ignant
influence. An interesting instance of this is given in Colenso's _Maori
Lexicon_ as illustrated by the meaning of the Maori word _atua_.

The importance of recognizing the special sense in which the word
"unclean" is used in this connection was clearly pointed out by Robertson
Smith in the case of the Semites. "The Hebrew word _tame_ (unclean)," he
remarked, "is not the ordinary word for things physically foul; it is a
ritual term, and corresponds exactly to the idea of _taboo_. The ideas
'unclean' and 'holy' seem to us to stand in polar opposition to one
another, but it was not so with the Semites. Among the later Jews the Holy
Books 'defiled the hands' of the reader as contact with an impure thing
did; among Lucian's Syrians the dove was so holy that he who touched it
was unclean for a day; and the _taboo_ attaching to the swine was
explained by some, and beyond question correctly explained, in the same
way. Among the heathen Semites,[362] therefore, unclean animals, which it
was pollution to eat, were simply holy animals." Robertson Smith here
made no reference to menstruation, but he exactly described the primitive
attitude toward menstruation. Wellhausen, however, dealing with the early
Arabians, expressly mentions that in pre-Islamic days, "clean" and
"unclean" were used solely with reference to women in and out of the
menstrual state. At a later date Frazer developed this aspect of the
conception of taboo, and showed how it occurs among savage races
generally. He pointed out that the conceptions of holiness and pollution
not having yet been differentiated, women at childbirth and during
menstruation are on the same level as divine kings, chiefs, and priests,
and must observe the same rules of ceremonial purity. To seclude such
persons from the rest of the world, so that the dreaded spiritual danger
shall not spread, is the object of the taboo, which Frazer compares to "an
electrical insulator to preserve the spiritual force with which these
persons are charged from suffering or inflicting, harm by contact with the
outer world." After describing the phenomena (especially the prohibition
to touch the ground or see the sun) found among various races, Frazer
concludes: "The object of secluding women at menstruation is to neutralize
the dangerous influences which are supposed to emanate from them at such
times. The general effect of these rules is to keep the girl suspended, so
to say, between heaven and earth.