Realising this, we are prepared to find that the Malay theory of Animism embraces, at least partially, the human race,[83] animals[84] and birds,[85] vegetation[86] (trees and plants), reptiles and fishes,[87] until its extension to inert objects, such as minerals,[88] and “stocks and stones, weapons, boats, food, clothes, ornaments, and other objects, which to us are not merely soulless, but lifeless,” brings us face to face with a conception with which “we are less likely to sympathise.”
Side by side with this general conception of an universally animate nature, we find abundant evidences of a special theory of Human Origin which is held to account not only for the larger mammals, but also for the existence of a large number of birds, and even for that of a few reptiles, fishes, trees and plants, but seems to lose its operative force in proportion to its descent in the scale of creation, until in the lowest scale of all, the theory of Human Origin disappears from sight, and nothing remains but the partial application of a few vague anthropomorphic attributes.[89] It is, doubtless, to the prevalence of this theory that we owe the extraordinary persistence of anthropomorphic ideas about animals, birds, reptiles, trees, if not of minerals, in Malay magical ceremonies;[90] and it is hard to say which of these two notions—the theory of Human Origin, or the other theory of Universal Animism—is to be considered the original form of Malay belief.
The following tale, which is entitled Charitra Mĕgat Sajobang, and is told by Selangor Malays, will serve as an illustration of the idea of Human Origin:—
“There was a married Sakai couple living at Ulu Klang, and they had a son called Mĕgat Sajobang. When he grew up he said to his mother, ‘Mother, get me a passage, I want to go and see other countries.’ She did so, and he left Ulu Klang; and ten or twelve years later, when he had grown rich enough to buy a splendid ship (p’rahu), he returned with his wife, who was with child, and seven midwives, who were watched over by one of his body-guard with a drawn sword. His mother heard the news of his return, and she made ready, roasting a chika (monkey) and lotong (monkey), and went with his father on board their bark canoe to meet their son.
“As they approached they hailed him by his name; but he was ashamed of their humble appearance, and forbade his men to let them on board. Though his wife advised him to acknowledge them, ‘even if they were pigs or dogs,’ the unfilial son persisted in turning them away. So they went back to the shore and sat down and wept; and the old mother, laying her hand upon her shrivelled breast, said, ‘If thou art really my son, reared at my breast, mayest thou be changed into stone.’ In response to her prayer, milk came forth from her breast, and as she walked away, the ship and all on board were turned into stone. The mother turned round once more to look at her son, but the father did not, and by the power of God they were both turned into trees of the species pauh (a kind of mango) one leaning seawards and the other towards the land. The fruit of the seaward one is sweet, but that of the landward one is bitter.
“The ship has now become a hill, and originally was complete with all its furniture, but the Malays used to borrow the plates and cups, etc., for feast days and did not return them, until at last there were none left.”
[1] Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, N.S. vol. xiii. part iv. Cp. also the note to page 8 supra, in which the Golden Dragon is made to say, “I have neither father nor mother, but I was incarnated from the hollow part of a bamboo.” See also J.R.A.S., S.B., No. 9, p. 91. [↑]