Chapter 67 The idea of ​​the soul residing outside the body in folktales

We have seen earlier in this book the primitive view that the soul can leave the body temporarily without causing death.It is believed that such a temporary departure of the soul from the body is quite dangerous, because the wandering soul can easily fall into the hands of the enemy and suffer various disasters or other dangers.If the soul's safety can be ensured during the out-of-body period, there is no reason why the soul should not be kept out of the body for a long time.Purely for personal safety, a person may wish that his soul never returns to his body.Uncivilized people cannot understand life abstractly as "continuous possibility of perception" or "constant adjustment of the heart to adapt to external relations". They understand life as concrete material things with specific volumes that can be seen. Tangible, able to hide in boxes or jars, yet vulnerable to injury, breakage or shattering.The life understood in this way does not necessarily have to be in the human body, it can leave the body and continue to keep the human body alive through long-distance induction or operation.As long as the body which he calls his life or soul is not harmed, the man lives well; if this body is harmed, he suffers; if this body is destroyed, he dies.Or, to put it another way, if the person is sick or dead, the explanation for that fact is that that physical thing called his life or soul, whether inside or outside him, must have been injured or destroyed up.It may also be the case that the life or soul resides in the body, where there is more opportunity for harm, and it is better to hide it in some safe and secret place.Therefore, in this case, the primitive man takes his soul out of the body, stores it in a warm, comfortable and safe place to ensure safety, and returns it to the body after the danger has passed.Or if he did find a place of absolute safety, he would safely hide his soul there forever.The advantage of this is that, as long as the soul is there unharmed, the man will live forever, since his life is not placed in the body, and nothing can cause him to die.

There are many folk tales that confirm this belief of primitive people, the Nordic folk tale of "The Giant with the Immortal Soul" is the best known example.This kind of stories are widely circulated all over the world. From the large number of stories and the various events and details that embody their main ideas and concepts, we can infer that the concept of the external soul played an important role in the thinking of early people in history. status.Because folk tales are the faithful reflection of primitive thought on the objective world, we can be confident that any idea common in folk tales, however absurd it may seem to us, must have once been a common belief.Take, for example, the belief that the soul can leave the body permanently or temporarily, compare the actual beliefs and behaviors of primitive man with the stories told in folktales, and then go back and work on the problem.We shall enumerate the stories in such a way as to illustrate their peculiarities and at the same time their wide spread.

First, all Aryan tribes, from Hindustan to the Hebrides, tell in different forms the story of the existence of the soul outside the body.A very common saying goes like this: wizards, giants, faeries, are all immortal and invulnerable, because they all hide their souls in distant secret places.There is a beautiful princess who was imprisoned by magic in the magic palace. She cleverly explored the wizard's secrets, told the hero in the story, and managed to find the wizard's soul (heart, life or dead soul - all kinds of called it), destroyed it, and thus killed the wizard.For example, there is a folk story in India that a wizard named Penchkin kidnapped a queen, imprisoned him for twelve years, and forced him to marry her. It was planned to kill Pengqijin.So the queen was kind to the wizard, pretending that she had figured it out and was willing to marry the wizard.She said: "Please tell me, can you really live forever? Is the god of death never able to do anything to you? If you really have this great ability, will you not suffer from birth, old age, sickness and death like the world?" It is indeed different. Thousands or tens of thousands of miles away from here, there is a dense jungle. In the middle of the jungle grows a circle of palm trees. In the middle of this circle of trees stands six umbrellas, one on top of the other. Rainwater, under the umbrella on the bottom floor, there is a birdcage with a small green parrot in it. My life depends on that parrot. If the parrot is killed, I will not be able to live. But ’” he continued, “the parrot will never suffer any harm, because on the one hand, the distance is too far for people to go, and on the other hand, I have cast a spell and summoned thousands of gods and monsters to surround the palm tree to protect the parrot. Anyone who comes near that place will be killed." The queen's young son, overcoming all kinds of difficulties, caught the parrot, brought it to the gate of the wizard's magic palace, and began to play with the parrot.When the wizard Penchkin saw the prince, he came out and tried to trick the prince into giving him back the parrot. "Give me back the parrot!" cried Penchkin.The prince held the parrot tightly and tore off one of its wings.When the prince tore off the parrot's right wing, the wizard's right arm also fell off.The sorcerer stretched out his left arm again, and shouted, "Give me back the parrot!" The prince tore off the parrot's other wing, and the sorcerer's left arm fell off again immediately. "Give me back the parrot!" cried the wizard, kneeling on the ground.When the prince tore off the parrot's right leg, the wizard's right leg fell off; when the prince tore off the parrot's left leg, the wizard's left leg also fell off.The wizard's limbs were gone, only his body and head remained, but he rolled his eyes and cried, "Give me back my parrot!" "Take your parrot!" cried the Prince.As he spoke, he wrenched the parrot's neck and threw it at the wizard.As he twisted and turned in this way, the wizard's head turned aside, and with a terrible moan, he died instantly!Another Indian folktale says that a monster's daughter asked the monster, "Dad, where is your soul hidden?" "It's 16 miles away," he replied, "It's a tree. It's full of tigers." , bears and snakes and scorpions. There is a huge snake on the top of the tree, a small cage on the head of the snake, and a small bird in the cage, and my soul is in the body of the small bird." The result of this monster is the same as in the previous story. The same thing happened to the wizard.As the bird's wings and legs were torn off, the monster's limbs fell off; when the bird's head and neck were wrenched off, the monster fell to the ground dead.A Bengal folk tale says that all the monsters live in Ceylon [renamed Sri Lanka on May 22, 1972], and their lives are hidden in a lemon.A child cut a lemon into pieces, and all the monsters died.

In Siam, or Cambodia, there is a folktale (possibly passed down from India) that Thossakan, or Ravana, king of Ceylon, used witchcraft whenever he went out to fight. His soul was taken out of the body and kept in a box at home, so he was always invulnerable and never injured in battle.Once, when he was about to set out to conquer Rama [the seventh incarnation of the Hindu second day god Vishnu (protector god)], he gave his soul to a hermit named Fire Eye for safekeeping.During the battle, Lamore's arrows could not hurt him, which shocked him greatly.One of Lamo's partners knew the secret that the king could not be hurt by swords and guns, so he used witchcraft to transform himself into the image of the king, and went to the hermit to get back the king's soul.After getting the king's soul, he soared into space and quickly flew back to Ramo, holding the box containing the soul in his hand, and pressed it with great force. As a result, the king of Ceylon was squeezed out of breath and died immediately.There is a story in Bengal that says that the king planted a tree in the courtyard of his father’s palace before his departure, and told his parents, “This tree is my life. If it grows green and pleasant, If the tree withers a little, it means that I am sick; if the tree withers completely, it means that I am dead." There is also an Indian story, which says that a prince traveled abroad and left behind A stalk of barley must be well watered and protected.If the barley grows well, he will be well on the journey; if the barley withers, he will be in trouble.Later, the barley fell by itself.It turned out that the prince was beheaded outside, and as his head fell to the ground, the barley stalk broke suddenly, and the ears of wheat scattered all over the ground.

The idea of ​​a soul existing outside the body is not uncommon in ancient and modern Greek folk tales.Seven days after Meleager was born, Fate came to his mother and told her that Meleager would die when the log in the furnace was exhausted.So his mother immediately took the burning log out of the stove, and hid it in a box.After many years, she was very angry because he had killed her brother, and she put the stick on the fire, and Meleager felt at once that a flame was consuming his life, and as the wood was consumed, He too died in excruciating pain.Nessus, king of Megra, had three purple or golden hairs in the middle of his head. It was fate that when these three hairs were pulled out, the king would die.Later, when the Cretans besieged Megra, the king's daughter Scylla fell in love with Minos (King of the Cretans) and tore off the three hairs on her father's head that were tied to life.So King Nissus died.A folk tale in modern Greece tells of a man who stored all his strength in three golden hairs on his head.His mother pulled out the three hairs, and he was weak and cowardly, and was later killed by the enemy.Another modern Greek tale tells of a sorcerer who entrusted his life to three turtledoves in the belly of a wild boar.When the first turtledove was killed, the demon became weak; when the second turtledove was killed, the demon became very sick; finally the third turtledove died, and the demon died. .Another Greek story of the same kind tells of a monster whose whole strength rests in three singing birds that live in the belly of a wild boar.The protagonist in the story catches them, kills two of them, finds the monster's dwelling, and finds the monster lying on the ground in agony.The hero took out a third bird, and the monster begged the hero to let it go or to eat it.The hero twisted the bird's head and neck, and the monster died instantly.

Aladdin and the Magic Lamp, a modern Roman version of the folktale, tells the story of a sorcerer who takes a princess captive and imprisons her on a floating rock in the middle of the ocean.He also told the princess that he would not die.Then the princess's husband came to rescue her, and she told the prince about it.The prince said: "That's impossible, but there must be something that is vital to it; try to find out what it is." So the princess asked the wizard, and the wizard said that there was a hydra in the forest, and the one in the middle In the head of the snake was a little hare, and in the head of the hare was a bird, and in the head of the bird was a jewel, and whoever could put that jewel under his pillow would die.So the prince managed to get the gem, and the princess put it under the wizard's pillow.As soon as the sorcerer fell asleep with his head on the pillow, he screamed three times, rolled his body three times, and died.

Stories of the above kind were also popular among the Slavic peoples.For example, there is a Russian folktale about a wizard called Immortal Koshey who kidnapped a princess and imprisoned her in his golden castle.One day, when the princess was walking alone in the garden of the Golden Castle and was very sad, a prince passed by, saw her, and expressed his friendship to her.The princess was encouraged by the opportunity to escape from the magic den with the prince, so she came to the wizard and said flattering words to deceive the wizard.The princess said: "Dearest friend, please tell me, are you immortal?" "Of course you are immortal," replied the wizard. "Very well," said the princess, "then none of you died, did you put your life in your dwelling?" "Yes," said the wizard, "just under the threshold In the broom." The princess found the broom under the threshold, threw it into the fire, and the broom melted, but the immortal Koshey was safe, and not a single hair was scorched.After the first effort was thwarted, the clever girl pursed her lips deliberately and said: "You don't really love me, because you didn't tell me where you hid your soul. But I'm not angry, I still love you with all my heart ’” With these flattering words, she asked the wizard to reveal the place where the soul was hidden.The wizard smiled and said, "Why do you want to know this? Well, I will tell you because I love you. In a field, there grew three lush oak trees. Under the root of the largest oak tree, there was A snake. If the snake is killed, I will die at once." When the princess heard this, she went to tell her lover, who went to search for the three oak trees and dug them up. Killed the Basilisk, smashed it to pieces, and drove it back to the wizard's castle.But the princess told him that the wizard was still alive and well.So the princess came to flatter the wizard again.This time, the wizard couldn't bear the coaxing, and told the truth to the princess. He said: My soul is in a far away place, and it is hard to find. I have hidden it in the ocean.In the vast ocean, there is a small island with an oak tree growing on the island. Under the oak tree is an iron box with a small basket inside. There is a rabbit in the basket, a duck in the belly of the rabbit, and a duck in the belly of the duck. There is an egg.Whoever finds the egg and breaks it kills me at the same time. "Of course the prince managed to find the egg, and came up to the immortal wizard with the egg in his hand. The monster would have killed the prince, but when the prince squeezed the egg hard, the monster cried out in pain. He turned to The princess stood aside with a false smile and said, "Isn't it because I love you that I tell you where my soul is hidden?Is this what you give me in return? "As he spoke, he stretched out his hand to pick up the sword hanging on the wall. But before he could take off the sword, the prince quickly smashed the egg in his hand, and the so-called immortal wizard fell to the ground and died. There is another story As for Kosei's death, he was said to have been struck on the forehead by the mysterious egg with which his life was bound together by magic. Another version of the story tells It was a big snake, and it was a small stone that killed the big snake. The place where this small stone hides is an isolated island. There is a huge rock on the island, and there is a hare in the stone. The hare has a duck in its belly, and the duck belly There is a duck egg in it, and this small stone is hidden in the yolk of the duck egg.

Among the nations of Teutonic descent, there are also legends and stories about the soul existing outside the body.The Saxon people in Transylvania have a story about a young man who shot a witch repeatedly with a gun, and the bullets pierced through the witch, but the witch was not hurt at all, but laughed at the young man. "Stupid," she yelled, "shoot as hard as you can, you won't hurt a single hair of my hair. You know my life is not on me, it is placed far away. In a big mountain, there is a pond, the pond There is a duck floating on the water, and there is an egg in the duck's stomach, and a fire is burning inside the egg, and that fire is my life. If you can put out the fire, you can end my life. Tell you, It can't be done, it can never be done." But at last the young man got hold of the egg, smashed the egg, and put out the fire, and with the extinguishment of the fire, the witch's life was over.A Germanic story says: There was a man-eating monster called "Soulless Body," or "Soulless Man."He hid his soul in a casket and placed the casket on a rock in the Red Sea.A soldier got the box and took it to the "soulless man". The "soulless man" begged the soldier to return the box to him.The soldier opened the box, took out the soul inside, and threw it back over the head, and the man-eating monster fell down dead instantly.

Another Germanic tale tells of an old wizard who lives alone with a young girl in a great dark wood.The girl was afraid that the wizard would grow old and die and leave her alone in the forest.The wizard reassured the girl again and again. He said to the girl, "My dear child, I will not die. My heart is not in my chest." The girl asked the wizard to tell her where his heart was.The wizard said: Far from here, in a remote place that no one knows of, there is a cathedral.The door of the church is made of iron, which is very safe.The church is surrounded by a wide and deep stream.There is a bird flying inside the church, and my heart is in the bird's belly.As long as the bird lives, I will not die.The bird will never die by itself, and no one can catch it.Therefore, I will not die.You don't need to worry at all. "Before the girl was abducted by the old wizard to the forest, she was going to marry a young boy. After learning the secret of the wizard, the young man tried his best to enter the church mentioned by the old wizard and caught the bird. He took the little bird The bird came to find the girl, and the girl put him and the bird under the old wizard's bed secretly. Soon, the old wizard came back. He was very sick and told the girl. The girl said tearfully, "Oh, Daddy is going to die." Yes; but Daddy still has a heart in his bosom. " "Son," said the wizard, "quickly stop talking.I'm not going to die, I'll be fine soon. At this moment the young man under the bed squeezed the bird lightly; as soon as he squeezed, the old wizard felt very uncomfortable and sat down. So the young man squeezed the bird tighter, and the old wizard sat on the chair Lost consciousness on the ground." Strangled him to death. cried the girl. Her lover did so. The bird was strangled, and the old wizard fell dead on the ground.

The Norwegians have a folktale "The Giant Without Heart". In the story, the giant told the captive princess: "There is a large lake in a distant place, and there is a small island in the middle of the lake, and there is a church on the island. There is a well in the church, and in the well there is a duck floating on the water, and in the duck's stomach is an egg, and my heart is hidden in that egg." The hero in the story got it with the help of some animals that he favored. He squeezed the egg hard, and the giant immediately screamed, begging for mercy.The hero smashes the egg to pieces, and the giant is soon crushed to pieces.Another Norwegian folktale about trolls tells that a troll kidnapped a princess and lived in a cave, and told the princess that she would never go home unless she could get on the ninth head of a certain dragon. Find the grain of sand that hides his heart under the ninth tongue.If she can put that grain of sand on the cave where the goblin lives, all the goblins in the cave will be smashed to pieces, "The cave will become a magnificent palace, and the lake will become a green meadow." The protagonist in the story finally Find the grain of sand and put it on the roof of the tall cave where the troll lives.So all the goblins in the cave became ashes, and everything else came true as the mountain goblin predicted.

In a Celtic folktale recorded in the Western Highlands of Scotland, a giant kidnaps a queen.Then the queen asked the giant where he hid his soul.The giant lied to the queen several times by not telling the truth.But in the end, he confided the secret about his life and death to the queen. "There is a large stone slab under the threshold, and there is a wether under the slab, and there is a duck in the belly of the sheep, and there is an egg in the belly of the duck. My soul is hidden in that egg." The next day the giant went out, and the queen tried to get Crack the egg and smash the egg.It was nearly dusk, and the giant was hurrying home in the dusk, when the queen smashed the egg, and in that instant the giant fell dead.Another Celtic folktale tells of a sea monster who robbed the king's daughter. An old blacksmith said that there is only one way to kill the siren, and no other way is possible. "There was a small island in that long bay, and on it was a white-footed doe called Aled Heathforsing. It had very slender legs, and it ran very fast, and though it could be caught, it A crested seagull will burst out of its stomach, and when the seagull is caught, it will burst out a whale. There is an egg in the whale's mouth, and the soul of the siren is hidden in that egg. If you can get that Break the egg, and the sea monster will die.” Like the old story, when the egg was finally broken, the sea monster died. In an Irish folktale we read that a giant took a maiden and shut him up in his castle on the top of a hill.Many strong men came to the castle to save the beautiful girl and lost their lives. Their bones were piled up around the castle.The last hero (the protagonist in the story) after a knife and an axe can't hurt him, finally found that the only way to kill the giant is to find the egg buried in the belly of a duck in a box under the sea. That egg to wipe the mole on the giant's right chest.With the help of some friendly animals, the hero got hold of the precious egg, and easily killed the giant by rubbing it on the mole on his right breast.There is also a Breton story about a giant who could not be harmed by fire, water, or sword.He killed six wives, married a seventh, and said to her: "I cannot die, and no one can hurt me, unless he smashes a special egg on my chest. But The egg was hidden in the belly of a pigeon, the pigeon was in the belly of a rabbit, the rabbit was in the belly of a wolf, and the wolf was in the belly of my brother, my brother Lives 3,000 miles away from here. So, I'm very relieved." One of the soldiers managed to get the egg and smashed it on the giant's breast, and the giant lost his life instantly.Another Breton tale of a giant who hid his life in a box tree in the garden of his castle.To kill the giant, first cut the taproot of the tree with one blow without hurting any smaller roots.As is often said, the hero of the story succeeds in doing all this, and at the same time the giant falls down dead. We explore the idea of ​​an out-of-body soul in the folktales of Aryan peoples from India to Ireland.The same notion is common in the folktales of other peoples who are not of the Aryan race.We will also give some examples.The ancient Egyptians had a story of "Two Brothers", which was recorded around 1300 BC during the reign of Ramsith II.The story goes: There were two brothers, one used magic to put his heart in the flowers of an acacia tree.His wife urged the flowers to be picked, and he himself fell down dead at once.Later his brother found his lost heart in a locust seed, put it in a glass of fresh water, and he came back to life. "The Arabian Nights" has a story "Saifu Fanfu? Moloch".The gods and monsters in the story said to the captive Indian king's daughter: "When I was born, the astrologer said that my soul would be destroyed in the hands of a prince of the king of the world, so I put my soul in a sparrow's crop and put the sparrow in one little box, which was put in another little box, which was put into seven other little boxes, and these little boxes were all Put them into seven chests, and put all the seven chests into a marble safe, and this safe is placed in a place surrounded by the sea, far away from the world, and human beings cannot reach it.” Saif Fanfu Moloch Finally got the sparrow, screwed it to death, and the monster fell to the ground and turned into a pile of black ash.In a folktale of the Kabir [a branch of the Berber people who live between Algiers and Tunisia], a monster claims that its life is contained in an egg in a distant place.The egg was placed in the belly of a pigeon in the belly of a camel under the sea. The hero in the story managed to get the egg, crushed it in his hand, and the monster died.The Malza [the main ethnic group in Hungary] have a folk tale about an old witch who shut a young prince named Ambrose under the earth's crust.Later she confided the secret to the prince. It turned out that she raised a wild boar on a beautiful meadow. A small box containing a black and a shiny beetle.The shiny beetle holds her life, the black beetle holds her mana.If the two beetles die, her life ends with it.One day, while the old witch was away, Ambrose killed the boar, brought out the rabbit, caught the pigeon, took out the box, and caught two beetles.He killed the black beetle, leaving the life of the bright beetle.So the old witch lost her magic power at once, and went to bed when she got home.Ambrose asked her how to escape from the prison and return to the ground, and then killed the bright beetle, and the old witch died immediately.The Kalmyks have a folk tale in which a khan tests the skills of a wise man by asking him to steal a gem that the khan himself sent with his life.The wise man managed to steal the talisman while the Khan and his guards were asleep, and to prove his prowess, went too far by putting a gallbladder on the Khan's head.The next morning, the khan told the wise man that everything else could be forgiven, but the insult to the khan's dignity could not be forgiven, and he ordered the immediate execution of his joking friend.The wise man was very distressed by the Lord's ungrateful performance, and threw the amulet in his hand to the ground.Khan immediately bled from his nostrils and died. There is also a story about the soul residing outside the body, from the island of Nias, west of Sumatra.The story says that in the past, a chieftain was captured by the enemy. He wanted to kill him, but he couldn't kill him.Finally the chief's wife revealed his secret: there is a hair on his head, as hard as a steel wire, and his life is combined with the steel wire.So the enemy pulled out the hair on his head, and the chief died. There is a story in southern Nigeria in West Africa about a king who put his soul on a brown bird on a big tree in front of the palace gate.The life of the king is closely linked with the life of the bird. Whoever kills the bird kills the king at the same time and inherits the throne.The queen told the secret to her lover.The man shot the bird with an arrow, and killed the King, and took the throne that was vacated.The Baronga people in South Africa told such a story: There was a family who entrusted their whole family's life to a cat.The family's youngest daughter, Tatishan, later married and asked her parents to let her take the precious cat to her new home.The parents refused, saying, "You should know our lives are all tied to it." They promised her a chamois, and even an elephant, in place of the cat.But the girl was not satisfied with anything else, so she finally let her take the cat away.The girl kept the cat in a place where no one knew, not even her husband.One day, she went to work in the fields, and the cat ran out, entered the house, put on the ornaments of the girl's husband practicing martial arts, and danced and sang.Some children, attracted by the noise it made, came to watch it, and were amazed to find the cat so strange.The cat jumped even more and hurt the child.The children ran away and told the owner, "Someone is dancing in your house and hurt us." "Shut up!" said the owner, "I'll expose your lies right away." The family hid behind the door and peeped into the house, and it really was the cat tossing and singing.So he fired a shot at the cat, and the cat fell down dead.His wife fell while working in the field. "Someone killed me at home," she said.With her breath still alive, she asked her husband to go back to her parents' village with her, and take the dead cat with him wrapped in a mat.All her relatives came to visit and bitterly reproached her for insisting on taking the cat to her husband's village.When the mat was untied to reveal the dead cat, the people present fell to the ground one by one and lost their lives.The cat family is thus extinct.The grief-stricken husband sealed the village gate with a branch, returned to his home, and told his friends and relatives how he had killed the cat, thereby killing the entire family of his wife's family, because their lives depended on the cat. cat's body.