Print
Word
PDFall inferior deities, of rain, fruit, hunt, boundaries,
etc., as well as all tutelary local divinities.[13]
Men have four kinds of fates. The soul goes to
the sun, or remains in the tribe (each child is declared
by the priest to be N.N. deceased and returned), or
is re-born and suffers punishments, or is annihilated.[14]
The god of judgment lives on Grippa Valli, the ‘leaping
rock,’ round which flows a black river, and up
the rock climb the souls with great effort. The
Judgment-god decides the fate of the soul); sending
it to the sun (the sun-soul), or annihilating it,
etc. The chief sins are, to be inhospitable,
to break an oath, to lie except to save a guest, to
break an old custom, to commit incest, to contract
debts (for which the tribe has to pay), to be a coward,
to betray council. The chief virtues are, to
kill in battle, to die in battle, to be a priest, to
be the victim of a sacrifice. Some of the Khonds
worship the sun-god; some the earth-goddess, and ascribe
to her all success and power, while they hold particularly
to human sacrifice in her honor. They admit (theoretically)
that Bella is superior, but they make Tari the chief
object of devotion, and in her honor are held great
village festivals. They that do not worship Tari
do not practice human sacrifice. Thus the Civaite
sacrifice of man to the god’s consort is very
well paralleled by the usage that obtains among them.
The Khond priests may indulge in any occupation except
war; but some exercise only their priestcraft and
do nothing else. The chief feast to the sun-god
is Salo Kallo (the former word means ‘cow-pen’;
the latter, a liquor), somewhat like a _soma_-feast.
It is celebrated at harvest time with dancing, and
drinking, “and every kind of licentious enjoyment.”
Other festivals of less importance celebrate the substitution
of a buffalo for human sacrifice (not celebrated, of
course, by the Tari worshippers). The invocation
at the harvest is quite Brahmanic: “O gods,
remember that our increase of rice is your increase
of worship; if we get little Rice we worship little.”
Among lesser gods the ‘Fountain-god’ is
especially worshipped, with a sheep or a hog as sacrifice.
Female infanticide springs from a feeling that intermarriage
in the same tribe is incest (this is the meaning of
the incest-law above; it might be rendered ’to
marry in the tribe’).
Of the Or[=a]ons, or Dhangars,[15] we shall mention but one or two good parallels to what is found in other religions. These Dravidians live in Bengal, and have two annual festivals, a harvest feast and one celebrating the marriage of heaven and earth. Like the Khonds, they recognize a supreme god in the sun, but, just as we showed was the case with the Hindus, who ignore Brahm[=a] because they do not fear him, so here, the Or[=a]ons do not pray to the sun, on the ground that he does them no harm; but they sacrifice to evil spirits because the latter are evil-doers. These savages, like the Burmese Mishmis, have no idea
