A background on Dai religous beliefs

Dai people are originally animists believing in super-natural spirits (phi - ᥚᥤᥴ). Although these spirits can be both benevolent (phi li - ᥚᥤᥴᥘᥤᥴ) as well as fiendish (phi hâai - ᥚᥤᥴᥞᥣᥭᥳ), the Tais believe that guardian spirits have a huge impact on our day to day live.

And each spirit has a special bias to the spectrum it is associated with. Village guardian spirit cares only about the village it is guarding. Water spirits care only about water, forest spirits care only about forests and one's ancestral spirits care only about their own mortal descendants and guiding them towards true path.

Tai animist philosphy explains natural disasters like tsunami, earthquake, etc are through supernatural spirit medium. Landslides and floods are explained as the angst of land and water spirits, to reply to human provoking or maintain balance in nature. Success and failure of a human being are also explained as the working of ancestral spirits being benevolent or evil to the mortals.

Diffusion with Hindu Paganist Beliefs

Dai people originally didn't have Gods. They come from contact with Indian religion missionaries such as the Buddhist Goddess Tara or Hindu God Indra. The Brahmins, in particular, created an entirely separate lineage of Ahom Kings dissolving their Tai roots and instead showing them as descendant of Hindu God Indira with 'lowly' Shyama (Shan) woman whom they called as Shudra or lowest of the low in their horrible caste system.

The Ahom Kings saw in Brahmins, a tool to expand their empire and the Brahmins, saw in Ahom Kings, a tool to expand their religion. The Ahom priests however realized the inherent dangers of such adventurism but afraid of saying anything directly, which would lead to their own necks being cut, they slyly invented an “Ahom” of “Dai” version of such Hindu Gods. This was an attempt to resist Aryanisation not promote it but there can be no doubt that these “gods” even today have strong parallel to the Hindu paganist gods like Indra, Saraswati, etc.

The Ahom Kings saw in Brahmins, a tool to expand their empire and the Brahmins, saw in Ahom Kings, a tool to expand their religion.

Meaning of some Ahom Religion Terms

It is very important to note that there is actually no native word for religion in Tai. There are two words — phàsà and sàsnà both of which are from Pali/Sanskrit. So we use approximations like bâan pʰǐi (บ้านผี) or the spirit house which actually refers to the temple for spirits and not the religion itself (because the animist Tai religion doesn't actually have a name). Shan people call it sàsnà phi - သႃႇသၼႃႇၽီ or literally the religion of spirits. Ahom Revivalists call it phrálung - 𑜇𑜞𑜡: 𑜎𑜤𑜂𑜫 which originally was the name of ritual / manuscript but literally translates to the great creator, same as the word Sanamahi referring to the creator God in Meitei religion. So understanding these words in detail might perhaps help us lot in understanding the historical Ahom religion.

Some Terms in Ahom Religion

	Ahom	Roman	Meaning
	Sfa# lu[q	Phralung	lit. great god (a term used for Ahom Religion by Neo-Revivalists)
	B,nq@ fI	Banphi	lit. hamlet of spirits (a term used for Native Tai Religion in SEA)
	xunq fI	Khunphi	god/male spiritual being lit. prince of spirits
	n,[q# fI	Nangphi	goddess/female spiritual being lit. lady of spirits
	mE[q# fI	Merngphi	heaven/country of spirits
	doj fI	Doiphi	so-called “moidam” lit. spirit mountain
	sUnq fI	Sonphi	cemetery lit. spirit garden
	eha fI	Hawphi	temple lit. spirit palace
	lV[q# donq	Lengdon	white light (my interpretation)
	[I#[w@xmq#	Ngingaokham	Deer of Golden Shade (ngi=deer)
	ynq! s,j hu[q	Yansaihung	God of Natural Powers (lit. spread-ray-dawn)
	A,j@ lV[q# dinq	Ai Laeng Din	Guardian Spirit of Land (lit. light of earth)
	cw$fIdmq@	Tsao Phi Dam	Family Guardian Spirit (lit. spirit of dead)
	cw$fIm,nq@	Tsao Phi Man (or Ban)	Village Guardian Spirit (lit. spirit of village)
	fa$tEw$cE[q@	Phatertserng (NOT PhatuChing)	Creator God (lit. heaven-touch-state)
	ya@sV[qfa#	Yasengfa (NOT Jasingfa)	Goddess of Culture/etc (lit. grandmother-jewel-heaven)

Importance of Doiphi (so-called 'Moidam')

Now first of all let's debate the word 'moidam' because I find it very irritating and whoever uses this word first has to explain its meaning. It is clearly an Assamese word and some people say it come from Tai word 'maidam'. Now māi - ໄໝ້/မႆႈ means to burn and dām - ດ້ຳ/လမ်ႈ means family guardian spirit, or the ancestral spirits. So does this mean burning ancestral spirits? Literally no sense at all. Some people can try to force meaning by saying it is mâi - ໄມ້/မႆႉ for wood but even that doesn't make sense when you clearly know the object that is being referred has no connection to wood. Also, there is no reason for 'Maidam' to become Moidam in Assamese when Changmai didn't become Changmoi, so it is clearly an Assamese word which I think some people try to reverse-impose on Tai language. Or perhaps it was originally called as doi-dam but because of spelling mistake it became moi-dam. That is plausible

In Tai, these structures are called doiphi - ດອຍຜີ/လွႆၽီ literally meaning spirit mound. Other Tai people stopped making such earthen burial mounds after conversion to Buddhism which makes Ahoms most unique among all Tai group to have still continued this tradition, which has strong similarities to other East Asian burial mound traditions.

Lack of Idol Worship

It is very important to note that there are no idols or relics inside these doiphis. Infact animist Tai religion is completely free of any kind of idol worship, even symbolic worship of idols is against animist Tai beliefs contrasting to the Buddhists beliefs of worshipping idols of 'phra.' Edward Gait notes that Ahom kings found it humiliating to worship idols of Hindu Gods and instead they believed in destroying idols as many religious idols of Tsutias were destroyed to mark superiority over them. The eventual transition of Ahoms from animists to idol-worshippers is discussed in this article

Ending Notes

This is a big criticism of Paganist religions like Hinduism, Buddhism that they don't kill native religions and replace them with new beliefs and new identity. But they intrude on the existing faith and existing identity to completely pollute the original culture / original faith. So anthropologists studying Hinduised or Indianised populations are often left at confusion as to what actually is native tradition and what is foreign. Some may call it cultural diffusion but from anthropologist point of view this is the worst case scenario where a culture has not died but simply irrecognizable.

The ancient Ahom religion has long been lost and attempts to revive it shall all be in vain partly because unlike the language which the Ahom priests guarded and protected very well in written form, there is unfortunately lot of Hindu-Buddhist paganist influences in religous Ahom manuscripts as we can see in Penkaka [18th CE], Phuralung, etc. So we can safely say that Ahom religion died completely.

Although Ancient Ahom Religion is extinct, Ahom people still follow some parts of it like ancestor worship along with their local religion (Christianity, Taoism, etc)

Beyond identity politics and labels is a revived but living tradition of Dai people, their beliefs, and their faith seeking not conflict but co-existence with all communities.