Tokarev early forms of religion 1st edition. FROM
The name of the historian and ethnographer S. A. Tokarev is known to the reader from the book "Religion in the history of the peoples of the world", which is very popular. The proposed edition introduces the reader to the works of S. A. Tokarev devoted to the origin of religion and its early forms. History buffs will meet some of them for the first time.
The book is intended for anyone interested in the history of culture and religion.
HISTORICAL CONTINUITY OF RELIGION FORMS.
The last question to be touched upon in this introductory chapter is that of the historical connection or continuity between different forms of religion.
Attempts to arrange the forms of religion in a strictly sequential order, where each form seems to grow out of the previous one, where one belief is considered as a logical development of another, can hardly lead to success. Such schemes of the seemingly immanent development of religion were built repeatedly, starting from the schemes of Volney and Hegel and up to the construction of Lobbock, and later they were replaced by schemes of a multilinear or, as it were, fan-shaped development of religion (Taylor, Wundt, etc.), where from one embryonic belief, for example, from faith in the human soul, grow like a fan in different directions, more and more complex forms religious beliefs. Having overcome the simplified one-linearity, these schemes still did not overcome the main vice - the idea of the spontaneous evolution of religion, where each stage is considered as logically growing from the earlier one and all together are ultimately derived from the primary elementary belief - from the same belief in the human soul.
Such evolutionary schemes, whether single-line or multi-line, are very reminiscent of the actions of a magician who, in front of the audience, removes an endless paper tape from his mouth, so that the audience only wonders where he put it there.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
EARLY FORMS OF RELIGION AND THEIR DEVELOPMENT 13
Introduction, PRINCIPLES OF MORPHOLOGICAL CLASSIFICATION OF RELIGIONS 14
Chapter 1. TOTEMISM 51
Chapter 2. Witchcraft (harmful rites) 84
Chapter 3
Chapter 4 Erotic Rites and Cults 116
Chapter 5. FUNERAL CULT 153
Chapter 6. EARLY TRIBAL CULT (initiations) 206
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10 Shamanism 266
Chapter 11. NAGUALISM 292
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15 AGRICULTURAL CULTS 360
THE PROBLEM OF THE ORIGIN OF RELIGION AND EARLY FORMS OF BELIEFS 375
THE PROBLEM OF THE ORIGIN AND EARLY FORMS OF RELIGION 376
THE ESSENCE AND ORIGIN OF MAGIC 404
WHAT IS MYTHOLOGY? 507
TO THE QUESTION OF THE SIGNIFICANCE OF FEMALE IMAGES OF THE PALEOLITH EPOCH 552
THE PROBLEM OF TOTEMISM IN THE COVERAGE OF SOVIET SCIENTISTS 564
MYTHOLOGY AND ITS PLACE IN THE CULTURAL HISTORY OF HUMANITY 577
SACRIFICES 589
ON THE CULT OF THE MOUNTAINS AND ITS PLACE IN THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 602
INDEX 612.
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Early forms of religion.
// M.: Politizdat. 1990. 622 p. ISBN 5-250-01234-5 (Atheist Literature Library).
[ V.P. Alekseev ]. - 5
Early forms of religion and their development. - 13
Introduction. Principles of morphological classification of religions. - fourteen
Chapter 1. Totemism. - 51
Chapter 2. Witchcraft (harmful rites). - 84
Chapter 3 - 104
Chapter 4. Erotic rites and cults. - 116
Chapter 5 - 153
Chapter 6 - 206
Chapter 7 - 227
Chapter 8 - 242
Chapter 9 - 255
Chapter 10 Shamanism - 266
Chapter 11 - 292
Chapter 12 - 307
Chapter 13 - 320
Chapter 14 - 331
Chapter 15 - 360
The problem of the origin of religion and early forms of belief. - 375
The problem of the origin and early forms of religion. - 376
Essence and origin of magic. - 404
What is mythology? - 507
On the question of the significance of female images of the Paleolithic era. - 552
Mythology and its place in the cultural history of mankind. - 577
Sacrifices. - 589
About the cult of mountains and its place in the history of religion. - 602
Subject index. - 61...
S.A. Tokarev is a scientist and popularizer of science.
The book lying in front of the reader is a collection of works by one of the outstanding Soviet scientists - Sergei Aleksandrovich Tokarev. His major works in the field of history, world culture, ethnography and religious studies, translated into many languages, earned him well-deserved international fame not only among specialists, but also among a wide range of readers.
Sergei Alexandrovich Tokarev was born on December 16, 1899 in the city of Tula in the family of a teacher. In 1925 he graduated from Moscow State University, and since then his life has been inextricably linked with historical science, with ethnography. He worked as a lecturer at the Communist Workers' Institute of China. Sun Yat-Sen, and in 1928 became researcher Central Museum of Ethnology. In 1932, he headed the sector of the North in this museum. At the same time, he worked in State Academy history of material culture and in the Central anti-religious museum. In 1935 S.A. Tokarev was awarded the degree of candidate of historical sciences, and in 1940 he defended his doctoral dissertation.
The Great Patriotic War began, and S.A. Tokarev was evacuated to Abakan, where he headed the department of history at the Pedagogical Institute. In 1943 he returned to Moscow and headed the sector of ethnography of the peoples of America, Australia and Oceania in the newly organized Moscow branch of the Institute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences, and since 1961 - the sector of ethnography of the peoples of foreign Europe. In the same years (1956-1973) he headed the Department of Ethnography of Moscow State University, and later, having resigned
these duties, continued to teach lecture courses there.
Breadth and versatility of S.A. Tokarev manifested itself already from his first steps as a researcher. He actively works on mastering the huge literature on the ethnography of Oceania, critically rethinks this literature, and soon becomes an unsurpassed expert on the ethnography of Australia and Oceania. At the same time, Sergei Alexandrovich is deeply engaged in the ethnography of Siberia, mainly South, collects specific ethnographic material and works in the archives. At first glance, such a concentration of research efforts in two different, distant from one another areas can be perceived as a dispersion of scientific interests. But it was she who to a large extent determined the encyclopedism of knowledge of S.A. Tokarev, his ability to work with a variety of data.
A characteristic feature of S.A. Tokarev as a researcher was not only a constant expansion of the scope scientific activity, but also further deepening, polishing already put forward and previously argued provisions. The system of kinship among the natives of Australia, the reconstruction of the social structure of the Melanesians, social stratification on the islands of Tonga, the interpretation of the folklore traditions of the Polynesians as an ethnogenetic source - these are the milestones of his research in Australian studies and oceanography. The volume of publications S.A. Tokarev on the above topics is such that, put together, they would constitute a solid work. To a certain extent, the result of all these specific developments was the volume "Peoples of Australia and Oceania" in the "Peoples of the World" series, published in 1956 and often called "Tokarevsky". Sergei Alexandrovich owned most of the text in this volume, which rightfully took pride of place in world ethnographic literature.
No less significant are the achievements of S.A. Tokarev and in the study of ethnography and history of the peoples of Siberia, their settlement and social system. His research in this area culminated in the publication in the 1930s and 1940s of three books of a consolidated nature: Precapitalist Survivals in Oirotia (1936), Essay on the History of the Yakut People (1940) and social order Yakuts XVII-XVIII centuries. (1945). Skillful comparison of ethnographic
observations and written sources, the filigree of the source analysis, the impartiality of the approach to the analyzed problems, the caution and balanced conclusions - the most character traits research method S.A. Tokarev, which are fully reflected in these books.
To the same cycle of works S.A. Tokarev can also be attributed to the monumental book “Ethnography of the Peoples of the USSR. Historical foundations of everyday life and culture”, which was based on a series of lectures he gave at Moscow State University. For many decades, Sergei Alexandrovich taught a course in ethnography of the peoples of the USSR at the Department of Ethnography of Moscow State University; in typewritten form, these lectures were widely used as study guide students and graduate students in universities and scientific institutions of the country. Established specialists also often turned to them, they contained so much original information, the results of independent study and interpretation of many fundamental problems of the ethnography of the USSR, meaningful historiographical and critical excursions. The author himself in the preface to the book, with characteristic modesty, wrote that it was being published "as a textbook primarily for university teaching" (p. 3). But in fact, it has far outgrown the framework of a textbook, having taken the form of an encyclopedic work on the peoples of the USSR and the historical dynamics of their culture.
The book covered all aspects of traditional culture, including the material one. The description of the latter is closely linked to the forms economic activity. In general, S.A. Tokarev was highly characteristic of a synthetic vision of the subject of research in all its complex direct and indirect connections, therefore the entire descriptive part in this book - and it occupies a considerable place - is extremely interesting. A lot of attention is paid to the study of traditional beliefs. The presentation is conducted in accordance with the territorial principle, and the analysis of each large territorial population of peoples is preceded by a review containing complete and generalized historical and historical-ethnographic information. But besides this, the description of each people opens with an outline of ethnogenesis, in which the author's point of view is carefully, unobtrusively, but at the same time quite clearly and definitely formulated.
on the basis of an objective consideration of the main previous hypotheses. It is natural that a book of such volume, content and scientific level has been used for the third decade as an invaluable source of information on the ethnography of the peoples of the USSR.
The intensive development of S.A. falls on the 70s. Tokarev problems of the history of ethnographic science. As a matter of fact, works on this topic are typical of Tokarev's entire work, starting from the first years of his scientific activity. He constantly informed the scientific community about the latest achievements of ethnographic and archaeological science abroad, speaking with critical articles on various theoretical concepts, acquainted Soviet readers with the life and work of the most prominent and authoritative figures in science about peoples and their culture. Reviews, essays on the practical activities and ideological foundations of individual ethnographic schools, portrait sketches did not obscure S.A. Tokarev common problems history of science, and he paid much attention to the development and substantiation of the periodization of the history of ethnographic science in Russia and the USSR.
Everything said about Tokarev's research in the field of history and the current state of ethnography had another aspect - many books by foreign scientists were published in Russian under his editorship and with his prefaces. These prefaces are unusual in this genre. By the abundance of facts, clarity of wording, compressed style, these are small monographs covering the problems of the published book and convexly depicting the figure of its author. So the works of Te Rangi Hiroa, Elkin, Lips, Heyerdahl, Neverman, Chesling, Danielson, Worsley, Buckley, Frazer and many others were published. Among them were ethnographers-country experts, travelers, historians of religion, theorists of ethnographic science. And for all of them, the editor and author of the preface found expressive words characterizing the scientific significance of their works, their place in the ideological struggle of their time, personal characteristics and life destiny. So gradually, year after year, a whole library of ethnographic books written by foreign scientists was created in Russian.
And in this area of many years of vigorous activity of Sergei Alexandrovich, the result was large-scale
independent monographs. The first of them was published in 1966 and was devoted to the history of ethnographic science in Russia. The periodization proposed in earlier articles by the scientist found a complete justification in this book. But no less interesting is the coverage of individual periods in the history of Russian ethnography and the characteristics of its most prominent representatives. Such is the erudition of the author, so skillfully he selects individual facts and combines them, cites letters, memoirs of contemporaries, official documents, that one gets the impression that all the people characterized are well known to the author not only by work, but also personally, they rise as if alive from the pages of his book ... And since many of them were not only ethnographers, but also religious scholars, philologists, historians, publicists, public figures, the book of S.A. Tokarev goes far beyond the history of ethnography and acquires general cultural significance.
He devoted two books to the history of ethnographic research in European countries, published in 1978. One of them covers a huge period of time - from the beginning of empirical knowledge to Ancient Egypt until the middle of the 19th century. This is a leisurely and detailed story about how peoples first became interested in the appearance, language and culture of each other, what rich ethnographic information we receive from the works of ancient chronographs and historians, how slowly but inevitably ethnographic information accumulated in the Middle Ages and what a revolutionary influence on it The growth was provided by the era of the Great geographical discoveries, as, finally, the contours of science in its modern sense took shape in the 18th-19th centuries. Along with historical and ethnographic literature, the author widely used the texts of sources, and this conveys to us a unique image of the past, builds a continuous series from free and free descriptions of Herodotus to harmonious ethnographic prose, allows us to see in the views of the ancients the prototypes of many ideas close to modernity.
The second book, so to speak, is more "ethnographic". This is the history of the already established ethnographic science, its methodological guidelines and methodological achievements. Demonstrating the widest erudition, S.A. Tokarev from characterizing one direction of ethnographic thought to another, it is easy
and freely navigates the differences in the views of scientists from different schools, no matter how small these differences may be, tactfully and calmly sets out his critical considerations. This book is an excellent example of an objective presentation of the development of a vast and important field of human knowledge, free from preconceived opinions and biased personal assessments.
In the last two decades of his life, Sergei Alexandrovich was engaged in the typology of culture, which was reflected in a number of articles and especially in the four-volume collective work prepared under his editorship "Calendar customs and rituals in foreign European countries" (1973-1983). In this regard, it is impossible not to mention the fact that, headed by S.A. Tokarev until his death on April 19, 1985, the sector of foreign Europe of the Institute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences - the first structural association of European ethnographers not only in the USSR, but also in Europe - covered in its work the entire subject of European ethnography and in many respects anticipated those forms of European ethnographic research that are currently being developed.
But perhaps the most famous among different categories of readers was brought by S.A. Tokarev his works on the history of religion. Almost simultaneously with the "Ethnography of the Peoples of the USSR" in 1957, his first book on religion was published. We are talking about "religious beliefs of the East Slavic peoples XIX-beginning XX century. Sergei Alexandrovich became interested in religious studies from the very first steps of his scientific activity, constantly reviewed foreign religious literature, wrote seven essays characterizing the role of traditional beliefs of the peoples of Siberia for the book "The Religion of the Peoples of the USSR", published in 1931. Already in his first monograph on the history of religion, remnants pagan beliefs and cultures of Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians are characterized with exceptional detail not only on the basis of ethnographic observations in the narrow sense of the word, but also using information from written sources and against the backdrop of all the achievements of Slavic studies in the study of the religion of the Slavic and neighboring peoples of Europe. The author also demonstrated in it a broad understanding of the problems of the ethnography of the East Slavic peoples in general.
The book on Eastern Slavic beliefs opens the list of generalizing works by S.A. Tokarev on the history of religions and their place in societies of different geographic location and different stages of historical development. In 1964 the books "Early Forms of Religion and Their Development" and "Religions in the History of the Peoples of the World" were published. The latter went through three editions and has been translated into almost all major European languages. Both of these works are historical and cultural studies of an extremely wide content, including consideration of the conditions for the emergence and structure of early religious beliefs, the historical circumstances of the emergence of world religions, their pantheon, the ideological role of religion in various socio-historical formations, and many issues of the sociology of religion. S.A. In these books, Tokarev showed himself to be both an orientalist, a historian of social consciousness, and a representative of comparative cultural studies, largely predetermining the main directions of research into the history of religion in subsequent decades.
In addition to these generalizing books, S.A. Tokarev owns a large number of articles devoted to the most diverse problems of the history of religion, starting with the definition of mythology and its place in the cultural history of mankind, through the classification of magical rites, the study of the essence of totemism, elucidating the ritual meaning of female images of the Upper Paleolithic era and ending with the analysis of certain aspects of the religious beliefs of those or other peoples in connection with the general problems of the dynamics and functioning of their culture.
The main of these articles are collected in the collection offered to the attention of readers. They give a fairly complete picture not only of the author's views on the problems of the origin and development of various forms of beliefs and his fundamental contribution to the science of religion, but also of the most characteristic features of his research manner - the desire for the most complete consideration of factual data, caution in their comprehension and interpretation, avoiding far-reaching and not fully substantiated conclusions, and finally, about a concise, simple and at the same time elegant author's style.
The articles by S.A. Tokarev on various issues of the history of religion are a logical addition to his fundamental religious books.
V.P. Alekseev, Academician, Director of the Institute of Archeology of the USSR Academy of Sciences
The book lying in front of the reader is a collection of works by one of the outstanding Soviet scientists - Sergei Aleksandrovich Tokarev. His major works in the field of history, world culture, ethnography and religious studies, translated into many languages, earned him well-deserved international fame not only among specialists, but also among a wide range of readers.
Sergei Alexandrovich Tokarev was born on December 16, 1899 in the city of Tula in the family of a teacher. In 1925 he graduated from Moscow State University, and since then his life has been inextricably linked with historical science, with ethnography. He worked as a lecturer at the Communist Workers' Institute of China. Sun Yat-Sen, and in 1928 he became a researcher at the Central Museum of Ethnology. In 1932, he headed the sector of the North in this museum. In parallel, he worked at the State Academy of the History of Material Culture and at the Central Anti-Religious Museum. In 1935, S. A. Tokarev was awarded the degree of candidate of historical sciences, and in 1940 he defended his doctoral dissertation.
The Great Patriotic War began, and S. A. Tokarev was evacuated to Abakan, where he headed the department of history at the Pedagogical Institute. In 1943 he returned to Moscow and headed the sector of ethnography of the peoples of America, Australia and Oceania in the newly organized Moscow branch of the Institute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences, and since 1961 - the sector of ethnography of the peoples of foreign Europe. In the same years (1956-1973) he headed the Department of Ethnography of Moscow State University, and later, having resigned these duties, he continued to teach lecture courses there.
The breadth and versatility of S. A. Tokarev's scientific interests manifested themselves already from his first steps as a researcher. He actively works on mastering the huge literature on the ethnography of Oceania, critically rethinks this literature and soon becomes an unsurpassed expert on the ethnography of Australia and Oceania. At the same time, Sergei Alexandrovich is deeply engaged in the ethnography of Siberia, mainly South, collects specific ethnographic material and works in the archives. At first glance, such a concentration of research efforts in two different, distant from one another areas can be perceived as a dispersion of scientific interests. But it was she who to a large extent determined the encyclopedism of knowledge of S. A. Tokarev, his ability to work with a wide variety of data.
A characteristic feature of S. A. Tokarev as a researcher was not only the constant expansion of the scope of scientific activity, but also further deepening, polishing of already put forward and previously argued provisions. The system of kinship among the natives of Australia, the reconstruction of the social structure of the Melanesians, social stratification on the islands of Tonga, the interpretation of the folklore traditions of the Polynesians as an ethnogenetic source - these are the milestones of his research in Australian studies and oceanography. The volume of publications by S. A. Tokarev on the above topics is such that, taken together, they would constitute a solid work. To a certain extent, the result of all these specific developments was the volume "Peoples of Australia and Oceania" in the "Peoples of the World" series, published in 1956 and often called "Tokarevsky". Sergei Alexandrovich owned most of the text in this volume, which rightfully took pride of place in world ethnographic literature.
No less significant are the achievements of S. A. Tokarev in the study of ethnography and the history of the peoples of Siberia, their settlement and social system. His research in this area culminated in the publication in the 1930s and 1940s of three books of a consolidated nature: “Pre-capitalist survivals in Oirotia” (1936), “An outline of the history of the Yakut people” (1940) and “The social system of the Yakuts of the 17th-18th centuries.” (1945). Skillful comparison of ethnographic observations and written sources, filigree source study analysis, impartial approach to the analyzed problems, caution and balanced conclusions are the most characteristic features of the research method of S. A. Tokarev, which are fully reflected in these books.
The monumental book “Ethnography of the peoples of the USSR. Historical foundations of everyday life and culture”, which was based on a series of lectures he gave at Moscow State University. For many decades, Sergei Alexandrovich taught a course in ethnography of the peoples of the USSR at the Department of Ethnography of Moscow State University; in typewritten form, these lectures were widely used as a teaching aid by students and graduate students in universities and scientific institutions of the country. Established specialists also often turned to them, they contained so much original information, the results of independent study and interpretation of many fundamental problems of the ethnography of the USSR, meaningful historiographical and critical excursions. The author himself in the preface to the book, with characteristic modesty, wrote that it was published "as a textbook primarily for university teaching" (p. 3). But in fact, it has far outgrown the framework of a textbook, having taken the form of an encyclopedic work on the peoples of the USSR and the historical dynamics of their culture.
The book covered all aspects of traditional culture, including the material one. The description of the latter is closely linked to the forms of economic activity. In general, S. A. Tokarev was highly characteristic of a synthetic vision of the subject of research in all its complex direct and indirect connections, therefore the entire descriptive part in this book - and it occupies a considerable place - is extremely interesting. A lot of attention is paid to the study of traditional beliefs. The presentation is conducted in accordance with the territorial principle, and the analysis of each large territorial population of peoples is preceded by a review containing complete and generalized historical and historical-ethnographic information. But besides this, the description of each nation opens with an outline of ethnogenesis, in which the author's point of view is carefully, unobtrusively, but at the same time quite clearly and definitely formulated on the basis of an objective consideration of the main previous hypotheses. It is natural that a book of such volume, content and scientific level has been used for the third decade as an invaluable source of information on the ethnography of the peoples of the USSR.
SA Tokarev's intensive development of problems in the history of ethnographic science falls into the 1970s. As a matter of fact, works on this topic are typical of Tokarev's entire work, starting from the first years of his scientific activity. He constantly informed the scientific community about the latest achievements of ethnographic and archaeological science abroad, speaking with critical articles on various theoretical concepts, acquainted Soviet readers with the life and work of the most prominent and authoritative figures in science about peoples and their culture. Reviews, essays on the practical activities and ideological foundations of individual ethnographic schools, portrait sketches did not obscure the general problems of the history of science from S. A. Tokarev, and he paid much attention to the development and justification of the periodization of the history of ethnographic science in Russia and the USSR.
Everything said about Tokarev's research in the field of history and the current state of ethnography had another aspect - many books by foreign scientists were published in Russian under his editorship and with his prefaces. These prefaces are unusual in this genre. By the abundance of facts, clarity of wording, compact style, these are small monographs that cover the problems of the book being published and clearly depict the figure of its author. So the works of Te Rangi Hiroa, Elkin, Lips, Heyerdahl, Neverman, Chesling, Danielson, Worsley, Buckley, Frazer and many others were published. Among them were ethnographers-country experts, travelers, historians of religion, theorists of ethnographic science. And for all of them, the editor and author of the preface found expressive words characterizing the scientific significance of their works, their place in the ideological struggle of their time, personal characteristics and life destiny. So gradually, year after year, a whole library of ethnographic books written by foreign scientists was created in Russian.
M.: Politizdat, 1990 - S. 579-583. Myths are often defined as narratives that explain natural phenomena or some other things that surround a person. This definition, although close to the truth, is too superficial and simplistic.The latest researchers (L. Levy-Bruhl, B. Malinovsky, A.F. Losev (Malinowski D. Myth in Primitive Psychology.L., 1926. P. 41-43.79 etc. Levy-Brühl L., La mythologie primitive.P., 1935. P. 175-176; Losev A.F. Ancient mythology. M., 1957. S. 8.) and others) have repeatedly warned against the tendency to attribute to “primitive man” a tendency to purely abstract questions, such as, for example, the explanation of various natural phenomena. In general, Jensen's attempt ( Jensen A.E. Mythos und Kult bei Natűrlich k ern. Wiesbaden, 1951, pp. 90-93 etc.) to contrast “etiological” myths with “true” ones seems to me artificial and unconvincing.Nevertheless, in order to approach what constitutes the essence of myth, to limit it from fairy tales, heroic epic, etc., it is necessary to proceed from its explanatory, etiological function. This is the most obvious aspect of any myth, although it is not enough to fully understand the essence and origin of mythology. The simplest myths explaining, for example, the origin of the characteristic features of animals, stars, mountains, etc., or various social customs and institutions, are well known not only among the “primitive” peoples - the Australian Aborigines, Papuans, Bushmen and others, but also among the "civilized", including the ancient Greeks and modern Europeans.However, a careful analysis of the content of these myths, even the most primitive and purely etiological ones, reveals that the above interpretation cannot satisfy us.First of all, the "explanations" of natural phenomena contained in myths are never based on an objective perception of causal relationships between these phenomena. On the contrary, they are always subjective and are expressed through the personification of a phenomenon that needs explanation. The latter appears in myth as a living being, most often anthropomorphic; but even if the personification is zoomorphic, human traits and motivations for action clearly appear in it. Here is one of the simplest examples, taken from a collection of folklore of Queensland (Australia), published by Walter Roth: I have bruises on my face (hence the black spots)”.Another myth explains why the turtle lives in the sea: other animals drove it there because it hid water under its arm ( Roth W.E. North Queensland Ethnography // Superstition.Magic and Medicine (Brisbane). 5 (1903).P. 12-14.). In such myths, the phenomenon being interpreted is presented as if it were a question of a person belonging to a certain ethnic environment and his actions. natural phenomenon (in this case- specific features of animals) is included, so to speak, in the traditional framework of the social system. It is not at all difficult to prove (which, incidentally, has been done a long time ago) that most of the much more complex myths of any nation are built entirely on the personification of natural phenomena and social forces.Secondly, the “explanation” of a given fact is often organized according to a naive precedent formula: in other words, it is given, as it were, a repetition of what has already happened once ... This characteristic tendency to replace the causal explanation with reference to a previous example has already been noted by Lévy-Bruhl.Thirdly, in etiological myths, the explanation from the contrary (a contrario) is very often found: this or that phenomenon exists because the exact opposite once existed. Here are two examples taken from the mythology of the Sulca tribe in New Brittany (Melanesia). One of the myths tells about the origin of the sea: once it was very small and one elderly woman kept it hidden in a jug covered with a stone in order to use salt water for cooking food; but one day her little children tracked her down and saw what she was doing, and then the sea spread wide. The second myth explains the different strengths of the light of the Sun and the Moon in this way: there were times when the Moon shone as brightly as the Sun, but a small bird covered it with mud and since then the Moon has emitted only a pale light (Parkinson R. Dreissig Jahre in der Sdsee. Stuttgart, 1907, pp. 693, 698).The weakly developed human intellect, being a prisoner of traditional thinking, was satisfied with such a solution to the problem and did not ask other questions.And even the complex mythological systems of the ancient world often reveal an equally naive turn of consciousness when one has to answer the question “from where?”. The cosmogonic world of Hesiod derives "cosmos" from "chaos", that is, from its opposite. The biblical myth of God creating the world out of nothingness is based on the same idea.Fourthly, the purely explicative (explaining - Ed.) function of myth is often complicated by the intrusion of moralizing thought. In any mythological narrative, there is always the idea of punishment for some forbidden or reprehensible act (we have already shown this with the example of the myth of the turtle and the sea). In many ancient myths and legends of modern European peoples, the theme of punishment is usually associated with the intervention of a deity as a punishing force...These moralizing aspects of mythology, although very significant, have received almost no attention in the scientific literature. Even Wundt, who emphasized the emotional element of "mythological apperception", passes them over in silence.Fifthly, if we carefully compare the content of the myths of different peoples, it is impossible not to notice one characteristic pattern: the plots of a myth, just like all its themes, invariably correspond, sometimes down to the smallest details, to the material conditions of life of each of the peoples and the level of its development. Questions “where from? "and why?" laid at the basis of any myth are never directed at an idle object: their objects are always things that are somehow connected with the forms of material existence of a person. Among primitive hunters, the range of their ideas was usually limited to the local animal and plant world, simple forms of tribal life; that is why their mythology is initially occupied with this or that animal and its characteristics, as well as with the origin of fire, matrimonial rules, totemic groups, initiation rites, etc. Astral myths are also found here, but they all concern only the external characteristics of phenomena - everyday the movements of the Sun, the phases of the Moon, etc., while among the sedentary agricultural peoples, whose life is more stable, the horizon is wider, mythology usually consists of a complex cycle of legends, corresponding not only to individual phenomena of nature or social life, but always containing a holistic concept universe. In short, mythology includes evolutionary stages corresponding to the main epochs in the development of the social life of people.In other words, the primary function of myth is to satisfy human curiosity by answering the questions “why?” and where?". But we should not forget that this curiosity is by no means an invariable attribute of human thinking - quite the contrary, it depends on the conditions of material life. human society. What excites the interest of a person of one era can leave people of another era completely indifferent, and vice versa (on the contrary, (lat.).If this is the case, one can ask oneself the question: what place does religion have here? Indeed, in the myths we have been talking about so far, religious beliefs play no role. Even where the Gods punish people for their crimes, they act only as a mechanical force that restores the violated moral order.However, there is a significant category of myths, where religious ideas are not only present, but determine the very content, functions and purpose of the mythological narrative. These are predominantly religious or cult myths (ritual myths or ritual legends of van Gennep).It seems obvious that the function of cult myths is the interpretation or explanation of some religious or magical rite. This is, so to speak, the libretto according to which the ritual action develops. And if the form of the rite is regarded as sacred and sometimes secret, then it is natural that the myth associated with this rite is also regarded as sacred and secret. Examples are not needed here - they are well known.
