Seventeen years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo; a ... - Sabrizain.org

208 DYAK RELIGION
The Sea Dyak belief in a future life has already been
mentioned in the chapter on Burial Rites. But it is no
gloomy Tartarus, nor is it a happy Elysium, that lies
before him. It is simply a prolongation of the present
state of things in a new sphere.
The dead are supposed
to build houses, make paddy farms, and go through all
the drudgery of a labouring life in that other world. This
future life does not, in the mind of the Dyak, mean immortality.
Death is still the final and inevitable destiny
of man. He may live many lives in different spheres —
he may die as often as seven times—but in the end he
becomes annihilated, and absorbed into air, or earth, or
certain jungle plants.
To sum up, the Sea Dyak worships his gods.
There are
good spirits ready to help him, and evil spirits eager to
harm him. He has omens and divination and dreams to
encourage or warn him. The traditions of his ancestors,
handed down by word of mouth from generation to genera-
tion, are his authority for his beliefs. He makes sacrifices
to the gods and spirits, and invokes their help in long
incantations. He believes he has a soul which after
death will live in another world a future life differing little
from his existence in the flesh.