The central place in the worldview of the Khakass people is occupied by ideas about the soul. It is believed that the soul is the center, the criterion of life; it is in everything. It is the soul that makes it possible to connect everything with everything; this idea is most clearly manifested in the ideas of transitions to other worlds, in the practice of shamans and in the interpretation of dreams of ordinary mortals. Before starting to characterize this phenomenon in the Khakass worldview, it should be noted that the interpretation of the concept of soul in the traditional consciousness differs significantly from the Christian understanding of this substance. As far back as the 19th century, the famous researcher L. Levy-Bruhl was critical of the use of the term soul in describing the thinking of primitive people, since "a sense of belonging and unity" with the vital principle dissolved in nature has nothing to do with the "spiritual guest of the body", called the soul [1999, pp. 73-74]. S. D. Mainagashev, a researcher of Khakass ethnic culture, noted that "the soul proper, as a being capable of living after a person's death, has several names" [1915, p. 278]. Soviet ethnographic science also expressed opinions about the complexity of using the termIn particular, it refers to the beliefs of the Sayan-Altai Turks, since it does not describe all the properties and qualities that archaic consciousness gives to this phenomenon [Alekseev, 1980, p.21; Diakonova, 1975, p. 43; Potapov, 1991, p. 27-28]. In our opinion, the most accurate definition of the concept of soul is proposed by the authors of the monograph "Traditional Worldview of the Turks of Southern Siberia..." [1989]. They consider the soul as a "vital activity of a person", which "acts as a complex interweaving of anatomical characteristics, physiological processes, mentality, and all this is supplemented by social characteristics" [Ibid., pp. 54-55]. Ideas about the soul as a vital force and functions of th ... Read more