Are Animals Religious?

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Chimpanzees are just as spiritual as humans. Or so said the late renowned primatologist Jane Goodall. During her field work in Tanzania, she observed chimpanzees acting kind of odd at the base of a waterfall. These chimps, who normally avoid water, would spend up to 10 minutes rhythmically swaying around the waterfall, stamping their feet, sitting in the stream, staring at it, swinging on vines out and around it, and throwing rocks over it. Goodall called these behaviors a dance. A dance that she thinks is inspired by feelings of awe, which she links to spirituality. She says, "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. You get the feeling that it's all locked up inside them and the only way they can express it is through this fantastic rhythmic dance."

Goodall is not the only scientist who has suggested that animals might practice something resembling religion. Ethologists or scientists who study animal behavior have documented behaviors responding to death in a variety of species that have been compared to wakes or funerals. And a large body of evidence appears to show that many animals experience emotions like grief, joy, and yes, maybe even awe. But this raises a bunch of questions about what counts as religion. Do feelings of awe and grief actually amount to religion? What about behaviors that resemble dances or funerals? Can we call these behaviors religious rituals? In many ways, asking whether or not animals have religion forces us to think about what religion is in the first place.

Back in 2018, an orca named Tlequa made headlines around the world. She had given birth to a calf who died shortly after, and she proceeded to carry the calf's dead body on her back for 17 days across 1,000 miles in what scientists called a tour of grief. Orca biologist Deborah Giles noted that what Tlequa did was not easy. She needed to continually retrieve the body of her baby as it sunk into the ocean. She needed to hold her breath for long periods of time as carrying the body on her back restricted her breathing. Giles said, "It's obvious what's happening. You cannot interpret it any other way. This is an animal that is grieving for its dead baby and she doesn't want to let go."

But other scientists challenged this idea. The zoologologist Jules Howard argues that when we attribute emotions to animals, we are projecting our own experiences onto them. In an article published in the Guardian, he addressed the whole Tlequa situation, purposefully referring to the whale by the less emotionally charged designation J35. Howard writes that it is impossible to scientifically test whether J35 was in fact experiencing grief. If you believe J35 was displaying evidence of mourning or grief, you are making a case that rests on faith, not on scientific endeavor.

However, a number of scientists argue that we can safely conclude that at least some animals are experiencing emotions analogous to what humans experience. Brain imaging studies have shown important similarities in the structure and chemistry of animal and human brains in areas related to emotion. Cross species neuroscience studies have shown that primary emotions are linked to subcortical regions of the brain that are anatomically, neurochemically, and functionally homologous in all mammals that have been studied. In other words, human and non-human mammals alike share neurological structures that provide a neural substrate for primary emotions. There's also evidence for emotional capacity in non-mamals. For example, some studies have found that birds can experience fear, frustration, and even post-traumatic stress disorder. Based on all this research, the biologist Mark Beckov asserts that rejecting the possibility of animal emotions amounts to bad biology.

So, what about ritual behavior? Going back to that orca, was this an example of Tlequa engaging in a funeral for her baby, or was this J35 inexplicably toying with its deceased offspring? Animals reactions to death have been documented in other species besides orcas and have been frequently compared to human death rituals like funerals. For example, elephants appear to mourn their dead. They've been seen staying with deceased members of their herd for extended periods of time, gently touching and caressing the body with their trunks and showing signs of distress and even covering the dead with dirt or leaves. A video captured in 2016 showed that members of three different elephant families visited the corpse of a fallen matriarch repeatedly passing by the body and engaging with it through touch and smell. A 2019 study found that a group of gorillas in Rwanda engaged in mourning behaviors after the death of a male and female pair. For days following their deaths, members of their pack gathered around the bodies, touching and grooming them. In chimpanzees, mothers have been observed carrying their deceased infants for days or even weeks, grooming the body.

But even if we can establish that animals do in fact experience emotions like awe or grief, and that they do indeed engage in ritualized behavior, an important question still remains. Does all of this count as religion? Religion is famously difficult to define. The word encompasses an impossibly huge and diverse constellation of components. Sacred texts, worship of deities, theories about the origins of the universe, moral codes, prayer, meditation, pilgrimage, festivals, Jesus action figures. Now, scholars have argued that we cannot define religion by essential characteristics. This is called essentialism. Essentialism is the idea that things in the world are defined by having certain fundamental characteristics or traits. And if it doesn't have those traits, it doesn't count. For example, religion is often thought to be rooted in belief in the supernatural. Without this, it can't be religion. This view can be traced to Protestant and enlightenment concepts of religion that emphasize written texts and doctrines as well as the cognitive acceptance of their propositions. In many ways, this makes the definition of religion to always look like Protestant Christianity, a form of religion that does indeed emphasize texts, doctrines, and credal acceptance of particular truth claims. Essentialist definitions of religion are based on the idea that there is something inherently different about religion than any other cultural phenomenon which makes religion a uniquely human experience that is unique in its characteristics.

But what if it's not? What if we could imagine a definition of religion flexible enough to encompass animal behavior as well? This is what the scholar of religion James Herod has set out to do. To create a transspecies definition of religion. This requires deleting everything about religion that is human-centric. No language, no complex theological beliefs, no ideas of gods or divine beings, formal rituals or mythologies. Instead, Herod focuses on the shared emotional and behavioral patterns that could resemble religion across species. His transc breaks religion down into five dimensions. Reverence, or showing devotion, intense love, or deep respect. careful observance or intentional focused attention directed at a phenomenon. Experiencing or expressing the emotion of dread. Experiencing or expressing the emotion of wonder which are two aspects of awe in his opinion. Dread as a form of awe and an aspect of terror and wonder as awe in the sense of curiosity or fascination. And finally, a dimension of intimacy or communion with others. Together, these dimensions make up Herod's transspecies definition. what he calls a kind of prototype of human religion, stripped of all human things.

In a follow-up article, he applies his definition to chimpanzees. He starts by demonstrating how chimpanzees are very intelligent, and if their intelligence shares enough characteristics with human intelligence, then some of their behaviors could be seen as analogous to human behaviors, including religious behavior. Studies show that chimpanzees are capable of symbolic understanding, like recognizing the values of numbers. Their emotional complexity is evident in their expressions of joy, fear, and confusion, and they communicate these emotions through a wide range of vocalizations and gestures, which they adapt for emphasis, much like humans. While scientists debate whether chimpanzees possess a theory of mind, as in being able to detect the intentions of others, some evidence suggests that they may partly understand others intentions, engage in deception, and use basic analogical reasoning, forming the basis for empathy and social understanding. Some scientists argue that chimpanzees also exhibit moral behavior, enforcing social norms, breaking up fights, and showing empathy through acts of reciprocity and fairness. Moreover, chimpanzees show signs of cultural learning, passing on behaviors unique to specific groups, such as the waterfall behavior that Jane Goodall observed. A 2024 study found that chimpanzees could learn complex tasks through social observation, suggesting foundational capacities for cumulative culture. Herod argues that all of this research suggests that chimpanzees have a cognitive and emotional foundation that in many ways is analogous to humans. They grasp symbols, adapt emotional expressions, understand basic social intentions, and even pass along behaviors to other generations. So, if they possess these foundational capabilities, might they also be capable of behaviors that resemble religion?

Herod applies his definition to several observable chimpanzeee behaviors. For example, chimpanzees have been observed reacting to death in extraordinary ways. One study describes a large group of chimps gathering around a dead companion sitting quietly and simply gazing at the corpse for hours. Similar behavior was observed in the Ivory Coast Thai forest when a young chimp was killed by a leopard. The group lingered by the body for over 6 hours. Some grooming the corpse, others guarding it, only allowing higher ranking females to approach it. Chimpanzees also react to their dead companions with specific vocalizations like screaming in a particular way that generally signals extreme danger like in response to a lethal carnivore in another call used to express anger. Herod argues that we can call these ritualized responses to death. First, they are surprisingly structured behaviors and not just random actions. And these behaviors seem to be shared across different groups of chimps. He also argues that these behaviors are recombinations of ordinary behaviors that are applied to an extraordinary situation, like that lethal predator threat scream. Herod points out that in everyday usage, this is an alarm that a potentially lethal creature is nearby. And it's usually a signal that you should run away. But in this case, after the death of a companion, the call is reframed into an announcement to encourage others to gather around. Literally the opposite of running away. In other words, chimpanzees repurpose everyday vocalizations, giving them new meanings from their original purpose. This is one of the reasons why Herod concludes that we can label these behaviors as rituals. Scholars these days often define rituals more as a process rather than a specific type of action. The process of ritualization is when someone transforms an ordinary behavior, like drinking some wine, into an extraordinary behavior, like drinking the blood of Christ during a Catholic mass. An ordinary behavior is repurposed for an extraordinary event. In these cases, chimpanzees are repurposing everyday behaviors like grooming and screaming in fear of a leopard for an extraordinary event, a period of observation of their dead companion.

He then evaluates whether or not these behaviors meet his trans species definition of religion. He argues that his criteria of reverence and careful observation are met by chimpanzees observing the corpse silently for hours, grooming it, and highranking individuals guarding it. The various screams that chimps make exhibit dread and awe. He also applies his methodology to the waterfall dance that we started with. He notes that chimps appear to express some sort of awareness of and awe in response to elemental natural phenomena like sudden wind gusts, rainstorms, thunder, fire, waterfalls, earthquakes, sunsets, and flowing water. For example, in response to flowing water, they'll sit motionless and silent for extended periods of time, gazing at the water. In response to fire, wind, thunder, or rainstorms, they'll engage in aggressive charging displays, racing forward, shaking branches, or throwing stones. Charging displays like these are usually done to assert dominance over other chimpanzees. But in these cases, there is no opponent. Herod argues behaviors like these express reverence, wonder, and dread, and again are examples of ordinary behavior being repurposed for extraordinary events.

Now, I understand if you're skeptical. We can't exactly interview a chimpanzeee about what it feels or what it's doing. So maybe we're again reading humanlike intentions into behaviors that don't necessarily hold the same meaning for chimpanzees. The same problem we ran into with that orca tlequa or J35, whatever designation we want to use. Throughout this study, Herod self-consciously uses the phrase as if to try to characterize the meaning or intent of certain behaviors. Chimpanzees scream after the death of a companion as if undefended and vulnerable before death. They glance back at the corpse as if it's a final farewell, never again to follow. Some might argue that interpreting these behaviors as final farewells or feeling vulnerable is again simple projection. Attributing human-like emotions and thoughts to animals based on our own experiences and cultural concepts around death and loss. Others might argue that Herod's theory is essentialism by another name, attempting to identify core components of religion that are not necessarily self-evidently religious.

Instead of identifying specific components of religion, what if we looked at religion on an even more basic level as an animal instinct? In his book, Religious Aex, the scholar Donovan Schaefer argues that we fail to see nonhuman animal religion because we only search for religion in places where we already know we will find it. Here we are looking for awe and dread, funerals and dances. But he argues we should think about religion in terms of what bodies do and how things feel. In other words, he argues that religion is all about emotions and bodily sensations, things that both humans and non-human animals experience. Schaefer examines religion through the lens of something called affect theory. Basically, affect theory is the idea that emotions and feelings often shape our actions before we even start thinking about them. It's like how you feel afraid or excited without consciously deciding to. Your body just reacts. Schaefer argues that this applies to religious experiences as well. What we think of as religion emerges from these emotional bodily responses that have little to do with rational or intellectual thought. So if religion requires holding language-based beliefs, then yeah, it is a phenomenon restricted to humans. But if religion is about embodied feelings and actions, then it potentially is something that non-human animals can do as well. An elephant grieving for a dead companion or a chimpanzeee showing empathy might be having an emotional experience that is analogous to what humans feel in certain religious contexts.

To explore the idea of religion as instinctive nonverbal reactions that arise before we start even thinking about them, Schaefer cites the work of cognitive anthropologist Stuart Guthrie. Drawing on research from the field of cognitive and evolutionary science, Guthrie argues that religion is an accidental byproduct of evolutionary processes. In other words, a lot of behaviors and emotions that we call religion did not evolve specifically for religious purposes, but as a byproduct of the way our brains and the brains of other animals are wired to make sense of the world and navigate our environments. As an example, Guthrie points to what's called hyperactive agency detection. We've talked about this in other videos, but to summarize, this is the tendency for animals to interpret uncertain or ambiguous environments cautiously, especially when it comes to detecting potential threats. Humans and other animals are very quick to assume that something in their environment might be alive. Imagine you're walking in the woods and you hear rustling behind you. Your instinct might be to assume that it's a predator or some other creature, even though it could just be the wind. This cautious approach to interpreting the world has been useful for survival because it's safer to accidentally assume a potential threat is there than to ignore one completely. Safer to accidentally assume a boulder is a bear than to accidentally assume a bear is a boulder. The first one results in a jump scare. The latter results in you being dead. Some scientists think that this hyperactive agency detection system is an instinctual basis for believing in invisible beings like gods. Guthrie believes that the chimps are responding to the waterfall as if it were a living thing, something they instinctively react to. This dance might be a display to this agent even though the waterfall is not alive as we traditionally understand what that means. Schaefer emphasizes that this behavior is not about survival in any straightforward way. It's not evolutionarily adaptive in the sense that it helps the chimps find food, avoid predators, or reproduce. Instead, it's a byproduct of the way their brains are wired to detect agents in their environment. So, the waterfall dance may be an emotional instinctive response to a natural phenomenon. And Schaefer describes this reaction as a religious-like experience in so far as it's similar to what humans might feel when encountering something awe inspiring in nature.

Now, Schaefer admits that the chimpanzeee's response to the waterfall is still a mystery. Again, we cannot interview these chimps, but he theorizes they're drawing from an evolved cognitive tendency, like how they might react to a potential threat. Similar to James Herod's understanding of animal ritual, these behaviors have moved beyond their original evolutionary purpose. The same survival instinct that prompts chimps to avoid being eaten by a leopard moves them to respond to waterfalls in extraordinary ways. So, it is a stretch to say that human funerals and an elephant reacting to the corpse of a dead companion are the same thing. Human funerals are embedded within complex social dynamics and symbolic meanings that reflect cultural, religious, and linguistic constructs that are simply absent in elephant behavior. But Schaefer would argue that these behaviors are not fundamentally different. Both behaviors, a funeral and an elephant caressing its dead companion, emerge from reactions to death. And the human reaction is in a continuum with animal behavior. The animal behavior just happens to lack language or belief in the supernatural. That's not to say language or belief are not important to almost all forms of human religion, but it is to say that these are not fundamental or essential components of religion.

Now, this is an admittedly unconventional way to think about religion. As humans, it is very, very difficult to imagine religion without human-like characteristics. But these theories are not intended to serve as the final word on what religion is or is not. It's more about a way to challenge our preconceptions about religion, opening up new ways of understanding religion as more than its stereotypical components like gods, liturgies, texts, or doctrines. It's less about focusing on strict definitions or essential components, and more about how religion may emerge from fundamental bodily emotions and feelings. Viewing religion as instinctive bodily reactions to life events, natural phenomena, and the landscape may bridge the gap between human and animal behavior. We are very quick to call these animal behaviors quasi religion or proto religion. But perhaps these are knee-jerk reactions to try to protect religion as a uniquely human thing. Maybe we should consider the inverse. Rather than asking, is animal behavior religious? We should ask, is human religion on a continuum with animal behavior?

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