Satisfaction (In Ethnology)

SATISFACTION (IN ETHNOLOGY). - I. - Among primitive peoples, particularly among those ethnologically most ancient, there exists a moral ideal to which every person and society itself must always conform. They feel responsible before God for the observance of this moral ideal. Every action not conforming to this ideal is sin (v. CONFESSION). God, holy and just, wills only the good and hates evil; indeed, according to the ordinary manner of expression of primitive peoples, He is angered by man's sin and punishes it with death, with diseases, with great natural disasters, or by taking away his means of subsistence, or by depriving him of loved ones, because God is Lord of all and of everyone. The beliefs of primitive peoples concerning God's attitude toward sin can be seen most clearly and vividly in their legends regarding the first times of man, legends called "of paradise and of the fall into sin," and in those regarding the flood; legends very widespread, indeed one may say universal.

The former, studied extensively and profoundly, both among primitive peoples and among those of high civilization, by Feldmann, are summarized by him in four points: 1) the ancestors of humanity at first stood with God, their creator, in a relation of familiarity, and lived with him a happy life, immune from hardships and sorrows. 2) This happy state came to an end with an evil action against God, committed by men or by their representatives, which among some peoples is reduced to some act of thoughtlessness or to a misunderstanding. 3) In this evil action, to which the loss of the original goods is tied, a malignant power participated, an enemy of God and of man, which is fought and conquered, but not annihilated. 4) God, angered by the evil action of his creatures, isolates himself from humanity; from this there has not rarely also arisen the concrete idea that God drove men out of heaven or even from the earth. From that time on, laborious work and daily sustenance, illness and death weigh upon every inhabitant of the earth. It is easy to observe that in this way an answer is also given to the anguished questions of how evil came into the world and brought disorder and confusion there, how happiness and peace were lost — that is, on account of sin.

While in these legends the first parents are thus seen to be punished for their personal sin, in those of the flood, on the other hand, it is shown that God punishes with death all impenitent humanity, saving only a few innocents, from whom, by God's will, the human race begins to multiply again. These beliefs about sin influence the daily life of primitive peoples, even among those, be it noted well, in which belief in God has been obscured and the other belief in spirits has greatly developed — that is, the beliefs that place directly or indirectly the origin of physical evils and of death itself in moral evil.

God, according to primitive peoples, is not only holy and just, but also good and merciful. After having withdrawn because of the sin of the first parents, he has not abandoned humanity, but as a good father provides for its needs, watches over the observance of his law, of which no violation escapes him. On the other hand, primitive peoples, though feeling obliged before God to live according to the moral ideal, are not angels. As Father Schmidt rightly observes, they too have their defects, especially an extreme impulsiveness and excitability in their strong feelings, whereby inconsiderately and unconsciously they fall now at one point, now at another, of this moral ideal, rebelling quite openly against the supreme legislator himself. They know, however, that God forgives the repentant sinner; indeed, the African Pygmies of Gabon and the Andamanese believe that God forgives sins even after death (if correspondingly they have been the object of penance in this life) in a place that is neither "heaven" for the good nor "hell" for the wicked, but is something intermediate and provisional, a certain "purgatory." Therefore, the terror of God's wrath, which, according to primitive beliefs, manifests itself in many ways: with thunder, with lightning, with the rainbow, etc.; and the desire and the necessity of being at peace with him, drive the primitive to penance for his sin. In fact, once the moment of excitement has passed, thanks to calm reflection, he repents and is ashamed of his sin, disapproves of it and gives a moral [judgment] of it. There are many cases in which this has been observed, but the question of sin and expiation must be studied more profoundly among primitive peoples, and it well deserves it, because through it one penetrates into the innermost part of man. Judging from the whole of primitive peoples and setting aside actions that are not expiatory in a strictly religious sense, one may say that the expiation of sin is made with prayer, which often accompanies every other expiatory act, and with confession (v.), with sacrifice, called for that reason expiatory, with fasting, with numerous other penitential practices of simple recollection and silence, of mortification, of acts of sorrow and of blood; all this is then done personally or through others, for the sin or sins of a person or of an entire community, by a person or by an entire social group.

2. Individual prayer to ask forgiveness of God is an entirely interior act, often without a determined form; and it can be known externally only if it is manifested. Among the Pygmies of Gabon, in Africa, when the rainbow appears, it is customary to address a prayer, which at bottom is a request for forgiveness from God. Each Pygmy, or the head of the village if they are all gathered together, turning to the rainbow, says to it among other things: "O rainbow, give him (that is, God) thanks for us. — Tell him not to be angry. — Tell him not to be irritated. — Tell him not to kill us. — For we are greatly afraid. — O rainbow, tell him so."

The Pygmies believe that God punishes every crime by causing men to die, even by means of lightning. They fear the rainbow, because this, believed to be a divine manifestation, is connected with God's vengeance. They recount, in fact, that four men who attempted the life of their father were surprised and annihilated in the forest by a violent storm; then the rainbow arose. Therefore it is feared, and it is clear how that prayer is expiatory. Among the same Pygmies of Gabon and the Semang of the Malay Peninsula there exists expiatory sacrifice, made with one's own blood. The offering of this sacrifice is obligatory, and failure in such a duty would have as a consequence the flood, not only for some tribe, but for all humanity. When the thunder rumbles, sinners offer their own blood in sacrifice; the innocent light a fire to signify to God their own innocence.

Among the other ethnologically most ancient peoples, expiatory sacrifice has not been observed. It exists among many peoples of more recent civilization and also of high civilization. There are peoples who offer expiatory sacrifice only in determined cases or for certain more serious sins and crimes. Thus among the Nuer a particular illness is considered as divine punishment of incest; therefore the one who suffers from it is held outright guilty and must offer, to avert misfortune, a bull in expiatory sacrifice. Among the Dinka (Raik) it is believed that an incestuous girl would be punished with sterility in her future marriage; therefore she is obliged to confess her guilt and to make the sacrifice. If before the sacrifice ficio, if she or one of her relatives were to die, her seducer would bear the penalty of blood and would have to pay a bull and a sheep for the sacrifice to be performed, as well as one to three bovine animals, among them a cow for the girl's father or guardian. Among the Banyoro, sacrifices are offered after the delivery of the seduced girl. Among the ancient Mexicans, a human sacrifice was offered after each person of the community had confessed his sins over the victim (v. CONFESSIONE). The spirit of penance that animated the sinner shines through in the following prayer, which the priest recited before individual confession, quite different from the common one: "You, Lord, who are the father and mother of the gods and the most ancient divinity, know that your vassal, your servant, comes here; weeping, he approaches with great sadness, he is immersed in his contrition, because he recognizes that he has fallen into error... Our merciful Master, who are the support and defender of all, receive in penance and listen in anguish to your servant and vassal."

Among the Yaoze in China there is a feast of penance, celebrated every ten years to obtain the remission of sins. During the three days of the feast, the commandments and laws of the Supreme Being are read to the people and to the priests. The priests and the people do penance for the sins of the years past, praying, weeping and fasting. Among the Lolo of southwestern China, at the beginning of the new year a sacrifice is made for the whole village. The sacrificers must be three, chosen from among the people of the village who during the year had no deaths in their family. In some Lolo tribes this sacrifice can be compared to that of the scapegoat of the solemn Jewish feast of atonement: the goat, instead of being killed, is driven into the woods. The same Lolo celebrate a particular feast, which is held by one village, inviting to it all the nearest villages, in which the sacred combat is waged to obtain from the Supreme Being the cessation of an epidemic or a famine, a sacred combat compared to the "pardons" of France.

3. Regarding the origin of the expiatory sacrifice, three hypotheses have been devised: a) that it derives from the rites of purification. W. Wundt maintained that it was derived from the necessity of purifying oneself from the stain contracted through the transgression of totemistic taboos, and therefore known in totemistic civilization; but this is an error; today it is demonstrated that in the civilization of gatherers, which ethnologically is older than that of the totemists, there already exists a moral ideal, of whose observance, as has been said, man and society feel responsible before God. One might rather think that the rites of purification, especially when blood is used, derived, through a natural symbolism, from the expiatory sacrifice or are in some way closely connected with it. b) That it originated from the simple offering of a gift, in the sense that just as it is natural to please a person with a gift and make him a friend, so it is likewise natural to become a friend again, by means of a gift, with the one who has been offended by sin. c) That it derives from the idea of punishment for the transgression of a moral law. In fact, this idea is found developed in the ethnologically oldest civilization. The free acceptance of a punishment, already fixed by the Supreme Being, would have the character of an expiatory sacrifice. Hence Westermarck rightly notes that fasting in some cases can be a remnant of such a sacrifice. "The offering of foods," he says, made to the divinity, is transformed into a sacrifice, which consisted in an abstention from foods on the part of man. The same could hold for certain forms of asceticism. Hence the idea arose that a mortification necessarily belongs to every sacrifice, so that in ordinary language "sacrifice" and "privation" have often become synonyms. This seems to be precisely the idea of the expiatory sacrifice as it appears among the Pygmies of Gabon. Of them Father Trilles recounts that in an elephant hunt a third of the men of the camp were trampled by the enraged elephant. Then the leader of the expedition, wounded himself but escaped from death, offered his own blood in sacrifice. This had to be offered to the angered Creator, he explained, in order to

"renew the covenant" (rête). It is further noted that among the same Pygmies, when two persons wish to unite in brotherly friendship, there is the custom of mingling their own blood. Now, Father Schmidt rightly notes, the said sacrifice to appease the wrath of God and renew the covenant with him was offered after it had been established that the previous sacrifice of the animal had not had its effect. Therefore in the mind of the Pygmy the sacrifice of the animal represented that of the blood of man; and it had been made only as a trial sacrifice, in order to spare that of one's own blood, which was properly required, so true is this that even in this sacrifice of the animal blood is used as such. Even when the sacrifice is made to the rainbow, a few drops of human blood, drawn from the arm, are mingled with the blood of the beast.

Therefore, the principal idea of the expiatory sacrifice would be this: man by his sin makes himself worthy of death; the sinner acknowledges this before God, making the expiatory sacrifice in which the animal takes his place, and returns to peace with him, believing that he has thus satisfied divine justice.

Luigi Vannicelli