"O dweller, where on high
Flushes at dawn the snow,
O Cloud God, break, we cry,
The power of the foe."
--_Ib._, p. 352.
Again, the rain that is prayed for by the Manganja of Lake Nyassa is an
advantage indeed, but one enjoyed by the community and prayed for by
the community. They made offerings to the Supreme Deity that he might
give them rain, and "the priestess dropped the meal handful by handful
on the ground, each time calling in a high-pitched voice, {147} 'Hear
thou, O God, and send rain!' and the assembled people responded,
clapping their hands softly and intoning (they always intone their
prayers), 'Hear thou, O God'" (Tylor, p. 368).
The appeal then to facts shows that it is with the desires of the
community that the god of the community is concerned, and that it is by
a representative of the community that those desires are offered up in
prayer, and that the community may join in. The appeal to facts shows,
also, that an individual may put up individual petitions, as when a
Yebu will pray: "God in heaven protect me from sickness and death. God
give me happiness and wisdom." But we may safely infer that the only
prayers that the god of the community is expected to harken to are
prayers that are consistent with the interests and welfare of the
community.
From that point of view we must refuse to give more than a guarded
assent to the "opinion that prayer appeared in the religion of the
lower culture, but that in this its earlier stage it was unethical"
(Tylor, 364). Prayer obviously does appear in the religion of the
lower culture, but to say that it there is unethical is to make a
statement which requires defining. The statement means what {148}
Professor Tylor expresses later on in the words: "It scarcely appears
as though any savage prayer, authentically native in its origin, were
ever directed to obtain moral goodness or to ask pardon for moral sin"
(p. 373). But it might be misunderstood to mean that among savages it
was customary or possible to pray for things recognised by the savage
himself as wrong, and condemned by the community at large. In the
first place, however, the god of the community simply as being the god
of the community would not tolerate such prayers. Next, the range and
extent of savage morality is less extensive than it is--or at any rate
than it ought to be--in our day; and though we must recognise and at
the right time insist upon the difference, that ought not to make us
close our eyes to the fact that the savage does pray to do the things
which savage morality holds it incumbent on him to do, for instance to
fight bravely for the good of his wife, his children, and his tribe, to
carry out the duty of avenging murder. And if he prays for wealth he
also prays for wisdom; if he prays that his god may deliver him from
sickness, that shows he is human rather than that he is a low type of
humanity.
It would seem, then, that though in religions of low {149} culture we
meet religion under the guise of desire, we also find that religion
makes a distinction between desires; there are desires which may be
expressed to the god of the community, and desires which may not.
Further, though it is in the heart of a person and an individual that
desire must originate, it does not follow that prayer originates in
individual desire. To say so, we must assume that the same desire
cannot possibly originate simultaneously in different persons. But
that is a patently erroneous assumption: in time of war, the desire for
victory will spring up simultaneously in the hearts of all the tribe;
in time of drought, the prayer for rain will ascend from the hearts of
all the people; at the time of the sowing of seed a prayer for "the
kindly fruits of the earth" may be uttered by every member of the
community. Now it is precisely these desires, which being desires must
originate in individual souls, yet being desires of every individual in
the community are the desires of the community, that are the desires
which take the form of prayer offered by the community or its
representative to the god of the community. Anti-social desires cannot
be expressed by the community or sanctioned by religion. Prayer is the
essential {150} expression of true socialism; and the spirit which
prompts it is and has always been the moving spirit of social progress.
Professor Tylor, noticing the "extreme development of mechanical
religion, the prayer-mill of the Tibetan Buddhists," suggests that it
"may perhaps lead us to form an opinion of large application in the
study of religion and superstition; namely, that the theory of prayers
may explain the origin of charms. Charm-formulae," he says, "are in
very many cases actual prayers, and as such are intelligible. Where
they are mere verbal forms, producing their effect on nature and man by
some unexplained process, may not they or the types they have been
modelled on have been originally prayers, since dwindled into mystic
sentences?" (_P. C._ II, 372-373). Now, if this suggestion of
Professor Tylor's be correct, it will follow that as charms and spells
are degraded survivals of prayer, so magic generally--of which charms
and spells are but one department--is a degradation of religion. That
in many cases charms and spells are survivals of prayer--formulae from
which all spirit of religion has entirely evaporated--all students of
the science of religion would now admit. That prayers may {151}
stiffen into traditional formulae, and then become vain repetitions
which may actually be unintelligible to those who utter them, and so be
conceived to have a force which is purely magical and a "nature
practically assimilated more or less to that of charms" (_l.c._), is a
fact which cannot be denied. But when once the truth has been admitted
that prayers may pass into spells, the possibility is suggested that it
is out of spells that prayer has originated. Mercury raised to a high
temperature becomes red precipitate; and red precipitate exposed to a
still greater heat becomes mercury again. Spells may be the origin of
prayers, if prayers show a tendency to relapse into spells. That
possibility fits in either with the theory that magic preceded religion
or still more exactly with the theory that religion simply is magic
raised, so to speak, to a higher moral temperature. We have therefore
to consider the possibility that the process of evolution has been from
spell to prayer (R. R. Marett, _Folk-Lore_ XV, 2, pp. 132-166); and let
us begin the consideration by observing that the reverse passage--from
prayer to spell--is only possible on the condition that religion
evaporates entirely in the process. The prayer does not become a charm
until the {152} religion has disappeared entirely from it: a charm
therefore is that in which no religion is, and out of which
consequently no religion can be extracted. If then, _per impossibile_,
it could be demonstrated that there was a period in the history of
mankind, when charms and magic existed, and religion was utterly
unknown; if it be argued that the spirit of religion, when at length it
breathed upon mankind, transformed spells into prayers--still all that
would then be maintained is that spoken formulae which were spells were
followed by other formulae which are the very opposite of spells. Must
we not, however, go one step further and admit that one and the same
form of words may be prayer and religion when breathed in one spirit,
and vain repetition and mere magic when uttered in another? Let us
admit that the difference between prayer and spell lies in the
difference of the spirit inspiring them; and then we shall see that the
difference is essential, fundamental, as little to be ignored as it is
impossible to bridge.
The formula used by the person employing it to express his desire may
or may not in itself suffice to show whether it is religious in intent
and value. Thus in West Africa the women of Framin dance {153} and
sing, "Our husbands have gone to Ashantee land; may they sweep their
enemies off the face of the earth" (Frazer, _Golden Bough_,^2 I, 34).
We may compare the song sung in time of war by the Masai women: "O God,
to whom I pray for offspring, may our children return hither" (Hollis,
p. 351); and there seems no reason why, since the Masai song is
religious, the Framin song may not be regarded as religious also. But
we have to remember that both prayers and spells have a setting of
their own: the desires which they express manifest themselves not only
in what is said but in what is done; and, when we enquire what the
Framin women do whilst they sing the words quoted above, we find that
they dance with brushes in their hands. The brushes are quite as
essential as the words. It is therefore suggested that the whole
ceremony is magical, that the sweeping is sympathetic magic and the
song is a spell. The words explain what the action is intended to
effect, just as in New Caledonia when a man has kindled a smoky fire
and has performed certain acts, he "invokes his ancestors and says,
'Sun! I do this that you may be burning hot, and eat up all the clouds
in the sky'" (Frazer, _ib._, 116). Again, amongst the Masai in time of
{154} drought a charm called ol-kora is thrown into a fire; the old men
encircle the fire and sing:--
"God of the rain-cloud, slake our thirst,
We know thy far-extending powers,
As herdsmen lead their kine to drink,
Refresh us with thy cooling showers."
--HOLLIS, p. 348.
If the ol-kora which is thrown into the fire makes it rise in clouds of
smoke, resembling the rain-clouds which are desired, then here too the
ceremony taken as a whole presents the appearance of a magical rite
accompanied by a spoken spell. It is true that in this case the
ceremony is reenforced by an appeal to a god, just as in the New
Caledonian case it is reenforced by an appeal to ancestor worship. But
this may be explained as showing that here we have magic and charms
being gradually superseded by religion and prayer; the old formula and
the old rite are in process of being suffused by a new spirit, the
spirit of religion, which is the very negation and ultimately the
destruction of the old spirit of magic. Before accepting this
interpretation, however, which is intended to show the priority of
magic to religion, we may notice that it is not the only interpretation
of which the facts are susceptible. It is {155} based on the
assumption that the words uttered are intended as an explanation of the
meaning of the acts performed. If that assumption is correct, then the
performer of the ceremony is explaining its meaning and intention to
somebody. To whom? In the case of the New Caledonian ceremony, to the
ancestral spirits; in the case of the Masai old men, to the god. Thus,
the religious aspect of the ceremony appears after all to be an
essential part of the ceremony, and not a new element in an old rite.
And, then, we may consistently argue that the Framin women who sing,
"Our husbands have gone to Ashantee land; may they sweep their enemies
off the face of the earth," are either still conscious that they are
addressing a prayer to their native god; or that, if they are no longer
conscious of the fact, they once were, and what was originally prayer
has become by vain repetition a mere spell. All this is on the
assumption that in these ceremonies, the words are intended to explain
the meaning of the acts performed, and therefore to explain it to
somebody, peradventure he will understand and grant the performer of
the ceremony his heart's desire. But, as the consequences of the
assumption do not favour the theory that prayer must be {156} preceded
by spell, let us discard the assumption that the words explain the
meaning of the acts performed. Let us consider the possibility that
perhaps the actions which are gone through are meant to explain the
words and make them more forcible. It is undeniable that in moments of
emotion we express ourselves by gesture and the play of our features as
well as by our words; indeed, in reading a play we are apt to miss the
full meaning of the words simply because they are not assisted and
interpreted by the actor's gestures and features. If we take up this
position, that the things done are explanatory of the words uttered and
reenforce them, then the sweeping which is acted by the Framin women
again is not magical; it simply emphasises the words, "may they sweep
their enemies off the face of the earth," and shows to the power
appealed to what it is that is desired. The smoke sent up by the New
Caledonian ancestor worshipper or the Masai old men is a way of
indicating the clouds which they wish to attract or avert respectively.
An equally clear case comes from the Kei Islands: "When the warriors
have departed, the women return indoors and bring out certain baskets
containing fruits and stones. These fruits and stones they anoint and
place on a board, {157} murmuring as they do so, 'O lord sun, moon, let
the bullets rebound from our husbands, brothers, betrothed, and other
relations, just as raindrops rebound from these objects which are
smeared with oil'" (Frazer, _op. cit._, p. 33). It is, I think,
perfectly reasonable to regard the act performed as explanatory of the
words uttered and of the thing desired; the women themselves explain to
their lords, the sun and moon,--with the precision natural to women
when explaining what they want,--exactly how they want the bullets to
bounce off, just like raindrops. Dr. Frazer, however, from whom I have
quoted this illustration, not having perhaps considered the possibility
that the acts performed may be explanatory of the words, is compelled
to explain the action as magical: "in this custom the ceremony of
anointing stones in order that the bullets may recoil from the men like
raindrops from the stones is a piece of pure sympathetic or imitative
magic." He is therefore compelled to suggest that the prayer to the
sun is a prayer that he will give effect to the charm, and is perhaps a
later addition. But independently of the possibility that the actions
performed are explanatory of the words, or rather that words and
actions both are intended to make clear to the sun precisely {158} what
the petition is, what tells against Dr. Frazer's suggestion is that the
women want the bullets to bounce off, and it is the power of the god to
which they appeal and on which they rely for the fulfilment of their
prayer.
There is, however, a further consideration which we should perhaps take
into account. Man, when he has a desire which he wishes to
realise,--and the whole of our life is spent in trying to realise what
we wish,--takes all the steps which experience shows to be necessary or
reason suggests; and, when he has done everything that he can do, he
may still feel that nothing is certain in this life, and the thing may
not come off. Under those circumstances he may, and often does, pray
that success may attend his efforts. Now Dr. Frazer, in the second
edition of his _Golden Bough_, wishing to show that the period of
religion was preceded by a non-religious period in the history of
mankind, suggests that at first man had no idea that his attempts to
realise his desires could fail, and that it was his "tardy recognition"
of the fact that led him to religion. This tardy recognition, he says,
probably "proceeded very slowly, and required long ages for its more or
less perfect accomplishment. For the recognition of man's
powerlessness to influence the course of {159} nature on a grand scale
must have been gradual" (I, 78). I would suggest, however, that it
cannot have taken "long ages" for savage man to discover that his
wishes and his plans did not always come off. It is, I think, going
too far to imagine that for long ages man had no idea that his attempts
to realise his desires could fail. If religion arises, as Dr. Frazer
suggests, when man recognises his own weakness and his own
powerlessness, often, to effect what he most desires, then man in his
most primitive and most helpless condition must have been most ready to
recognise that there were powers other than himself, and to desire,
that is to pray for, their assistance. Doubtless it would be at the
greater crises, times of pestilence, drought, famine and war, that his
prayers would be most insistent; but it is in the period of savagery
that famine is most frequent and drought most to be feared. Against
them he takes all the measures known to him, all the practical steps
which natural science, as understood by him, can suggest. Now his
theory and practice include many things which, though they are in later
days regarded as uncanny and magical, are to him the ordinary natural
means of producing the effects which he desires. But when he has taken
all {160} the steps which practical reason suggests, and experience of
the past approves, savage man, harassed by the dread of approaching
drought or famine, may still breathe out the Manganja prayer, "Hear
thou, O God, and send rain." When, however, he does so, it is, I
suggest, doubly erroneous to infer that this prayer takes the place of
a spell or that apart from the prayer the acts performed are, and
originally were, magical. These acts may be based on the principle
that like produces like and may be performed as the ordinary, natural
means for producing the effect, which have nothing magical about them.
And they are accompanied by a prayer which is not a mere explanation or
statement of the purpose with which the acts are performed, but is the
expression of the heart's desire.
No _a priori_ proofs of any cogency, therefore, have been adduced by
Dr. Frazer, and none therefore are likely to be produced by any one
else, to show that there was ever a period in the history of man when
prayers and religion were unknown to him. The question remains whether
any actual instances are known to the science of religion.
Unfortunately, as I pointed out at the beginning of this lecture, so
neglected by the science of religion has been the subject of prayer
that even now we are scarcely {161} able to go beyond the statement
made more than a quarter of a century ago by Professor Tylor that, "at
low levels of civilisation there are many races who distinctly admit
the existence of spirits, but are not certainly known to pray to them
even in thought" (_P. C._ II, 364). Professor Tylor's statement is
properly guarded: there are races not certainly known to pray. The
possibility that they may yet be discovered to make prayers is not
excluded.
Now, if we turn to one of the lowest levels of culture, that of the
Australian black fellows, we shall find that there is much doubt
amongst students whether the "aborigines have consciously any form of
religion whatever" (Howitt, _Native Tribes of S. E. Australia_), and in
southeast Australia Mr. Howitt thinks it cannot be alleged that they
have, though their beliefs are such that they might easily have
developed into an actual religion (p. 507). Now one of the tribes of
southeast Australia is that of the Dieri. With them rain is very
important, for periods of drought are frequent; and "rain-making
ceremonies are considered of much consequence" (p. 394). The
ceremonies are symbolic: there is "blood to symbolise the rain" and two
large stones "representing gathering {162} clouds presaging rain," just
as the New Caledonian sends up clouds of smoke to symbolise
rain-clouds, and the Masai, we have conjectured, throw ol-kora into the
fire for the same purpose. But the New Caledonian not only performs
the actions prescribed for the rite, he also invokes the spirits of his
ancestors; and the Masai not only go through the proper dance, but call
upon the god of the rain-cloud. The Dieri, however, ought to be
content with their symbolic or sympathetic magic and not offer up any
prayer. But, being unaware of this fact, they do pray: they call "upon
the rain-making _Mura-muras_ to give them power to make a heavy
rainfall, crying out in loud voices the impoverished state of the
country, and the half-starved condition of the tribe, in consequence of
the difficulty in procuring food in sufficient quantity to preserve
life" (p. 394). The _Mura-muras_ seem to be ancestral spirits, like
those invoked by the New Caledonian. If we turn to the Euahlayi tribe
of northwestern New South Wales, we find that at the Boorah rites a
prayer is offered to Byamee, "asking him to let the blacks live long,
for they have been faithful to his charge as shown by the observance of
the Boorah ceremony" (L. Parker, _The Euahlayi {163} Tribe_, p. 79).
That is the prayer of the community to Byamee, and is in conformity
with what we have noted before, viz. that it is with the desires of the
community that the god of the community is concerned. Another prayer,
the nature of which is not stated by Mrs. Parker, by whom the
information is given us, is put up at funerals, presumably to Byamee by
the community or its representative. Mrs. Parker adds: "Though we say
that actually these people have but two attempts at prayers, one at the
grave and one at the inner Boorah ring, I think perhaps we are wrong.
When a man invokes aid on the eve of battle, or in his hour of danger
and need; when a woman croons over her baby an incantation to keep him
honest and true, and that he shall be spared in danger,--surely these
croonings are of the nature of prayers born of the same elementary
frame of mind as our more elaborate litanies." As an instance of the
croonings Mrs. Parker gives the mother's song over her baby as soon as
it begins to crawl:---
"Kind be,
Do not steal,
Do not touch what to another belongs,
Leave all such alone,
Kind be."
{164}
These instances may suffice to show that it would not have been safe to
infer, a year or two ago, from the fact that the Australians were not
known to pray, that therefore prayer was unknown to them. Indeed, we
may safely go farther and surmise that other instances besides those
noted really exist, though they have not been observed or if observed
have not been understood. Among the northern tribes of central
Australia rites are performed to secure food, just as they are
performed by the Dieri to avert drought. The Dieri rites are
accompanied by a prayer, as we have seen. The Kaitish rites to promote
the growth of grass are accompanied by the singing of words, which
"have no meaning known to the natives of the present day" (Spencer and
Gillen, _Northern Tribes_, p. 292). Amongst the Mara tribe the
rain-making rite consists simply in "singing" the water, drinking it
and spitting it out in all directions. In the Anula tribe "dugongs are
a favourite article of food," and if the natives desire to bring them
out from the rocks, they "can do so by 'singing' and throwing sticks at
the rocks" (_ib._, pp. 313, 314). It is reasonable to suppose that in
all these cases the "singing" is now merely a charm. But if we
remember that prayers, when {165} their meaning is forgotten, pass by
vain repetitions into mere charms, we may also reasonably suppose that
these Australian charms are degraded prayers; and we shall be confirmed
in this supposition to some extent by the fact that in the Kaitish
tribes the words sung "have no meaning known to the natives of the
present day." If the meaning has evaporated, the religion may have
evaporated with it. That the rites, of which the "singing" is an
essential part, have now become magical and are used and understood to
be practised purely to promote the supply of dugongs and other articles
of food, may be freely admitted; but it is unsafe to infer that the
purpose with which the rites continue to be practised is the whole of
the purpose with which they were originally performed. If the meaning
of the "singing" has passed entirely away, the meaning of the rites may
have suffered a change. At the present day the rite is understood to
increase the supply of dugongs or other articles of food. But it may
have been used originally for other purposes. Presumably rites of a
similar kind, certainly of some kind, are practised by the Australians
who have for their totem the blow-fly, the water-beetle, or the evening
star. But they do not {166} eat flies or beetles. Their original
purpose in choosing the evening star cannot have been to increase its
number. Nor can that have been the object of choosing the mosquito for
a totem. But if the object of the rites is not to increase the number
of mosquitoes, flies, and beetles, it need not in the first instance
have been the object with which the rites were celebrated in the case
of other totems.
Let us now return to Professor Tylor's statement that "at low levels of
civilisation there are many races who distinctly admit the existence of
spirits, but are not certainly known to pray to them even in thought."
The number of those races who are not known to pray is being reduced,
as we have seen. And I think we may go even farther than that and say
that where the existence of spirits is not merely believed in, but is
utilised for the purpose of establishing permanent relations between a
community and a spirit, we may safely infer that the community offers
prayer to the spirit, even though the fact may have escaped the notice
of travellers. The reason why we may infer it is that at the lower
levels of civilisation we meet with religion, in Hoeffding's words, "in
the guise of desire." We may put the same truth in other words and say
that religion is {167} from the beginning practical. Such prayers as
are known to us to be put up by the lowest races are always practical:
they may be definite petitions for definite goods such as harvest or
rain or victory in time of war; or they may be general petitions such
as that of the Khonds: "We are ignorant of what it is good for us to
ask for. You know what is good for us. Give it us." But in any case
what the god of a community is there for is to promote the good of the
community. It is because the savage has petitions to put up that he
believes there are powers who can grant his petitions. Prayer is the
very root of religion. When the savage has taken every measure he
knows of to produce the result he desires, he then goes on to pray for
the rainfall he desires, crying out in a loud voice "the impoverished
state of the country and the half-starved condition of the tribe." It
is true that it is in moments of stress particularly, if not solely,
that the savage turns to his god--and the same may be said of many of
us--but it is with confidence and hope that he turns to him. If he had
no confidence and no hope, he would offer no prayers. But he has hope,
he has faith; and every time he prays his heart says, if his words do
not, "in Thee, Lord, do we put our trust."
{168}
That prayer is the essence, the very breath, of religion, without which
it dies, is shown by the fact that amongst the very lowest races of
mankind we find frequent traditions of the existence of a high god or
supreme being, the creator of the world and the father of mankind. The
numerous traces of this dying tradition have been collected by the
untiring energy and the unrivalled knowledge of Mr. Andrew Lang in his
book, _The Making of Religion_. In West Africa Dr. Nassau (_Fetichism
in West Africa_, pp. 36 ff.) "hundreds of times" (p. 37) has found that
"they know of a Being superior to themselves, of whom they themselves,"
he says, "inform me that he is the Maker and the Father." What is
characteristic of the belief of the savages in this god is that, in Dr.
Nassau's words, "it is an accepted belief, but it does not often
influence their life. 'God is not in all their thought.' In practice
they give Him no worship." The belief is in fact a dying tradition;
and it is dying because prayer is not offered to this remote and
traditional god. I say that the belief is a dying tradition, and I say
so because its elements, which are all found present and active where a
community believes in, prays to, and worships the god of the community,
{169} are found partially, but only partially, present where the belief
survives but as a tradition. Thus, for instance, where the belief is
fully operative, the god of the community sanctions the morality of the
community; but sometimes where the belief has become merely
traditional, this traditional god is supposed to take no interest in
the community and exercises no ethical influence over the community.
Thus, in West Africa, Nyankupon is "ignored rather than worshipped."
In the Andaman Islands, on the other hand, where the god Puluga is
still angered by sin or wrong-doing, he is pitiful to those in pain or
distress and "sometimes deigns to afford relief" (Lang p. 212 quoting
_Man_, _J. A._ I., XII, 158). Again, where the belief in the god of
the community is fully operative, the occasions on which the prayers of
the community are offered are also the occasions on which sacrifice is
made. Where sacrifice and prayers are not offered, the belief may
still for a time survive, at it does among the Fuegians. They make no
sacrifice and, as far as is known, offer no prayers; but to kill a man
brings down the wrath of their god, the big man in the woods: "Rain
come down, snow come down, hail come down, wind blow, blow, very much
blow. {170} Very bad to kill man. Big man in woods no like it, he
very angry" (Lang, p. 188, quoting Fitzroy, II, 180). But when
sacrifice and prayer cease, the ultimate outcome is that which is found
amongst the West African natives, who, as Dr. Nassau tells us (p. 38),
say with regard to Anzam, whom they admit to be their Creator and
Father, "Why should we care for him? He does not help nor harm us. It
is the spirits who can harm us whom we fear and worship, and for whom
we care." Who the spirits are Dr. Nassau does not say, but they must
be either the other gods of the place or the fetich spirits. And the
reason why Anzam is no longer believed to help or harm the natives is
obviously that, from some cause or other, there is now no longer any
established form of worship of him. The community of which he was
originally the god may have broken up, or more probably may have been
broken up, with the result that the congregation which met to offer
prayer and sacrifice to Anzam was scattered; and the memory of him
alone survives. Nothing would be more natural, then, than that the
natives, when asked by Dr. Nassau, "Why do you not worship him?" (p.
38), should invent a reason, viz. that it is no use worshipping {171}
him now--the truth being that the form of worship has perished for
reasons now no longer present to the natives' mind. In any case, when
prayers cease to be offered--whether because the community is broken up
or because some new quarter is discovered to which prayers can be
offered with greater hope of success--when prayers, for any reason, do
cease to be offered to a god, the worship of him begins to cease also,
for the breath of life has departed from it.
In this lecture, as my subject is primitive religion, I have made no
attempt to trace the history of prayer farther than the highest point
which it reaches in the lower levels of religion. That is the point
reached by the Khond prayer: "We are ignorant of what it is good to ask
for. You know what is good for us. Give it us." That is also the
highest point reached by the most religious mind amongst the ancient
Greeks: Socrates prayed the gods simply for things good, because the
gods knew best what is good (Xen., _Mem._, I, iii, 2). The general
impression left on one's mind by the prayers offered in this stage of
religious development is that man is here and the gods are--there. But
"there" is such a long way off. And yet, far off as it is, man {172}
never came to think it was so far off that the gods could not hear.
The possibility of man's entering into some sort of communication with
them was always present. Nay! more, a community of interests between
him and them was postulated: the gods were to promote the interests of
the community, and man was to serve the gods. On occasions when
sacrifice was made and prayer was offered, the worshippers entered into
the presence of God, and communion with Him was sought; but stress was
laid rather on the sacrifice offered than on the prayers sent up. The
communion at which animal sacrifice aimed may have been gross at times,
and at others mystic; but it was the sacrifice rather than the prayer
which accompanied it that was regarded as essential to the communion
desired, as the means of bridging the gap between man here and the gods
there. If, however, the gap was to be bridged, a new revelation was
necessary, one revealing the real nature of the sacrifice required by
God, and of the communion desired by man. And that revelation is made
in Our Lord's Prayer. With the most earnest and unfeigned desire to
use the theory of evolution as a means of ordering the facts of the
history of religion and of enabling {173} us--so far as it can enable
us--to understand them, one is bound to notice as a fact that the
theory of evolution is unable to account for or explain the revelation,
made in Our Lord's Prayer, of the spirit which is both human and
divine. It is the beam of light which, when turned on the darkness of
the past, enables us to see whither man with his prayers and his
sacrifices had been blindly striving, the place where he fain would be.
It is the surest beacon the missionary can hold out to those who are
still in darkness and who show by the fact that they pray--if only for
rain, for harvest, and victory over all their enemies--that they are
battling with the darkness and that they have not turned entirely away
from the light of His countenance who is never at any time far from any
one of us. Their heart within them is ready to bear witness. Religion
is present in them, if only under "the guise of desire"; but it is "the
desire of all nations" for which they yearn.
There are, Hoeffding says, "two tendencies in the nature of religious
feeling: on the one hand there is the need to collect and concentrate
ourselves, to resign ourselves, to feel ourselves supported and carried
by a power raised above all {174} struggle and opposition and beyond
all change. But within the religious consciousness another need makes
itself felt, the need of feeling that in the midst of the struggle we
have a fellow-struggler at our side, a fellow-struggler who knows from
his own experience what it is to suffer and meet resistance" (_The
Philosophy of Religion_, Sec. 54). Between these two tendencies Hoeffding
discovers an opposition or contradiction, an "antinomy of religious
feeling." But it is precisely because Christianity alone of all
religions recognises both needs that it transcends the antinomy. The
antinomy is indeed purely intellectual. Hoeffding himself says, "only
when recollection, collation, and comparison are possible do we
discover the opposition or the contradiction between the two
tendencies." And in saying that, inasmuch as recollection, collation,
and comparison are intellectual processes, he admits that the antinomy
is intellectual. That it is not an antinomy of religious feeling is
shown by the fact that the two needs exist, that is to say, are both
felt. To say _a priori_ that both cannot be satisfied is useless in
face of the fact that those who feel them find that Christianity
satisfies them.
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