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Systems of Religious and Spiritual
Belief
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The term ancestor worship describes, in
a broad and loose sense, a variety of religious beliefs and practices concerned
with the spirits of dead persons regarded as relatives, some of whom may be
mythical. Although far from universal, ancestor worship exists or formerly
existed in societies at every level of cultural development. |
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The core of ancestor worship is the
belief in the continuing existence of the dead and in a close relation between
the living and the dead, who continue to influence the affairs of the living.
Beliefs in a surviving element of the human person (e.g., the soul) and in an afterlife have been held in all kinds of
societies. Attitudes toward the spirits of the dead vary from love, respect, and
trust, mingled with special feelings of reverence, to outright fear; the
attitudes are sometimes ambivalent. The spirits of the dead are often thought to
help the living, but they often are thought to do harm if they are not
propitiated. All societies give ritual attention to death or to the souls of the
dead, but not all of these practices may appropriately be called ancestor
worship. If death itself, rather than the ancestral relationship, is the focus
of attention, the name death cults is more appropriate. The deification of dead
heroes is similarly poorly distinguished from ancestor worship. Death cults, the
worship of dead heroes who may or may not be regarded as ancestors, and clearly
distinguishable rites of ancestor worship may all exist in the same society. |
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Ancestors venerated by elaborate rites
are those persons who in their lifetimes held positions of importance, such as
heads of families, lineages, clans, tribes, kingdoms, and other social groups.
Depending on the manner in which kin
are organized into social groups, ancestral spirits that are worshipped may be
limited to one sex, or may include both sexes. Among primitive societies that
trace descent only through male lines, for example, the titular positions of
prestige are held by males, and only male ancestors are significant. (see also primitive religion) |
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Ancestral spirits that are worshipped
also vary in nearness or remoteness in time from the living. In some societies
only the spirits of the recently deceased are given attention; in others, all
ancestors, near and remote in time, are included. In still other societies, one
ancestor, real, honorary, or mythical, may be the focus of attention, and he is
often regarded as a hero. |
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The presence or absence of ancestor
worship relates in a general way to the importance of kinship in the societies
concerned. In the primitive world society is ordered and life made possible
through bonds of kinship, though intergenerational continuity of kinship
extending to deceased forebears may not be regarded as important. Among
societies of higher levels of cultural complexity, the importance of kinship and
the size of actively functioning kin groups decreases. Where continuity of
kinship and inheritance of property are very important, elders are
characteristically regarded with respect, and the persistence of bonds of
affinity with ancestors is favoured, as was the case in traditional China and
Japan. Societies in which the only important kin group is the nuclear
family composed of parents and immature children, and where economic
support as well as emotional well-being among adults do not depend upon kinship,
are ill-suited for the development or maintenance of ancestor worship.
Illustrative examples are modern China and Japan, where sociocultural changes,
brought about by adaptation to Western civilization and modern technology, have
included a great decline in the importance of kinship and the size of kin
groups, and where traditional practices of ancestor worship have correspondingly
declined. |
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Ancestor worship includes all of the
attitudes and acts usually associated with the worship of nonancestral gods and
spirits. According to some scholars and theorists, ancestral spirits are
anthropocentric conceptions similar to other supernatural beings; that is, the
spirits have the qualities of personality and the capabilities of man, to which
supernatural potency is added. The spirits see, hear, feel, understand, and
communicate with the living; they make moral judgments; they are wishful,
willful, joyful, angry, stern, permissive, kind, cruel, and sometimes
capricious; and they have all the other emotions and traits of human beings. All
of the behaviour and practices that are customary with regard to other kinds of
supernatural beings are found in rites of ancestral worship--veneration and
propitiation in the forms of prayers, offerings, sacrifices, the maintenance of
moral standards, and festivals of honour that may include pageantry, music,
dance, and other forms of art. Where ancestral spirits directly control the
affairs of the living, their continued favour is sought by established periodic
rites, and their special aid may be requested at times of crisis. Perhaps the
only truly distinctive ritual
acts of ancestor worship are commemorative ceremonies, held annually or at other
fixed intervals, and tendance of graves, monuments, or other symbols
commemorating them (see also RITES
AND CEREMONIES: e="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">Death and funerary rites
and customs ). |
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Motives for acts of piety toward
ancestors are diverse, and they differ from devotional acts toward other gods or
spirits principally in reflecting the idea that the spirits continue in some
measure to be kin and are active participants in the life of the community.
Rituals directed toward ancestral spirits maintain communion with them in ways
that reflect human regard for the deceased elders and desires to aid them in
their spiritual existence. These rites and devotional acts also seek to gain
spiritual and practical benefits for the living. The powers the ancestral
spirits are believed to possess vary greatly from society to society, as do the
powers of other supernatural beings. Their powers may be weak or strong,
generalized or specific. In some societies, their supernaturalistic roles
include that of being intermediaries between living relatives and the gods.
Where neglected ancestral spirits are thought to be harmful to the living, the
goals of ritual observances may include or emphasize the desire for protection
from them. Whether ancestral spirits are themselves gods with powers or are
intermediaries, communion with them is a form of transcendence of ordinary
states of existence, which may be a conscious or unconscious goal of the acts of
devotion. |
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Until the 19th and 20th centuries
ancestor worship in various forms and of varying importance in total religious
complexes was widely but irregularly distributed throughout the world. In most
societies, however, it was only one element of a complex of supernaturalism, and
seldom a dominant feature. The spread of European culture weakened, displaced,
or otherwise put an end to ancestor worship in most nonliterate societies, and
technological, social, and ideological changes discouraged its continuation in
culturally advanced societies. |
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Among nonliterate societies,
well-developed ancestor cults are limited principally to peoples of sub-Saharan Africa,
Melanesia, and some tribal
groups of India and adjacent parts of Asia. The greatest development was in
Africa, where ancestral spirits are commonly an important part of the roster of
supernatural beings. In the aboriginal kingdoms and near-kingdoms of sub-Saharan
Africa, the spirits of kings and paramount chiefs were often regarded as
generalized ancestors and were venerated by all members of society. Spirits of
the heads of clans, often a mythical couple, were also worshipped, as were the
spirits of founders of lineages and of deceased heads of individual families.
Ancestral spirits of kings and high chiefs often were believed to have power
over matters of concern to the entire society, such as rain and the growth of
crops and cattle, whereas spirits of heads of families, lineages, and clans
influenced matters of immediate concern to the particular social groups. Acts of
piety were numerous and included sacrifice, prayers, and hospitable celebrations
that honoured the spirits by story-telling and other forms of entertainment. The
spirits were generally regarded as very helpful to their living descendants and
were propitiated in established cyclic ceremonies as well as at times of crisis
when help was needed. |
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In Melanesia the spirits of the dead
generally were held to be important, and in some societies were the focus of
much attention. An outstanding example is the ancestor cult of the Manus
of the Bismarck Archipelago, where Sir Ghost, the spirit of the living male head
of the household, was the tutelary god of the family and supervised the
behaviour of its members. Only spirits of the newly dead were worshipped, and
when the head of a household died, the old tutelary god was discarded. The skull
of the deceased household head was placed above the entrance in the dwelling,
where it watched the conduct of all within, giving rewards and punishments in
accordance with their deeds, and protected the family from the malign influences
of the guardian spirits of other families. |
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Among the Trobriand
Islanders near New Guinea, the dead had two spirits, one of which was a harmless
ghost that vanished a few days after death. The other spirit, baloma,
had an eternal existence as an ancestral spirit abiding in another world.
Death rites were clearly distinguishable from ceremonies directed to the baloma.
Communion was maintained with these ancestral spirits, who returned to their
villages when annual feasts were held by their living relatives, and also
appeared in dreams and trances. Seers with special powers of communication with
the supernatural world brought news of the spirits by visiting them in person in
the land of the dead. The baloma were
propitiated but were never feared. They were invoked and believed to provide
supernatural aid in numerous acts of magic, especially in connection with the
raising of the crops upon which the livelihood of the people depended. |
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Elsewhere in nonliterate societies,
ancestral spirits sometimes were important, but nowhere were they the lone or
primary supernatural beings. In aboriginal Polynesia,
where people of high social status were regarded as descendants of the gods, the
spirits of kings and high chiefs had power to help men, but they were not the
objects of worship to any great extent. Indian tribes of North and South America
seldom gave much ritual attention to ancestors. Among tribes of the present-day
United States, for example, the greatest ritual elaboration was among the Pueblo
tribes of the Southwest, whose complex ceremonial calendar included impressive
rites honouring generalized ancestral spirits. These ancestors were impersonated
in ritual and appealed to for aid in providing rain, bountiful crops, and
general well-being. (see also Pueblo
Indians) |
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Among the civilizations of Asia, the
classic examples of ancestor worship have been China and Japan. In both
societies, however, reverence for, rather than worship of, ancestors is a more
nearly accurate description of the beliefs and practices. In China the ancestor
cult is extremely ancient and emphasized continuity of familial lines. Reverence
for elders was an act of filial piety strongly supported by the teachings of the
sage Confucius of the 6th-5th
centuries BC. The family was
viewed as a closely united group of living and dead relatives rather than a
group of individuals. Unity of the larger kin group was also stressed through
devotional acts at clan temples that honoured all ancestral spirits. Rites of
reverence were held in the home, at temples, and in graveyards. Ancestral
shrines containing tablets bearing the names of recent ancestors and especially
notable forebears were maintained in the homes, and rites were observed before
them. Temple rites were also observed; funerals and commemorative ceremonies
were elaborate, and custom also called for pilgrimages to graves. Motives for
performing rites involved concern for the welfare of the ancestors, who were
thought to require solicitous care and, since the kin group was an indivisible
unit with common goals and fortunes, a means of continuing to receive the aid
and cooperation of the deceased relatives. (see also Chinese religion,
Japanese religion) |
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The early background of Japanese
ancestral veneration is obscure, but most of the historically known practices
are adaptations of Chinese customs. Some sort of ancestor cult may have existed
in the native Shinto religion
before the diffusion of Buddhism
from China in the 6th century. When Buddhism came to Japan it was a
comprehensive religious system. With the passage of time and in coexistence with
the Shinto religion, Japanese Buddhism began to emphasize death rites and
commemorative ceremonies, and Shinto became more concerned with matters
of daily life. Confucianism was never an organized religion in Japan, but
quasi-religious Confucian ideals of filial piety were very important and were
sometimes incorporated in the teachings of Japanese Buddhist sects, thereby
reinforcing ancestral veneration. Japanese rites, like those of China, consisted
of elaborate funerals and many commemorative rites at the home, the temple, and
the grave. A great annual ceremony honours all spirits of the dead, who return
to their homes at that time. Until recent years Shinto rites of passage
at death also were conducted in the home. |
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The state of ancestor worship in modern
China is unclear, but it may be disappearing. In modern Japan ancestors have
declined in importance, and Buddhist ritual tends to emphasize funerals, giving
less attention than formerly to later commemorative ceremonies. |
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In India the vast, locally variable, and
unorganized complex of theology and rites of the Hindu religion conspicuously
includes ceremonies honouring ancestors, but the cult of ancestors is
nevertheless a relatively small part of the full religious system.
Characteristically, funeral rites are very elaborate and have many motifs of
supernaturalism, among which is attention to ancestral spirits. The practices
relating to ancestors reflect ideas concerning reincarnation and the system of castes,
which are in turn closely intertwined. One of the manifest goals of the funeral
rites is to guide the spirits of the deceased during the perilous time between
death and rebirth. The idea that one's moral behaviour in life determines his
fate in the next life is also connected with caste affiliation. Sinful behaviour
will bring rebirth in a low caste. Among some castes and in some regions of
India, annual rites are performed in honour of the spirits of the ancestors of
the male heads of household, who are believed to give spiritual aid in promoting
the growth of crops and in other important matters of everyday life. (see also Hinduism, samsara) |
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Ancestor worship in various forms
existed among the ancient civilization of the Mediterranean, where cults of the
dead sometimes also existed, and among later European peoples. Ancient Egyptian
religion featured a cult of the dead but gave little attention to
ancestral spirits except to those of royalty, which were venerated by the people
and especially honoured in rites observed by their royal descendants. In ancient
Babylonia a cult of the dead
also existed, and among the members of the ruling class ancestral spirits were
honoured by festive rites and sometimes deified. Beliefs and practices of late Zoroastrianism
(a religion founded by the 6th-7th-century-BC Iranian prophet Zoroaster)
included rites for the spirits of the dead, who were believed to have power in
the affairs of the living. In ancient Greece ancestor worship overlapped with hero
worship. Some ritual attention was given to spirits of household heads
and political leaders, and the spirits of men whose deeds were heroic were
sometimes elevated to immortality and made the objects of rites of reverence. In
ancient Rome ancestor worship was a familial cult activity. Ancestral spirits
were believed to have influence on mortal life and to return to visit their
relatives, when rites were held in their honour. (see also Greek religion) |
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Among various northern and eastern
peoples of Europe, ancestral
spirits also held some importance. Ancient Celts, Teutons, Vikings, and Slavic
groups conducted rites of propitiation and sacrifice. |
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The 19th-century sociologist Herbert
Spencer regarded fear and consequent propitiation of the souls of
ancestors as the earliest form of religion, an interpretation that later
scholars set aside as unverifiable. Reflecting the decline of ancestor worship
among societies of the world, modern scholarship has seldom given much concern
to this subject in isolation but has instead followed the trend of the social
sciences in considering ancestor cults in relation to other elements of
religious complexes, the social order, and the whole of culture. Early writings
often expressed the idea that all people fear death, but this idea is questioned
by Hindu thought, in which extinction rather than eternal life is the ultimate
goal. It is generally held that all peoples have some beliefs of an afterlife.
Such beliefs are presumed by anthropologists to be very ancient, as seems
evident from Paleolithic burials dating from perhaps as much as 60,000 years ago
containing stone tools, shells, and other objects, and the abundance of later
prehistoric burials with grave goods. |
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No recent study of wide comparative
scope attempts to interpret the significance of ancestor worship, and modern
interpretations of these practices view them as having essentially the same
social and psychological value as other beliefs and practices of
supernaturalism. Through their symbolic representations of kinship and of the
social hierarchy of kin groups, the beliefs and acts of ancestor worship may be
seen as establishing and reinforcing ideas of social roles and identities,
thereby contributing to psychological well-being and social harmony. Joint rites
promote social solidarity, and characteristically display and thereby reinforce
the social order. Where ancestral spirits have power in mortal affairs, they are
psychologically and socially significant in ways similar to those of gods and
other supernatural beings. In the many matters of life over which man lacks
secular control, for example, the intervention of ancestral spirits alleviates
anxiety. But, quite like various other beliefs of supernaturalism, ideas about
ancestors may also be seen sometimes to instill as well as to allay anxiety. In
this connection ancestor cults may have an important moral significance by
serving as sanctions of social conformity. In many societies, improper behaviour
is usually thought to reflect unfavourably upon both living and dead relatives,
whether or not ancestor cults exist. Scholars often interpret the primary
significance of ancestor cults in some societies as a sanctioning force.
Ancestral spirits are viewed as approving or disapproving the behaviour of their
descendants, in a generalized way, without exercising specific sanctions, or
they may be regarded as vigilant protectors of morality. Among the Manus
of Melanesia, the ancestral tutelary spirit was believed to punish all moral
defections by removing the "soul stuff" from the wrongdoer, thereby
causing illness. When the offense was serious, death followed unless penitential
acts were performed. Where, as among the Manus, ancestral wrath might affect any
member of the group for an offense committed by another member, the sanctioning
force is viewed as powerful, operating so that all living members monitor the
behaviour of each other. |
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Special value is attributed to the rites
of ancestral reverence in promoting familial solidarity, and, to the extent that
such rites are emphasized, in promoting the unity of larger kin groups and
entire societies. Information is most abundant on traditional practices of
familial ancestor worship in China and Japan. In these societies in former times
the individual was submerged in the family, and rites of ancestral reverence may
thus be viewed as both reflections and reinforcements of the social order. As
acts of supernaturalism, they place a special stamp of approval upon familial
roles, unity, and continuity. ( E.N.) |
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