Rafael Karsten

Sigfrid Rafael Karsten (16 August 1879 — 21 February 1956) was a Finnish social anthropologist and philosopher of religion, known especially for his work among the indigenous people of Southern America.^[1]

Rafael Karsten in the 1920s

Career

Rafael Karsten was born in Kvevlax, Grand Duchy of Finland, to a very religious family, and his native language was Swedish. He studied philosophy at the University of Helsinki in 1899–1902 and had his first job at the British Museum.^[1]

A student of Edvard Westermarck, Karsten was critical of theological explanations of religions. He was a critic of Christianity and state religion, and a proponent of freedom of religion. Karsten defended his doctoral thesis, The Origin of Worship: A Study in Primitive Religion, in 1905 at the University of Helsinki.^[1] He was a member of the Prometheus Society, a student society promoting freedom of thought and freedom of religion.^[2]

In total, Karsten travelled six times in Southern America and studied the indigenous people and their religions — in Bolivia and Argentine, 1911–1913, in Ecuador, 1916–1918, and in the Amazonas, 1946–1947, and others — and published extensively on them in Swedish, Finnish, German, English, and Spanish.^[1] He also authored several academic course books on sociology and social anthropology.^[3]

Karsten served as the professor of practical philosophy at the University of Helsinki in 1922–1946.^[1] His pupils included Arne Runeberg.^[4]

Karsten died in Helsinki, aged 76.^[1]

Publications in English (selection)

• The Origin of Worship: A Study in Primitive Religion (1905)
• Studies in Primitive Greek Religion (1907)
• Indian Dances in the Gran Chaco (South America) (1915)
• The Couvade, or Male-childbed among the South-American Indians (1915)
• Contributions to the Sociology of the Indian Tribes of Ecuador (1920)
• Studies in South American Anthropology (1920)
• The Religion of the Jibaro Indians of eastern Ecuador (1922)
• The Toba Indians of the Bolivian Gran Chaco (1925)
• Civilization of the South American Indians, with Special Reference to Magic and Religion (1926)
• Ceremonial Games of the South American Indians (1930)
• Indian Tribes of the Argentine and Bolivian Gran Chaco (1932)
• The Headhunters of Western Amazonas (1935)
• The Origins of Religion (1935)
• A Totalitarian State of the Past: The Civilization of the Inca Empire in Ancient Peru (1949)
• Studies in the Religion of the South-American Indians East of the Andes (1964)^[5]