Nature worship

Nature worship, system of religion based on the veneration of natural phenomena—for example, celestial objects such as the sun and moon and terrestrial objects such as water and fire.

In the history of religions and cultures, nature worship as a definite and complex system of belief or as a predominant form of religion has not been well documented. Among the indigenous peoples of many countries, the concept of nature as a totality is unknown; only individual natural phenomena—e.g., stars, rain, and animals—are comprehended as natural objects or forces that influence them and are thus in some way worthy of being venerated or placated. Nature as an entity in itself, in contrast with human society and culture or even with God, is a philosophical or poetic conception that has been developed among advanced civilizations. This concept of nature worship, therefore, is limited primarily to scholars involved in or influenced by the modern (especially Western) study of religion.

Nature as a sacred totality

To students of religion, the closest example of what may be termed nature worship is perhaps most apparent in ancient cultures in which there is a high god as the lord in heaven who has withdrawn from the immediate details of the governing of the world. This kind of high god—the deus otiosus, Latin for “hidden, or idle, god”—is one who has delegated all work on earth to what are called “nature spirits,” which are the forces or personifications of the forces of nature. High gods exist, for example, in such indigenous religions on Africa’s west coast as that of the Dyola of Guinea. In such religions the human spiritual environment is functionally structured by means of personified natural powers, or nature spirits.

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Pantheism (a belief system in which God is equated with the forces of the universe) or Deism (a belief system based on a nonintervening creator of the universe), as was advocated in the rationalistic philosophy of religion of western Europe from the 16th to the 18th century, is not appropriate in studies of nature worship in preliterate cultures. Worship of nature as an omnipotent entity, in the pantheistic sense, has not as yet been documented anywhere.

The power or force within nature that has most often been venerated, worshiped, or held in holy awe is mana. Often designated as “impersonal power” or “supernatural power,” the term mana used by Polynesians and Melanesians was appropriated by 19th-century Western anthropologists and applied to that which affected the common processes of nature. Mana was conceptually linked to North American Indian terms that conveyed the same or similar notions—e.g., orenda of the Iroquois, wakan of the Dakotas, and manitou of the Algonquin. Neither “impersonal power” nor “supernatural power” implies the true meaning of mana, however, because mana usually issues from persons or is used by them, and the concept of a supernatural sphere as distinct or separate from a natural sphere is seldom recognized by the peoples who use the term.

Thus, a better designation for mana is “super force” or “extraordinary efficiency.” A person who has mana is successful, fortunate, and demonstrates extraordinary skill—e.g., as an artisan, warrior, or chief. Mana can also be obtained from the atuas (gods), provided that they themselves possess it. Derived from a root term that has aristocratic connotations, mana corresponds to Polynesian social classifications. The ariki, or alii, the nobility of Polynesia, have more mana than commoners, and both their land and the insignia associated with them have mana. Besides areas and symbolic elements that are associated with the ariki, many objects and animals having special relationships with chiefs, warriors, or priests have mana.

The concept of hasina among the Merina (Hova) of central Madagascar is very similar to that of mana. It demonstrates the same aristocratic root character as the word mana, which is derived from the Indonesian manang (“to be influential, superior”).

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The Iroquoian term orenda, like mana, designates a power that is inherent in numerous objects of nature but that does not have essential personification or animistic elements. Orenda, however, is not a collective omnipotence. Powerful hunters, priests, and shamans have orenda to some degree. The wakanda, or wakan, of the Sioux is described similarly, but as Wakan-Tanka it may refer to a collective unity of gods with great power (wakan). The manitou of the Algonquin is not, like wakan, merely an impersonal power that is inherent in all things of nature but is also the personification of numerous manitous (powers), with a Great Manitou (Kitchi-Manitou) at the head. These manitous may even be designated as protective spirits akin to those of other North American Indians, such as the digi of the Apache, boha of the Shoshone, and maxpe of the Crow, as well as the sila of the Eskimo.

The super forces (such as Mulungu, Imana, Jok, and others in Africa) that Western scholars have noted outside of the Austronesian and American peoples are often wrongly interpreted as concepts of God. Only the barakah (derived from the pre-Islamic thought world of the Berber and Arabs), the contagious superpower (or holiness) of the saints, and the power Nyama in the western Sudan that works as a force within large wild animals, certain bush spirits, and physically handicapped people—appearing especially as a contagious power of revenge—may be added with a certain justification to that force of nature that is designated by mana. A striking similarity with mana may also be noted in the concepts of heil (good omen), saell (fortunate), and hamingja (luck) of the Germanic and Scandinavian peoples.