Essay on the nature and function of sacrifice

Marcel Mauss and Henri Hubert

We proposed in this work to define the nature and social function of sacrifice. The
ambitious undertaking would be if it had been prepared by the research of Tylor,
Robertson Smith and the Frazer. We know what we owe them. But other studies
allow us to propose a different theory of their own, which seems more
comprehensive. We do not think, moreover, to the present as other than a
provisional hypothesis: on a subject as vast and complex, new information can not
fail to lead us in the future, to change our current thinking. But under express these
reservations, we thought it might be useful to coordinate the facts we have and to
give an overall design.
The history of old ideas and popular gift of sacrifice, sacrifice food, sacrifice and
study of contract they may have had repercussions on the ritual will not stop us,
whatever may be of interest. Theories of sacrifice is as old as religion, but to find
ones that have a scientific nature, we must descend until recent years. It has the
anthropological school and especially its English representatives that the merit of
the have developed.
Under the inspiration of parallel Bastian, of Spencer and Darwin, Mr. Tylor [1] ,
comparing facts taken to races and different civilizations, imagined a genesis of
forms of sacrifice. Sacrifice, according to the author, is originally a gift that has
made the savage supernatural beings that he must concentrate. Then, when the
gods grew up and moved away from the man, the need to continue to send them
this gift gave rise to the sacrificial rites, designed to bring up these things
spiritualized spiritual beings. Succeeded in giving the tribute which the faithful no
longer expresses no hope of return. From there to the selflessness and sacrifice
became cessation, there was only one step, the evolution did so pass the rite
presents from the wild, self-sacrifice. - But if the theory accurately described the
stages of moral development of the phenomenon, it does not explain the
mechanism. She did in fact play in a language that defined the old popular designs.
Without doubt, by itself, it had a historical truth. It is certain that the sacrifices
were generally in some degree, donations [2] giving the faithful rights to his god.
They also served to feed the gods. But it was not enough to state the fact, he was
accountable.
In fact, R. Smith [3] was the first who attempted a reasoned explanation of the
sacrifice. It was inspired by the recent discovery of totemism [4] . Just as the
totemic clan organization had explained the Arab family and Semitic [5] , and he
wanted to see in the worship practices of the strain totem sacrifice. In totemism,
the totem or god is a parent of his worshipers, and they even have the same flesh
and blood, the ritual is to maintain and ensure that common life which animates
them and the association between them. If necessary, it restores the unit. The
"blood alliance" and the "communal meal" are the easiest ways to achieve this
result. But the sacrifice does not differ from those practices in the eyes of R. Smith.
To him it was a meal where the faithful, eating the totem, is assimilation,
assimilated to him, allied with each other or with him. The sacrificial murder had no
other purpose than to allow the consumption of a sacred animal and therefore
prohibited. Of sacrifice communiel R. Smith deduces the propitiatory or expiatory

sacrifice, that is to say piacula gifts and sacrifices, or fees. Atonement is, according
to him, that the restoration of the broken covenant, yet the totemic sacrifice had all
effects of a sacrificial rite. He found, moreover, this virtue in all sacrifices, even
after the total elimination of totemism.

It remained to explain why the victim, originally shared and eaten by the faithful,
were usually destroyed in whole piacula. Is that from the moment the old totems
were supplanted by domestic animals in the cult of pastoral peoples, they figured
more rarely in the sacrifices, and in particularly serious circumstances. As a result,
they appeared to be too sacred for the uninitiated might touch: the priests ate
alone, or they did all disappear. In this case, the extreme holiness of the victim ends
up turning into impurity and the ambiguous nature sacred things, that R. Smith had
so admirably brought out, he could easily explain how such a transformation had
occurred. On the other hand, when the parent of men and beasts had ceased to be
intelligible to the Semites, human sacrifice replaced animal sacrifice, for he was now
the only way to establish a direct exchange of blood between the clan and god. But
then the ideas and customs in society that protected the lives of individuals by
prohibiting cannibalism, did fall into disuse the sacrificial meal.

On the other hand, little by little, the sanctity of domestic animals, desecrated daily
for food. the man himself went into disappearing. The deity was detached from its
animal forms. The victim, the god away, approached the man, owner of the herd. It
was then, to explain the offering was made, we represent it as a gift from the gods
to man. Thus was born the sacrifice-gift. At the same time, the similarity of the
rites of the sentence and the sacrificial rite, the bloodshed which was found in both
sides gave a criminal communions piacular origin and transformed them into
atonement.

In this research relate, firstly, the work of Dr. Frazer and the other, theories of Mr.
Jevons. More cautiously on some points, they are, in general, the exaggeration of
the theological doctrine of Smith [6] . As for Mr. Frazer [7] , it adds an important
development. The explanation of the sacrifice of the god was still rudimentary at
Smith. Without disregarding the naturalistic character, he made a piaculum higher
order. The old idea of the totem kin of the victim survived and gods to explain the
annual sacrifices, and reprints they commemorated a tragedy in which the god was
the victim. Frazer acknowledged the similarity between the gods and demons
sacrificed agrarian Mannhardt [8] . He approached the totemic sacrifice ritual
murder of the geniuses of the vegetation he showed how the sacrifice and the
communal meal, where we were supposed to assimilate the gods, left the land
where sacrifice for the god of allied fields at the end of its annual life, he was killed,
then ate. He found together, often, the old god and sacrificed appeared, perhaps
because of the taboos which he was charged, carries with it sickness, death, sin and
played the role of scapegoat, scapegoat . But although the idea of expulsion was
marked in these sacrifices, atonement still seemed out of communion. Mr. Frazer
has instead proposed to complete the theory that Smith to discuss it.

The great defect of this system is to want to return if multiple forms of sacrifice the
unity of a principle arbitrarily chosen. First, the universality of Totem, the starting
point of any theory is a postulate. Totemism does a pure state in a few isolated
tribes of Australia and America. Make it the basis of all religions theriomorphism is
to make an assumption, perhaps unnecessary, and it is in any case, impossible to
verify. Above all, it is difficult to find proper totem sacrifice. Mr. Frazer himself has
acknowledged that often the victim was that of a totem sacrifice land. In other
cases, the alleged totems are representatives of an animal species which depend on
the life of the tribe, this species is domesticated, it is the preferred game or
whether, instead, particularly dreaded. At the very least, a detailed description of a
number of these ceremonies would it be necessary, yet this is precisely what is
missing.

But a moment accept this first assumption, however it is questionable. Walking

same demonstration is subject to criticism. The delicate point of doctrine is the
historic estate and the bypass logic that Smith claims to be made between the
sacrifice communiel and other types of sacrifice. Nothing is more doubtful. Any
attempt to comparative chronology sacrifices Arabic, Hebrew or other he studied, is
fatally ruinous. The forms that appear the most simple are known only by recent
texts. Yet their simplicity can it lead to insufficient documentation. In any case, it
implies no priority. If we stick to the facts of history and ethnography, we find
everywhere piaculum next communion. Moreover, this vague term piaculum allows
Smith to describe, under the same heading and in the same terms, purifications, of
atonement and expiation, and it is this confusion which prevents analysis of the
Atonement . Surely, these sacrifices are usually followed by a reconciliation with
God, a sacrificial meal, a spray of blood, an anointing restore the alliance. But for
Smith, it is in these rituals communiels themselves lies the purifying virtue of these
kinds of sacrifices, the idea of atonement is absorbed in the idea of communion.
Without doubt, he noted, in some extreme forms or simplified, something he dare
not relate to the communion, a kind of exorcism to evict a bad character. But
according to him, these are magical processes which have nothing sacrificial and
explained with great erudition and ingenuity of their late introduction into the
mechanism of sacrifice. This is precisely what we can give. One purpose of this
work is to show that the elimination of a sacred, pure or impure, is a cog in primitive
sacrifice as primitive and as irreducible as communion. If the unit has its sacrificial
system, it must be sought elsewhere.

The error of R. Smith was primarily a methodological error. Instead of analyzing

the complexity originating in the system of ritual Semitic, rather he was tied
genealogically to group the facts from the reports of analogy he thought seeing
them. It is, moreover, a common feature of English anthropologists who are
concerned above all to accumulate and classify documents. For us, we do not want
our turn has an encyclopedia that would be impossible to complete and which,
coming after their own, would not be useful. We will try to study well the typical
facts. These facts, we borrow particularly Sanskrit texts and the Bible. We are far

from the sacrifices of the Greek and Roman documents of the same value. By
bringing together scattered information provided by the inscriptions and authors,
there is only one disparate ritual. Instead, we have in the Bible and the texts of
Hindu body of doctrines which belong to a particular time. The document is
straightforward, written by the actors themselves, in their language, in the spirit in
which they performed the rites, if not always very clear awareness of the origin and
cause of their actions.

No. doubt, as he is able to distinguish simple shapes and primary institution, it is

unfortunate to take as its starting point the search for elaborate rituals, recent
commentary and probably distorted by a learned theology . But, in that order of
facts, any purely historical research is futile. The ancient texts or facts reported,
barbarism on the people, the apparent simplicity of the rites are misleading
historical clues. It is unreasonable to search a string of verses of the Iliad an
approximate picture of early Greek sacrifice, they are not even enough to give an
exact idea of sacrifice in Homeric times. We perceive the oldest rituals as through
literary documents, vague and incomplete, partial survivals and liars, infidels
traditions. - It is also impossible to ask only the schema of Ethnography primitive
institutions. Usually truncated by a hasty observation or distorted by the precision
of our language, the facts recorded by ethnographers do their value if they are
closer to documents more accurate and complete.

We do not have to be thinking here of the genesis and history of sacrifice and if we
ever speak of anticipation, it will be logical and not prior to historical precedence.
It's not that we refused the right to appeal either to classical texts, or ethnology, to
inform our analysis and monitor the generality of our findings. But instead to focus
our study on groups of artificially made forms, we will, in rituals that defined and
complete we will investigate, given sets, natural systems of rites necessary to
observation. Thus forced by law, we will be less vulnerable to omissions and
arbitrary classifications. Finally, as the two religions will be the focus of our
investigation are very different, because one leads to another and monotheism to
pantheism, hopefully, by comparison, to arrive at conclusions sufficiently general
[9] .

I
Definition and unit of the sacrificial system

But it is important before going further, to define external facts we refer to as

sacrifice.

The word sacrifice immediately suggests the idea of consecration and one might be
led to believe that the two notions coincide. It is quite certain, indeed, the sacrifice

always involves consecration in every sacrifice, an object passes the common

domain in the religious field, he is devoted. But all the accolades are not the same
kind. There are those who exhaust their effects on the blessed object, whatever it
is, man or something. This, for example, if the anointing. Rite Is there a king? Only
the religious personality of the king is amended, and outside it, nothing is changed.
In the sacrifice, on the contrary, the dedication reaches beyond the thing
consecrated, reaching between the other entity that is the cost of the ceremony.
The faithful who provided the victim, the object of consecration is not, at the end of
the operation, he was in the beginning. He acquired a religious character that he
did not, or he got rid of a negative character which he was afflicted, it amounted to
a state of grace or it is out of a state of sin . In one case as in the other, it is
religiously transformed.

We call on the sacrifice that reaping the benefits of sacrifice or suffering the effects
[10] . This topic is now an individual [11] and now a community [12] , family, clan,
tribe, nation, secret society. When a community is, it happens that the group
collectively meets the Office of sacrifice, that is to say, attending in a body to
sacrifice [13] , but sometimes, it delegates any of its members acting in instead.
Thus the family is usually represented by its leader [14] , the company by its judges
[15] . This is a first degree in this series of images which we encounter at every
step of the sacrifice.

However, there are cases where the influence of the sacrificial consecration is not
directly felt on sacrificing himself, but on some things that are more or less directly
to the person. In the sacrifice that takes place during the construction of a house
[16] is the house that is affected and the quality it has gained and can survive its
current owner. In other cases, the scope of the sacrifice, the river that must pass,
he gives the oath, the covenant he concludes, etc.. We call objects of sacrifice such
things for which the sacrifice takes place. It is important, moreover, noted that the
sacrifice is reached, also because of its presence at. sacrifice and the share or
interest there is. The action of radiant sacrifice here is particularly sensitive,
because it produces a double effect, one on the purpose for which it is offered and
on which we want to act, the other on the legal person who wishes to that effect
and causes . Sometimes, indeed, it is useful only if it has the dual result. When a
father sacrificed for the inauguration of his house, he must not only home to receive
his family, but that it is ready to enter [17] .

We see what is the distinguishing feature of the consecration in the sacrifice that is
holy that mediates between the sacrificer, or object that should receive the useful
effects of sacrifice and divinity to whom the Sacrifice is usually addressed. Man and
God are not in immediate contact. Thereby, the sacrifice is different from most of
the facts known as of alliance by blood, which occurs through the exchange of
blood, a direct fusion of human life and divine life [18] . We say many cases of
offering of hair, here again, the subject who is sacrificed by the party of the person
who is offered, in direct communication with god [19] . Without doubt, there are

between these rites and sacrifice of reports on related and they must always be
distinguished.

But this first feature is not sufficient because it does not distinguish the sacrifice of
those facts which should be well defined name offerings. Indeed, there is not an
offering where the blessed object is interposed also between God and the offering
and the latter being affected by the consecration. But if any sacrifice is in fact an
oblation, there are offerings of different species. Sometimes the subject is devoted
simply presented as an ex-voto; consecration may affect the service of God, but it
does not change its nature simply because it is passed into the religious sphere:
those of beginnings which were only made to the temple, there remained intact and
belonged to the priests. In other cases, however, the consecration destroys the
object presented, where an animal is brought to the altar, the goal is pursued is
achieved only when he was slain, or made coins or consumed by fire, in a word,
sacrificed. The object is destroyed and the victim. This is obviously the offerings of
this kind that should be reserved for the name of sacrifice. We feel that the
difference between these two kinds of operations is due to their seriousness and
their uneven uneven effectiveness. In the case of sacrifice, the religious energies
involved are higher, thence their toll.

Under these conditions, it should call any sacrifice oblation same plant every time
the gift, or a portion of the offering, is destroyed, although its use appears to
reserve the word sacrifice in the name of the only bloody sacrifices. It is arbitrary
and restrict the meaning of the word. Relatively speaking, the mechanism of
consecration is the same in all cases and there is no objective reason to distinguish
them. Thus, Hebrew is a minha offering of flour and cake [20] , and it accompanies
some sacrifices. However, it is a sacrifice so the same way as they did in Leviticus
indistinguishable [21] . The same rites are observed. A portion was destroyed in
the fire of the altar, the rest is eaten whole or in part by the priests. Greece [22] ,
admitted of some gods on their altar as offerings plant [23] , so there were
sacrificial rites that did not contain animal offerings. It can be said of the libations
of milk, wine or other liquid [24] . They are prone in Greece [25] the same
distinctions as the sacrifices [26] , and it even happens that they take place [27] .
The identity of these operations has been so much felt by Hindus as the items
offered in these cases were self-identified. They are also considered alive and
treated as such. Thus, when, in a solemn sacrifice enough, it crushes the grain, we
beg them not to avenge the sacrifice of evil that makes them. When removing the
cakes on the shards for cooking, they are asked not to be broken [28] , when cut,
we implore them for they do not hurt the sacrificer and priests. When you make a
libation of milk (and all the libations are Hindu with milk or any of its products), it is
not something inanimate that offer, the cow itself his successor, in its sap in its
fertility [29] .

So we come finally to the following formula: Sacrifice is a religious act which, by the
consecration of a victim, modifies the state of the legal person who performs or
some objects it is interested [30] .

For brevity of exposition we call personal sacrifices of those where personality is

directly affected by sacrificing the sacrifice, and sacrifice those goals where objects,
whether real or ideal, immediately receive the sacrificial action.

This definition does not define only the object of our research, it sets us on a very
important point: it presupposes, the generic unit sacrifices. Thus, as we did
anticipate, when we reproached Smith to reduce the atoning sacrifice for sacrifice
communiel, it was not to establish the original diversity and irreducible sacrificial
systems. It is that their unity, while real, is not such that he was representing.

But this first result seems in contradiction with the infinite variety that seem to at
first, forms of sacrifice. The opportunities are endless sacrifice, the desired effects
quite different, and the multiplicity of purposes implies that means. So have we
become accustomed, especially in Germany, storing the sacrifices in a number of
distinct categories: one speaks, for example, atonement (Shnopfer), sacrifice of
thanksgiving (Dankopfer) of sacrifices-applications (Bittopfer), etc.. But in reality,
the boundaries of these categories are floating, tangled, often indistinguishable, the
same practices are found to some degree in all. We will not take any account of our
classifications commonly used, as they are not, in our opinion, a methodical search.
Without attempting to try a new one that would be exposed to the same objection,
we'll just borrow here to get an idea of the variety of sacrifices, one of the
classifications given by the Hindu texts.

The most instructive is perhaps the one that divides the constant sacrifices and
occasional [31] . The occasional sacrifices are first sacrifices sacramentaries
(samskrs), that is to say, those accompanying solemn moments of life. A number
of these sacrifices are part of domestic ritual (as outlined in the Sutras Grhya): are
those that occur during the birth, tonsure ritual, the start of the ward, marriage,
etc.. Others are part of the solemn ritual, the anointing of the king and the sacrifice
which confers civil and religious quality is considered superior to all others [32] .
Secondly, there are votive sacrifices whose casual nature is even more pronounced
[33] and finally, the sacrifices and expiatory curative. - As for the constant
sacrifices (nityni) or, better, periodicals, they are attached to certain fixed times,
independent of human will and chance circumstances. Such are the daily sacrifice,
the sacrifice of the new and full moon sacrifices of seasonal festivals and pastoral
beginnings of year-end. Each other and are generally found in the solemn ritual and
the domestic ritual, with differences that include the solemnity of one and the
family nature of the other.

We can see how many different opportunities to serve the Brahmins were the
sacrifices. But at the same time, they have so felt the unity they have made it the
basis of their theory. Almost all of the solemn ritual texts have the same plan:
statement of a fundamental rite, which is gradually diversifying to meet the
different needs [34] . Thus the brahmanas and sutras crauti that comment depart
from the general description of all the sacrificial rites that constitute cakes to the
new and full moon, and this scheme they adapt successively, the changing
according to circumstances, all the ceremonies that involve a sacrifice of cake.
Thus, a sacrificial cake is the essential ceremony and seasonal festivals, aspects of
which are already so many and varied (sacrifices to nature, sacrifices of purification,
the first grain consumption, etc..), And also, a series of votive sacrifice [35] . And
there is not only a fireworks display, but a real sense of the flexibility of the
sacrificial system. Indeed, animal sacrifice is solemn. We find isolated or combined
with other, where the most diverse festivals in the journals Nature and vegetation,
and occasional rites, during the construction of the altar, in rites for redeem person.
Now the sacrifice of soma [36] . Because the soma is fit for sacrifice in the spring,
this can only be a celebration periodic [37] , yet they sacrifice for a multitude of
purposes which are sometimes dependent, sometimes independent of the wishes
and opportunities: Each spring, during the consecration of the king to reach a higher
social status, to become invulnerable and victorious, to escape the misfortunes that
could become chronic. Similarly, rituals in the opposite direction may have the
same design: internal reasons have been the cause of the barren cow, a sacrifice to
Rudra, god of evil, by the Brahmins, is in the same manner as the goat to the gods
celestial good, Agni and Soma [38] .

The ritual Hebrew provides examples equally striking complexity of the rituals and
identity of their elements. Leviticus reduces all the sacrifices to four basic forms:
Ola hattt, shelamim, minha [39] . The names of two of them are significant.
Battat was the sacrifice that was used specifically to expiate sin appointed or
hataah Battat, including Leviticus gives us a very vague definition, unfortunately
[40] . The shelamin [41] (LXX [Greek text]) is a communiel sacrifice, a sacrifice of
thanksgiving, an alliance of hope. As for the terms and Ola minha, they are purely
descriptive. Each of them reminds one of the special sacrifice: the second, the
presentation of the victim, where it is likely plant, the first, sending the offering to
the deity [42] .

This simplification of the sacrificial system [43] is probably the result of a

classification too special and too arbitrary to also serve as a basis for a
comprehensive study of sacrifice. But in truth, these four typical forms are not, or at
least are not real types of sacrifices, but a kind of abstract elements where one of
the organs of the sacrifice is highly developed and that can always enter more
complex formulas. The ritual has decomposed ceremonies which gave rise every
opportunity to sacrifice a single or plurality of sacrifices that were considered as
such. For example, the sacrifice of the ordination of the high priest [44] consists of
a hattt, Atonement, an Ola sacrifice where the victim was burned entirely and
sacrifice of the ram of consecration which is a zebah shelamim, communiel
sacrifice. The sacrifice for the purification of birth, and includes a la [45] hattt.

The sacrifice for the purification of leprous comprises rites similar to those of the
dedication of the priest [46]. Here are thus two sacrifices of which one appears to
be expiatory and the other rather communiel, which leads to similar rites. Thus,
even these two irreducible ideas of atonement and communion, communication of a
crowned nature or expulsion of a contrary nature, cannot provide the base of a
general and rigorous classification of the sacrifices. Perhaps we would in vain seek
examples of expiatory sacrifice where no element communiel or of sacrifices
communiels slips which do not resemble by any side expiatory sacrifices [47].

Because, not only in the complex sacrifices, but even in the elementary sacrifices of
Pentateuque, we find same ambiguity. The zebah shelamim [48] is a sacrifice
communiel; and yet, certain parts of the victim (blood, grease, some internal
organs) are always reserved, destroyed or prohibited. A member is always eats by
the priests. The victim of hattt can be allotted very whole to the priests [49]; in the
absence of sacrificing, the sacrificers communicate. In hattt celebrated for the
dedication or the purification of the temple or the furnace bridge, the blood of the
victim is used to rub with oil the doors and the walls. This rite communicates the
dedication [50] to them. However a rite of the same kind finds in the zebah
shelamim ordination; an oiling of very similar blood is made on Aaron and his sons
[51].

These examples show which affinity present practices which, by the nature of their
object and their results, seem to be opposite. It ya continuity enters the forms of the
sacrifice. They are at the same time too varied and too similar so that it is possible
to divide them into too characterized groups. They have all the same core; and it is
there what makes their unit. They are the envelopes of the same mechanism that
we now will dismount and describe.
II
The pattern of sacrifice

Admission

We obviously can think of drawing a pattern here of sacrifice that is abstract

enough to agree to complete all known cases, and different facts is too great. All he
can do is explore specific forms of sacrifice, rather complex for all the important
moments of the drama will be met, and quite well known for an accurate analysis
can be made . The sacrifice that we feel best meet this condition is the Hindu Vedic
animal sacrifice. We do not know, indeed, the details should be better explained.
All the characters are very clearly presented, at the time of their entry and exit as

well as in the course of action. Moreover, it is a rite amorphous and is not oriented
in one direction, but it can serve many different purposes. But it is not who is better
suited to research that we undertake. Therefore we will base our study, except to
gather around the analysis of other facts, taken either in India itself or to other
religions.

Sacrifice is a religious act which can only be accomplished in a religious

environment and through agents essentially religious. However, in general, before
the ceremony, nor sacrifice, nor the priest nor the place nor the tools nor the victim,
have this character to the degree appropriate. The first phase of the sacrifice is to
give it to them. They are profane, they must change state. For this, the rites are
necessary to introduce into the sacred world and engage them more or less
profoundly, according to the important role they will play then. This constitutes,
according to the expression of Sanskrit texts [1] , entry in the sacrifice.

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1 sacrificing. - To investigate how this change of state occurs in the sacrifice,

immediately take an extreme case, almost abnormal, which is not a ritual animal
sacrifice, but where the common rituals are like magnified and, therefore, more
easily observable. This is one of the diks, that is to say the preparation of
sacrificing the sacrifice of soma [2] . - As soon as the priests are chosen, a series of
symbolic ceremonies begin for the sacrifice, which will gradually be stripped of the
time he was reborn to do entirely new species. Anything related to the gods must be
divine, the sacrifice has to become a god himself to be ready to act on them [3] .
For this, he built a special hut, tightly closed, for the dksita is a god and the world
of the gods is separated from that of men [4] . We shave, we cut the nails [5] , but
the manner of the gods, that is to say in a reverse order that men usually follow
[6] . After he took a bath purificator [7] , there is a linen garment brand new [8] ,
thereby indicating that new life will start for him. Then, following the various
junctions [9] , it is covered by the skin of the sable antelope [10] . It is the solemn
moment when the new being awakened in him. He became a fetus. It hides its
head and he made a fist [11] , because the embryo in its membranes has closed
fist, one does come and go around the home as restless fetus in the womb. It
remains in this state until the grand ceremony of the introduction of soma [12] .
Then he opened his fists, he reveals he was born in the existence of God, he is god.

But his divine nature once proclaimed [13] confers rights and imposes duties of a
god, or at least a saint. It should not have intercourse with men impure caste, or
with women, he does not answer who asks, we do not touch [14] . Being a god, he
is exempt from any sacrifice. It takes only milk, food fast. And this life lasted for
months until her body has become transparent. So, having sacrificed his old body

as [15] , reached the last degree of nervous excitement, it is capable of sacrifice

and ceremonies begin.

This initiation complex, long-term, required for ceremonies of exceptional gravity,

is, indeed, a magnification. But we find it, though with less exaggeration in the
preparatory rites of animal sacrifice ordinary. In this case, it is not necessary that
the sacrifice is deified, but he always becomes sacred. Therefore, again, he shaves,
bathes her, abstains from sex, fasting, sleep, etc.. [16] . And even for these simple
rites, the interpretations given to them by their accompanying prayers and
comments Brahman, speak clearly defined. We read from the beginning of
Satapatha Brahmana. "(The sacrifice) to rinse the mouth ... Because, before that it
is unfit for sacrifice ... For the waters are pure. It becomes pure inside ... It happens
in the world of men in the world of the gods " [17] .

These rites are not peculiar to Hindus: the Semitic world, Greece and Rome also
provide examples. A degree of kinship with the god is first required of those
seeking admission to sacrifice [18] . Also abroad there is usually excluded [19] , a
fortiori, courtesans, slaves [20] , often women [21] . In addition, purity is required
momentary [22] . The approach is formidable deity who is not pure [23] ; when
Iahwe will appear on Sinai, the people must wash his clothes and remain chaste
[24] . Similarly, the sacrifice is preceded by a purification or longer [25] . It mainly
consists of sprinkling holy water and washing [26] , and sometimes the sacrifice
must fast [27] and serve [28] . He must wear clean clothes [29] or even special
clothes [30] which give a beginning of holiness. The Roman ritual usually prescribed
use of the veil as a sign of separation and, consequently, of consecration [31] . The
crown that was sacrificed on the head, while it ruled out the bad influences, marked
with a sacred character [32] . Sometimes sacrificing the completed his toilet by a
shaven head and eyebrows [33] . All these purifications [34] , lustrations,
consecrations, preparing the profane to the sacred act, eliminating the vices of his
body of secularism, by subtracting from the common life and by introducing step by
step in the sacred world gods.

2 The priest. - There are sacrifices that no other players and the sacrifice of the
victim. But generally, we do not dare approach the sacred things directly and alone,
they are too serious and too high. An intermediary or, at least, a guide is necessary
[35] . It is the priest. More familiar with the world of gods where he is hired by a
half prior consecration [36] , it can look more closely and with less fear that the
secular stained perhaps unknown stains. At the same time, it avoids the sacrifice of
fatal errors. Sometimes even the layman is formally excluded from the sanctuary
and sacrifice [37] . The priest is, first, the agent of sacrifice [38] which shares the
state and under it is the faults [39] . But on the other hand, it is marked with a
divine seal [40] . It is known [41] , title [42] or the suit [43] of his god, he is the
minister, his incarnation [44] , or at least the custodian of his power. He is the
visible agent of consecration in the sacrifice, in short, he is on the threshold of the
sacred and the profane world and it represents simultaneously. They join him.

As a result of this religious, one would think that he at least can enter the sacrifice
without prior initiation. This is indeed what is happening in India. The Brahmin
arrived with almost divine nature, he did not need a special consecration, except in
extraordinary circumstances [45] , because there are advance preparation. It only
differs from the one we described for the secular in that it is generally less
complicated. As the priest is naturally closer to the sacred world, the simplest
operations are sufficient for them to bring a whole.

Among the Hebrews, although the priest was ordained, he needed to be able to
sacrifice, take some extra precautions. He had to wash before entering the
sanctuary [46] and it was before the ceremony, abstain from wine and fermented
beverages [47] . He wore linen garments [48] he left immediately after sacrifice
[49] . He deposited them in a sacred place, for they were already by themselves a
holy and formidable whose contact was dangerous to outsiders [50] . The priest
himself, in his business, though usual, with the divine, was constantly threatened
with death supernatural [51] who hit two son of Aaron [52] , those of Eli [53] or
priests Family Baithos [54] . By increasing his personal holiness [55] , it is difficult
initially facilitated the sanctuary, he gave backups.

But he did not just sanctified for himself he also sanctified the person or company
on whose behalf he acted. It would take even more precautions he exhibited at the
same time as himself, those he was the substitute. That's what was particularly
noticeable at the Day of Atonement [56] . On this day, in fact, the high priest
represents the people of Israel. He forgives both for him and for Israel, for him and
his family with the bull, to Israel with the two goats [57] . It was after this that
penetrates atonement, making incense, behind the veil of the Holy of Holies [58]
where he found God in the cloud. For as serious duties required of all special
preparations in connection with the quasi-divine role as the priest fulfilled. Similar
rites, proportionately, than in the diks we talked about earlier Seven days before the
feast, the high priest isolated from his family [59] , it is held in the cell consort (of
assessors) [60] . As sacrificing Hindu, it is subject to all kinds of care. The day
before, it is surrounded by old people who read him the section of the Bible which is
exposed the ritual of Yom Kippur. It only gives him something to eat, after which he
was led into a special chamber [61] where it is left after making him swear not to
change the rites. "Then, weeping, her and them, they separated [62] . All night, it
must ensure [63] , because sleep is a time during which the involuntary stains can
be assumed [64] . Thus all the pontifical ritual tends toward the same goal: to give
the priest a large special sanctification [65] which allows him to approach the god
behind the mercy seat and the burden of sins that will be accumulated on his head.

3 place instruments. - It is not enough for the sacrifice and the priest are
consecrated for the sacrifice itself can begin. This can take place or at any time and
anywhere. For all the times of day or year are not equally conducive to the
sacrifices and it is even that exclude. In Assyria, for example, was prohibited on 7,

14 and 21 Month [66] . Depending on the nature and purpose of the ceremony, the
time of the celebration was different. Sometimes he would be offered the day [67] ,
sometimes, on the contrary, evening and night [68] .

The location of the scene itself must be sacred, outside a holy place, the sacrifice is
a murder [69] . When the sacrifice is done in a temple [70] or in a place already
sacred in itself, is useless prior dedications, or at least greatly reduced. This is true
of Hebrew sacrifice as regulated by the ritual of the Pentateuch. It was celebrated
in a unique sanctuary, dedicated to advance [71] , chosen by the deity [72] and
deified by its presence [73] . Also texts which have survived only do they contain
any provisions relating to the sanctification of the place of sacrifice repeated. It was
still necessary maintain the purity and sanctity of the temple and the sanctuary: the
daily sacrifices [74] and an annual sacrificial ceremony to meet this need [75] .

Among Hindus, there was no temple. Each could choose where he wanted to
sacrifice [76] , but this place should first be devoted by a number of rites, the most
important is that which was to draw fire [77] . We do not describe in detail. The
elaborate ceremonies that are designed to create a fire in which he does as pure
elements, already devoted to Agni [78] . Even one of the fires ignited by friction, so
it is completely new [79] . Under these conditions, it has a magical power that
removes the evil spirits, spells and demons. Fire is killer of demons. It's not even
enough to say he is god, Agni is in its complete form [80] . Similarly, according to
some Biblical legends, too, the fire of sacrifice is nothing but the deity itself devours
the victim or, to speak more exactly, it is a sign of consecration that kindle [81] .
What in him divine the Hindu sacrificial fire is communicated so instead sacrificial
and dedicated [82] . This site consisted of a fairly large rectangular space, called
vihara [83] .

Within this space it is another, called vedi, whose sacred character is even more
marked: it is equivalent to the altar. The vedi occupies an even more central than
the fires. These, indeed, contrary to what happens in most other religions, are not
on the altar itself, but the surrounding [84] . The contours of the vedi are carefully
drawn on the ground [85] And for this, we take a shovel (or, in other cases, the
magical wooden sword) and touches the earth lightly, saying: "The villain is killed
[86] . Any impurity is thus destroyed, the magic circle is drawn, the place is
consecrated. Within the limits thus marked, we dig the ground and is leveled: the
hole thus formed constitutes the altar. After a lustration was both expiatory and
purificator, it covers the bottom of the hole of different kinds of lawns. It is on this
lawn that come sit the gods to whom the sacrifice is for, that's where, invisible and
present, they attend the ceremony [87] .
We will not dwell on the various instruments [88] which are deposited on the altar
[89] after being made or during the session or carefully purified. But there is one
that deserves our attention because it is, indeed, part of the altar [90] And is the
Yupa, the post which will be linked beast. This is not a raw material, but the tree
with which it has been done already by itself a divine nature [91] That anointing

and libations were further strengthened [92] . He held, too, an eminent position,
because that is where will the most important of all visible characters who take part
in the ceremony [93] The victim. Also the Brahmanas do they represent a point
where just converge and concentrate all the religious forces at play in the sacrifice.
By its slender stem, he recalled how the gods ascended to heaven [94] ; By its
upper part, it gives power over the heavenly things, for its middle part, the things of
the atmosphere, by its lower part, those of the earth [95] . But at the same time,
it represents the sacrifice and is the size of the sacrifice, which determines its size
[96] . When the anointed, anointed one sacrifice, and when it strengthens, it is the
sacrifice that strengthens [97] . In it occurs, a more marked than in the priest, this
paper, the merger of the gods and sacrifices, which will become even more
complete in the victim [98] .
The staging is now set. The players are ready. The entrance to the victim will start
the play. But before introducing it, we have noted an essential character of the
sacrifice: it is the perfect continuity that is required to have. From the time he starts
[99] , it must be to follow through without interruption and in the ritual order. We
need all the operations which it is composed succeed and complete and are in their
place. The forces are in action, if they do not run exactly along the lines prescribed
outside the sacrificer and the priest and turn against them, terrible [100] . This
continuity of external rites is not even sufficient [101] . It is still a kind of
constancy in the same state of mind where the sacrificer and the priest about the
gods, the victim, the vow which sought to be enforced [102] . Es must have the
automatic result of the sacrifice trust that nothing crazy. In sum, it is to perform a
religious act in religious thought, we need the attitude to match internal external
attitude [103] . We see how, from the beginning, the sacrifice demanded a creed
(credo Sraddha equals, even phonetically), how the act has resulted in its wake faith
[104] .

The victim
We said earlier that construction of the altar in the Hindu ritual is to describe a
circle on the floor magic. In reality, all the operations we have just reviewed the
same purpose. They are tracing as a series of concentric circles, magic, sacred
space interiors. On the outer circle is the sacrifice, and then just turn the priest, the
altar and the pole. At the periphery, in the layman's interest in which the sacrifice
takes place, religiosity is low minimums. It is increasing as the space in which it
develops, will itself is narrowing. All life is organized as sacrificial middle and
focuses around a single home, everything converges to the victim who will now
appear. Everything is ready to receive it. He is taken.
Sometimes it was sacred because of its birth the species to which it belonged was
united to the divinity by special ties [1] . Thus having a divine character
congenital, she did not need to acquire it specially for the occasion. But more
generally, rites determined were necessary to bring in the religious state which
demanded the role it was intended. In some cases, where it had been designated in
advance, these ceremonies took place before it was brought to the place of sacrifice
[2] . But often, it was still nothing sacred at this time. She was only required to
meet certain conditions which makes it able to receive consecration. She must be

without blemish, without sickness, without weakness [3] . She must have a certain
color [4] , such an age, or sex, as the effects we had to produce [5] . But to take
action this general ability to raise the required degree of religiosity, he had to
submit to a variety of ceremonies.
In some countries, it seems the [6] , it is painted, it is whitened, as bos cretatus
Roman sacrifices. He gilded the horns [7] , he placed a crown, decoration strips
[8] . These ornaments communicating a religious character. Sometimes, the
costume you put him closer to the god who presided over the sacrifice that was the
purpose of the disguises used in the sacrifices we have more land than survivals
[9] . The half-consecration that we gave him and could also be obtained in another
way. In Mexico [10] , Rhodes [11] , it intoxicated the victim. That intoxication was a
sign of possession. The divine spirit already invaded the victim.
But the Hindu ritual will enable us to better track the entire sequence of operations
in which the victim is gradually deified. After it was washed [12] , we introduced
various libations while we do [13] . He then addresses the speech by multiplying the
laudatory epithets and begging her to calm down [14] . At the same time, it
invokes the god, lord of cattle, asking him to consent to what we would use his
property as a victim [15] . These precautions, such atonement, these marks of
honor have a dual purpose. First, they accuse the sanctity of the victim, calling it an
excellent thing, ownership of the gods, it makes such. But mostly, it's the induced
to leave peacefully sacrifice for the good of mankind, not to take revenge once
dead. These uses, which are infinitely frequent [16] Does not mean, as we said,
that the beast is always sacrificed a former totemic animal. The explanation is
forthcoming. There are a victim in mind that the sacrifice is specifically intended to
liberate. We must therefore reconcile the spirit that might otherwise, once free,
become dangerous, thence these blandishments and apology beforehand.
Then it binds the victim to the post. At this point, the sacred character that is
being purchased is already such as Brahman can not touch it with your hands, and
that the priest himself is reluctant to approach them. It needs to be invited and
encouraged by a special formula that gives him a priest [17] . And yet, to bring to
these limits, this religiosity already so high, three sets of rituals are necessary. It
makes drinking water to the beast [18] Because the water is divine is the
chandelier above, below, everywhere [19] . Then the anointed with butter on his
head on the shoulders and withers, the rump and the two horns. These junctions
correspond to those made with oil in sacrifice Hebrew at the ceremony of the mola
salsa in Rome, the [Greek text] or barley as assistants, Greece, threw on the animal
[20] . Similarly, we find everywhere libations similar to those discussed above.
They were intended to produce an accumulation of holiness on the victim's head. Finally, after these lustrations and the anointing comes, in the Vedic ritual, a final
ceremony which has the effect of locking the victim herself in a last magic circle,
narrower and more divine than others. A priest takes fire from the gods, a
firebrand, and the firebrand in his hand, he did three times around the beast. This
tour was done in Linda about all the victims, with or without fire. It was the god
Agni, which surrounded the beast on all sides, the sacred, separated [21] . But
while moving and in the world of gods, the victim was to remain in relationships
with men. The means used to ensure that communication is provided in the
religions that we study here, by the principles of sympathetic magic and religion.
Sometimes there is direct representation, natural: a father is represented by his son

he sacrifices, etc.. [22] . In general, a sacrifice is still required to personally pay the
costs, there is, for that very reason, a more or less complete [23] . But in other
cases, the association of the victim and the sacrifice is done by physical contact
between sacrificing (sometimes the priest) and the victim. This contact is achieved,
in the Semitic ritual, by the laying on of hands, moreover, by rites equivalents [24] .
Following this approximation, the victim, who already represented the gods, is
represented as the sacrifice. It is not enough to say she is, she merges with it. The
two personalities merge. Even the identification becomes so, at least in the Hindu
sacrifice that, now, the future destiny of the victim, her impending death have a
kind of feedback effect on the sacrifice. Hence results for the latter an ambiguous
situation. He needs to touch the animal to remain united with him and yet he is
afraid to touch him, because he exposes himself and share his fate. The ritual
resolves the difficulty by a compromise. The sacrifice is touching the victim through
one of the instruments of sacrifice [25] . Thus, this combination of sacred and
profane, we have seen continue gradually through the various elements of sacrifice,
ends in the victim.
We have reached the climax of the ceremony. All elements of sacrifice are given,
they have just been the last time in contact. But the Supreme transaction remains
to be done [26] . The victim is already highly sacred. But the spirit that is in it, the
divine principle that it now contains, is still engaged in his body and attached by the
last link to the world of profane things. Death will remove it, making the final and
irrevocable consecration. It is the solemn moment.
It is a crime that begins a kind of sacrilege. Also, while they brought the victim
instead of the murder, they prescribe certain rituals and libations of atonement
[27] . We apologized for the act that was done, we groaned from the death of the
animal [28] , it is crying like a parent. He apologized before the strike. It was for the
rest of the species to which it belonged, as a large family clan that we begged him
not to avenge the damage that would be caused to the person of one of its
members [29] . Under the influence of the same ideas [30] , it happened that the
murderer was punished, was hit [31] or it is banished. In Athens, the priest of the
sacrifice of the Bouphonia fled, throwing his ax, and all those who took part in the
sacrifice were cited in Prytaneion, they threw the blame on each other and finally, it
condemned the knife, which was thrown the sea [32] . purifications that was
scheduled after the sacrifice the priest also resembled the expiation of crime [33] .
Also, once the animal is placed in the prescribed position and oriented in the
direction specified by rites [34] Everyone is silent. In India, the priests returned,
and the sacrifice and the officiant returns [35] murmuring mantras propitiatory [36]
. We heard more than a simple voice commands given by the priest to priest. This
emissions when the link around the throat of the animal [37] "Soothes his breath
[38] , "As the euphemism used. The victim died. The spirit is gone.
The rites of the murder were extremely variable. But every religion required them
to be scrupulously observed. The change was usually a fatal heresy, punishable by
excommunication and death [39] . Because, by murder, it gave off a force
ambiguous, or rather blind, awesome simply because it was a force. It was
therefore necessary to limit the direct and tame. This is what used rites. Most
commonly, the victim was neck and neck sliced [40] . The stoning was an ancient
rite which no longer appears in Judea, in some cases to criminal enforcement, in

Greece and state witness in the ritual celebrations of some [41] . Elsewhere, the
victim was knocked down [42] or hanging [43] . They could not wrap too many
precautions as serious an operation. Most often, they wanted that death was swift;
we rush the transition from earthly life of the victim and his divine life, in order not
to let the evil influences time to vitiate the sacrificial act. If the cries of the animal
to be bad omens, trying to stifle or to avert [44] . Often, to avoid possible
deviations of the consecration unleashed, it sought to regulate the shedding of
blood spent [45] ; We saw to it that would fall only good place [46] Or else we
made do in order to do not spill a single drop [47] . However, it also happened that
these precautions were regarded as indifferent. Methydrion A, in Arcadia, the rite
commanded to tear apart the victim [48] . You could even have an interest in
prolonging the agony [49] . The slow death as sudden death, could diminish the
responsibility of the priest, for the reasons that we say, the rituals were ingenious in
finding a mitigating circumstances. The rites were simpler when, instead of an
animal is not sacrificed as flour or cakes. The oblation was thrown whole or in part
in the fire.
By this destruction, the essential act of sacrifice was accomplished. The victim was
finally separated from the secular world, it was dedicated, she was sacrificed, in the
etymological sense of the word, and various languages called sanctifying the act
that put her in that state. It changed in nature, as Demophon, like Achilles, as the
son of the King of Byblos, when Demeter, Isis and Thetis in the fire consumed their
humanity [50] . His death was one of the Phoenix [51] : it revived sacred. - But the
phenomenon was happening at that time had a different face. If, on the one hand,
the spirit were released, if it had passed completely behind the veil, in the world
of the gods, of another dimensioned, the body of the animal remained visible and
tangible; and he also, by the fact of the dedication, was filled of a crowned force
which excluded it from the profane world. All in all, the sacrificed victim resembled
deaths whose heart resided, at the same time, in the other world and the corpse.
Also its remainders were surrounded by a religious respect [52]: honors were
returned to them. The murder thus left behind him a crowned matter, and it is it
which, as we will see it now, was useful has to develop the useful effects of the
sacrifice. One subjected it for that to a double series of operations. What survived of
the animal was or allotted entire to the world crowned, or allotted entire to the
world profane, or divided between one and the other.
Attribution in the crowned world, protective divinities or evil demons, was carried
out by various processes. One of them consisted in putting materially in contact
certain left the body of the animal and the furnace bridge of the god or some
objects who were especially devoted to him. In Hebraic day of Kippour hattt, such
as it is described in the first verses of the chap. IV of Lvitique [53], the sacrificer
soaks its finger in the blood which is presented to him; it makes sprinkling seven
times in front of Iahwe, i.e. on the veil, and puts a little blood on the horns of the
furnace bridge of the perfumes, in the interior of the sanctuary [54]. The remainder
was versed at the bottom of the furnace bridge of the l which was at the entry. In
ordinary the priest hattt put blood on the horns of the furnace bridge of the l
[55]. The blood of the victims of the l and the shelamin was simply versed at the
bottom of the furnace bridge [56]. Elsewhere, one smeared of it the crowned stone
or the figure of the god [57]. In Greece, in the sacrifices with the watery divinities,
one made run blood in water [58]; or, after collectbeing collected in a cut, it was
versed with the sea [59]. When the victim had been stripped, one could cover to his

skin the idol [60]. This rite was particularly observed in the ceremonies where a
crowned animal was sacrificed, whatever was, moreover, the form given to the idol
[61]. In any case, the killed victim was presented as one had presented before the
dedication [62]. In the l, the assistances, after having cut the victim of pieces,
bring them with the head to the priest officiating who puts them on the furnace
bridge [63]. In the ritual of the shelamim, the parts presented received significant
names: teroum, raised offering, tenouph, turned offering [64].
The incineration was another means. In all the Hebrew sacrifices, just as blood was
entirely allotted by way of sprinkling or of overflowing [65] grease and the internal
organs were burned with the fire of the furnace bridge [66]. The portions thus
devoted to the god who personified the dedication arrived him in pleasant smoke of
odor [67]. When the god intervened in the sacrifice, it was supposed to eat really
and substantially the sacrificed flesh; it was its meat [68]. The Homeric poems
show us the gods sitting down with the sacrificial banquets [69]. The cooked flesh
[70], reserved to the god, was presented to him and placed in front of him. It was to
consume it. In the Bible, several times, divine fire spouts out and makes disappear
the flesh with which the furnace bridge is charged [71].
On the flesh which remained after this preliminary destruction, other taking away
were made. The priest took his share [72]. However the share of the priest was still
a divine share. The writers of Pentateuque were worry to know if the victim of hattt
were to be burned or eaten by the priests, Mose and the sons of Aharon were,
according to Lvitique [73], in dissension on this point. The two rites thus had
obviously the same direction [74]. In the same way, in the Roman expiatory
sacrifices, the priests ate the flesh [75]. In the zebah shelamim, the priests kept the
parts especially presented to Iahwe, the shoulder and the chest [76], the tenouph
and the teroum. The shares reserved to the priests could be eaten only by them
and their families, and in a crowned place [77]. The Greek texts contain number of
information, not less precise, on the parts of the victims and the oblations reserved
for the sacrificers [78]. Undoubtedly, the rites appear sometimes rather not very
demanding; thus, the priests carry their share on their premises; one makes money
of the skin of the victims and the taking away end up resembling accidental. It ya,
however, place to believe that the priests were, in this case still, the agents, the
representatives, lieutenants of the god. Thus the mystes of Bacchus tore and
devoured the victims when they were had [79]. One must perhaps regard as
sacerdotal shares various taking away made by the kings [80] or crowned families
[81].
The incineration, consumption by the priest had the aim of completely eliminating
from the temporal medium the parts of the animal which were thus destroyed or
consumed. As the heart which the immolation had released before, they, by that,
were even directed towards the crowned world. There were cases where the
destruction and the elimination which resulted from it related to the entire body and
not only on some of its parts. In the Hebraic l and the Greek holocaust [82], the
victim very whole being burned on the furnace bridge or in the crowned place,
without nothing out of inattentive barrel. The priest, after having washed the
entrails and the members of the animal, placed them on fire where they were
consumed [83]. Sometimes the sacrifice was called Kalil, i.e. complete [84].

Among the cases of destruction supplements, it of it is a certain number which have

a special aspect. The immolation of the victim and the destruction of its body took
place at a stretch. One did not start by killing it to incinerate his remainders then:
all occurred at the same time. Such were the sacrifices by precipitation. That one
threw the animal in an abyss, that it was precipitated tower of a city or from the top
of a temple [85], one carried out ipso facto the brutal separation which was the sign
of the dedication [86]. These kinds of sacrifices were very generally addressed to
the infernal divinities or to the evil geniuses. Responsible for bad influences, it was
especially a question of moving away them, of cutting off them from reality.
Undoubtedly, any idea of attribution was not absent from operation. One
represented oneself vaguely that the heart of the victim, with all the evil powers
which were in it, was going oneself from there to join the world of the evil powers;
thus the goat of Large-Forgiveness was devoted to Azazel [87]. But essence was to
eliminate it, to expel it. Also it happened that expulsion took place without it putting
there at death. In Leucade, it was provided that the victim escaped; but it was
exiled [88]. The bird released with the fields in the sacrifice of the purification of
leprous in Judaea [89], it [in Greek in the text] [90] driven out houses, and town of
Athens, are sacrificed in this manner. In spite of the difference of the rites, it occurs
here the same phenomenon as on the furnace bridge from the ol to Jerusalem
when the victim goes up very whole in smoke in front of the face of lahwe. Of the
two shares, it is separated, it disappears completely, though it is not towards the
same areas of the religious world that it moves in both cases.
But when the remainders of the victim very whole were not allotted either to the
gods, or with the demons, one made use of it to communicate or to sacrificing, or
with the objects of the sacrifice, the religious virtues that there had caused the
sacrificial dedication. The operations which we will describe correspond to those
which we met at the beginning of the ceremony. We saw then sacrificing it, by the
laying on of hands, to pass to the victim something of its personality. Now, it is the
victim or what remains about it which will pass to sacrificing new qualities that it
acquired by the sacrification. This communication can be obtained by a simple
blessing [91]. But, in general, one resorted to more material rites; they was, for
example, the sprinkling of blood [92], the application of the skin [93], of oilings of
grease [94], the contact of the residues of the cremation [95]. Sometimes, the
animal was cut into two and sacrificing it passed to through [96]. But the means of
carrying out the most perfect communication was to give up with sacrificing a share
of the victim which it consumed [97]. It was assimilated the characters of the whole
when it ate a piece of them. Moreover, just as there were cases where all was burns
by the god, there were of them others where sacrificing it received the totality of
the oblation [98].
However, its rights on the part of the victim which was abandoned for him were
limited by the ritual [99]. It was to very often consume it in a given time. Levitique
makes it possible to eat the shortly after the ceremony the remainder of the victim
of the sacrifice of the wish (neder) and of the sacrifice indicates by the name of
nedab (voluntary offering). But if still the third day ago of it, they were to be
flaring; that which ate some sinned seriously [100]. Generally, the victim must be
eaten the very same day sacrifice [101]; when it takes place the evening, nothing
must remain in the morning: it is the case of the sacrifice of Passover [102]. One
found in Greece of the similar restrictions, for example, in the sacrifices [in Greek in
the text], gods chthoniens, in Myonia in Phocide [103]. Moreover, the sacrificial

meal could take place only within the boundary of sanctuary [104]. These
precautions were intended to prevent that the remainders of the victim, being
crowned, did not come into contact with the profane things. The religion defended
the holiness of the objects crowned at the same time as it protected the vulgar one
against their malignity. If, though layman, sacrificing it was allowed to touch there
and to eat some, it is that the dedication by sanctifying it, had put it in a position to
do it without danger. But the effects of its dedication lasted only a time; they
disappeared with long and this is why consumption was to be done within a given
time. Unutilized, the remainders were to be at least, if they were not destroyed,
were tightened and were not supervised [105]. Even the residues of the cremation
which could be neither destroyed nor used were not thrown randomly. They were
deposited in special places protected by religious prohibitions [106].
The study of the Hindu animal sacrifice, of which we stopped description, presents a
unit, seldom carried out, of all these practices, and those which relate to attribution
with the gods, and of those which look at the communication with sacrificing.
Immediately after the smothering of the victim, one ensures of it by a special rite
the sacrificial purity. A priest leads near the wide body the woman of sacrificing who
attended the ceremony [107], and, during various washings, it makes drink with
each opening of the animal water of purification [108]. That made, the cutting-up
starts. As of the first stab, blood runs; one lets it escape. It is the share intended for
the evil geniuses. You are the share of shaved [109].
The ceremony comes then which has the aim of allotting to the god the essential
part of the victim: it is the vap, in medical term the greater omentum [110]. One
quickly removes it with all kinds of precautions and propitiations. One
processionnellement brings it like a victim, sacrificing it always holding the priest
who carries it [111]. One makes it cooked near crowned fire and one lays out the
things so that grease, while melting, runs drop by drop on fire. One says that it falls
on the skin from fire [112], i.e. of Agni and, as Agni is charged to transmit to the
gods the offerings, it is a first share allotted to the gods [113]. - Once the cooked
vap, cut out, one throws it to fire [114], in the middle of blessings, of reverences
and after the invocations necessary were made. It is a new share for the gods. This
second attribution itself is treated like a kind of complete sacrifice [115]; thus one
excuses oneself near the vap, as one had made near the victim at the time of the
immolation. - That made, one returns to the animal, one skins it and, in his flesh,
one cuts out eighteen pieces [116], which one makes cook together. Grease, the
bubble, scum [117] which survives [118] in the pot where this cooking takes place,
is for the god or the couple of gods to which this sacrifice is addressed: one
sacrifices all that in fire. What one destroys thus formally represents once again the
very whole victim [119], it is a new complete abolition of the animal which is carried
out EC manner. - Lastly, on the eighteen pieces which were used to make this
bubble, a certain number are taken which is still allotted to various divinities or
mythical personalities [120].
But seven of these shares are useful has very an other object [121]: it is by them
that will be communicated to sacrificing the crowned virtue of the victim [122].
They constitute what one names the id. This name is also that of the goddess who
personifies the cattle and who exempts fortune and fruitfulness [123]. The same
word thus designates this divinity and the sacrificial share [124]. It is that the

goddess comes to incarnate herself there with the course even of the ceremony,
and here how takes place this incarnation. In the hands of a priest, rubbed with oil
beforehand [125], one places the id; the other priests and sacrificing it surround it
and touch it [126]. While they are in this position, one calls upon the goddess [127].
It is here about an invocation to the clean and technical direction of the word
(vocare in, to call inside). The divinity is not only invited to attend and take part the
sacrifice, but to go down in the offering. It is a true transsubstantiation which takes
place. On the call which is sent to him, the goddess comes and pleasing with it all
kinds of mythical forces, those of the sun, the wind, the atmosphere, the sky, the
ground, cattle, etc Thus, like known as a text, one exhausts on the id (sacrificial
share) all that it ya of good in the sacrifice and the world [128]. Then, the priest who
held it in his hands eats his share [129] and, then, sacrificing it makes some as
much [130]. And everyone remains sitted in silence until sacrificing the mouth [131]
rinsed. Then [132], one distributes their shares to the priests, who represent each
one a god [133].
After having distinguished in the various ritual ones which has just been compared
the rites of attribution to the gods and the rites of use by the men, it is important to
notice their analogy. All and sundry are made same practices, imply same the
operations. We found on the two sides the sprinkling of blood; the application of the
skin, here on the furnace bridge or the idol, there on sacrificing or the objects of the
sacrifice; the communion food, fictitious and mythical for what looks at the gods,
real concerning the men. At the bottom even, these various operations all are
substantially identical. It is a question of putting in contact the victim once
immolated either with floods crowned, or with the people or the things which must
benefit from the sacrifice. Sprinkling, the contact, the application of the skin are
obviously only different manners to establish a contact which the food communion
carries to its more high degree of intimacy; because it not produces a simple
external bringing together, but a mixture of the two substances which absorb one in
the other at the point to become indistinguishable. And if these two rites are at this
point similar, it is that the object continued on both sides is not itself not without
analogy. In both cases, it is a question of making communicate the religious force
that the successive dedications accumulated in the sacrificed object, on a side with
the field of the monk, other with the profane field to which belongs sacrificing it. The
two systems of rites contribute, each one in their direction, with establishes this
continuity which appears to us, after this analysis, being one of the most
remarkable characters of the sacrifice. The Victim is the intermediary by which the
current is established. Thanks to it, all the beings which meet with the sacrifice, link
themselves there. All the forces which contribute to it confuse.
It ya more: there are not only resemblance, but narrow solidarity between these two
kinds of practices of attribution. The first are the condition of the seconds. So that
the victim can be used by the men, it is necessary that the gods received their
share. It is, indeed, in charge of such a holiness that the layman, in spite of the
preliminary dedications which have it, to a certain extent, raised above its ordinary
and normal nature, cannot touch there without danger. Few degrees thus should be
lowered this religiosity which is in it and which makes it unusable for simple mortals.
Already the immolation, partly, had reached this result. Indeed, it is in the spirit that
this religiosity was most eminently concentrated. Once thus that the spirit left, the
victim becomes more accessible. One could handle it with less precautions. There
were even sacrifices where any danger had consequently disappeared; it is those

where the entire animal is used by sacrificing, without it anything being allotted by
it to the gods. But, in other cases, this first operation was not enough to discharge
the victim as much as it was necessary. It was thus necessary to be begun again
there has new to still eliminate, towards the areas of the sacring, which had
remained there of too frightening; it was necessary, like says it the Hindu ritual, to
remake a kind of new sacrifice [134].
Thus the rites, if many, which are practical on the victim, can be, in their essential
features, summarized in a very simple diagram. One starts by devoting it; then
energies which this dedication caused and concentrated on it, one makes them
escape, the ones towards the beings of the world crowned, the others towards the
beings of the profane world. The series of states by which it master key could thus
be appeared by a curve: it rises with a maximum degree of religiosity where it
remains only one moment, and from where it goes down again then gradually. We
will see that sacrificing it passes by homologous phases [135].

The exit

The useful effects of the sacrifice are produced; however, all is not finished. The
group of people and things which was formed for the circumstance around the
victim does not have any more a raison d'tre; still it is necessary that it dissolves
slowly and without clashes and, as in fact rites created it, in fact rites also, only, can
give in freedom the elements of which it is made up. The bonds which linked with
the victim the priests and sacrificing it were not broken by the immolation; all those
which took share with the sacrifice there acquired a crowned character which
isolates them from the profane world. It is necessary that they can there return. It is
necessary for them to leave the magic circle where they are still locked up.
Moreover, during ceremonies, of the faults could be made that it is necessary to
erase before taking again the common life. The rites by which this exit of the
sacrifice takes place are exactly the hanging ones of those which we observed at
the time of the entry [1].
In the Hindu animal sacrifice, like, moreover, in all the sacrifices of the same ritual,
this last phase of the sacrifice is very clearly marked. One sacrifices what remains of
butter and scattered grease on the grass [2]; then, one destroys in sacrificial fire a
certain number of instruments [3], the grass of the sacrifice [4], the stick of reciting,
the small planks which surrounded the vedi [5]. One pours water of lustration which
was not employed, then, after having revered the post [6], one makes on him a
drinking. Sometimes, one carries it at the house, it is supposed to purify ritual
faults; or one burns it like the grass [7]. One destroys by fire all that can remain
offerings, one cleans the ustensils and one gains them after having washed them
[8]. Only, the pin which was used to make brown the heart is hidden; particular case
of the rite in virtue of which the instrument of the crime or the pain must be hidden
[9].
Here now what occurs for the people. The priests, sacrificing it, his wife meet and
gloss themselves by washing the hands [10]. The rite has a double object: one
purifies initially faults which one could make in the sacrifice and also of those that

the purpose of the sacrifice was to erase. Actually, the sacrificial religiosity is given
up. It is what the rite of the abandonment of the wish [11] expresses: O Agni, I
made my wish; I equalized myself with my wish, I become again man I go down
again of the world of the gods in the world of the men [12].
An exaggerated form of the same rite will make from there the direction apparent: it
is the bath of transport [13] which finishes the sacrifice of summoned, and which
is the opposite of the dks. After the instruments were demountings, sacrificing it
takes a bath in a quiet handle formed by a running water [14]. One plunges in water
all the remainders of the sacrifice, all the branches pressed of summoned [15].
Sacrificing unties then the sacrificial belt which it had covered at the time of the
dks; it makes some as much for the bond which tightened certain parts of the
costume of the woman, for the turban, the black skin of the antelope, two clothing
of the sacrifice, and it immerses the whole. Then him and his wife, in water to the
neck, take their bath while requesting and while washing herself, initially the back,
then the members, one with the other [16]. That made, they leave the bath and
cover new clothing [17]. All thus be passed to water so as to lose any dangerous
character or even simply religious; the ritual faults which could be made are
expiated, as well as the crime which one committed by killing the god Soma.
However if the rite is more complex than that about which we spoke first of all, it is
of comparable nature: the facts and the theory assign the same function to him.
The biblical texts are unfortunately less complete and less clear; one however finds
there some allusions to the same practices. In the Day of Atonement, the high
priest, after having driven out the goat of Azazel, returned to the sanctuary and
withdrew his crowned costume, so that it did not propagate the dedication; he
washed himself, gave of other clothing, left and sacrificed the l [18]. The man
who had led the goat bathed and washed his clothing before returning [19]. That
which burned the remainders of hattt made in the same way [20]. We are unaware
of if the other sacrifices were accompanied by similar practices [21]. In Greece,
after the expiatory sacrifices, the sacrificers, which besides abstained from touching
as much as possible the victim, washed their clothing in a river or a source before
returning in the city or on their premises [22]. The ustensils which had been used
for the sacrifice were washed carefully when they were not destroyed [23]. These
practices limited the action of the dedication. They are enough important to have
remained in the Christian mass. The priest, after the communion, washes the
chalice, washes the hands; after which, the mass is finished, the cycle is closed and
the officiant pronounces the final formula and liberator: Ite, missa is. These
ceremonies correspond to those which marked the entry in the sacrifice. The faithful
one and the priest is released, as they had been prepared at the beginning of the
ceremony. They are ceremonies opposite, they make counterweight with the first.
The religious state of sacrificing thus described, him also, a symmetrical curve of
that which the victim traverses. It starts by rising gradually in the sphere of the
monk, it reaches a culminating point thus from where it goes down again then
towards the layman. Thus, each being and of the objects which play a part in the
sacrifice, is involved as by a continuous motion which, entry at the exit, continues
on two opposite slopes. But if the curves thus followed have the same general
configuration, they do not have all the same height; it is naturally that which the
victim describes which arrives at the highest point.

Moreover, it is clear that the respective importance of these phases of rise and
descent can vary infinitely according to the circumstances. It is what we will show in
what will follow.

III
How the pattern varies according to the general duties of sacrifice

We did, indeed, in the above, a scheme built. But this scheme is nothing but a
mere abstraction. We saw, indeed, it was realized in concrete in the case of Hindu
animal sacrifice more about this ritual, we were able to group a set of sacrificial rites
prescribed by the ritual and rituals Semitic Greek and Latin. In reality, it is the
common material of which are made more special forms of sacrifice. After the end
pursued, according to the function to be met, the parties that compose it can be
positioned as different proportions and in a different order, one may assume greater
importance over others, some even may be totally default. Hence arises the
diversity of sacrifices, but there may be between various combinations of specific
differences. It is always the same items grouped differently or unequally developed.
That's what we'll try to see about some basic types.

Because the sacrifice was meant to affect the status of religious sacrifice or the
object of sacrifice, we can predict a priori that the general lines of our design should
vary what this state at the beginning of the ceremony. Suppose first that it was
neutral. The sacrifice (and what we say could be repeated sacrifice of the object in
the case of sacrifice objective) is invested before the sacrifice, no sanctity, then the
sacrifice function for him to acquire . This happens especially in the sacrifices of
initiation and ordination. In these cases, the distance is great between the point
from where the sacrifice and when it must happen. The ceremonies of introduction
are necessarily highly developed. He entered step by step, with care, in the sacred
world. Conversely, as the consecration is then more desired than feared, the fear of
diminishing by limiting and circumscribing the too closely. We need the sacrifice,
even returned to secular life, retains something of what he acquired during the
sacrifice. Release practices are reduced to their simplest expression. They may
even disappear altogether. The Pentateuch does not indicate when he describes
the rites of ordination of priests and Levites. In the Christian Mass, they survive only
in the form of further purifications. The changes produced by these sacrifices,
moreover, a longer or shorter. They may involve a constitutional and fundamental
transformation. It was alleged that the man who touched the flesh of human
victims sacrificed to Zeus Lycaios (wolf) on the school was changed into a wolf as
Lycaon had been sacrificed after a child [24] . That even for this reason that these
sacrifices are found in the rites of initiation, that is to say, in rituals that are
intended to introduce a soul in a body [25] . In any case, the was sacrificed at the
end of the ceremony, marked with a sacred character, which sometimes resulted in
special prohibitions. This character could even be incompatible with others of the
same kind. Thus, in Olympia, the man who, having sacrificed to Pelops, ate the
flesh of the victim had no right to sacrifice to Zeus [26] .

The first characteristic is secured to another. The end of the entire rite is increasing
religiosity of the sacrificer. For that, it had to involve the victim as closely as
possible, for it is through force that the consecration has amassed in her, he
acquires the desired character. We can say that in this case, the character whose
communication is the very purpose of sacrifice is the sacrifice of the victim (or
object). So it is after the immolation they are contacted, or at least, that's when the
only place in contact the most important. Without doubt, sometimes a laying on of
hands to establish a link between the sacrificer and the victim before it is destroyed,
but sometimes (eg in the zebah shlamim), it lacks completely, and in any case, it is
secondary. The most essential is that which occurs when the mind is gone. It was
then that practice communion food [27] . Might be called sacred sacrifice the
sacrifices of this kind. The same name is also suitable for those that have the effect
not of creating from scratch a sacredness in the sacrifice, but simply to increase an
existing character.

But it is not unusual that the man who will sacrifice is already marked with a sacred
character, which result from the ritual prohibitions that may be contrary to his
intentions. Staining [28] he contracts by failing to observe religious laws or by
contact with impure things, is a kind of consecration [29] . The sinner, like the
criminal, is a sacred being [30] . If sacrifice, the sacrifice is intended, or at least one
of the purposes of sacrifice is then gently remove the dirt. This is the atonement.
But note an important fact: illness, death and sin, are the religious point of view,
identical. Most mistakes are sanctioned by the ritual misery or physical harm [31] .
And, conversely, they are supposed to be caused by mistakes committed knowingly
or unknowingly. The religious consciousness, even that of our contemporaries never
quite separate the offense to the divine rules and their consequences on the
physical body, on the situation of the offender, his future in the other world. So we
can deal with both curative and sacrifices merely expiatory sacrifice. Each other
and are intended to convey, through the continuity sacrificial victim on the impurity
of religious sacrifice and eliminate her.

So the most basic form of atonement is it the outright elimination. Of this kind, is
the expulsion of the Azazel goat, and the bird in the sacrifice of purification of the
leper. The Day of Atonement, two goats were chosen. The high priest, after various
hattt, put both hands on the head of one of them confessed to him the sins of
Israel, then sent him to the desert. He carried with him the sins that were
communicated by the imposition of hands [32] . In the sacrifice of the purification
of lepers [33] , the priest took two sparrows (?). He cut the throat of one of them
over an earthen vessel containing flowing water. The other was soaked in the
bloody water, with which a spray was made on the leper. The sparrow was alive
and then released leprosy he carried with him. The patient had only to make an
ablution, and he was cleansed and healed. Hattt The present disposal as clear in
cases where the victim's remains were brought outside the camp and burned
completely [34] . - The sacrifices-Hindu medicine are similar cases [35] . To cure
jaundice [36] , below the patient's bed, it binds the yellow birds, we gloss it so that

water falls on the birds began to chatter. As the hymn says magic is when that
"jaundice" is "in the yellow birds" [37] . - Go beyond this point a little too much
material of the rite. Let a man carrying a curse. It employs a series of rituals which
are purely symbolic one [38] , but the others are close to the sacrifice. It binds to
the left leg "of a black cock [39] "a hook, crochet a cake and it is said in releasing
the bird [40] : "Fly away, Oh, bad luck [41] , destroy you here; fly away also the one
who hates us, with that iron hook, we'll Lions [42] . The tare of sacrifice was fixed
on the bird and disappeared with him, whether it be destroyed, either because it
falls on the enemy [43] .

But there is one case where one sees clearly that the character is eliminated
primarily religious. is that the "bull pin [44] "propitiation to the god Rudra. Rudra is
the lord of animals, one that can destroy them and men, by plague or fever. He is
the god dangerous [45] . However, the god of cattle in the herd there, while it
surrounds and threatens him. To deviate from, concentrated on the best bulls of the
herd. This bull is Rudra himself, is the student, the coronation itself, he pays tribute
[46] . Then, at least in some schools, they sacrifice outside the village at midnight,
in the woods [47] ; this way, Rudra is eliminated [48] . Rudra The animals went to
join the timber Rudra fields and crossroads. So although the expulsion of a divine
element that the sacrifice was intended.

In all these cases, the character whose sacrifice operates the transmission will not
sacrifice the victim [49] but, instead of sacrificing on the victim. On it he gets rid.
So is it before and not after the sacrifice that takes place them in contact, at least
that is really essential. Once it was unloaded on her, he tends, instead, to flee and
that the whole environment where did the ceremony. For this reason, the rites of
output are developed. The rites of this kind that we reported in the Hebrew ritual
we were not presented for expiatory sacrifices. After the first sacrifice that was
purified, the leper must complete its purification by ablution and even added a new
sacrifice [50] . Instead, the rites of entry are limited or lacking. The sacrifice was
already invested with a religious character does not have to buy it. Religiosity
which is marked progressively lowered since the beginning of the ceremony. The
upward movement that we found in the complete sacrifice is rudimentary or
lacking. We find ourselves in the presence of another type in which the same
elements that enter into the sacrifice of sanctification, but these elements are
oriented in opposite directions and their relative importance is reversed.

In the above, we assumed that the sanctity of which was marked at the beginning
of the sacrifice of sacrifice for him was a defect, a religious cause of inferiority, sin,
impurity, etc.. But there are cases where the mechanism is exactly the same and
yet where the initial state is sacrificing for a source of superiority, is a state of
purity. The nazir [51] in Jerusalem, was a perfectly pure, and he devoted himself to
a vow Jahwa after which he abstained from wine and does not cut his hair. He had
to guard against contamination. But once at the end of his vow [52] , he could not
identify it as a sacrifice. For this, he takes a bath of purification [53] , then he

brings a lamb as Ola, a ewe and a ram hattt zebah shelamim. He shaves his hair
and throw on the fire which cooked the meat shelamim [54] . When the priest
makes zebah shelamim, he puts on the hands of the nazir Terumah, the tenouph,
that is to say, the parties spent, and a cake of the same offering [55] . After which
these offerings are presented Jahwa. Then the text says, the nazir may drink wine,
that is to say, he is released from the consecration. She passed one hand over her
hair cut and offered on the altar, the other on the victim, who represents him. One
thing and another are eliminated. The process is the same as in the atonement.
The sacred character, whatever the high religious value, is the sacrifice to the
victim. Therefore the sacrifice of atonement itself is a particular variety of a more
general type, which is independent of favorable or unfavorable to the state affected
by religious sacrifice. It could be called sacrifice of desecration.

Things, like people, can find themselves in such a state of holiness that they
become unusable and unsafe. Sacrifices of this kind are needed. This applies, in
particular, products of the soil. Each species of fruits, cereals and other whole is
sacred, forbidden, as a ritual, often sacrificial, has not eliminated the prohibition
that the guard [56] . For this purpose, concentrated on a portion of the species
under all the fruit that contain the other. Can we sacrifice this part, and this alone,
others are released [57] . Or, through two successive phases of desecration, it
focuses primarily on the premises throughout the consecration, then, it is these
premises themselves a victim is removed. This happen, for example, if the
contribution of the first fruits to Jerusalem [58] . The inhabitants of a district [59]
brought their baskets into the body. Leading the procession marched a flute player.
The Cohens came in front of the arrivals, and, in the city, everyone rose to their
passage, making the honors due to sacred things that were there. Behind the flute
player, there was an ox, the horns golden olive wreath. This beef, which may bore
the fruit or dragged the car, was later sacrificed [60] . Arriving at the holy
mountain, everyone, "even Agrippa you in person, took her basket and went up to
the courts [61] . The doves that were raised above served as burnt [62] , and what
we had in hand was given to the priest. Thus, in this case, two ways to eliminate
overlap of the first fruits of holiness: the temple dedication, sacrifice and beef
sacrifice doves, personifications of the virtues that were supposed to reside.

The approximation that we have just made, between the individual and atonement
Nazir, between the case of the first fruits and the other things you need to get rid of
a religious nature more really bad, brings us to an important point . It was already a
remarkable fact that, in general, the sacrifice could serve two purposes as otherwise
than to acquire a state of holiness and remove a state of sin. Since it is done in
both cases, the same elements, it is necessary that there not between these two
states, the opposition decided that it usually sees. But again, we have seen only
two states, one of perfect purity, the other impurities, could be an opportunity to
carry the same sacrifice, in which elements are not only identical, but arranged in
the same order and oriented in the same direction. Conversely, moreover,
sometimes a state of impurity is treated, under certain conditions, as the opposite
state. That we have reached and basic mechanisms, almost abstract types, which in
reality are often interdependent. It is not quite accurate to represent the atonement

as a mere removal of the victim would play the role of a passive or a receptacle.
The victim of the Atonement is the most sacred sacrifice. She takes care of
consecration is not always different from what it takes in the sacrifices of
consecration. As well, will we see the sacred rites and rituals included in the same
expiatory sacrifice. The force that holds the victim is complex and in the Hebrew
ritual, the residue of the cremation of the red heifer, which are assembled in a clean
place, make impure by contact a man who is in normal condition, and yet they are
used for purification of those who contracted certain stains [63] . The same order of
certain facts belong communications established between the sacrificer and the
victim as a result of sacrificial murder: there are expiatory sacrifice where the victim
was stripped, the sacrifice, before being completely purified, is on the skin of the
victim or the key. Moreover, it drags the skin of the victim in the place for which is
the atonement [64] . Sacrifices in more complex, we have the opportunity to speak,
elimination is complicated by absorption. In sum, in many consider the Hebrew
sacrifice, consecration of the victim accomplished the same way as in hattt and
Ola. The ritual of award of blood is simply more complete in the first sacrifice. And
it is remarkable that the award of more blood is complete, more exclusion
atonement is perfect. When blood was brought into the sanctuary, the victim was
treated as impure, and is burned outside the camp [65] . Otherwise, the victim was
eaten by the priests as devoted portions of shelamim. What difference was there
between the impurity of the first victim bayt and the sanctity of the second victim?
None, or rather there was a theological difference between atonement and sacrifice
of sanctification. The donations hattt and other sacrifices, there were many award
of blood to the altar, but the altar was divided by a red line. The blood was poured
hattt below the blood of the Holocaust, above [66] . There were two religiosity
whose distinction was not very deep.

The fact is that, as Robertson Smith has shown, the pure and the impure are not
mutually exclusive opposites: they are two aspects of religious reality. The religious
forces are characterized by their intensity, their importance, their dignity because
they are separated. That is what constitutes them, but the direction in which they
operate is not necessarily predetermined by nature. They can be exercised for good
or for evil. It depends on the circumstances, rites employees, etc.. This explains
how the same sacrificial mechanism can satisfy the religious needs of which the
difference is extreme. It carries the same ambiguity that religious forces
themselves. It is capable of good and evil is the victim's death as well as life,
disease as health, the sin that deserves the falsehood as truth. It is the average
concentration of religious and she expresses it, she embodies, she wears it. By
acting on it that acts on it, that it is directed, or that attracts and absorbs or expels
it and removes it. We explained in the same way that, through appropriate
procedures, these two forms of religiosity can be transformed into each other and
rituals that in some cases, seem opposed, are sometimes almost indistinguishable.
IV
How the scheme varies the special functions of sacrifice

We have shown how our scheme varies to suit different religious states in which
there is being, whatever it is, affected by the sacrifice. But we are not concerned to
know what this creature itself, but only whether he had a sacred character before
the ceremony. However, it is easy to foresee that the sacrifice can not be the same
when it is made in contemplation of sacrificing himself or thing to which it bears
interest. The functions it performs then have to specialize. Let's see what
differentiations occur under this head.

We called the personal sacrifices that relate directly to the person of the sacrificer.
From this definition it follows that they all have a first common characteristic: since
the sacrifice is the beginning and the end of the rite, the act begins and ends with
him. It is a cycle closed on the sacrifice. Without doubt, we know there are always
at least award the spirit of the thing sacrificed to the god or religious power that
acts in the sacrifice. It remains, however, that the act done by sacrificing himself in
an immediate advantage.

Secondly, in all these kinds of sacrifice, the sacrifice, after the ceremony, has
improved his fate, whether he has removed the evil from which he suffered, or
where he has rehabilitated through or he has acquired a divine force. There is even
a very large number of rituals in which a special form, either at the outlet was at the
solemn moment of the priest expresses the change, which occurs hello [1] , the way
the sacrifice is transported into the world of life [2] . It even happens that
determines the communion as an alienation of personality. By eating the sacred
where the god is supposed to reside, the sacrificing absorbs and is possessed of him
[in the text in Greek] [3] as the priestess of Apollo's temple on the Acropolis of
Argos when she drank the blood of the sacrificial lamb. Apparently, it is true that
the atonement would not have the same effects. But in reality, the day
"Forgiveness" is also the "day of God." This is when those outside the sin by the
sacrifice are inscribed "the book of life [4] . As in the case of sacralization, the
resulting current through the victim between the sacred and sacrifice, regenerates
it, gives it new strength. By this single sin, death has been eliminated, positive
powers come into play for the good of the sacrificer.

That regeneration by the personal sacrifice gave birth to a number of important

religious beliefs. We must first relate to the theory of rebirth through sacrifice. We
saw the symbols that make dksita a fetus, then a Brahmin and a god. We know
what was the importance of the doctrines of rebirth in the Greek mysteries,
Scandinavian and Celtic mythology, Osiris cults, Avestan and Hindu theologies in
the Christian dogma itself. But most often, these doctrines are clearly linked to the
achievement of certain sacrificial rituals: eating the cake of Eleusis, the soma, the
Iranian haoma etc.. [5] .

Often, a change of name brand this recreation of the individual. We know that the
name is, in religious beliefs, intimately linked to the personality of the wearer: it

contains something of its soul [6] . But the sacrifice often accompanied a change of
name. In some cases, this change is reduced to an addition of an epithet. Even
today, in India it bears the title of dksita [7] . But sometimes the name is changed
completely. In the old church was on Easter Sunday we baptized neophytes after
they exorcise: but, after his baptism, communion and we made them they imposed
their new name [8] . In Jewish practice, even today, the same rite is used when life
is at risk [9] . However, it is likely that once surrounded a sacrifice, and we know
that Atonement, when the agony was there among the Jews [10] , as indeed in all
religions on which we are sufficiently shown [11] . It is therefore natural to think
that name change and Atonement were part of the same complexus ritual,
expressing the profound change that is produced at that time in the person of the
sacrificer.

Under this invigorating sacrifice is not confined to life in this world, it spread to the
afterlife. During the evolution of religion, the notion of sacrifice has joined the
notions concerning the immortality of the soul. We have nothing to say on this
matter to the theories of Rohde, MM. Jevons and the Greek mysteries Nutt [12] ,
which must reconcile the facts cited by S. Levi, borrowed from the doctrines of the
Brahmanas [13] and those Bergaigne Darmesteter and had emerged from the Vedic
texts [14] and Avestan [15] . Another is the relationship that unites the Christian
communion to eternal salvation [16] . Important as these facts, we must not, in
fact, be exaggerated. As the belief in immortality is not of theology dgge crude
sacrifice, it remains vague. It is "not dead" (amrtam) of the soul that provides the
sacrifice. It guarantees against annihilation in the other life like it. But the notion of
personal immortality not emerged from the previous and following a philosophical
development and, moreover, the conception of another life does not originate from
the institution of sacrifice [ 17] .

The number, variety and complexity of the sacrifices objectives are such that we
can deal with relatively briefly. Except for the sacrifice land whose study is now far
advanced, we must content ourselves with general indications of how these
sacrifices are related to our general scheme.

The characteristic feature of the sacrifices objectives is that the main effect of the
rite is, by definition, an object other than the sacrifice. Indeed, sacrifice is not to its
point of departure but the things he seeks to change are outside the sacrificing.
The effect on the latter is secondary. As a result, the rites of entry and exit, which
have particularly in mind the sacrifice, become rudimentary. This is the central
phase, the priest, who tends to take more space. It's all about creating the spirit
[18] , whether we create it to be attributed to real or imagined that the sacrifice is
concerned, that is, to release something under some sacred made it unaffordable,
this virtue is transformed into pure spirit, whether we continue with the aim both at
once.

But, again, the particular nature of the object of interest by the sacrifice amend it.
In the sacrifice of construction [19] for example, proposes to make a mind that is
the guardian of the house, or the altar or city that you built or you want to build and
which makes the force [20] . Also award rites they grow. It Emmure the skull of the
human victim, the cock, the head of an owl. On the other hand, according to the
nature of construction, the importance of the victim varies, depending on whether a
temple or a city or a simple house. Depending on whether the building is already
constructed or under construction, the sacrifice will aim to create the spirit or the
guardian deity, or it will be a propitiation engineering soil that construction will
harm [21] . The color of the victim varies by this same: she is black, for example, if
they propitiate the genius of the earth, white if you want to create a sympathetic
[22] . The rituals of destruction themselves are not identical in both cases.

In the sacrifice and demand, we look primarily to produce some special effects that
defines the rite. If the sacrifice is the fulfillment of a promise already made, if made
to untie the bonds of religious and moral bond hanging over him, the victim, to
some degree, an expiatory character [23] . If On the contrary, we want to invoke the
deity by a contract, the sacrifice was rather the form of a distribution [24] : the do
ut des is the principle and, consequently, there is no allocation to sacrificers . If this
is to thank the deity of a particular grace [25] , the holocaust, that is to say the total
allocation, or the shelamim, that is to say that the sacrifice First is the sacrifice may
be the norm. On the other side, the importance of the victim is in direct relation to
the seriousness of the vow. Finally, the special characters of the victim depends on
the nature of the desired thing: if you want rain, they sacrifice black cows [26] or it
involves the sacrifice a black horse on which it pays water [27] , etc.. We can give
this general principle a very plausible reason. Here, as in the magical act with which
these rites are confused in some ways, the ritual acts, basically by himself same.
The force generated is effective. The victim was mold on the votive formula, it was
incorporated, the fill, the anime, the door to the gods, becomes the mind, "the
vehicle [28] .

We have only indicated how the theme of sacrifice varies with the different effects
it produces. See how the various mechanisms we have distinguished can gather in
one sacrifice. The sacrifices are specifically agrarian excellent examples from this
point of view. Because basically objectives, they nevertheless have important
effects on the sacrificer.

These sacrifices have a dual purpose. They are designed primarily to enable and
work the land and use its products, lifting the bans that protect them. Secondly,
they are a means to fertilize the fields that they cultivate and preserve their lives
when, after harvest, they appear to be dead and skinned. The fields, in fact, and
their products are considered eminently alive. It is in them a religious principle that
lies dormant during the winter, reappearing in the spring, is manifested in the
harvest and makes, therefore, a first difficult to mortals. Sometimes, we think of
this principle as a spirit that stands guard over land and fruit, and he has them, and

this is their holy possession. It is therefore necessary to eliminate the harvest or

use of fruit is possible. But at the same time, there is the very life of the field, we
must, after having expelled, recreate it and fix it in the ground which it is fertility.
The sacrifices of desecration may be sufficient simply the first of these
requirements, but not the second. The sacrifices were therefore agrarian, mostly
multiple effects. There are gathered from various forms of sacrifice. This is a case
where there best this fundamental complexity of the sacrifice which we jumped
overemphasized. So do not pretend we not make these pages a general theory of
agrarian sacrifice. We dare not predict all the apparent exceptions and we can not
unravel the tangle of historical developments. We will limit ourselves to the
analysis of a sacrifice well known, that is already the subject of a number of studies.
It is the sacrifice to Zeus Polieus the Athenians celebrated the feast known as the
Dipolia or Bouphonia [29] .

This festival [30] took place in June at the end of the harvest and the beginning of
threshing wheat. The main ceremony took place on the acropolis, at the altar of
Zeus Polieus. Cakes were placed on a bronze tablet. They were not kept [31] . So
we let go of oxen one of them approached the altar, ate some of the offerings and
trampled on the rest [32] . Immediately, one of the priests struck with his hatchet.
When he was shot dead, another in the finished cutting his throat with a knife,
robbed others, while he who had struck first took flight. Following the ruling in
Prytaneion we talked, the flesh of the beef was divided among the assistants, the
skin was stitched, stuffed with straw, and the animal was stuffed and yoked to a
plow.

These practices were open to the singular legend. Three different versions
attributed it to three different people - one in Diomos, Polieus priest of Zeus, the
other Sopatros, the third Thaulon [33] , which appeared well be the mythical
ancestors of the priests of the sacrifice. In all three versions, the priest has filed an
offering on the altar a bull occurs, remove the priest strikes the sacrilege and
furious, profane himself, he went into exile. The longest of these versions is the one
whose hero is Sopatros. Drought and famine are the consequence of his crime.
Consulted the Pythia answered that the Athenians exiled could save them, we
should punish the murderer, revive the victim at a sacrifice like the one where she
died and eat his flesh. It brings back Sopatros, he makes his rights it offers to
sacrifice and celebrates the feast as we have described.

Those are the facts: what do they mean? There are three acts to distinguish in this
festival: 1 death of the victim; communion 2 , 3 the resurrection of the victim [34]
.

At the beginning of the ceremony, cakes and grains are deposited on the altar.
These are probably the first fruits of corn beaten [35] . This offering is similar to all
those that enable lay use of crops. All the holiness of wheat to beat was

concentrated in cakes [36] . The beef will key the suddenness of the blow that
strikes shows that the consecration has passed over him, crushing. He embodied
the divine spirit housed in the premises he has eaten. It is this spirit, so that his
murder is a sacrilege. Still, the sacrificial victim agrarian symbolically represents the
fields and their products. It is also linking with them before the final conservation.
In this case, the ox eats the cake of the first fruits, elsewhere it is paraded through
the fields, or the victim is killed with agricultural or buried to the waist.

But the facts must be considered from another side. At the same time that the
field, the victim may also represent the faithful who will desecrate harvest using it
[37] . Not only products of the earth spreading the sacrifice, but the sacrifice might
be in a state where he should stay away. The sacrifice was to correct this condition.
In some cases, practices purificators sat in the ceremony. Thus a confession joined
the sacrifice [38] . Other times, the sacrifice himself realized this sort of expiation.
He could stand as a true redemption. Thus the Passover has become a rite of
redemption General on the occasion of the consumption of beginnings, not only
being redeemed life of the firstborn [39] of men by the blood of the paschal lamb
[40] , but still every Hebrew freed from danger. It might be closer to these facts the
struggles that sacrificial practice amongst themselves in certain agricultural
festivals [41] . The shots appear to sanctify, purify and redeem. So there, in the
first moment of the rite [42] , a double operation: 1 desecration of the wheat crop
and beaten by the victim who is 2 redemption harvesters and laborers by the
immolation of this victim representing them.

For Dipolia, the documents do not refer to a communication between the sacrificer
and the victim before the consecration. But after it happens and is done by a
communal meal [43] constitutes a new phase of the ceremony. After the priests
were absolved of their sacrilegious communion assistants can dare. We remember
that according to myth, had advised the Pythia [44] . Many sacrifices land are
followed by a similar communion [45] . Through this communion, sacrificing Dipolia
attending the sacred nature of the victim. They received a consecration attenuated,
because it was divided and a portion of beef remained intact. Invested with the
same sanctity as the things they wanted to use, they could approach them [46] .
It's a rite of this kind that Kafre of Natal and Zululand to allow the early use of new
fruits, the flesh of a victim is cooked with grains, fruits and vegetables. The king
puts a bit in the mouth of every man and this holy communion for the whole year
[47] . Communion of Easter had the same results [48] . Very often, in the sacrifices
performed before plowing, the farmer is given a share in the flesh of the victim
[49] . This communion, it is true, may seem unnecessary since the pre-sacrifice has
already had the effect of desecrating the land and grain. It seems that there is
duplication [50] and it is possible, indeed, sometimes the communion has been
sufficient to achieve the desired effect. But in general, it follows a desecration,
which already produces a first desecration. That is what is very significant in the
Hindu ritual of Varunapraghsas. Barley is dedicated to Varuna [51] and it is his
food [52] . The creatures formerly said the myth, they ate and became hydropic. It
is through the ritual of which we speak they escaped this danger [53] . Here's what
it is. Among other offerings [54] , two are priests, with grains of barley, two figures

who have the shape of a ram and a ewe. The sacrificer and his wife are the first on
the sheep, the other on the ram, tufts of wool representing breasts and testicles, in
such large quantities as possible [55] . Then there is the sacrifice one hand is
attributed to Varuna and other offerings of barley. And then we eat the rest
solemnly. "Through sacrifice, it spreads [56] Varuna, it is eliminated, it removes
those who eat the barley "link" that would throw at them. Then, by eating the
remaining figures, we absorb the spirit of barley. Communion is superimposed so
much to desecration. In this case and in similar cases, it is feared that without
doubt the desecration had been incomplete and that, secondly, the sacrifice has
received only half consecration. The sacrifice establishes a level between sanctity of
the object to be used and that of sacrificing.

But in the sacrifices whose purpose is to fertilize the earth [57] , that is to say of
him infusing divine life or make life more active it may have, it is no longer as
previously, to eliminate a sacred and it must communicate. The methods of direct
or indirect communication are necessarily involved in these kinds of operations.
Must be set in the ground that the fertile mind. The Khonds sacrificed human
victims to ensure the fertility of land, the flesh was shared between the different
groups and buried in fields [58] . Moreover, the blood of the human victim was shed
on earth [59] . Europe is deposited in the field of ashes of St. John of blessed bread
on St. Antoine [60] , bones of animals killed at Easter or other holidays [61] . But
often, the whole victim was not employed in this manner and, as in the Bouphonia,
sacrificing them in receiving their share [62] . Sometimes she was awarded their
whole. It was a way to involve the farmer in the profits of the consecration, and
even, perhaps, to entrust to his care the forces he assimilated and that in other
cases was fixed in the field . Moreover, later we sowed the relics of the meal, when
plowed or sowed [63] . Or else they shared another victim, a new incarnation of
Agrarian Engineering, and is spreading through the earth life that had once been
withdrawn. What is going to land, it was the land that had borrowed [64] . This
fundamental correspondence between the rites of desecration of the premises and
those of fertilizing fields between the two victims, could, in some cases lead to a
true fusion of the two ceremonies, then practiced on the same victim. This is what
happened to the Bouphonia. They are an offering to double face: they are a
sacrifice of hype, as they began with an offering of first fruits, but also the ultimate
goal of fertilizing the earth. We saw, in fact, according to legend, the festival was
established to end a famine and a drought. One could even say that communion
made using the flesh of the beef, too This dual purpose: to allow the consumption of
new grains, giving citizens a special blessing for their future business land.

But continuing analysis of our data. We touch the third time in our rite. Sopatros,
killing the ox had killed the spirit of the wheat and had not grown back. Under the
terms of the oracle, the second sacrifice must resurrect the dead. Therefore it stuffs
the ox beef stuffed [65] is raised beef. It splint to the plow and the sham that he is
making plowing through the field corresponds to the dispersion of the victim in
Khonds. But it should be noted that the existence of individual beef, its spirit
survives , and consumption of his flesh, and the dissemination of his holiness. This
spirit, which is the same one that was removed from the harvest cut, is found there

in the skin sewn up and filled with straw. This trait is not peculiar to Bouphonia. In
a Mexican holiday, to represent the rebirth of Agrarian Engineering, robbed the
victim is dead and one was of her skin which was to succeed him next year [66] . In
Lusatia, the spring festival we are buried "dead", that is to say, the old god of
vegetation, remove the shirt of the dummy representing him and the door is
immediately on the tree May [67] , with the garment, it carries the spirit. So the
victim himself reborn. Now the victim is the very soul of the vegetation,
concentrated primarily in the premises, was transported to the beast, and that the
sacrifice was, again, purified and rejuvenated. So the principle of germination and
fertility, that's life fields, which rises and rises and [68] .

What is most striking in this sacrifice is the unbroken continuity of this life which he
is the duration and transmission. Once the mind is cleared by the sacrificial murder,
it remains fixed where the ritual directs. In the Bouphonia, it is the beef stuffed
dummy. When the resurrection was not represented by a special ceremony, the
retention of part of the victim or the offering attested persistence and presence of
the soul that resided in it. In Rome, we just did not keep the horse's head in
October, but it kept her blood to Palilies [69] . The ashes of the sacrifice of
Forcidiciae were also retained until that date [70] . In Athens, we shut the remains
of pigs sacrificed to Thesmophoria [71] . These relics were used as body to the
spirit generated by the sacrifice. They allowed to enter, use it, but, first, to keep it.
The periodic return of sacrifice, in times when the earth is stripped, ensured the
continuity of life naturally, to locate and secure the sanctity that there was interest
to keep and which, year after reappeared in new products from the ground to
incarnate again in a new victim.

Following sacrifice agrarian thus presents a consecutive series of concentrations

and broadcasts. Soon became the victim mind, genius, it is shared, it is dispersed
to plant life with her. For this life is not lost (and we may still lose a little, witness
the story of Pelops shoulder ivory), it must gather periodically. The myth of Osiris,
whose members were scattered together by Isis is an image of this rhythm and this
alternation. In conclusion, contained in the sacrifice itself, apart from the regular
return of agricultural work, the condition of periodicity. Moreover, it is stipulated by
the legend that relates the institution of these sacrifices. Pythia prescribed the
endless repetition of Bouphonia and other similar ceremonies. The interruption was
inconceivable.

In a word, as well as the personal sacrifice the life of the insured person, even the
sacrifice goal in general, and especially the sacrifice agrarian provide real life and
healthy things.

But in general, the ceremonial sacrifices land, we have analyzed a type, was
overloaded rites accessories, and much distorted by interpretation that may have
been receiving this or that its practices. It usually mingled magical rites of rain and

sunshine we drown the victim or one pours water on it, the fire of sacrifice or special
lights represent the Sun fire [72] . On the other hand, there have been rites of
desecration (the object of sacrifice) taking pride of place, the whole ritual could
take, as shown by Mr. Frazer, the character of a true sacrifice atonement [73] . The
spirit of the field coming out of the victim was of the species of scapegoat [74] .
The Agrarian party became a celebration of forgiveness. Often in Greece, myths
which told the institution of these festivities represented as atonement for crimes
original periodical. This is the case Bouphonia [75] .

Thus, one sacrifice of land, a whole body effects can emerge. The value of the
victim was such a solemn sacrifice, the expansive force of the dedication was so
great that it was impossible to limit arbitrarily efficiency. The victim is a center of
attraction and radiation. Things that could touch the sacrifice received their share
of influence. According to the state, the nature of needs, people or objects, the
effects might differ.
V
The sacrifice of the god

This singular value of the victim is clear in one of the highest forms of the historical
evolution of the sacrificial system: it is the sacrifice of the god. It is, indeed, in the
sacrifice of a divine person that the notion of sacrifice reaches its highest
expression. So it is this form that it has entered religions the more recent and there
gave rise to beliefs and practices that are still alive.

We'll see how the sacrifices land could provide a starting point for this
development. Mannhardt and Frazer [1] had already seen that there were close
links between the sacrifice of the god and sacrifices land. We will not dwell on the
points they have treated the issue. But we will try, using some additional facts to
show how this form of sacrifice is connected with the substance of the sacrificial
mechanism. Our main effort will tend to be determined mainly by the considerable
mythology has taken this development.

For a god to descend and the role of victim, there must be some affinity between
nature and the victims. For him to come to submit to the sacrificial destruction, it
must have its origin in the sacrifice itself. This seems in some ways, filled with all
the sacrifices, because the victim is always something that releases the divine
sacrifice. But God is a victim not a victim God [2] . Do not confuse the sacred
things that are of religious figures with those defined, which are the subject of
myths and rituals also defined, and are called gods. Objectives in the sacrifices, it is
true, we have already seen the release of the victim beings whose face was more
accurate simply because they were attached to an object and a function
determined. Similarly, in the sacrifices of construction, sometimes the mind set is

almost a god. However, these mythic figures are usually vague and indecisive.
Especially in agrarian sacrifices they arrive at their utmost determination. They
have the privilege to different causes.

First, these sacrifices, the god and the sacrificial victim is particularly
homogeneous. The spirit of a house is something other than the home it protects.
The spirit of the wheat, by contrast, is almost indistinguishable from wheat that
embodies it. In god we barley made offers victims of barley in which it resides. It is
therefore anticipated that, as a result of this homogeneity and the resulting fusion,
the victim may contact her individuality in mind. As long as it is simply the first
sheaf of the harvest or the first fruits of the harvest, the spirit remains, like her,
something essentially agrarian [3] . It therefore falls outside the field that to go
soon: he did not materialize at the precise moment when it is concentrated in the
victim. Once it is sacrificed, it diffuses back across species which makes agricultural
life and becomes so vague and impersonal. For his personality deepens, it is
necessary that the links that unite the fields are relaxed and, for this it is necessary
that the victim herself takes less close to things it represents. A first step has been
taken in this direction when, as often happens, the wreath dedicated receives the
name or even the shape of an animal or a man. Sometimes, as if to make the
transition more sensitive, it contains [ 4] a living animal, a cow, a goat, a rooster, for
example, which becomes cow, goat, rooster harvest. The victim loses part of its
agrarian character and the same extent, engineering detaches from its support.
This independence increases even when the jet is replaced by an animal victim.
Then, the report argues that with what it embodies is so distant that it is sometimes
difficult to perceive. Only, the comparison has been discovered that the bull and the
goat to Dionysus, the horse or pig Demeter were incarnations of the life of wheat
and vines. But differentiation is especially marked when the role is assumed by a
man [5] who carries his own autonomy. Then genius becomes a legal entity that
has a name that begins to exist in the legend outside of festivals and sacrifices.
Thus, little by little, the soul of country life becomes external fields [6] and
individualized.

But this one cause, another was added. The sacrifice shall determine, by itself, an
exaltation of the victims who deified directly. Many legends are told of apotheosis.
Hercules was admitted to Olympus after his suicide on Oeta. Attis [7] and Eshmoun
[8] were inspired after death of a divine life. The constellation Virgo is another
qu'Erigone, a goddess who had hanged land [9] . Mexico reported a myth that the
sun and moon were created by a sacrifice [10] ; Toci goddess, mother of the gods,
was also presented as a woman would sacrifice a deified [11] . In the same country,
on the feast of the god Totec, where they killed and robbed of captives, a priest
wore the skin of one of them, he then became the image of god, wearing his
vestments and his suit, sat on a throne and received instead of the god firstfruits
images of [12] . In the Cretan legend of Dionysus, the god of the heart, which had
been slain by the Titans was placed in a xoanon or he should be worshiped [13] .
Philo of Byblos employs to express the state of Oceanos, mutilated by his son
Kronos, a very significant phrase he was dedicated, "[Greek in text] [14] . In these
legends remain obscure awareness of the virtue of sacrifice. The trace also persists

in the rites. For example, in Jumiges, where the role of genius animal vegetation
was kept by a man whose office lasted a year and started on St. John, we pretended
to throw the future Green Wolf in the flames of fire, after this feigned execution, his
predecessor handed him his insignia [15] . The ceremony did not result simply
embody the spirit land. He was born in the same sacrifice [16] . - However, since
there is no need to distinguish between victims of agrarian demons, these facts are
precisely examples of what we said about the consecration and its direct effects.
The sacrificial apotheosis is nothing but the rebirth of the victim. Deification is a
special case and a higher form of sanctification and separation. But this form is
little evidence in the sacrifices which, by the location, concentration, the
accumulation of a sacred character, the victim is entrusted with a maximum of
holiness that organizes and sacrifice personified.

That is the necessary condition for the sacrifice of God is possible. But to become a
reality, it's not enough that the god came out of the victim: he must have still all his
divine nature when he returns to the sacrifice to become a victim himself. That is,
the personification of where it has resulted to become sustainable and necessary.
This indissoluble association between beings or species of beings and supernatural
virtue is the result of the periodicity of sacrifice, which is precisely here. The
repetition of these ceremonies, in which, as a result of habit or for any other reason,
the same victim reappeared at regular intervals, has created a kind of personality
continues. The sacrifice keeping its side effects, the creation of the deity is the
work of past sacrifices. And this is not an accidental and meaningless, since in a
religion as abstract as Christianity, the figure of the paschal lamb, the victim of a
normal agricultural or pastoral sacrifice, has persisted and is still used today to
designate Christ, that is to say God. The sacrifice has provided the symbolic
elements of the divine.

But it is the imagination of the creators of myths that has completed the
development of the sacrifice of the god. Indeed, it gave first a civil, history and thus
a more continuous life personality intermittent, dull and passive, which arose from
the periodicity of sacrifices. Besides that, releasing it from its earthly dross, it made
it more divine. Sometimes, you can follow the myth in the various phases of this
progressive deification. Thus, the great festival of Dorian Karneia, celebrated in
honor of Apollo Karnios had been established, we told, to atone for the murder of
the diviner Karnos killed by Heraclides Hippotas [17] . However, Apollo Karnios n '
Another is that the diviner Karnos whose sacrifice and atonement is accomplished
as that of Dipolia; and Karnos himself "the horned [18] , coincides with the hero
Krios 'ram' [19] , hypostasis of the animal victim primitive. The sacrifice of the ram,
the mythology had made the murder of a hero and then she turned the last great
national god.

However, if the mythology developed the representation of the divine, it did not
work on arbitrary data. Myths keep track of their origin: a sacrifice more or less
distorted forms the central episode and as the nucleus of the legendary life of the

gods who came out of a sacrifice. MS Levi explained the role of sacrificial rites in
the Brahmanic mythology [20] . See how, specifically, the history of agrarian gods
is woven on a background of agrarian rites. To show this, we will group some types
of Greek and Semitic legends, close to that of Attis and Adonis, which are all strains
of the theme of sacrifice of the god. Some are myths that explain the institution of
certain ceremonies, some are stories, usually from myths like the first [21] . Often,
the commemorative rites that correspond to these legends (sacred dramas,
processions [22] , etc..) have, to our knowledge, none of the characters of sacrifice.
But the theme of the sacrifice of God is a cause whose imagination mythological use
freely.

The tomb of Zeus in Crete [23] , the death of Pan [24] , that of Adonis are well
known for it is enough to mention. Adonis has left legends Syrian descendants who
share his fate [25] . In some cases, it is true, the tombs are perhaps divine
monuments of the cult of the dead. But most often, in our opinion, the mythical god
of death recalls the ritual sacrifice, and is surrounded by legend, also dark, poorly
supplied, incomplete circumstances that allow to determine its true nature.

We read in the Assyrian tablet of the legend of Adapa [26] : "From the earth two
gods are gone, so I wear the clothes of mourning, what are these two gods? These
are Du-mu-zu-zi and Gish-da. "The death of Du-mu-zu is a mythic sacrifice. The
proof is given by the fact qu'lshtar, his mother and his wife, wants to resurrect [27]
by making its body of water from the source of life she will look into hell, as it
imitates that the rites of certain agricultural festivals. When the spirit of the field is
dead or was killed, his corpse is thrown into the water and sprinkles it with water. So
it is resurrected, or that a maypole stands on his grave, life is reborn. Here is the
water poured over the body and the resurrection that we determine to equate the
victim to a dead god agrarian in the myth of Osiris is the dispersion of the body and
the tree that grows on coffin [28] . A Troezen in peribolus temple of Hippolytus, was
commemorated by an annual celebration of the [Greek text], death goddesses
Damia and Auxesia, blank, foreign, coming from Crete, which were, according to
tradition, stoned in a sedition [29] . Foreign goddesses are abroad, from which
often plays a part in harvest festivals; stoning is a rite of sacrifice. Often, a simple
wound of God is equivalent to its annual death. Belen, asleep in the ball of the foot
Blumenthal Guebwiller, was wounded in the foot by a boar, like Adonis, every drop
of blood from his wound grew a flower [30] .

The death of God is often a suicide. Hercules on Oeta, Melkarth Tyre [31] , the god
Sandon Sands or to Tarsus [32] , Dido in Carthage, had blown themselves. Melkarth
death was commemorated with a festival each summer; was a harvest festival.
Greek mythology knows goddesses who bore the title of [Greek text] is to say
goddesses "hanged" like Artemis, Hecate, Helen [33] . In Athens, the goddess was
Erigone hanged, mother of Staphylos, hero of the grape [34] . At Delphi, she was
called Charila [35] . Charila, said the story was a little girl who, during a famine,
had gone to ask you to share the latest distribution, beaten and chased by him, she

hanged herself in a valley spreads. Now an annual event, set up, they say, on the
order of the Pythia, was celebrated in his honor. It began with a distribution of
wheat and then manufactured an image of Charila is beaten, it is hung and buried.
In other legends, the God whose self-inflicted mutilation, sometimes it dies. This is
the case of Attis and Eshmoun who, pursued by astronomers, was mutilated with a
hatchet.

Often it was a founder of the cult or the first priest of the god whose myth
recounted death. Thus, Iton, Iodama on the tomb which burned a sacred fire, was a
priestess of Athena Itonia [36] . Similarly Aglauros in Athens, which were supposed
to atone Pluntries death, was also a priestess of Athena. In reality, the priest and
the god are one and the same being. We know, indeed, that the priest may be, as
well as the victim, an incarnation of the god, and often it is disguised in his image.
But this is a first differentiation, a kind of mythological duplication of the divine
being and the victim [37] . With this split, the god seems to escape death.

This is a differentiation of another kind that are due myths whose central episode is
the fight of a god with a monster or another god. These, in Babylonian mythology,
Marduk fighting Tiamat with it to say Chaos [38] ; Perseus killing the Gorgon or
dragon Joppa, cons of Bellerophon fighting the Chimera, Saint-Georges Dajjaal
winner [39] . It is also the case of the Labours of Hercules and finally all
thomachies, for in these fights, the loser is as divine as the winner.

This episode is one of the forms of mythological god of sacrifice. These fights
divine, in fact, equivalent to the death of one god. They alternate in the same
festivals [40] . The Isthmian Games, celebrated in spring, or commemorate the
death of Melicerte or victory of Theseus Sinis on. The Nemean games or celebrate
the death of Archemoros or victory of Hercules over the Nemean lion. - They are
sometimes accompanied by the same incidents. The defeat of the monster is
followed by the marriage of the god, Perseus with Andromache, Hercules with
Hesione; the bride exposed to the monster and the hero is issued by another,
moreover, that the legends Maibraut pursued by the German Spirits of the Wild
Hunt. But in the cult of Attis, the sacred marriage following the death and
resurrection of the god. - They occur in similar circumstances and have the same
object. The victory of a young god against an ancient monster is a rite of spring.
The Feast of Marduk, the first day of Nisan, repeating his victory against Tiamat [41]
. The feast of St. George, that is to say the defeat of the dragon, was celebrated on
April 23 [42] . However, it was the spring that Attis died. - Finally, it is true, as
reported by Berosus, a version of Genesis showed Assyrian Bel cutting himself in
half to give birth to the world, the two episodes occur concurrently in the legend of
the god, the Suicide Bel replaces his duel with Chaos [43] .

To complete the proof of the equivalence of these themes, saying that often the
god dies after his victory. In Grimm (Maerchen, 60), the hero, having fallen asleep

after his fight with the dragon is killed, the animals that accompany the recall to life
[44] . The legend of Hercules has the same adventure: after killing Typhon, stifled
by the breath of the monster, he lay lifeless: it was resurrected by Iolaus with the
help of a quail [45] . Hesione in the legend of Hercules was swallowed by a whale.
Castor, after killing Lync, was himself killed by Idas [46] .

These equivalents and these vibrations are easily explained if we consider that the
opponents brought together by the theme of the fight are the product of duplication
of a single genius. The origin of myths of this kind has generally been forgotten and
are presented as the fighting between the weather gods of light and those of
darkness or the abyss [47] , between the gods of heaven and of hell . But it is
extremely difficult to distinguish with clarity the nature of each of the combatants.
They are creatures of the same nature which differentiation, accidental and
unstable part of the religious imagination. Their relationship appears fully in the
Assyrian pantheon. Ashshur and Marduk, the sun gods, the kings of the Annunaki,
the seven gods of the abyss [48] . Nergal is called sometimes Gibil, god of fire, is
also the name of a vicious monster. The seven gods of the abyss, it is difficult,
especially in myths that followed the Assyrian mythology, to distinguish the seven
planetary gods, executors of wills celestial [49] . Long before the Greco-Roman
syncretism that made the sun the master of Hades [50] and closer Mithra of Pluto
and Typhoon [51] , the Assyrian tablets saying that Marduk governs the abyss [52] ,
that Gibil the fire [53] , and Marduk himself is the son of the abyss [54] . In Crete,
the Titans put to death were his parents Dionysus [55] . Elsewhere, rival gods were
brothers, often twins [56] . Sometimes, the fight occurred between an uncle and
nephew, or even between a father and son [57] .

Without this relation, another relationship drama unites the players and shows their
fundamental identity. The animal sacred to Perseus Seriphos was the crab, [Greek
text] [58] . But the crab in the legend of Serifos, was the enemy of the octopus,
joins the Hydra of Lerna, which is an octopus to fight Hercules. The crab, like the
scorpion, is sometimes the best, sometimes the enemy of the sun god, in total, are
forms of the same god. Mithraic bas-reliefs show Mithras the bull riding he will
sacrifice. Thus Perseus rode Pegasus, born from the blood of the Gorgon. The
monster or animal sacrificed to the god used to mount victorious before or after
sacrifice. In sum, the two gods fighting or hunting are legendary collaborators.
Mithras and the bull, says Porphyry, demiurges are in the same way [59] .

Thus the sacrifice had produced in the mythology of an infinite offspring. From
abstraction to abstraction, it became one of the fundamental themes of divine
legends. But it is precisely the introduction of this episode in the legend of a god
who has determined the formation of the ritual sacrifice of the god. Priest or victim,
priest and victim, already formed a god who acts and suffers in both the sacrifice.
But the divinity of the victim is not limited to the mythological sacrifice, but she also
appears in the real sacrifice that goes with it. The myth, once formed, reacts on the
rite where he came out and it carries. Thus the sacrifice of God is not just about a

beautiful mythological tale. Whatever became of the personality of the god in the
syncretism of paganism, adults or aged, is still the god who undergoes the sacrifice
is not a simple set [60] . There, at least initially, "real presence" as in the Catholic
mass. St. Cyril [61] reported that in some gladiatorial rituals and periodicals, a
Kronos (Greek text), hidden underground, received the cleansing blood flowing from
wounds. This [Greek text] is the Saturn of Saturnalia, which in other rituals, was put
to death [62] . The name given to the representative of God tends to identify the
god. For this reason, the high priest of Attis, who also played the role of victim, bore
the name of his god and mythical predecessor [63] . The Mexican religion provides
well known examples of the identity of the victim and the god. Especially at the
feast of Huitzilopochtli [64] , even the statue of the god, made of beet pulp, mingled
with human blood, was put into pieces, divided between the faithful and eaten.
Without doubt, as we have noticed In sacrifice, the victim has something of the god.
But here it is the god himself and it is this identification which characterizes the
sacrifice of the god.

But we know that the sacrifice is repeated periodically because the rhythm of
nature requires this frequency. The myth is thus the living god out of the race than
for them to resubmit and thus made his life an unbroken chain of passion and
resurrection. Astarte revived Adonis, Tammuz, Ishtar, Isis, Osiris, Attis and Cybele
Iolaus Hercules [65] . Dionysus is designed murdered a second time by Semele [66]
. We're already far from the apotheosis of which we spoke earlier in this chapter.
God never leaves the sacrifice to go in and vice versa. There is no interruption in his
personality. If it is torn to pieces, as Osiris and Pelops, we find it closer and it
revives its tracks. So the original purpose of sacrifice is overshadowed, it is not a
sacrifice or a sacrifice pastoral land. The God who comes as a victim is in itself, it
has multiple qualities and powers. It follows that the sacrifice appears as a
repetition and a commemoration of the sacrifice of the original god [67] . A legend
tells that usually adds some circumstance that ensures the perpetuity. So when a
god dies a death more or less natural, an oracle prescribes expiatory sacrifice which
reproduces the death of this god [68] . When a god is another winner, it
perpetuates the memory of his victory by the institution of a cult [69] .

It should be noted here that the abstraction that, in sacrifice, was born the god
could give another aspect to the same practices. By a process analogous to the
duplication that produced the thomachies, she could separate the god of the
victim. In the myths discussed above, the two opponents are equally divine, one of
them appears as the priest of his sacrifice that succumbs predecessor. But the
virtual deity of the victim has not always developed. Often she remained on earth,
and consequently, the god created, released once the victim, now lives outside of
sacrifice. So the consecration, which puts the victim in the world coronation, takes
the form of a grant to a divine person, a gift. However, even in this case, it is
always a sacred animal sacrificing, or at least something that recalls the origin of
sacrifice. In sum, they offered to the god himself: Dionysus Dionysus became
Kriophage ram [70] . Sometimes, however, as in the duplication of the resultant
thomachies where the animal sacrificed was considered an enemy of God [71] . If
it was sacrificed to atone for a wrong committed against the God by his species . In

Virbius Nemi, killed by horses, a horse was sacrificed [72] . The notion of sacrifice
to the god developed in parallel to that of the sacrifice of the god.

The types of sacrifice of the god we just review are made in concrete and attached
together about a single Hindu rite of sacrifice soma [73] . It can see first what the
ritual sacrifice of a true god. We can not explain here how god Soma is identified
with the soma plant, how it is actually present or describe the ceremonies amid
which it is brought and is received at the place of sacrifice. Wear it on a shield, we
love it, then pressing it and kill it. So, these branches squeezed, the god emerges
and spreads in the world, a series of distinct responsibilities to communicate the
different kingdoms of nature. This real presence, the birth of the god, succeeding
his death, are, somehow, the ritual forms of myth. As for purely mythical forms has
paved the sacrifice, they are the ones we described above. This is the first
identification of Soma with the enemy god of gods, Vrtra, the demon who holds the
treasure of immortality and Indra kills [74] . For to explain how a god could be
killed, one is represented in the guise of a demon is the demon is killed, and to spell
the god of the envelope that bad restrained her, emerges gasoline excellent. But on
the other hand, it often kills Vrtra Soma, and in any case, it is he who gives strength
to Indra, the warrior god, destroyer of demons. Even in some texts, Soma, who is
his own priest, they go so far as to represent the type of celestial priests. Thence to
the suicide of god the distance was not great, the Brahmins have taken.

By then, they have highlighted an important point of the theory of sacrifice. We

have seen between the victim and the god there is always some affinity: Apollo has
Karneios rams are offered to Varuna, barley, etc.. It's like being fed by the same
and the victim is the food of the gods. Also the sacrifice he was quickly regarded as
the condition for the existence of God. "That's where the material that immortal
gods live. So not only is the sacrifice that some gods are born, but it is by the
sacrifice that all maintain their existence. He ended up appearing as their essence,
their origin, creator [75] . It is also the creator of things in him because that is the
source of all life, Soma is both sun and moon in the sky, cloud, lightning and rain in
the atmosphere, the king of plants on earth, yet in the soma victim, all these forms
of Soma are met. He is the custodian of all the nutrients and rich nature. It is at the
same time, the food of gods and men of intoxicating liquor, author of immortality of
some and the short life of others. All these forces are concentrated, created and
distributed again by the sacrifice. This is "the master of being", Prajapati. It is the
Purusa [76] of the famous hymn X, 90 of which are born the Rg Veda gods, rituals,
men, caste, sun, moon, plants, livestock and will be the Brahmin of India classic. All
theologies have assigned this creative power. Spreading and bringing in turn the
deity, he spreads things like Jason and Cadmus sowing the dragon's teeth which are
born warriors. In death he draws life. Flowers and plants growing on the body of
Adonis; swarms of bees fly away from the body of a lion killed by Samson and the
bull of Aristeas.

Also borrowed theology does its cosmogonies sacrificial myths. It explained

creation as the popular imagination explained the annual life of nature, by a
sacrifice. For this, she turned to God the sacrifice of the origin of the world [77] .
In Assyrian cosmogony, the blood of defeated Tiamat had given rise to the beings.
The separation of the elements of chaos was conceived like the sacrifice or the
suicide of the demiurge. Mr. Gunkel [78] proved, we believe, that the same design
was found in the popular beliefs of the Hebrews. It appears in the mythology of
North. It is also has the base of the mithriaque worship. The low-reliefs want to show
the life which leaves the sacrificed bull; already its tail ends in an ear bouquet. In
India, finally, creation continues things by means of the rite ends even up becoming
an absolute creation, and ex nihilo. At the beginning nothing was. Purusa wished. It
is by its suicide, by the abandonment of oneself, the renouncement of its body,
model, later, of the Buddhist renouncement, that the god made the existence of the
things.
We edge assumes that this dismantles of glorification of sacrifice, the periodicity
remained. The renewed attacks of chaos and the evil unceasingly require new
sacrifices, creators and redeemers. Offensive chaos and evil require ever more
sacrifices, creative Returns and redemptive. Thus transformed and, so to speak,
sublimated, the sacrifice was preserved by Christian theology [79]. And thus
transformed, so to speak, sublimated, the sacrifice has been preserved by Christian
theology [79]. Its effectiveness was simply transported physical world in the moral
world. Moral Its effectiveness was simply transported from the physical world to the
world. The sacrifice redeemer of the god remains in the mass day laborer. God' S
redemptive sacrifice is perpetuated in the farmhouse daily. We do not claim to seek
how the Christian ritual of the sacrifice was constituted, nor how it is attached to the
former rites. We C not claims to look up how did the Christian ritual of sacrifice, gold
how it report to the previous rites. We however believed, power during this work, to
sometimes bring closer the ceremonies to the Christian sacrifice of those which we
studied. We believe, however, whitebait in this work, sometimes closer to the
ceremonies of Christian sacrifice of those we studied. That it is enough for us here
to recall the astonishing similarity simply and to indicate of it how the development
of rites, if similar to those of the agrarian sacrifice, could give rise to the design of
the sacrifice, redeemer and communiel, of the single and transcendent god. Suffice
it young stag simply to recall the astonishing similarity and indicate how the
development of rites, so similar to those of agrarian sacrifice, could give small
channel to the concept of sacrifice and redemptive communiel, the only god and
transcends. The Christian sacrifice is, in this respect, one of most instructive than
one can meet in the history. The Christian sacrifice is, in this glance, has most
instructive that we edge meet in history. Our priests seek, by the same ritual
processes, about the same effects as our more remote ancestors. Our priests are
seeking, through the same ritual procedures, butt the same effect distant ace our
most ancestors. The mechanism of the dedication of the catholic mass is, in the
general lines, the same one as that of the Hindu sacrifices. The mechanism of the
dedication of the Catholic Farmhouse is, in general lines, the same ace that of Hindu
sacrifices. It presents to us, with a clearness which does not leave something to be
desired anything, the alternative rhythm of the atonement and the communion.
Christian imagination built on ancient levels. It present custom with has clarity that
leaves nothing to Be desired, the alternating rhythm of atonement and communion.
The Christian imagination has built one old plane.

VI
Conclusion

Now we see better what is in our unity of the sacrificial system. It does not, as
believed by Smith, that all possible kinds of sacrifices are out of a primitive and
simple. This is no sacrifice. All processes sacrificial most general, the less rich in
elements that we have achieved are those of sacralization and secularization. But
in reality, any sacrifice of desecration, so pure it may be, we always find a
sacralization of the victim. Conversely, any sacrifice of sanctification, even the
characteristic, a desecration is necessarily involved, because otherwise the remains
of the victim could not be used. These two elements are so closely interrelated that
one can not exist without the other.

But again, these two kinds of sacrifices are still only abstract types. All killing takes
place in circumstances and for specified purposes; the diversity of purposes that
may be born and continuing various ways in which we have provided a few
examples. But first, there is no religion where those terms do not coexist in more or
fewer, all sacrificial rituals that we know are already very complex. In addition,
there is no particular rite that is complex in itself, for, or he has several goals at
once, or, to reach one, it sets in motion various forces. We have seen the sacrifices
of desecration and even proper expiatory sacrifices communiels be complicated, but
it could give many other examples of complications. The Amazulu to have rain,
gather a herd of black cattle, kill one, eat it in silence, and then burn the bones out
of the village that makes three different themes in the same operation [1] .

In the Hindu animal sacrifice, this complexity is even more pronounced. We found
expiatory shares allocated to evil spirits, divine reserved shares, the shares enjoyed
communion with sacrifice, as consumed units priestly priests. The victim is also a
curse against the enemy, divination, wishes to. In one aspect, the sacrifice falls
theriomorphism to religion because it sends the soul of the beast in heaven join the
archetypes of animals and to maintain the perpetuity of the species. It is also a rite
of consumption, because the sacrifice which laid the lights can not eat meat after
making such a sacrifice. Finally it is a sacrifice of redemption, for the sacrifice is
consecrated, it is in the making of the deity and he buys by substituting the victim.
Everything is mixed and confounded in a single organization that, despite this
diversity does not cease to be harmonic. A fortiori is this the case of a rite, to a
huge extent, as the Soma sacrifice, where we, besides all the above, a case made of
sacrifice of the god. In a word, as the magical ceremony, as well as prayer, which
can serve both as a thanksgiving, a vow, a propitiation, the sacrifice may serve
concurrently a variety of functions.

But if the sacrifice is so complex, where he can bring his unit? It's basically, as the
diversity of forms it takes, it is always the same process that can be used for

purposes the most different. The method includes establishing communication

between the sacred world and the secular world through a victim, that is to say a
thing destroyed during the ceremony. Contrary to what Smith believed, the victim
does not necessarily sacrifice a religious nature, completed and defined, it is the
sacrifice itself which confers on him. It can give the most diverse and virtues, and
make it suitable to serve as the most varied, either in different rites either during
the same ritual. It can also transmit a sanctity of the religious world to the profane
world or vice versa, it is indifferent to the direction of current flowing through it. We
may, at the same time, load the mind that emerged from her vow to wear to the
heavenly powers, to use it to divine the future, to atone for the wrath of God by the
gods their units, and finally enjoy the sacred flesh remaining. On the other hand,
once it is made, it, whatever you do, a certain autonomy and is a hotbed of energy
they reveal effects beyond the narrow view that the sacrifice assigned to the rite.
An animal is sacrificed to redeem a dksita; an immediate blow-cons, the liberated
soul leaves feed the eternal life of the species. Sacrifice over and, of course, goals
closer than most theologies Elementary assign him. Is that it does not consist only
of a series of individual actions. The ritual starts moving all the sacred things which
it is addressed. From the beginning of this work, the sacrifice has emerged as an
offshoot of the system of special consecration.

There is no need to explain why the length between secular and relations with the
divine that he sees the source of life itself. He has every incentive to get closer
because that is where are the very conditions of its existence. But where does it
comes close to that by staying away? Where does it communicate with the sacred
than through an intermediary? The destructive effects of the rite partly explain this
strange process. If religious forces are the very principle of the vital forces, in
themselves, they are such that contact is terrible to the vulgar. Especially when
they reach a certain level of intensity, they can not focus on an object layman
without destroying it. The sacrifice, he has some need, therefore, can not deal with
extreme caution. That is why, between them and him, it inserts intermediaries
whose main victim. Committing to the end in the rite, he would find death and not
life. The victim replaces. It only gets dangerous in the sphere of sacrifice, she
succumbs, and is there to succumb. The sacrifice is immune, the gods take it
instead of taking it. She bought it. Moses had not circumcised his son came Iahwe
"fight" with him at an inn. Moses died when his wife suddenly violently the child's
foreskin and threw it at the feet of lahw saying: "thou art a bloody husband." The
destruction of the foreskin has met the god who destroyed more Moses bought .
There is no sacrifice which intervenes some idea of redemption.

But this first explanation is not general enough, for in the case of the offering, the
communication is also done through an intermediary, and yet there is no
destruction. It was too strong a consecration serious drawbacks, even though it is
not destructive. Anything that is too deeply involved in religion is, for that very
reason, withdraws from the secular sphere. More a being is imbued with religiosity,
the more it is charged with prohibitions that isolate. The sanctity of Nazir paralyzes
him. On the other side, anything too intimate contacts with sacred things take their
sacred nature and becomes like them. But the sacrifice is made by a layperson. The

action it has on people and things is for the state to fulfill their role in the temporal
life. Each other and can therefore be useful in the sacrifice unless they can get out.
Rites of output used in part for this purpose. They reduce the consecration, but
alone, they could reduce it enough if it had been too intense. It is therefore
important that the sacrifice or the object of sacrifice does receive significant losses,
that is to say indirectly. This is what is the middleman. Thanks to him, the two
worlds can penetrate presence while remaining distinct.

This explains a very special character of religious sacrifice. In every sacrifice there
is an act of selflessness, as the sacrificing himself and gives private. Even this
sacrifice he is often imposed as a duty. Because the sacrifice is not always optional,
the gods require. They must worship service, as says the Hebrew ritual, they must
share, as the Hindus say. - But this sacrifice and this submission does not come
without a return selfish. If the sacrifice is giving something of oneself, it is not given,
it reserves prudently. Is that it provides, in part to receive. - The sacrifice is thus in
a double aspect. This is a useful and it's an obligation. Relief mingled with interest.
That's why he has so often been conceived as a contract. Basically, there can be
no sacrifice that has something contractual. The two parties exchange their
services and each finds its account. For the gods, too, need the profane. If nothing
was reserved for the harvest, the god of wheat would die to be reborn as Dionysos
can, must, in the harvest, the goat was sacrificed to Dionysus, the soma is that men
give drink to their gods their strength against the demons. For the sacred remains,
that he must do its part and it is on the part of laymen is that this levy. This
ambiguity is inherent in the nature of sacrifice. It is, indeed, the presence of the
intermediary, and we know that, without any intermediary, there is no sacrifice.
Because the victim was separate from god and sacrificing, it separates them while
uniting them, they come closer, but without giving any integer from one to another.

Yet there is a case where any selfish calculation is absent. It is the sacrifice of the
god as the god who gives without sacrificing return. Is that this time everything has
gone through. The god, who is also the sacrifice, but one with the victim and
sometimes even the priest. All the various elements that go into the regular
sacrifices here fall into each other and merge. But such confusion is possible only
for mythical beings, that is to say ideals. That is how the design of a god sacrificing
himself to the world was able to produce and has become, even for the most
civilized people, the highest expression and as the ideal limit of self-denial without
sharing.

But just as the sacrifice of God is not out of the imaginary sphere of religion, as one
might think that the whole system is a set of images. The powers which addressed
the faithful who sacrifices her most precious possessions seem to be anything
positive. Who does not believe, sees in these rites of fruitless and costly illusions
and was surprised that all mankind is keen to dispel his strength for gods ghostly.
But there may be genuine realities that it is possible to link the institution in its
entirety. Religious notions, because they are raw, are, and they exist objectively, as

social facts. Sacred things, against which operates the sacrifice are social things,
and this is sufficient to explain the sacrifice. So that the sacrifice is well founded,
two conditions are necessary. It must first be there outside of sacrificing things that
do come out of himself and that he should sacrifice it. Then you have these things
to be near him so he can get in touch with them, find the strength and confidence
they need and remove them from contacting the profit he expects its rites.
However, this character of intimate penetration and separation of immanence and
transcendence is at the highest level, distinctive social things. They also exist at a
time, depending on the point of view one is placed inside and outside the individual.
We can now understand what may be the function of sacrifice, apart from the
symbols by which the believer expresses himself. It is a social function because the
sacrifice is related to social things.

On the one hand, the personal renunciation of individuals or groups to their

property feeds the social forces. No, without doubt, that the company may need
things that are the subject of sacrifice everything happens here in the world of
ideas, and that mental and moral energy is about. But the act of selflessness that is
involved in every sacrifice, pointing to individual minds frequently the presence of
collective forces, specifically enjoys their ideal existence. These general atonement
and these purifications, these communions, the sacralization of groups, these
creations of geniuses cities provide or renew periodically to the community,
represented by his gods, that good character, strong, serious, terrible, which is an
essential feature any social personality. - Secondly, individuals are at that same act
their advantage. They give to them and the things they care closely, the whole
social force. They are a social authority their vows, their oaths, their marriages.
They surround him, like a circle of holiness that protects them, they plowed the
fields, the houses they have built. At the same time they are in the sacrifice means
to restore the disturbed balance: by atonement, they redeem themselves from the
curse social consequence of the misconduct, and fall within the community by
levies on things they do which the company has reserved the use, they are entitled
to enjoy. The social norm is kept safe for them, with no reduction for the group. And
the social function of sacrifice is completed, both for individuals and the community.
And as society is composed not only of men but of things and events, we can see
how sacrifice can follow and reproduce both the pace of human life and that of
nature and how he could become periodic the use of natural phenomena, such as
occasional momentary needs of men, finally folding a thousand functions.

Besides, we could see along the way, how beliefs and social practices, which are
not strictly religious, are in relation to the sacrifice. He was successively contract
issue, redemption, sorrow, donation, dedication, ideas concerning the soul and
immortality are still the basis of common morality. This shows how important is for
sociology the notion of sacrifice. But in this work, we did not follow its development
through all its ramifications. We are simply given the task of trying to build it.