CHAPTER XIV
Creation Myths and the God and Goddess Cults
Are Animistic Beliefs Primitive?—Evidence of a Mummy-imported Culture in Primitive Communities—Chinese Creation Myth—Chaos Transformed into Kosmos—Pʼan Ku as the World-artisan—Chinese World-giant Myth—Tibetan Version—Pʼan Ku and the Egyptian Ptah—Hammer Gods—Pʼan Ku and the Scandinavian Ymir—Osiris as a World-giant—Fusion of Egyptian and Babylonian Myths—The Chinese Ishtars—The Goddess of the Deluge—The Chinese Virgin Mother—Dragon Boat Ceremonies—The Mountain Goddess in China—Kiang Yuan as the Divine Mother—Ancient Myths in Chinese Buddhism—The “Poosa” as Goddess of Mercy—As Controller of Tides—Vision of Sky-goddess—Island Seat of Goddess Worship—The Chinese Indra.
Although some exponents of the stratification theory incline to regard Chinese religion as a stunted outcrop of animistic ideas, and chiefly because of the remarkable persistence through the ages of the worship of ancestors—the worship of ghost-gods and ghosts identified with gods—there is really little trace of what is usually referred to as “the primitive state of mind”. Under the term “animism” have been included ideas that are less primitive than was supposed to be the case about a generation ago. The belief, for instance, that there are spirits in stones, or that the soul of the dead enters a megalithic monument, or a statue placed in the tomb, may not, after all, belong to a primitive stage of thought; nor does it follow that because it is found to be prevalent among savage tribes isolated on lonely islands it is a product [[257]]merely of the early “workings of the human mind” when man, as if by instinct, framed his “first crude philosophy of human thought”. The fact that savages reached isolated islands, such as, for instance, Eastern Island, where stone idols were erected, indicates clearly that they had acquired a knowledge of shipbuilding and navigation directly or indirectly from a centre of ancient civilization. It may be, therefore, that they likewise acquired from the same source ideas regarding the soul and the origin of things, and that these, instead of being “simple” and “primitive”, are really of complex character, and have remained in a state of arrested development, simply because they have been detached from the parent stem, to be preserved like flower petals pressed in a book, that still retain a degree of their original brightness and characteristic odour.
In outlying areas, like Australia and Oceania, are found not only “primitive beliefs”, but definite burial customs that have a long history elsewhere, including cremation and even mummification. “You get the whole bag of tricks in Australia”, the late Andrew Lang once declared to the writer when contending that certain beliefs and customs found in Egypt, Babylonia, India, and Europe were “natural products of the primitive mind”. But is it likely that such a custom as mummification should have “arisen independently” in Australasia? Let us take, for instance, the case of the mummy from the Torres Straits, which is preserved in the Mackay Museum in the University of Sydney. It was examined by Professor G. Elliot Smith, who, during his ten years’ occupancy of the Chair of Anatomy in the Government School of Medicine in Cairo, had unique opportunities of studying Ancient Egyptian surgery as revealed by the mummies preserved in Gizeh museum. When he examined the [[258]]Papuan mummy at Sydney he found that undeniable Egyptian methods of a definite period in Egyptian history had been employed. He communicated his discovery to the Anthropological Section of the British Association in Melbourne in 1914, and, as an anatomist, was astonished to hear Professor Myres contending that it seemed to him natural that people should want to preserve their dead! “If”, Professor Elliot Smith has written, “Professor Myers had known anything of the history of anatomy he would have realized that the problem of preserving the body was one of extreme difficulty which for long ages had exercised the most civilized peoples, not only of antiquity, but also of modern times. In Egypt, where the natural conditions favouring the successful issue of attempts to preserve the body were largely responsible for the possibility of such embalming, it took more than seventeen centuries of constant practice and experimentation to reach the stage and to acquire the methods exemplified in the Torres Straits mummies.”[1] Arm-chair theories vanish like mist when the light of scientific evidence is released.
In like manner may be found in the folk-lore and religious literature of China “mummies” of imported myths, as well as early myths of local invention that, ancient as they may be, cannot be regarded as “primitive” in the real sense of the term. The following myth, found in the literature of Taoism, may be more archaic than the writings of Kwang-tze, who gives it.
At the beginning of time there were two oceans—one in the south and one in the north, and there was land in the centre. The Ruler of the southern ocean was Shu (Heedless), and the Ruler of the northern ocean was Hu [[259]](Hasty), while the Ruler of the Centre was Hwun-tun (Chaos).
“Heedless” and “Hasty” were in the habit of paying regular visits to the land, and there they met and became acquainted. “Chaos” treated them kindly, and it was their desire to confer upon him some favour so as to give practical expression to their feelings of gratitude. They discussed the matter together, and decided what they should do.
Now Chaos was blind, his eyes being closed, and he was deaf, his ears being closed, and he could not breathe, having no nostrils, nor eat, because he was mouthless.