Christian Doctrine, ii. 325. Montefiore, Hibbert Lectures, p. 103. Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, p. 421. Schultz, Old Testament Theology, ii. 308. Bernard, ‘Sin,’ in Hastings, Dictionary of the Bible, iv. 530, 534.
152 Joshua, vii. 1.
153 1 Samuel, ii. 27 sqq.
154 2 Samuel, xxi. 1 sqq.
155 Deuteronomy, i. 37; iii. 26; iv. 21. 2 Kings, xxiii. 26; xxiv. 3. Jeremiah, xv. 4 sqq.
156 Exodus, xx. 5; xxiv. 7, Numbers, xiv. 18. Deuteronomy, v. 9. Cf. Leviticus, xxvi. 39.
157 Ecclesiasticus, xli. 6. Cf. ibid. xvi. 4; xli. 5, 7 sqq.
158 Wisdom of Solomon, iii. 16. Cf. ibid. iii. 12, 13, 17 sqq.
159 Eicken, op. cit. p. 572.
160 Lecky, History of Rationalism in Europe, ii. 37 n.
161 Stewart, Sketches of the Character, &c., of the Highlanders of Scotland, p. 127.
Men originally attribute to their gods mental qualities similar to their own, and imagine them to be no less fierce and vindictive than they are themselves. Thus the retribution of a god is, in many cases, nothing but an outburst of sudden anger, or an act of private revenge, and as such particularly liable to comprise, not only the offender himself, but those connected with him. Plutarch even argued that the punishments inflicted by gods on cities for ill-deeds committed by their former inhabitants allowed of a just defence, on the ground that a city is “one continuous entity, a sort of creature that never changes from age, or becomes different by time, but is ever sympathetic with and conformable to itself,” and therefore “answerable for whatever it does or has done for the public weal, as long as the community by its union and federal bonds preserves its unity.”162 He further observes that a bad man is not bad only when he breaks out into crime, but has the seeds of vice in his nature, and that the deity, knowing the nature and disposition of every man, prefers stifling crime in embryo to waiting till it becomes ripe.163
162 Plutarch, De sera numinis vindicta, 15.
163 Ibid. 20.
But there are yet special reasons for extending the retribution of a god beyond the limits of individual guilt. Whilst the resentment of a man is a matter of experience, that of a god is a matter of inference. That some particular case of suffering is a divine punishment, is inferred either from its own peculiar character, suggesting the direct interference of a god, or from the assumption that a certain act, on account of its offensiveness, cannot be left unpunished. Now experience shows that, in many instances, the sinner himself escapes all punishment, leading a happy life till his death; hence the conclusion is near at hand that any grave misfortune which befalls his descendants, is the delayed retribution of the offended god.164 Such a conclusion is quite in harmony with the common notions of divine power. It especially forces itself upon a mind which has no idea of a hell with post mortem punishments for the wicked. And, where the spirit of a man after his death is believed to be still ardently concerned for the welfare of his family,165 the affliction of his descendants naturally appears as a punishment inflicted upon himself. As Dr. de Groot observes, the doctrine of the Chinese, that spiritual vengeance may descend on the offender’s offspring, tallies perfectly with their conception “that the severest punishment which may be inflicted on one, both in his present life and the next, is decline or extermination of his male issue, leaving nobody to support him in his old age, nobody to protect him after his death from misery and hunger by caring for his corpse and grave, and sacrificing to his manes.”166
164 Cf. Isocrates, Oratio de pace, 120; Cicero, De natura Deorum, iii. 38; Nägelsbach, op. cit. p. 33 sq.
165 Cf. Schmidt, op. cit. i. 71 sq. (ancient Greeks).
166 de Groot, op. cit. (vol. iv. book) ii. 452.
The retributive sufferings which innocent persons have to undergo in consequence of the sins of the guilty, are not always supposed to be inflicted upon them directly, as a result of divine resentment. They are often attributed to infection. Sin is looked upon in the light of a contagious matter which may be transmitted from parents to children, or be communicated by contact.
This idea is well illustrated by the funeral ceremonies of the Tahitians. “When the house for the dead had been erected, and the corpse placed upon the platform or bier, the priest ordered a hole to be dug in the earth or floor near the foot of the platform. Over this he prayed to the god by whom it was supposed the spirit of the deceased had been required. The purport of his prayer was that all the dead man’s sins, and especially that for which his soul had been called to the po, might be deposited there, that they might not attach in any degree to the survivors, and that the anger of the god might be appeased.” All who were employed in embalming the dead were also, during the process, carefully avoided by every person, as the guilt of the crime for which the deceased had died was believed to contaminate such as came in contact with the corpse; and as soon as the ceremony of depositing the sins in the hole was over, all who had touched the body or the garments of the deceased, which were buried or destroyed, fled precipitately into the sea to cleanse themselves from the pollution.167 In one part of New Zealand “a service was performed over an individual, by which all the sins of the tribe were supposed to be transferred to him, a fern stalk was previously tied to his person, with which he jumped into the river and there unbinding, allowed it to float away to the sea, bearing their sins with it.”168 The Iroquois White Dog Feast, which was held every year in January, February, or early in March,169 implied, according to most authorities, a ceremony of sin-transference.170 The following description of it is given by Mrs. Jemison, a white woman who was captured by the Indians in the year 1755:—Two white dogs, without spot or blemish, are strangled and hung near the door of the council-house. On the fourth or fifth day the “committee,” consisting of from ten to twenty active men who have been appointed to superintend the festivities, “collect the evil spirit, or drive it off entirely, for the present, and also concentrate within themselves all the sins of their tribe, however numerous or heinous. On the eighth or ninth day, the committee having received all the sin, as before observed,