In the East it is perhaps the Hindu, Chinese and Japanese deities that the general public will recognise more than the native gods and goddesses from Central Asia or in other parts of Asia. However, there is a rich mythology belonging to different countries that offers us a great deal of information on the cultural elements of these people and an insight to their history.
For example, the god Qormusta Tengri, also known as Chormusta (to the Buriats he is called Esege, the Malan calls him Tengeri and the Yakut’s call him by the name Tangara), is the supreme god of the Mongolian deities. We know that Qormusta Tengri is the king of the Tengri, the realms of heaven where he rules supreme over the other deities, not unlike that of Zeus, of the ancient Greek religion.
There are not many reliable sources of information on Qormusta Tengri, since he comes from a shamanistic religion where myths and legends and stories are passed down orally. We do know that, according to Mongolian belief that Qormusta Tengri lives in the centre of the world and is the consort of Itugen (an earth or fertility goddess) or Umai (a mother goddess).
Qormusta Tengri is said to be a creator god and populated the world with humans by combining fire, water and wind. He then populated the world with his own offspring who eventually became the rivers, trees, mountains and everything else in the world.
In recent decades there has been a sharp increase in the interest of shamanistic religions, especially in the Mongolian region where the faith is still going strong and continues to be practiced, despite the exorcising of Lamas (Tibetan Buddhist priests) after 1945 and after the Cultural Revolution in China.
During the 1970’s a scholar journeyed to East Mongolia to record shamanistic practices since no records were ever produced in this region. He records that “The prayers and incantations of the above-mentioned Khortsin shamans invoke Tngri for help, with Qormusta tngri as the highest embodiment of charismatic power; they further address spirits (sunesun) of ancestors, other objects of veneration (situgen), Ongghot and descending helpful spirits”. It is only the most powerful shamans who can communication with the god.
In shamanistic belief there are three realms – earth, heaven and the underworld. In both heaven and the underworld there are nine realms, the highest realm in heaven is where Qormusta Tengri dwells, where he is said to be without anthropomorphic form.
Qormusta Tengri was worshipped fervently by the great Genghis Khan who regarded him (or the Everlasting Blue Sky) as “the supreme deity above the gods he worshipped”.
There is a source which mentions his great belief in Tengri before his campaigns into China. “On one occasion before starting for a campaign into China, Chingis Khan consecrated himself by shutting himself up in his tent, remaining there for three days, the surrounding soldiers and people exclaiming at intervals in the meanwhile "Tengri!, Tengri! Sky! Sky !". On the 4th day he came out of his tent and announced that the Everlasting Sky granted him victory, and that now they were to go and punish the Kins”.
Genghis Khan’s belief in Qormusta Tengri can be summed up in his own phrase – “The Sky has ordered me to rule all nations”.
Bibliography:
Earthy, Dora E. (1955) The Religion of Genghis Khan (A.D. 1162 – 1227), Numen, BRILL.
Heissig, Walther (1990) New Material on East Mongolian Shamanism, Asian Folklore Studies, Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture.
Moses, Larry (1986) Triplicated Triplets: The Number Nine in the “Secret History” of the Mongols, Asian Folklore Studies, Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture.
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