Soul, spirit

The concept of the soul has served as a means of expressing a general understanding of life, encompassing both its enduring and transient aspects, and has likely helped man connect himself with the wider natural world. The soul belonged to the living, but was more enduring - it had the ability to depart from the body, to migrate, or assume new forms. In the world view of the past, natural creatures and objects were animated and lived in a very similar  way to humans. The soul was considered the animating and unifying principle of the world in the Estonian pre-Christian worldview, which can be described as essentially animistic.

The Estonian understanding of the soul was not clearly defined. Rather, it encompassed aspects that were not fully comprehensible and, in certain manifestations, even frightening. Souls and spirits were believed to possess different powers and freedoms compared to physical beings, yet they too had limitations.

The understanding of the soul was likely shaped by breathing as the words have in Estonian the same root: hing 'soul', hingama 'to breathe', also hingestatud 'animated'. The idea of a permanent, reincarnating and freely moving soul has also likely been influenced by various factors such as genetic inheritance, instincts, memories, dreams, hallucinations, altered states of consciousness, shadows, supernatural experiences, natural phenomena, the influence of the past and other cultures, as well as the persistence of soul-related ways of thinking and activities.

The idea of a soul that could move from one being to another and indeed to different worlds gave man a connection to the rest of nature and a temporal dimension. For example, the ensouled Sun and Moon, and myths about interacting with them, helped to enable a perceived connection with the universe. Estonian’s belief in the longevity of the soul is reflected in their belief in their ancestors and in natural guardian spirits. Through spiritual lore and ritual, man organised relationships with his fellows and the wider natural world; but at the same time, he also confirmed and reproduced his beliefs. So for example, the Dead Soul’s time of the folk calendar, the funeral customs together with traditional lamentations, protection magic and much more besides, indicate ancestors worship and a world populated with souls and spirits. In the traditions that have come down to us, the pagan Estonian image of the soul is often mixed with Christian ideas, which in turn are based on the pre-Christian traditions of the East.

Perceiving the whole world and a nature full of souls, and the soul itself as an enduring entity could (and can) help man overcome our human cosmic loneliness and perception of the brevity of life, because it enables our contact with the natural world and its temporal history. As man's understanding developed, he/she may have come to feel a separation from nature and the universe, and so attributing a similar soul to the cosmos would be attempt to establish contact and an express a perception of togetherness.

Natural creatures and places had their own souls and guardian spirits whose conception partly might have been partially mixed with that of human ancestors. Local defenders of nature were called mothers and fathers in South Estonia. This is similar to neighbouring Latvia, where natural places also had "mothers" - Mates, e.g. Meza Mate 'Forest Mother'. In Northern and Western Estonia, the guardian spirits of nature are called haldjas 'fairy, governor', similar to Scandinavian languages.

References: Loorits 1949, 1951, 1957; Loorits 1990; Masing 1995; Paulson 1997. 

Taive Särg