Tales and Traditions of the Eskimo - Alternative Religions ...

Tales and Traditions of the Eskimo - Title Page
besides the moon and several stars. Though it has been asserted the Greenlanders believe that the first of
our race arose from the earth, and that the first man, called Kallak, created the first woman out of a tuft of
sod, and also that some tradition exists about the Deluge, yet these statements cannot be accepted without
doubt and reservation, because they may have partly originated from the questioners themselves, who
pretend to have heard them from the Greenlanders, but have probably involuntarily acted upon the latter
by p. 39 their prepossessed mode of questioning. Still, on looking at the whole religious views of the
natives, they do seem to presuppose a single power by which the world is ruled. Certain means were
believed to exist by which man was not only enabled to enter into communion with the invisible rulers,
but could also make them his helpers and servants. Such supernatural assistance might be acquired in a
more or less direct wayviz., either through men endowed with the peculiar gift called angakoonek (cor.
spelling angákûne8, signifying angakok-wisdom or -power, or the state of being angakok). But these
men only acquired this gift by applying to and calling on a yet more exalted power, which made these
rulers become their helping or guardian spirits, or tornat (plural of tôrna8). This supreme ruler was
termed tornarsuk; and in his being thus enabled to dispose at will of all the minor powers, forcing them
to serve the angakut, and in the same degree making the whole nature subordinate to mankind, some idea
surely of the godhead must be connected with him. It also seems to have been ascertained that the
Greenlanders have imagined him as having his abode in company with the happy deceased in the under
world; but to this vague belief the whole doctrine concerning his existence seems to have been limited.
The early authors on Greenland, indeed, have given utterance to different opinions concerning tornarsuk
which they have gathered from the natives, some of them representing him as the size of a finger, others
of a bear, and so on; but all these statements seem to rest upon error and superficial inquiry. As far as the
traditions are concerned, the name of tornarsuk is very rarely mentioned in any of them.
Among the supernatural powers was another constituting the source of nourishment, supplying the
physical wants of mankind. These being almost exclusively got from the sea, we cannot wonder that this
power had its abode in the depths of the ocean; and its being represented p. 40 as a female is probably
emblematical of the continual regeneration of life in nature, as well as of economy and household
management, generally devolving on women. This being is named arnarkuagsak (cor. sp. arnar8uagssâ
8, also signifying old woman in general); but the common opinion among the older authors, describing
her as a demon of evil, is quite erroneous. She sits in her dwelling in front of a lamp, beneath which is
placed a vessel receiving the oil that keeps flowing down from the lamp. From this vessel, or from the
dark interior of her house, she sends out all the animals which serve for food; but in certain cases she
withholds the supply, thus causing want and famine. Her retaining them was ascribed to a kind of filthy
and noxious parasites (agdlerutit, which also signifies abortions or dead-born children), which had
fastened themselves around her head; and it was the task of the angakok to deliver her from these, and to
induce her again to send out the animals for the benefit of man. In going to her he first had to pass the
arsissut, and then to cross an abyss, in which, according to the earliest authors, a wheel was constantly
turning round as slippery as ice; and then having safely got past a boiling kettle with seals in it, he
arrived at the house, in front of which a watch was kept by terrible animals, sometimes described as
seals, sometimes as dogs; and lastly, within the house-passage itself he had to cross an abyss by means of
a bridge as narrow as a knife's edge.
According to the religious notions just given, there must have existed a generally established belief in the
presence of some ruling power to which mankind and nature were alike subjected, as well as in certain
modes of obtaining assistance from this power. This supernatural aid, as well as all the actions of men
with a view to call it forth, were in social estimation considered as being good and proper. But besides
file:///I|/mythology/american indian/24/24.html (30 of 317) [01/24/2004 8:57:48 AM]