The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 03 of 12)Frazer, James George
Religion
The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 03 of 12)
Frazer, James George
Magic; Mythology; Religion; Superstition
(M23) So exact is the resemblance of the mannikin to the man, in other
words, of the soul to the body, that, as there are fat bodies and thin
bodies, so there are fat souls and thin souls;(84) as there are heavy
bodies and light bodies, long bodies and short bodies, so there are heavy
souls and light souls, long souls and short souls. The people of Nias (an
island to the west of Sumatra) think that every man, before he is born, is
asked how long or how heavy a soul he would like, and a soul of the
desired weight or length is measured out to him. The heaviest soul ever
given out weighs about ten grammes. The length of a man’s life is
proportioned to the length of his soul; children who die young had short
souls.(85) The Fijian conception of the soul as a tiny human being comes
clearly out in the customs observed at the death of a chief among the
Nakelo tribe. When a chief dies, certain men, who are the hereditary
undertakers, call him, as he lies, oiled and ornamented, on fine mats,
saying, “Rise, sir, the chief and let us be going. The day has come over
the land.” Then they conduct him to the river side, where the ghostly
ferryman comes to ferry Nakelo ghosts across the stream As they thus
attend the chief on his last journey, they hold their great fans close to
the ground to shelter him, because, as one of them explained to a
missionary, “His soul is only a little child.”(86) People in the Punjaub
who tattoo themselves believe that at death the soul, “the little entire
man or woman” inside the mortal frame, will go to heaven blazoned with the
same tattoo patterns which adorned the body in life.(87) Sometimes,
however, as we shall see, the human soul is conceived not in human but in
animal form.
§ 2. Absence and Recall of the Soul.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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