This week’s Discovering Fiji story is based on the writings of Scottish judge Lord Adam Gifford on ancient beliefs on the afterlife.
He said the side of a Fijian chief’s house was broken down to allow his corpse to be carried out for burial.
This was despite the fact that there were doors.
The intention was to prevent the return of his ghost to intrude or disturb his successor on the throne.
Mr Gifford said in Fiji it was customary after the death of a chief to circumcise boys who had “reached a suitable age”.
On the fifth day after the chief’s death, a hole was dug in “under the floor of a temple” and one of the newly circumcised boys was to be in it.
Then his companions fastened the doors of the temple securely and ran away.
When the boy hidden in the hole blew on a shell-trumpet, the friends of the deceased chief surrounded the temple and would thrust their spears at him through the fence.
Mr Gifford assumed it had something to do with the state of the late chief’s soul, which was probably supposed to be lingering in the village.
The river of the souls
According to Mr Gifford, after death, the souls of the departed were believed to set out for Bulu “to dwell with the great serpent-shaped god Degei”.
His home seemed to be in the Nakauvadra mountains towards the western end of Viti Levu.
Mr Gifford said old Fijian beliefs on the afterlife were not only many but also “vague and inconsistent”.
The souls had to cross water either the sea or a river and they were to cross it with the help of a ghostly “ferryman” who “treated the passengers with scant courtesy”.
When the ghosts arrived on the bank of the river of souls called Wainiyalo, they hailed the “ferryman” and he would paddle his canoe over to receive them.
Mr Gifford noted that the people of Kadavu believed the world of the afterlife could be seen “lying away across the sea” on a clear sunny day.
The place of ghosts’ embarkation
Though every village had its own portal through which the spirits passed on during their long journey in the afterlife, Mr Gifford said one popular place was called Nai Cobocobo.
He said it was at the northern point of Bua Bay on Vanua Levu.
From the bay, a road led to the mountains which had a rocky face.
He said natives had been known to go on pilgrimage to Naicobocobbo expecting to meet ghosts and gods face to face.
The ghost and the pandanus tree
Mr Gifford said many obstacles and dangers were on the road in the afterlife or the Path of the Souls, locally called Sala Ni Yalo.
One of the most celebrated is a certain pandanus tree at which every ghost must throw at the tree using a tabua or whale’s tooth which was placed in its hand at the burial.
If he hits the tree, it would be well for him.
This showed that his friends at home were strangling his wives and, accordingly, he had to wait for the ghosts of his helpers who will soon come hurrying to him.
But if he missed the tree, the poor ghost’s wives will not be strangled, and he would end thereby jumping to his death.
Hard fate of unmarried ghosts
But the hardships of a married ghost was nothing compared to the fate of bachelor ghosts.
They faced a terrible being called the “Great Woman” who lurked in a shade, ready to pounce out on men.
If he escaped her clutches, the spirit faced a worse monster called Nagaga from whom there is “no escape”.
This ferocious short monster would lay himself out to catch the souls of bachelors.
So vigilant and alert is Nagaga that not a single unmarried Fijian ghost is known to have ever escaped.
He would sit beside a big black stone at the high-water mark waiting for his prey.
The bachelor ghosts were aware that it would be useless to attempt to march past him when the tide was in.
So they would wait till it was low water and then try to sneak past him.
Nagaga sat by the stone, gripped any shivering soul that passed by and clubbed them to pieces.
The killer of souls
Again, there is a very terrible giant armed with a great axe who loved eating corpses.
He made no distinction between the married and the unmarried, but he struck out at all ghosts indiscriminately.
Those whom he wounded cannot present themselves in their damaged state to the great Degei.
Mr Gifford said if souls never reach the promised land in the afterlife, they roam the rugged mountains alone.
Some face off with a giant called Samu-yalo, the Killer of Souls.
He artfully hid in some mangrove bushes.
Whenever he killed a ghost, he cooked and ate him and that would be the end of the poor ghost. It is the second death.
A trap for unwary ghosts
Souls who escaped the killer of souls pass on until they would come to one of the highest peaks of the Nakauvadra mountains.
Here the path ended abruptly on the brink of a precipice, the foot of which was washed away by a deep lake.
Over the edge of the precipice projected a large steer-oar and the handle was held either by the great god Degei himself or according to the better opinion by his deputy.
When a ghost came up and peered ruefully over the precipice, the deputy would accost him.
Mr Gifford said should the ghost be a man of rank, he may say “I am a great chief. I lived as a chief and my conduct was that of a chief”.
“I had great wealth, many wives and ruled over a powerful people. I have destroyed many towns and slain many in the war.”
If the ghost failed to appease the gods, he ended up on the blade of the oar with his legs dangling over the abyss.
He is then eventually killed.
A loud smack is heard as the ghost collides with the water.
There is a splash, a gurgle, a ripple and it all is over.
The ghost then went to his account in Murimuria “a very second-rate sort of heaven if it is nothing worse.”
But a ghost who found favour with the great god Degei is warned by him not to sit down on the blade of the oar but on the handle.
The ghost would take the hint and sit himself firmly on the safe end of the oar.
Murimuria an inferior sort of heaven
Mr Gifford said in Murimuria, a heaven of sorts, the departed souls do not necessarily lead a life of pure and unmixed enjoyment.
Some are punished for the sins they committed in the flesh.
The ancient Fijian’s notion of sin differed widely from Christians.
The ghosts of men who did not murder in their lives were punished for their negligence
Again, people who had not bored their eyes on earth were forced in the afterlife to go about forever bearing on their shoulders one of the logs of wood on which bark-cloth is beaten out with mallets.
All who saw the sinner bending under the load jeer at him.
Women who were not tattooed in their life were chased by female ghosts who scratched and cut and gored them with sharp shells.
They scraped the flesh from their bones and baked it into bread for the gods.
And ghosts who did anything to displease the gods were laid flat on their faces in rows and converted into taro beds.
But the few who found their way into the Fijian version of paradise were blessed.
Mr Gifford said here there was an “abundance of all that the heart can desire”.
He said language failed to describe the “ineffable bliss of the happy land”.
Fijian doctrine of transmigration
According to Mr Gifford, the souls of the dead were not universally believed to depart by the Spirit Path to the other world or to stay there forever.
To a certain extent the doctrines of transmigration found favour with the Fijians, he said.
Some of them wandered about the villages in various shapes and could make themselves visible or invisible at pleasure.
The places which these vagrant souls loved to haunt were known to the people who in passing by them.
They were spotted by their propitiatory offerings of food or cloth.
For that reason too villagers did not go out in the dark night lest they should come bolt upon a ghost.
Further it was generally believed that the soul of a celebrated chief might after death enter into some young man of the tribe and animate him to deeds of valour.
Persons so distinguished were pointed out and regarded as highly favoured.
Great respect was paid to them and they enjoyed many personal privileges and their opinions were treated with much consideration.
Souls saved under the old Fijian dispensation
On the whole, when Mr Gifford considered the many perils featured in the Fijian afterlife, he agreed that under the old Fijian belief system, there were “few indeed that were saved”.
He agreed that only a few spirits of the dead or ghosts were often left to inhabit the regions of Mulu and the immortality even of these was sometimes disputed.
He said the belief in a future state was universal in Fiji.
But their superstitious notions often bordered upon transmigration and sometimes taught an eventual annihilation of souls.
- History being the subject it is, a group’s version of events may not be the same as that held by another group. When publishing one account, it is not our intention to cause division or to disrespect other oral traditions. Those with a different version can contact us so we can publish your account of history too — Editor.
