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In the meantime the prince of evil, the fearful Erlik
Khan, ruling over the kingdom of darkness “in the seventh
stratum below the surface of the earth,” does not remain
inactive. He sends out one of his servants, Körmoss, who
tries to hinder the birth of the human being. If he does
not succeed in this, he persecutes the “child of man”
throughout life. Man is thus, from the cradle to the grave,
accompanied both by an evil and a good genius. The
good genius registers all his good deeds, and the evil
genius his bad ones. When the man dies, the evil genius
Körmoss carries his soul down to the throne of Erlik
Khan to be judged. If the man has done more good
than evil in his lifetime, Erlik Khan has no power over
him, and he mounts upwards to higher regions. But if he
has done more evil than good he is sent down to the
Shamanistic hell, below the throne of Erlik Khan, where he
is boiled in kettles with burning tar, until he is purified
of his earthly sin, when he mounts upward little by
little into the higher strata of the spirit world.
Our friend at Katanskoie told us that the Shamans on
the Taimyr, besides smaller annual meetings, have a large
conference every third year in some secluded place on the
tundra, where the officials cannot reach them. At these
meetings, not only are spiritual exercises held, but also
consultations on the temporal affairs of the natives. Although
Shamanism is strictly forbidden, and Russian missionaries
have for many years been doing mission-work in northern
Siberia, the fact remains that the great majority of the
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