceremony yet practised and revered among us that is not the lineal descendant of barbaric thought and usage.”[17] It is this which gives to folk-lore its extremely instructive character for the student of early religion.

The fourth source of information is the description of native religions by travellers. You might expect this to be the most accurate and therefore valuable of all the sources; but it is just the reverse. Omitting the ordinary tourist and globe-trotter, who is not expected to know anything thoroughly, and never deceives the expectation, even painstaking observers, who have lived long with savage tribes, sometimes mastering their languages, are, for reasons I shall presently state, constantly at fault about the native religions. We must always take their narratives with hesitation, and weigh them against others by persons of a different nationality and education. Indeed, of all elements of native life, this of religion is the most liable to be misunderstood by the foreign visitor.

Bearing in mind these various sources of information, what tribes, about which we have sufficient knowledge, could fairly be considered as examples of primitive conditions?

Beginning with those remotest in time, I believe we know enough about the early Aryans to claim it for them. The acute researches of recent scholars, so admirably summed up in the work of Professor Schrader, have thrown a flood of light on the domestic, cultural, and religious condition of the pristine epoch of Aryan society from the side of language; while the tireless prosecution of prehistoric archæology in Europe has put us into possession of thousands of objects illustrating the religious arts and usages then in vogue. Classical mythology and ritual, as well as modern folk-lore, lend further efficient aid toward reconstructing the modes and expressions of their sacred thought.

A very ancient people, possibly of Aryan blood, but more likely, I believe, to have come from North Africa and to be of Libyan affinities, were the Etruscans. They were extremely religious, and their theological opinions deeply coloured the worship of the Romans. We know the general outlines of their doctrine of the gods, and its simplicity and grandeur bespeak our admiration. I shall draw from this venerable “Etruscan discipline” from time to time for illustrations.