1. A Congo people believe that the world would perish if their chitome,
or pontiff, died a natural death. So he was clubbed or strangled by
his successor. But what god is incarnate in the chitome? None is
mentioned.[36] The king himself 'is regarded as a god in earth, and all
powerful in heaven.'
2. The Ethiopian kings of Meroe were worshipped as gods, but were
ordered to die by the priests, on the authority of an alleged oracle
of the gods, 'whenever the priests chose.' That they first showed any
signs of decay 'we may conjecture.'[37] We have no evidence except that
the priests put an end to the king 'whenever they chose.' And, far
from alleging the king's decay or bad crops as the regular recognised
reason, they alleged a special oracle of the gods.
3. When the King of Unyoro, in Central Africa, is old, or very ill, his
_wives_ kill him (an obvious reason readily occurs: it is the wives,
not a god, who need a more spirited person), alleging an old prophecy
that the throne will pass from the dynasty if the king dies a natural
death. But it is not here shown that this king is a man-god of either
species; and the prophecy does not concern injury to a god, or to
magical _rapport_.[38]
4. The King of Kibanga, on the upper Congo, is killed by sorcerers
when he 'seems near his end.' So are old dogs and cats and horses in
this country, and peasants are even thought to provide euthanasia for
kinsfolk 'near their end.' If the King of Kibanga is a man-god, Mr.
Frazer does not say so.
5. If wounded in war the King of Gingero is killed by his comrades or
kinsfolk, even if he be reluctant. The reason alleged is 'that he may
not die by the hands of his enemies.' Did Saul, Brutus, and many other
warriors who refuse to survive wounds and defeat die as man-gods? Is
the King of Gingero a man-god?
6. Chaka, King of the Zulus, used hair-dye, having a great aversion to
grey hairs. The Zulus, a warlike people, would not elect, or accept, a
greyhaired king, and, though I know no instance of slaying a Zulu king
because he was old, Mr. Isaacs (1836) says that grey hair is 'always
followed by the death of the monarch.' Even if an historical example
were given, a warlike race merely superannuates a disabled war-leader
in the only safe way.
7. At last we reach a king-man-god in Sofala, who, according to Dos
Santos, was the only god of the Caffres, and was implored to give good
weather.[39] A modern Zulu told Dr. Callaway that 'when people say
the heaven is the chief's they do not believe what they say.'[40] The
Sofalese, or rather their neighbours, were perhaps more credulous; and
it appears to have been a custom or law among them that a blemished
king should kill himself, though a reforming prince denounced this as
insanity, and altered the law. We are told that the king-god of the
Sofalese was under this law, and a neighbouring king (who is nowhere
said to have been a man-god) was. But what god, if any, was incarnate
in this man-god, if he _was_ a man-god, like his neighbour?[41]
8. The Spartans were warned by an oracle against a lame king, as the
Mackenzies were warned by the Brahan seer against a set of physically
blemished lairds. The seer's prophecy was fulfilled.[42] We do not hear
that the Spartans Killed any lame king.
9. The King of the Eyeos is warned to kill himself, warned by a gift
of parrot's eggs, 'when the people have conceived an opinion of his
ill-government.' His wives strangle him, and his son succeeds, or did
so before 1774, when the King refused to die at the request of his
ministers. To make a case, it must be shown that the king was a man-god
of one or other variety. He is, in fact, merely king while popular,
'holding the reins of government no longer than whilst he merits the
approval of his people.'
10. The old Prussians were governed by a king called God's Mouth. 'If
he wanted to leave a good name behind,' when weak and ill he burned
himself to death, in front of a holy oak.
11. In Quilacare, in Southern India, the king cut himself to pieces,
before an idol, after a twelve years' reign. We are not told that he
was an incarnation of the god, if any, incorporated in, or represented
by, the idol.
12. The King of Calicut, on the Malabar coast, used to cut his
throat in public after a twelve years' reign. About 1680-1700 this
was commuted. If any man could cut his way through 30,000 or 40,000
guardsmen, to kill the king, he succeeded. Three men tried, but numbers
over-powered them. Other examples are given in which every regicide
might become king, if he could, like Macbeth. It was held, at Passier,
that God would not allow the king to be killed if he did not richly
deserve it. These kings are not said to incarnate gods.
13. Ibn Batuta once saw a man throw a rope into the air, and climb up
it. Another man followed and cut the first to pieces, which fell on
the ground, were reunited, and no harm done. This veracious traveller
also saw a man, at Java, kill himself for love of the Sultan, thereby
securing liberal pensions for his family, as his father and grandfather
had done before him. 'We may conjecture that formerly the Sultans of
Java, like the Kings of Quilacare and Calicut, were bound to cut their
own throats at the end of a fixed term of years,'[43] but that they
deputed the duty to one certain family. We _may_ conjecture, but,
considering the lack of evidence, and the stories that Ibn Batuta
freely tells, I doubt! Ibn, at the Court of Delhi, saw cups and dishes
I at a wish appear, and at a wish retire.' Did the Sultan of Java
incarnate a god?
14. This case is so extremely involved and hypothetical (it concerns
Sparta, where I never heard that the king was a man-god) that the
reader must be referred to the original.[44]
Meanwhile the list of instances is numerically respectable. But are
the instances to the point? Do they prove a practice of killing a
royal man-god, for the purpose of helping a god incarnate in him, or
even of preventing his magical power (or _mana_, in New Zealand) from
waning? They rather prove regicide as a form of superannuation, or as
the result of the machinations of priests, or of public discontent.
Above all, they do not demonstrate that the king is ever killed as an
incarnation of a deity who needs a sturdier person to be incarnate in.
So recalcitrant is the evidence, that of all Mr. Frazer's kings who are
here said to be gods, or to incarnate gods, not one is here said to be
put to death by his worshippers.[45] And of all his kings who are here
said to be put to death, not one is here said to incarnate a god.[46]
Such are the initial difficulties of the theory: to which we may add
that elderly men are notoriously killed by many savages just because
they are elderly, whether they are kings or commoners.
Mr. Frazer's point is that Christ died in 'a halo of divinity,'
visible 'wherever men had heard the old, old story of the dying and
rising god.'[47] But, apart from other objections already urged, Mr.
Frazer's present instances do not contain one example of a 'dying and
rising god,' stated to be represented by a living man who is therefore
killed; even if there are one or two cases of a slain king who is a
medicine-man, sorcerer, or cosmic sensitive. Thus the argument fails
from the first. Christ is to be reckoned divine as representing a king
who was killed as an incarnation of a god. But of regicide for this
reason no proof is afforded, as far as I can see.