Human beings have been worshiping nature for centuries, and spirituality is often cited as what differentiates us from other animals. However, groundbreaking research on wild chimpanzees has revealed that the line dividing us from other animals is not so sharp.
From Dr. Jane Goodall’s early discoveries and subsequent scientific research, we know that humans and chimpanzees are strikingly similar in both genetics and behavior. Chimpanzees have indeed been observed performing common practices, traditions, and rituals, and the extent of these behaviors varies greatly from place to place.
A chimpanzee at the Maryland Zoo.
Mariam-Webster defines culture as “customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group.” Culture is typically thought of as group standardization of practices. In 1964, Dr. Goodall shaped an early theory of non-human culture based on her observations.
Cultural Variations Among Chimpanzee Groups
In Cultures in Chimpanzees, Gombe researchers wrote that they have observed 39 different behavioral patterns among chimpanzee groups across Africa. Some of the different behavioral patterns deal with tool usage, courtship, and grooming. The researchers believe these differences across chimpanzee groups are not due to ecological factors.
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Waterfall Displays and Rain Dances
One of the most notable ways chimpanzees have demonstrated what could be considered spirituality is through waterfall displays and rain dances. Dr. Goodall observed and wrote about the dances since her earliest days in Gombe. Other researchers, like JGI’s scientific advisor and filmmaker Bill Wallauer, have observed these rituals as well.
Many chimpanzees have been observed performing dances by the waterfall, which makes it seem like a collective cultural display. It would, if likened to human behavior, seem like a chimpanzee way of expressing amazement toward a force of nature.
Ultimately, as Jane has said, “It is important that science dares to ask questions outside the prison of the bias mind”. Learning about the complexities of non-human primates increases our understanding and respect of other species. It might even influence how we understand our own practices, ideas and cultures.
“I think chimpanzees are as spiritual as we are, but they can’t analyze it. They don’t talk about it. They can’t describe what they feel.
Chimpanzee: Our Closest Relatives in the Animal Kingdom | Amazing Facts | Chimp
The Mystery of Rock-Throwing Rituals in West Africa
Chimpanzees in three West African countries-Guinea Bissau, Côte d’Ivoire (the Ivory Coast), and Liberia, have been observed taking part in strange behavior. They store a great number of rocks in the hollows of trees. Then, usually a male, takes one of the rocks, walks a distance away, grunts an utterance, and hurls the rock at the tree, leaving a mark on it. The rock is then placed back in the hollow to be reused in this manner again.
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A team of 80 international scientists, led by Hjalmar S. Kuhl and Ammie K. Kalan, conducted the study. Kuhl and Kalan hail from the Max Planck Institute in Germany. The team set up camera traps in four remote locations in West Africa, where they caught footage of chimps taking part in this unusual and so far, unexplained behavior. Their findings were published in Scientific Reports, part of the journal Nature.
Stone cairns mark a hiking trail in Germany.
Tool usage among chimps is commonplace. Chimps have been known to use rocks as tools, to bash open fruits or nuts for instance. Certain groups have even been seen using sticks removed of leaves and sharpened as spears, for hunting.
But they’ve never been observed taking part in behavior outside of that tied to survival. No chimps east of these countries have been observed doing this. What’s more, there seems to be no reason for it tied to survival. It has nothing to do with acquiring food, mating, or furthering one’s status. Researchers say it might be a unique display of male power, marking the border of their troop’s territory, or even a spiritual ritual.
Over time, researchers found that this so-called ritualistic practice caught on in troops where males had taken part in it, with even a few females doing so. So could it be a spiritual ritual?
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Researchers on Kuhl and Kalan’s team have likened the rock pilings to the types of cairns the indigenous people of these areas make. Cairns are piles of rocks that serve many purposes. People have been making them since the Stone Age. They can signify where a battle took place or as a memorial, as a marker for a grave site, a demarcation of territory, a signpost on a path, to denote a sacred site, and much more.
Sacred Trees and Potential Explanations
Study co-author Laura Kehoe made a statement that has caused something of an uproar. She mused, “Maybe we found the first evidence of chimpanzees creating a kind of shrine that could indicate sacred trees.” It’ll take a long time to prove such a thing, should it be true.
The first major hurdle, there’s great debate in the archaeological community over what counts as a ritual, or even how to define one. Biological anthropologist Craig Stanford of USC, has studied chimps for a long time out in the field. He told The Atlantic that there’s lots of reasons they throw stones.
Primate cognitive psychologist Laurie Santos of Yale told Smithsonian Magazine that such behavior, “fits the definition of proto-ritualistic.” Yet, she worries that we don’t know how to interpret this behavior properly nor the context surrounding it.
These great apes have been shown to use creativity and imagination before, both in captivity and the wild. For instance, young female chimps have been known to carry a stick and care for it, as if it were a doll. Chimps can have empathy for others and follow rules set by their brethren. But there’s no evidence to point to any spiritual beliefs. Do these other humanlike behaviors open up the possibility?
In West Africa, scientists think chimps may ritualistically throw stones at hollow trees.
The world renowned primatologist Dr. Jane Goodall observed chimpanzees for 55 years in Gombe, Tanzania. She often speaks of them, one of our closest ancestors (along with bonobos), in terms of the sacred.
In her work, she’s explained instances where chimps dance near waterfalls or contemplate great storms of wind and rain with fascinated gazes. “Why wouldn’t they also have feelings of some kind of spirituality?” she asked.
Animal Faith and Rituals
Animal faith is the study of animal behaviors that suggest proto-religious faith. Nancy R. Howell suggests that "chimpanzees and bonobos may have the precursors for culture and spirituality, such as connectedness, interdependence and sociality and a level of 'symbolic capacity'."
Primatologist Jane Goodall goes further, noting that some chimpanzees may "dance" at the onset of heavy rain or when they come across a waterfall.
While grief is common to many animals, funeral rituals are not. However, one cannot ignore the elaborate burying behaviour of elephants as a similar sign of ritualistic or even religious behaviour in that species. When encountering dead animals, elephants will often bury them with mud, earth and leaves.
Animals known to have been buried by elephants include rhinos, buffalos, cows, calves, and even humans, in addition to elephants themselves. Both wild and captive chimpanzees engage in ritualized behaviors at the death of a group member.
Attention to the dead is not unique to elephants or chimpanzees. Dolphins have been known to stay with recently deceased members of their pod for several days, preventing divers from getting close. However, the reasons for this remain obscure.
The Evolutionary Perspective
The ritual lives of animals are of interest to paleoanthropologists, as they provide a convenient insight into how religious belief systems may have developed in our ancestors.
Evolutionary psychologist Matt Rossano has theorized that religion evolved in three stages:
- In the pre-Upper Palaeolithic, religion was characterised by ecstatic rituals used to facilitate social bonding.
- Later, shamanic healing rituals developed in the Upper Palaeolithic.
- Finally, religious expressions developed over time to include cave art, ritual artefacts, ancestor worship and the development of myth and moral structures.
If this is true, then the behavior of chimpanzees witnessed by Goodall may be interpreted as similar to pre-Upper Paleolithic Human religion.
However, De Waal notes that bonobos show no evidence of ritual behaviour yet are extremely peaceful and demonstrate moral agency.
A Minimal Definition of Ritual in Apes
The potential for rituals in non-human great apes (apes) is an understudied topic. A minimal definition of ritual can be derived and then examine the currently available evidence for it in untrained and non-enculturated apes.
First, examine whether such apes show evidence for the two main components of a minimal definition of ritual: symbolism and copying. Second, examine if there are actual cases already identifiable today that may fit all aspects of our minimal definition of ritual-or whether there are at least cases that fit some aspects (proto-ritual).
Apes are not likely to spontaneously practise minimal ritual, but the highest expected likelihood of occurrence is in the results-copying domain. Yet, actual cases of minimal ritual in apes-including those involving environmental results were not found.
However, some cases that may match at least part of the minimal ritual definition-which are termed proto-ritual were found. At least two out of three potential cases of such proto-rituals that were identified (rain dance, object-in-ear and surplus nest-making procedures) do revolve around results.
Overall, apes do not show much, or very clear, evidence for even minimal ritual, but may sometimes show proto-ritual. However, dedicated ape ritual studies are currently lacking, and future work may identify ape ritual (or clearer cases of proto-ritual).
Key Components of Minimal Ritual
According to the human definition above, rituals must be perceived in an extraordinary way and must be interpreted from a ‘social or normative point of view’. Ritual actions and/or results must therefore gain ‘social significance’ and do so through the ritual itself. The significance created must therefore also extend beyond the actor (it must be socially shared) and must exist at least in part because it is so perceived by others.
Part of what makes human rituals ‘extraordinary’ is their causal opacity. For example, if certain actions bring about a causal effect that itself may be the goal of the action (i.e. when the actions are instrumental), then they do not qualify as ritual. The actions (and/or results) must therefore be arbitrarily linked to the goal.
Human rituals must also have what might be called goal opacity (usually called ‘goal demotion’); e.g. Consequently, we have to have causally and goal-opaque actions and/or results (excluding ordinary cases that lead in a direct way straight to the goal), and these also have to create social significance. This means we would have to (i) exclude any direct relationship (and any naturally/sexually evolved or by-product relationship, see below) between behaviour and outcome. Furthermore, (ii) this would only leave indirect, opaque relationships-arbitrary relationships-which also have to create social significance. We interpret all this as a need for the ritual to be symbolic. Therefore, we conclude that one or more of the actions or object constellations or object changes involved in a ritual must gain a symbolic feature-as an effect of the ritual (during or after the ritual).
The alternative view that the ritual merely creates or fosters social meaning (directly or indirectly) seems unfeasible, because, if that were the case, all communication would be ritualistic. And so, what would need to be demonstrated in apes is that the ritual creates some symbolic feature.
Rituals must show stereotypical, accurately executed actions. Together with the requirement that rituals cannot be evolved traits (or their by-products), this strongly implies that these actions and/or resulting object changes must be culturally transmitted. In other words, they must have been copied, using copying social learning mechanisms. More precisely, rituals must therefore require copying. Actions or results must thus not merely be cultural, they must have been copied, in order to (potentially) be rituals.
