With reference to the soul’s life after death, the Greenlanders seem to have had diverse opinions. Some, whom the missionaries call stupid and brutish people, thought that all was over at death, and that there was no life beyond the grave. Most of the Greenlanders, however, seem to have thought that even if the soul was not quite immortal, it was yet in the habit of continuing to live after leaving the body, or at any rate of coming to life again even if it had died along with the body. In that case it went either to a place under the earth and the sea or to the upper world in the sky, or rather between the sky and the earth.[74] The former place is regarded as the better of the two; it is a very good land, where, according to Hans Egede, there is ‘lovely sunshine, excellent water, animals and birds in abundance.’ To many it may seem strange that, unlike us, they should place their happiest region under the earth or the sea; but this, it seems to me, may easily have arisen from their having seen the heaven and the mountains reflected in the water, and believed that it was another world they saw. No doubt they have in process of time discovered that it is only a reflection, but the original belief in an under-world has maintained itself none the less. It is particularly characteristic that this under-world is placed under the water, and that there is much sunshine in it; for it must have been chiefly in the sunshine that they saw the reflection.
The other region, in the over-world, is colder; it is like the earth with its hills and valleys, and over it is arched the blue heaven. There the souls of the dead dwell in tents round a lake, and when the lake overflows it rains on earth. There are many crowberries there, and many ravens, who always settle on the heads of old women[75] and cling on to their hair; it is difficult to drive them off, and they seem to fill the place of lice here on earth. The souls of the dead can be seen up there by night, in the form of northern lights, playing football with a walrus head. On the east coast, however, it is believed that the northern lights are merely the souls of stillborn or prematurely born children, or of those who are killed after their birth. These children’s souls ‘take each other’s hands and dance around in mazy circles. They play at ball, too, and when they see orphan children, they rush upon them and throw them to the ground. They accompany their sports with a hissing, whistling sound.’[76] Therefore, the northern lights are called alugsukat, which appears to mean untimely births, or children born in concealment. This notion of the Greenlanders seems to be closely related to the Indians’ belief[77] that the northern lights are the dead in dancing array.
The Eskimos have no hell. Both the above-named regions are more or less good, and whether the soul goes to the one or to the other does not seem to depend particularly upon the man’s good or evil acts.
Egede, however, asserts that to the lovely land under the earth there go only ‘women who die in childbirth, men who are drowned at sea, and whale-fishers, as a reward for the evil they have suffered here on earth; all others go to the sky.’[78] It seems doubtful whether this was ever a general belief. An exactly analogous idea is to be found among ourselves. An old woman in Telemark said to Moltke Moe, speaking of her son: ‘Ah, yes, he is certain enough to have gone straight to heaven; for you know it’s said in God’s Word that those who are drowned at sea or die in childbirth go straight away to the Kingdom of God.’[79]
From other accounts, in any case, it seems that these are not the only souls which go to the under-world. The destination of the soul may partly depend on the treatment of the body. Paul Egede says (Efterretninger om Grönland, p. [174]) that ‘it was their custom to take people who were sick unto death gently out of bed, and, laying them on the floor, to swathe them in their grave-clothes. This lowering them down from the bed probably symbolises their wish that after death they may descend beneath the earth. But if a man dies before he is taken from the bed, his soul goes upward.’ On his inquiring why a dog’s head was laid beside the grave, he was answered ‘that it was a custom among some of their fellows to lay a dog’s head beside a child when it was buried, in order that it might scent about and guide the child to the land of spirits when it came to life again, children being foolish and witless, and unable to find their own way.’[80] It seems as though Captain Holm[81] doubted the correctness of this trait (which, however, he quotes from Hans Egede), on the ground that he could discover no such poetical custom among the East Greenlanders. But in this he does not seem to be quite justified; for, on the one hand, we are scarcely entitled to doubt so definite a statement by a man like Paul Egede, who knew the Greenlanders and their language so well, while, on the other hand, we must always remember how fluctuating and changeable are religious conceptions. Analogous customs, moreover, are found among the Indians. The Aztecs killed a dog at funerals, and burned or buried it along with the body, with a cotton thread tied around its throat. Its function was to lead the deceased over the deep waters of Chiuhnahuapan on the way to the land of the dead.[82]
The journey to the beautiful region is, however, no easy matter. Egede says that there is on the way a high sharp rock, ‘down which the dead must slide on their backs, wherefore the rock is bloody.’ Cranz asserts that it takes the souls five or even more days to slide down this rock or mountain; and those luckless ones are especially to be pitied who have to make the journey in winter or in stormy weather, for then they can easily come to harm. This they call the second death, after which nothing is left of them.[83] They fear this very much, and, in order to avert it, the survivors, during the critical days, are bound to observe certain precautions. Similar legends as to the many difficulties besetting the long journey of souls to the land of the dead are to be found amongst most races.[84] It seems probable that these difficulties have arisen in order to serve as tests through which the good can pass more easily than the wicked. But since, among the Eskimos, the difficulties afford no touchstone of moral qualities, we must conclude that the legend describing them must be borrowed from others, and most probably from the Indians. The sharp rock in particular reminds us of the Indians’ ‘mountain ridge, which was as sharp as the sharpest knife,‘ along which the souls had to pass on the way to their dwelling-place, Wanaretebe.[85]
The Greenlanders seem generally to have attributed a soul to animals, which, like the human soul, could survive the body and journey to the regions beyond. This appears clearly enough from the bear story related in Chapter XII (see p. [206]). It also appears from the custom mentioned on p. [237] of laying dogs’ heads in the graves of children; for it is of course the dog’s soul, dwelling in its head, which is to accompany the child. For the rest, this is a general belief among primitive peoples. The Kamtchatkans, for instance, believe that the souls of all animals, even of the smallest fly, come to life again in the under-world.
The Greenlanders know of many supernatural beings of a higher order. Among those who stand nearest to man, and are most useful to him through the medium of the angekoks, we must first name the so-called tôrnat (the plural of tôrnak). These are the angekoks’ ministering spirits, who impart to them their supernatural power. They are often said to be souls of the dead, especially of grandfathers or other ancestors; but they may also be the souls of various animals, or other supernatural beings, either of human origin, like the kivigtut, to be hereafter mentioned, or independent spiritual essences dwelling in the sea or far inland. They may also be the souls of absent Europeans. An angekok would as a rule have several, some acting as councillors, others as helpers in danger, and others, again, as avengers and destroyers. These last were despatched by the angekok to show themselves in the form of ghosts, and thus to frighten to death those against whom the vengeance was directed.
In connection with, or superior to, the tornat, we find the tôrnârssuk, which is generally held to be their master, or a particularly powerful tornak. The tornarssuk was regarded as, on the whole, a benevolent power; through his tornak the angekok could get into communication with him and obtain wise counsels. But evil deeds seem often to have been attributed to him. With him, as with all the other supernatural beings, it probably depended on the angekoks whether he should be beneficent or the reverse. His home lay in the under-world, in the land of the souls. As to his appearance, ideas were very vague; some holding that he had no form at all; others that he was like a bear; others, again, that he was huge and had only one arm; and some, finally, that he was no larger than a finger. As to his nature, according to Hans Egede, there was no less difference of opinion; for while some held that he was immortal, others believed that it needed very little to kill him. Thus Egede relates that during an angekok’s magic operations, or while he is communing with the tornarssuk, ‘no one must scratch his head, or fall asleep; for by such means they say the wizard may be killed, and even the devil [that is, the tornarssuk] himself.’ Dr. Rink holds that all this is founded upon misunderstandings on the part of Egede and the other missionaries, and that, on the whole, very little was known either as to the tornarssuk’s appearance or as to his nature. The heathens on the east coast, however, seem, as we shall see, to know all about him.
In this tornarssuk many have been fain to see a beneficent supreme being whom the Eskimos worship; answering, accordingly, to our God. Nevertheless he was, on the introduction of Christianity, transformed into the devil, with whom he is now synonymous. I cannot help believing that Egede and the first missionaries have had some hand in working-up this conception of him as God. They no doubt started, as many missionaries do even to this day, from the hypothesis that every people must have a conception of God or of a beneficent supreme being, and, assuming this, they probably cross-questioned the poor heathen so long about their tornarssuk, that they at last came to answer just what their questioners desired. Moreover, they doubtless talked so much of their good and almighty God that the heathen priests, in order not to be beaten, began to maintain that they, too, had such a God to help them. That the tornarssuk was not so great a spirit as is commonly stated seems evident from Captain Holm’s account of the heathen East Greenlanders’ belief. Their tornarssuk is a much less imposing creature, who dwells in the sea, and whom many people, both angekoks and others, can see and have seen. They therefore describe him with great exactitude, and have even numerous representations of him. He is long, like a large seal, but fatter than a seal, and has, among other things, long tentacles. Holm, judging from their descriptions, has come to the heretical opinion that he must be an ordinary cuttle-fish. He devours the souls of those whom he can capture, and is often quite red with blood. One must admit that if this creature is descended from our innate conception of God, he has deplorably degenerated. Moreover, he is not, on the east coast, one and indivisible; but every angekok, according to Holm, has his tornarssuk. He has also a coadjutor, aperketek, a black animal as much as two ells in length, and with great ‘knife-tongs in his head.’ Holm says expressly that he could discover no trace of a conception of the tornarssuk as the master of the tornak; and we are thus forced to subtract a little from the power and importance attributed to this spirit by former authors.[86]