We have all heard about faith in spirits, Christ, Buddha, Muslims, Confucianism, Voodoo dolls and a host of other religions and beliefs …
But how many of us have heard of the Cargo Cult? Check yourself!
These people build flightless planes and wooden airstrips. They believe that "Coca-Cola" is sent to them by the gods, and they consider internal combustion engines to be witchcraft. The cargo cult is one of the strangest beliefs that a person could think of. Moreover, a man of the XX century.
People and Gods
One of the purposes of religion is to explain the world around us. In the past few centuries, this function has been won back by science. But everything depends not only on the development of society, but also on a specific person. Each creates his own faith, designed to explain what he does not understand.
Melanesia is a group of islands in the Pacific Ocean that includes the states of Fiji, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, as well as dependent territories.
When the natives of Melanesia first saw the plane, they could not explain its origin in the terms they knew. They weren't familiar with the basics of aerodynamics. Therefore, the plane became a manifestation of the divine for them.
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This is how the cargo cult appeared (from the word cargo - the cargo transported by ships and airplanes) - a belief system that makes objects created by people who have advanced further in technical development into a religious culture.
Carriers of cargo cults adopt the behavior of representatives of other cultures, rethinking their manners and customs in their own way and turning them into religious rituals. Thus, the European tradition of parades in Melanesian beliefs turns into an annual procession of preachers dressed in camouflage, calling on the gods to send them food and things. After all, the soldiers received help from heaven - weren't they from the gods?
But aborigines professing cargo cults do not worship the planes themselves, or even white people who fly in on iron birds. The Melanesians understand and have always understood that white people are as mortal as they are, they simply entered into a more successful alliance with the gods. Gods can be different: local, traditional, pagan, and conventional "gods of white people", more generous and powerful. An ordinary aborigine believes that a heavenly deity will send rain to him, and a cargo cult - that it will bring him an airplane with humanitarian aid. The ability of a piece of winged iron to stay in the air is also explained by the support of the gods.
The earliest cargo cult is the Took movement, which originated in Fiji in 1885. The island was a British colony in those years, and the locals became well acquainted with the life and customs of the British. True, they were distorted in the perception of the aborigines.
A native of Fiji around that time.
The local shaman Ndugomoi, fearing the Christian missionaries who preached on the island, took the name Navosavakandua ("one who speaks only once") and appointed himself the ruler of life and death. He promised to bring back from oblivion the great Fijian warriors of the past, who would turn the world inside out, after which the white invaders would serve the black people, and not vice versa. The colonial authorities worried about the expansion of Ndugomoi's influence, imprisoned him for six months, and then expelled him from the island. The Took cult existed for several months after that.
You ask: where is the cargo here? So far, nowhere. But the Tuka movement is the first Melanesian sect based on traditional beliefs that have changed under the influence of white people. The Europeans in the Tuka cult played the role of villains, but at the same time Ndugomoi performed rituals copied from Christians: he “sanctified” the water, prayed with folded hands, and sold religious souvenirs. In fact, it was a pagan sect that outwardly resembled a parody of Christianity. Her followers did not understand why the missionaries perform certain actions, and blindly repeated them in the hope that the gods would give them the same benefits as the Europeans. This is how the cargo cult works.
The natives of Tanna Island practiced cannibalism.
At the beginning of the 20th century, similar movements began to appear in different parts of Melanesia. The largest pre-war cult was the Vailal Madness in 1919-1922. It has been well researched by ethnographers and described in a number of books. The word "vailala" is onomatopoeia, an imitation of meaningless singing, reminiscent of a monologue. During religious rituals, members of the cult practiced glossolalia - speech from meaningless letter combinations, similar to a foreign language - so they imitated the speech of Europeans.
Members of the Vailala cult believed in a ghostly steamer on which the dead would sail to the island and bring various benefits: food, clothing, weapons. The cult of the dead is typical of the Australian territories of Papua, where Vailal's madness originated, and the steamer appeared already under the influence of the white colonialists. The dead on the ship will be white: the British have turned from demons into messengers of the gods.
Cannibals from Papua, 1910
Vailala's “priests” imitated many of the customs of white people, passing their meaning through the filter of their worldview. For example, they had a religious ceremony that simulates … tea brewing. The resulting brew was consumed sitting at the table on stools (despite the fact that the locals did not use wooden furniture and ate on mats). They also wore insignia, like British soldiers. These rituals were supposed to bring the arrival of the steamer closer.
All this was explained simply: the supply of the colonists was carried out by sea, just on steamers. Seeing how ships regularly come to the whites, loaded with clothes, food, household items, the Melanesians tried to attract the same ships to themselves, repeating the strange actions of the whites. But that was just the beginning.
Gifts from heaven
During the Second World War, the amount of unusual information coming to Melanesians from the outside world increased significantly. Before that, they saw only the unhurried British living in a measured gentlemanly rhythm, and then the Japanese appeared first with their customs, and then noisy and cheerful Americans. Both those and others received most of the supply from the air: planes flew in and out, and more often they simply dropped boxes with cargo parachutes.
American planes on the islands of Melanesia.
This heavenly phenomenon came in handy in a society that had long believed that the gods sent gifts to whites. The soldiers traded with the locals, trading knives, canned food, chocolate and clothing for fresh food, local art and the favors of local girls. This is how the classic form of the cargo cult was born. Airplanes were perceived as messengers of the gods, and whites were perceived as intermediaries in the transfer of amazing objects flying from the sky.
The most famous was the cult of John Froome, which subsequently split into several directions and has survived to this day. However, a man named John Froome never existed. Some of the Americans apparently introduced themselves as John from America, and since none of these three words meant anything to the Melanesians, they simply dropped the third. It turned out to be John Froome.
A still from the documentary film Ancient Aliens.
The cult of John Froome originated on the island of Tanna (the state of Vanuatu) - then this territory was called the New Hebrides. The cult was based on the traditional belief in Keraperamuna, the god of the Tukosmera volcano. The inhabitants of Tanna believed that the gods live on Tukosmere and sometimes come down from there to help people. When the whites appeared on the island, the belief in Keraperamuna changed. Some of the local preachers (according to some reports, his name was Manehivi) said that the Melanesians should refuse to cooperate with whites and return to their original life and beliefs (at that time, many aborigines had already converted to Christianity). Manehivi argued: if it is right to ask the god of the volcano, he will grant the Melanesians the same benefits that he had already given to the newly arrived Europeans, and the Messiah named John Froome, who will arrive by plane or, according to another version, descend from the mountain, will deliver them.
At the height of the cult, in 1941, the colonial authorities arrested Manehivi, who had already identified himself as John Froome, and sent him into exile. But then, as luck would have it, war came to this part of the world, and a huge amount of various goods began to be dumped on American bases: equipment, food, clothing, medicines, and so on. A large part went to the locals, and this was perceived as the approach of the legendary John Froome.
Costumed performance: "priest" in the mask of John Froome.
Generally speaking, the Melanesians had no idea about industrial production. Dozens of identical objects in their perception could only have a divine origin. The gods sent them objects through white people flying in iron birds, and the white people living next to them on the island gave gifts to their destination.
But the war ended, the Americans withdrew from their seats, Froome did not appear, and the flow of aircraft dried up. The inhabitants of the island took this as if the white soldiers decided to keep the gifts of the gods for themselves, not sharing them with the Melanesians. Then the followers of the cult began to build wooden runways, imitation planes, office buildings and other pseudo-elements of white life in order to lure planes (the natives sincerely believed that it was the airfield that attracted the plane). They dressed like whites and waved red flags like airfield staff sending pilots.
This is what they do to this day. The John Froome Cult is a peaceful sect occupying a medium-sized settlement on the island of Tanna. The followers of the cult have representatives in the government of Vanuatu and even their own army. The army is amusing: annually on February 15, on the day of the descent of Frum, according to the prophecy, it holds a parade. On the naked torsos of the "soldiers" is written "USA", and in their hands they carry wooden sticks resembling rifles with bayonets.
Until 2013, the John Froom cult was led by Titam Goiset, who was also Vanuatu's ambassador to Russia and Abkhazia. But in 2013, she became involved in a corruption scandal, was recalled to Vanuatu and convicted.
Today, the John Froome Cult is led by old man Isaac Van Nikiau, usually wearing a navy tunic and a cap.
It's funny, but on the opposite end of Tanna Island there is another cult - Toma Navi (apparently, a sailor stood at its origins, because navy is the Navy). On other islands of Melanesia, cargo cults that have survived since the war also flourish: Yali, Paliau, Peli, Turaga and so on. All of them weave modern European and American realities into traditional religions.
Prince Philip cult
One of the funniest cargo cults of Melanesia settled on the same Tanna Island (Vanuatu) in the village of Yaohnanen. Rural legends say that once the son of a mountain spirit descended from the peaks and sailed to distant lands, where he married a white woman, but one day he will definitely return to the village and bring prosperity. And somehow it so happened that the white woman is Queen Elizabeth II, and the son of a mountain spirit is her husband Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
Prince Philip fans.
Apparently, the cult arose at the turn of the 1950s and 1960s, and gained real strength in 1974 after Philip's official visit to the New Hebrides condominium, jointly run by Great Britain and France. The natives were not allowed to see the august guest, but already in Britain, the New Hebrides Commissioner John Champion told the prince about an entertaining phenomenon and persuaded Philip to send his photo with a signature to the fans.
In response, the inhabitants of Yaokhnanen gave Philip a gift - a traditional spear for hunting wild pigs. The moved prince was photographed again - spear in hand - and sent them a second photo. A quarter of a century later, in 2000, Philip again remembered his fans and sent them a third photo. And in 2007, five members of the cult were officially invited to the UK for an audience with Prince Philip. They left with another picture - this time a group one.
The cult still exists. The problem is that Philip of Edinburgh is already 96 years old, and it is not very clear what will happen to the Melanesian sectarians after the death of their god.
How should we treat this?
The first glance at cargo cults is amazing. But, if you look closely, behind them lies the usual desire to receive European goods for free. True, instead of military goods, tourists are now brought.
All cargo cults, of which about three hundred have appeared in the last century (a dozen and a half have survived to this day), have common features:
- clear boundaries, usually within one or two villages. The cult of John Froome became famous due to its extensive distribution - over the whole area of the island of Tanna;
- one leader - with his death, the cult often disappears;
- emphasis on material goods that the gods should send down;
- rituals parodying the actions of strangers.
Nothing else matters. The cargo cult can arise with gods of any origin: heavenly and natural, humanoid and animal-like. And if representatives of an extraterrestrial supercivilization ever fly to us, we may become like the Melanesians and comically imitate the behavior of aliens in the hope of getting some benefit for this. People are the same everywhere.