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Puberty Rites among Savages. Theodor Reik. (Concluded from Vol. IV, No. 3.)
Gottfried Keller. Psychoanalytic Assertions and Assumptions concerning His Character and His Work. Dr. Eduard Hitschmann. (Continued.)
Puberty Rites Among Savages.—Reik applies the interpretative principles of psychoanalysis to find the inner meaning of the widespread rites connected with puberty and to explain their importance to religious and social life. The seriousness also with which they emphasize a danger in sexuality, he considers, needs more than a superficial explanation.
A simulated killing followed by a simulated rising again is characteristic of such rites all over the savage world. Reik gives many examples of the variety of forms which these ceremonials assume. The youth is represented as swallowed by a monster and spewed out again, or he is taken away into the forest for a period. In either case his circumcision is a mark of the monster's violence upon him. A pretence of death and corruption is maintained for periods differing in length. The monster is represented in terrifying form and accompanied by terrifying noises. When the youths return to their former homes they must give every appearance of amnesia of their former state. They keep their eyes closed until bidden to open them, they have to relearn to talk, to feed themselves and otherwise to take up ordinary life. In short they must act as if newly born.
The feeling of hostility of the monster toward the youths is represented by the protracted period of the ceremonies, the refinement of cruelties to which the young men are subjected as well as by the terror inspired. The monster seems to be identified with the grandfathers or other ancestors of the novitiates. On the other hand the older men of the tribe exercise a protective function toward the young men during their ordeal, defending them against the monster and propitiating it. Certain ones assume the position of godfathers to the candidates. Thus
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