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 Nebuchadnezzar’s Image, 
 

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 { SEP 14 1951 
 
 \A 
 
 THE 
 
 SCRIPTURE HISTORY 
 
 OF 
 
 IDOLATRY, 
 
 ^ SHOWING 
 
 THE CONNEXION BETWEEN THE TRADITIONS 
 
 OF 
 
 PAGAN MYTHOLOGY 
 
 ■ ' . ^ 
 
 AND 
 
 THE BIBLE. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED WITH NUMEROUS ENGRAVINGS. 
 
 BY REV. J. F. BERG, 
 
 PASTOR OF THE FIRST GERMAN REFORMED CHURCH 
 OF PHILADELPHIA. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., 
 
 SOUTH-WEST CORNER OF FOURTH AND RACE STREETS. 
 
 1 8 3 8 . 
 
Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 
 1838, by 
 
 J. F. BERG, 
 
 in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United 
 States in and for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Lydia R. Bailey, Printer. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 An old historical miscellany in the German 
 language, printed A. D. 1728, first suggested 
 to the writer of the following pages the idea 
 of a Scripture History of Idolatry. The 
 work alluded to, amongst a variety of mat¬ 
 ter, highly useful to the Biblical student, con¬ 
 tains a few r pages devoted to the subject of 
 which this volume treats. Although the Ger¬ 
 man treatise is very short, being merely a 
 statement of facts, it embodies no small 
 amount of lore, which must have been col¬ 
 lected at the expense of great research on the 
 part of the compiler, if the number of old and 
 
IV 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 rare books, quoted in the margin, as authori¬ 
 ties, be regarded as a criterion. This little 
 volume contains all that was thought valua¬ 
 ble in the German work, which has been 
 used as the basis upon which the author has 
 arranged his own materials. 
 
 With this acknowledgment due to himself 
 and to the memory of Father “ Johann Ja¬ 
 cob Schmidt, Prediger zu Peest und Palow 
 in Pommern,” the author submits his book to 
 the public, with the humble hope and prayer 
 that it may, in some small degree, subserve 
 his Master’s glory. The topics discussed are 
 believed to be of special interest to the 
 habitual reader of the Word of God, and 
 although the subject may be thought un¬ 
 usual, it is hoped that it will prove neither 
 uninteresting nor uninstructive. Great sim¬ 
 plicity of style was thought desirable, par¬ 
 ticularly when Bible narratives are intro- 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 V 
 
 duced; and these are interwoven with the 
 subject in order to render it more attractive 
 to juvenile readers, and lead them to search 
 the Scriptures. No commendatory notice 
 has been solicited from any quarter previous 
 to the publication of the volume, because it 
 is preferred that the work should rest entirely 
 upon its own merits; if it is good , it needs no 
 recommendation to sustain it; and if any 
 thing less than good , it deserves none. 
 
 J. F. B. 
 
 Philadelphia , Oct. 18, 1838. 
 
SCRIPTURE HISTORY 
 
 OF 
 
 IDOLATRY. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 OF IDOLATRY IN GENERAL. 
 
 \ 
 
 Idolatry, or the worship of idols, is the act 
 of ascribing to persons and things, properties 
 which belong exclusively to God. It is an abuse 
 of that knowledge of the existence of a Supreme 
 Being, which all men possess, and which they 
 derive, partly from the internal testimony of 
 conscience, and (Rom. ii. 14, 15,) partly from 
 the external evidence so abundantly furnished by 
 the works of creation. (Rom. i. 20.) When the 
 primitive inhabitants of the earth, in haughty 
 defiance of the God of heaven, broke his bands 
 and cut asunder the cords that bound them to 
 
8 
 
 OF IDOLATRY I?* GENERAL. 
 
 him , he left them to the dominion of their own 
 folly—withdrew from them the restraints of that 
 grace which they had contemned, and as a na¬ 
 tural consequence, “ they became vain in their 
 imaginations, and their foolish heart was darken¬ 
 ed—professing themselves to be wise, they be¬ 
 came fools,” and the climax of their brutish folly 
 was, that “ they changed the glory of the incor¬ 
 ruptible God into an image made like to corrupti¬ 
 ble man, and to birds and to four-footed beasts 
 and creeping things.” (Rom. vii. 21, 23.) In 
 short, they became idolaters. 
 
 Idolatry has been distinguished as metaphori¬ 
 cal and proper. By metaphorical idolatry is 
 meant that inordinate love of riches, honour, and 
 sensual pleasures, by which the passions and ap¬ 
 petites of men are made superior to the will of 
 God. 
 
 Proper idolatry is giving the divine honour to 
 another. Let me try to illustrate my meaning. 
 Mr. A. is a wealthy man, and a member of the 
 church of Jesus Christ. He attends the house of 
 God very regularly on the Sabbath, comes now 
 and then to the evening prayer-meeting, and the 
 
OF IDOLATRY IN GENERAL. 
 
 9 
 
 weekly lecture, and may be seen at the com¬ 
 munion table, whenever the Saviour invites his 
 friends to eat and drink in remembrance of him. 
 Mr. A. is amiable in his deportment, and his 
 character for morality has never been called in 
 question by the world—but, according to the Bi¬ 
 ble, notwithstanding his many estimable quali¬ 
 ties, he is an idolater; for he loves money so 
 much, and the cause of Christ so little, that he 
 will let the poor heathen perish in their blindness 
 rather than contribute a small portion of his sub¬ 
 stance to relieve their wants. Mr. A. loves mo¬ 
 ney more than he loves Christ, and this being the 
 case, stands charged in God’s Word with the sin 
 of covetousness, which the Holy Ghost condemns 
 as idolatry; “ Mortify your members, which are 
 upon the earth—and covetousness, which is idola¬ 
 try.” (Col. iii. 5.) And, again—“ No covetous 
 man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in 
 the Kingdom of Christ and of God.” (Eph. v. 5.) 
 
 Or, to use an illustration which will be perhaps 
 more intelligible to a child. Suppose you are pass¬ 
 ing by a garden, in which you see some delicious 
 fruit—the trees hang their loaded branches down 
 
10 
 
 OF IDOLATRY IN GENERAL. 
 
 to the ground—you look around you—no one is 
 near and you are strongly tempted to climb the 
 fence and indulge your appetite. You lay your 
 hand upon the barrier, but something whispers, 
 44 Stop ! you are doing wrong—no human eye 
 may see you, but God is watching you !” You 
 hesitate—appetite pleads— 44 It is only a little 
 fruit, and if you take it, the owner will sustain no 
 injury,” and you decide the controversy for the 
 present, against conscience, and in favour of in¬ 
 dulgence. You climb the fence and hurry towards 
 the tree—you reach out your hand, and in spite 
 of the loud outcries of your injured conscience, 
 you break off the fruit and eat. In addition to 
 the violation of the eighth commandment, which 
 says, 44 Thou shalt not steal,” you have commit¬ 
 ted the sin of idolatry—you have broken the first 
 commandment, 44 Thou shalt have no other gods 
 before me,” (Philip, iii. 19.) by making a god of 
 your belly. 
 
 Proper idolatry is the worshipping any work 
 of God or man, such as the sun, or an image 
 made of wood or stone. Such, for instance, was 
 the idolatry of the Canaanites, who made images 
 
OF IDOLATRY IN GENERAL. 
 
 11 
 
 of wood, to which they prayed and offered sacri- 
 fices. How abominable every kind of idolatry is 
 in the sight of Him, who, amid the thunders and 
 lightnings of Sinai, gave as the first great com¬ 
 mandment, “ Thou shalt have no other gods be¬ 
 fore me,” may be seen by a reference to some 
 passages in the Bible. David, speaking of the 
 children of Israel, says, “ They did not destroy 
 the nations, concerning whom the Lord com¬ 
 manded them. But were mingled among the 
 heathen, and learned their works. And they 
 served their idols, which were a snare unto them. 
 Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daugh¬ 
 ters unto devils, and shed innocent blood, even 
 the blood of their sons and of their daughters, 
 whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan,; 
 and the land was polluted with blood. Therefore 
 was the wrath of the Lord kindled against his 
 people, insomuch that he abhorred his own in¬ 
 heritance,” &c. (Ps.. cvi. 34-40.) Indeed, the 
 whole hiatory of God’s chosen people is a history 
 of God’s hatred of idolatry. Read Ezekiel, xvi. 
 and xviii., and Rev. xvii., &c., &c. 
 
12 
 
 ORIGIN OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ORIGIN OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 The prime instigator of all sin, and therefore 
 of idolatry, is Satan, the arch-enemy of God. 
 The efforts of the Prince of Darkness since the 
 Fall, have been directed towards the attainment of 
 one grand object, the subjugation of mankind. He 
 is emphatically the god of this world, inasmuch 
 as a vast majority of the human race, worship at 
 his altars, and obey his laws, thus denying the 
 God in whose hand their breath is, and entering 
 into covenant with hell. It is hardly credible, 
 that the grosser forms of idolatry and supersti¬ 
 tion were much in vogue before the deluge. The 
 learned researches of those who have investigated 
 the subject, seem to prove, or at least render it 
 extremely probable, that Atheism was prevalent 
 in the ages preceding the flood, and that instead 
 of a belief in many gods, the antideluvians be- 
 
ORIGIN OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 13 
 
 lieved in none. Subsequent to that awful judg¬ 
 ment, which swept a race of rebels from the 
 earth, when the descendants of Noah had multi¬ 
 plied, we find that in the course of a very few 
 generations, the children of men had again be¬ 
 come fearfully degenerate. As a monument of 
 their impious presumption, they commenced build¬ 
 ing the tower of Babel, “ whose top should reach 
 to heaven,” but Jehovah baffled the ridiculous en¬ 
 terprise, and scattered the builders by confounding 
 their language. A general dispersion ensued. 
 Different companies, whom a similarity of lan¬ 
 guage drew together, travelled in separate bands 
 to the various countries to which God in his pro¬ 
 vidence directed them; and as they were indebted 
 to the heavenly bodies for guidance, and deter¬ 
 mined their course by observation on the relative 
 position and apparent motions of the sun, moon, 
 and stars, it is supposed that they then learned to 
 regard these works of the Creator with supersti¬ 
 tious veneration, instead of “looking from nature 
 up to nature’s Godso that in all probability 
 this was the first and simplest form of idolatry. 
 In support of this hypothesis, the undeniable fact 
 
 B 
 
14 
 
 ORIGIN OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 may be adduced, that the oldest nations all wor¬ 
 shipped these heavenly bodies : for example— 
 
 1. The Arabians regarded the Sun as the Su¬ 
 preme God, and the stars as subordinate deities. 
 
 2. The Persians held all who paid homage to 
 images in utter abhorrence, and worshipped only 
 the Sun and fire. 
 
 3. The Babylonians worshipped the Sun under 
 the name of Bel. The Phoenicians under that of 
 Baal. The Scythians called the Sun their lord, 
 and swore by it. 
 
 4. The Ammonites celebrated the horrid rites 
 of Moloch in honour of the Sun. 
 
 5. The Osiris of the Egyptians was a type of 
 the Sun and the heavenly bodies; hence the ap¬ 
 pellation of “many eyed” which was applied to 
 this imaginary deity, as though every star in the 
 firmament was an eye, through which their god 
 looked down upon the earth, and watched its in¬ 
 habitants. 
 
 6. The Sun was the Adonis of the Syrians, and 
 the moon their goddess, Astarte. 
 
 7. The Grecians worshipped the Sun under the 
 name of Phoebus; 
 
ORIGIN OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 15 
 
 8. The Romans under that of Apollo; and the 
 moon was adored by them under the various 
 names of Minerva, Venus, Diana, Juno, &c. 
 
 Chaldcea was the birth-place , and Babylon, 
 (the capital,) was the mother of idolatry, hence 
 denominated “ the mother of harlots and the 
 abominations of the earth.” (Rev. xvii. 5. From 
 this store-house of death, the seeds of idolatry 
 were disseminated throughout the East, and soon 
 covered it with a harvest of abominations. Greece 
 imported them from Egypt, and scattered the 
 poison throughout the Western world, until Satan 
 had his worshippers under every green tree, and 
 every hill and mountain was a high place, from 
 which the smoking altars of idolaters cried aloud 
 to the God of heaven, “ Depart from us, we de¬ 
 sire not the knowledge of thy ways.” 
 
16 
 
 PROGRESS OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 PROGRESS OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 There was one particular in which the wor¬ 
 shippers of the sun, moon, and stars soon found 
 their idol gods deficient; they were not always 
 visible, and from this they inferred they were not 
 always present. To remedy this defect they had 
 recourse to images, and vainly imagined that 
 after these senseless blocks had been consecrated 
 with some foolish ceremonies, they became gods 
 that could kill and make alive. This shows that 
 when men have cast away the cords with which 
 God would bind them to himself, their course is 
 only and always downward; the longer the alien¬ 
 ation from God continues, the greater is the de¬ 
 gradation of its subject, until at last his steps take 
 hold on hell, and its powers move from beneath 
 to meet him. Idols were originally either pyra¬ 
 mids, or rude unshaped stones; as the art of 
 
PROGRESS OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 17 
 
 sculpture advanced, blocks of marble were chi¬ 
 selled into various shapes; but the human form 
 was the principal model. The most common ex¬ 
 ternal act expressive of worship was, kissing the 
 hand, whilst looking reverently towards the object 
 of adoration—but it was not long before the 
 images themselves were kissed. To this custom 
 the prophet Hosea refers, (Hos. xiii. 2,) “and now 
 they sin more and more, and have made them 
 molten images of their silver, and idols according 
 to their own understanding, all of it the work of 
 craftsmen: they say of them, let the men that 
 sacrifice, kiss the calves .” And again, in the 
 well known passage in which God tells Elijah of 
 the seven thousand who had not bowed the knee 
 to Baal, we find a reference to this custom—“ Yet 
 I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the 
 knees which have not bowed to Baal, and every 
 month which hath not kissed him.” (1 Kings, 
 xix. 18.) 
 
 The usual mode of showing divine honours to 
 images, was by presenting offerings of flowers and 
 fruits, after the idols had been duly anointed and 
 consecrated. When the practice of erecting altars 
 
 b 2 
 
18 
 
 PROGRESS OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 had become common, animals were sacrificed in 
 order to avert the displeasure and insure the fa¬ 
 vour of these imaginary deities. The ridiculous 
 vanity of such gods is set forth in Psalms, xcv. 
 4-8; Isaiah, xliv. 9-20; Jer. x. 3-15, &c. (These 
 passages will repay the reader for their perusal.) 
 Trees and plants, as well as “ birds and four-footed 
 beasts and creeping things,” shared in the vene¬ 
 ration of the deluded heathen, who changed the 
 truth of God into a lie, and worshipped the crea¬ 
 ture more than the Creator. 
 
 The grossest form of idolatry was the apothe¬ 
 osis of men, distinguished either for personal 
 prowess or any remarkable endowment of body 
 or mind. In other words, the heathen made 
 gods of their heroes; after their death, they were 
 enrolled among the number of their deities. Al¬ 
 tars were erected to them, their statues were set 
 up in public places and worshipped, and in this 
 way, additions were constantly made to the cata¬ 
 logue of heathen divinities. Every province, city, 
 and family had its peculiar gods, who were its 
 tutelary, (or protecting), deities. No doubt the 
 foolish superstition of the Roman Catholic Church, 
 
PROGRESS OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 19 
 
 which requires its members to be under the par¬ 
 ticular patronage of some tutelary saint, may be 
 traced to this source. But the utmost stretch of 
 arrogant folly to which idolatry ever attained, was 
 this; that poor mortals, children of the dust, crush¬ 
 ed before the moth—nay, the most atrocious mon¬ 
 sters in human shape, claimed divine honours 
 during their life-tune , and had temples in which 
 they were worshipped! Such instances are: Alex¬ 
 ander the Great, the Roman Emperor Caligula, 
 and Antiochus the Great, of whom we read, (2 
 Macc. ix. 8-12), that when on his way to Jeru¬ 
 salem, to wreak his malicious vengeance on the 
 Jews, God smote him with “ a pain that was re¬ 
 mediless”—“ and thus he that a little afore thought 
 he might command the waves of the sea, (so proud 
 was he beyond the condition of man), and weigh 
 the high mountains in a balance, was now cast on 
 the ground, and carried in a horse-litter, showing 
 forth unto all the manifest power of God. So that 
 the worms rose up out of the body of this wicked 
 man, and while he lived in sorrow and pain his 
 flesh fell away, and the filthiness of his smell was 
 noisome to all his army. And the man that 
 
20 
 
 PROGRESS OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 thought a little afore he could reach to the stars 
 of heaven, no man could endure to carry for his 
 intolerable stink. Here, therefore, being plagued, 
 he began to leave off his great pride, and to come 
 to the knowledge of himself by the scourge of 
 God, his pain increasing every moment. And 
 when he himself could not abide his own smell, 
 he said these words: 4 It is meet to be subject to 
 God, and that a man that is mortal should not 
 proudly think of himself as if he were God.’ ” 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 21 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 l 
 
 The great adversary of God and man has uni¬ 
 formly blinded his deluded followers, by counter¬ 
 feiting those institutions of Jehovah with which 
 they were acquainted. God had revealed himself 
 by a peculiar title, Jehovah or Adonai, i. e. Lord, 
 Lord. (Ex. vi., iii. 3-14.) And Satan claimed 
 a similar name, and was worshipped as Baal, i. e. 
 Lord or Ruler, by almost every pagan nation. 
 The idols of the heathen being numerous, are fre¬ 
 quently called Baalim, Lords, or Joves , which is 
 no doubt derived from Jehovah , e. g. “ And it 
 shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that thou shall 
 call me Ishi, and shalt call me no more Baali; for 
 I will take away the names of Baalim out of her 
 mouth, and they shall no more be remembered 
 by their name.” (Hos. ii. 17). Hence, too, the 
 worship of idols and devils is synonymous; for 
 
22 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 which reason Paul writes to the Corinthians, “ But 
 I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice 
 they sacrifice to devils and not to God: and I would 
 not that ye should have fellowship with devils.” 
 (1 Cor. x. 20.) 
 
 Again; God at sundry times and in divers man¬ 
 ners spake unto the fathers by the prophets, 
 (Heb i. 1), and Satan attempted something similar 
 through the fanaticism of enthusiasts, devilish ap¬ 
 paritions, &c., and by all the means which, as 
 the prince of the power of the air,” were at his 
 command. It would be altogether foreign to the 
 purpose to attempt determining the limits of Sa¬ 
 tan’s agency. This is a vexed question, and like 
 the generality of such points utterly unprofitable. 
 But we do know that “ he now works in the 
 children of disobedience,” (Eph. ii. 2), that “ he 
 hath blinded the minds of them which believe 
 not,” (2 Cor. iv. 4), and that he always has been 
 the instigator of wickedness, (1 Chron. xxi. 1, 
 John, xiii. 2), ever since the Fall. (Gen. iii.) Of 
 this we may be sure, though the serpent’s head 
 has been bruised by the seed of the woman, the 
 devil still goes about like a roaring lion, seeking 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 23 
 
 whom he may devour. (Gen. iii. 15.) If his 
 chain has been shortened, lie will stretch it to its 
 full length, in order to terrify those whom he can¬ 
 not rend. But to return. Satan had his prophets 
 also. Jehovah confirmed the message and decla¬ 
 rations of those whom He sent, by signs and won¬ 
 ders; and Satan, to the full extent of his powers, 
 did the same by his messengers; and by means of 
 false miracles and the tricks of jugglers and ne¬ 
 cromancers, greatly promoted his cause. Exodus, 
 Chapters vii., viii., and ix., furnish proof of this. 
 There can be no doubt that the feats of the magi¬ 
 cians had a direct tendency to harden Pharaoh’s 
 heart, by making him believe that the power of 
 Moses’ God was no greater than that of the gods 
 of Egypt. There are several kinds of false pro¬ 
 phets of whom we read in Scripture, of which we 
 will enumerate the principal. 
 
 I. Kosem, a diviner: one who paid particular 
 attention to signs, or more properly, determined 
 doubtful cases by .the lot. To this superstition 
 Haman was addicted. (Esther, iii. 7; ix. 24.) 
 The Lord solemnly warns his people against all 
 
24 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 such practices. (Lev. xix. 31; xx. 6-27.) There 
 were several kinds of diviners. 
 
 1. Those who asked counsel at a stock or a staff. 
 “ My people ask counsel at their stocks, and their 
 staff declareth unto them.” (Hos. iv. 12.) This was 
 done in various ways. A common method was 
 that of spanning the staff, or measuring it with a 
 span from thumb to finger, in order to ascertain 
 which of two alternatives to choose. Another 
 mode was, to write names or directions on different 
 staves, and then cast lots to determine which should 
 be taken; or the directions were written upon ar¬ 
 rows, which were shot out in order to direct the 
 proper road when the way was doubtful. “ For 
 the King of Babylon stood at the parting of the 
 way, at the head of the two ways, to use divina¬ 
 tion ; he made his arrows bright, he consulted with 
 images, he looked in the liver,” &c. (Ezek. xxi. 
 21 - 22 . 
 
 2. A second kind of diviners consisted of those 
 who examined the entrails of sacrifices. (Ezek. 
 xxi. 21.) The colour, position, or number of the 
 entrails was made a criterion by means of which 
 doubts were decided. This superstitious custom 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 25 
 
 originated in Chaldcea, whence the Lydians im¬ 
 ported it, and from them the Romans learned its 
 practice. 
 
 3. Another mode of divination was the custom 
 of opening a book of one of their poets, &c., at 
 random, and then considering the first sentence 
 upon which the eye rested as a divine answer to 
 a question previously proposed. I have known 
 some calling themselves Christians, practice this 
 very divination with their Bibles. But surely there 
 is no need of borrowing from the abominations of 
 idolatry, when the blessed Saviour has promised 
 Spirit of the truth to all who will ask for it, and has 
 expressly said: “What things soever ye desire 
 when ye pray, believe that ye receive them and 
 ye shall have them.” (Mark, xi. 24.) And again: 
 “ If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, 
 who giveth to all men liberally and upraideth not, 
 and it shall be given him.” (James, i. 5.) 
 
 4. A fourth class of diviners was that including 
 the interpreters of dreams. They were very nu¬ 
 merous in Egypt and Chaldoea. (Gen. lxi. 8. Dan. 
 ii. 2-9.) There is an interesting account in the 
 Bible of a very good man who was skilled in in- 
 
 c 
 
26 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 terpreting dreams. His name was Joseph; he was 
 the son of Jacob and Rachel. God gave him great 
 knowledge, besides endowing him with many 
 other talents. He was Jacob’s favourite son, and 
 unfortunately both for Joseph and his father, no 
 effort was made by his parent to conceal the par¬ 
 tiality which was felt for him, and the consequence 
 was, the jealousy of Joseph’s brothers was awak¬ 
 ened. Their envy was further excited by the 
 narration of two dreams, which he with great 
 simplicity detailed in their hearing. Now, al¬ 
 though the artless disposition of Joseph was mani¬ 
 fested by the recital of his dreams, yet he cer¬ 
 tainly evinced very little wisdom in speaking about 
 them as he did, particularly as he was already re¬ 
 garded by his brethren with an evil eye. One day 
 he was sent by his father to see after his brothers, 
 who had gone to some distance to feed their flocks. 
 He had considerable difficulty in finding them; 
 they had espied him some time before he came up 
 to them, and were wicked enough to consult to¬ 
 gether about killing him. Reuben plead hard for 
 the poor boy’s life, and prevailed so far as to in¬ 
 duce them to refrain from shedding his blood; they 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 27 
 
 let him down alive into a pit, which was close at 
 hand. It so happened, that just at this very time, 
 a company of Midianitish merchants passed by, 
 and it was resolved that Joseph should be sold to 
 them. He was accordingly taken out of the pit, 
 and purchased by the merchants for twenty pieces 
 of silver; they then went on, and carried their 
 captive with them into Egypt. You may imagine 
 the feelings of Jacob, when his sons brought home 
 Joseph’s coat of many colours all stained with 
 blood, and told the old man this was the only ves¬ 
 tige of his darling son which they could find. He 
 was in great distress, supposing that his beloved 
 child had been devoured by wild beasts; indeed 
 he would not be comforted. Meanwhile the Mi- 
 dianites had sold their captive to Potiphar, an of¬ 
 ficer of Pharaoh, King of Egypt. The Lord had 
 not forgotten Joseph, but was with him and pros¬ 
 pered him, so that he found favour with his mas¬ 
 ter, who made him overseer in his house. But an 
 event occurred which at first appeared likely to 
 blast all the flattering prospects of the young He¬ 
 brew : for, owing to a wicked falsehood fabricated 
 by Potiphar’s wife, Joseph was thrown into prison. 
 
28 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 He might have avoided this calamity, but he chose 
 rather to suffer than to sin, and God did not for¬ 
 sake him. Even in the dungeon, the Lord raised 
 up friends for him, so that the keeper of the prison 
 committed to Joseph’s hand all those who were 
 under his charge. After some time, two of Pha¬ 
 raoh’s principal officers, having incurred their 
 master’s displeasure, were sent to prison, and 
 came under Joseph’s care. They each had a re¬ 
 markable dream in one and the same night. You 
 will find an account of the dreams, together with 
 Joseph’s interpretation, in Chapter lx. of Genesis. 
 The event agreed with his prediction. It was full 
 two years after this when Pharaoh was troubled 
 by strange visions in the night, fie thought he 
 was standing by the river, when all at once seven 
 fine cattle came up out of the water and began to 
 feed in a meadow. It was not long before they 
 were followed by seven other cattle, which were 
 lean and ill-favoured, and these kine eat up the 
 others. So Pharaoh awoke. Presently he fell 
 asleep again, and dreamed the second time. He 
 saw seven ears of corn come up on one stalk, rank 
 and good, and then seven thin ears, blasted with 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 29 
 
 the east wind, sprung up after them. These thin 
 ears devoured the good grain which came up first. 
 Next morning Pharaoh was in great perplexity, 
 and sent for all the magicians and interpreters of 
 dreams in Egypt, but there was not one among 
 them that could make out what his dreams meant. 
 The chief butler, who had promised to remember 
 his friend when he came out of prison, was now 
 reminded of his neglect, and told Pharaoh about 
 Joseph. They send for him in great haste, and 
 the king accosts him at once with the matter that 
 weighed upon his mind: “ I have dreamed a dream, 
 and there is none that can interpret it, and I have 
 heard say of thee that thou canst understand a 
 a dream to interpret it.” Joseph’s answer is worthy 
 of remark. He would not admit what Pharaoh 
 said, because the king’s words implied that he laid 
 claim to this skill just as the false interpreters of 
 Egypt did, whereas he gave all the glory to God. 
 “ It is not in me, but God shall give Pharaoh an 
 answer of peace.” God did not put his servant’s 
 confidence to shame, for no sooner were the 
 dreams told than they were interpreted, and Jo¬ 
 seph’s predictions were all verified. The seven 
 
 c 2 
 
so 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 years of plenty, which had been typified by the 
 seven fat cattle, and the seven good ears, were 
 followed by the seven years of famine, of which the 
 lean kine and the blasted ears of corn had been the 
 emblems. Joseph was exalted to be the second 
 ruler in Egypt; and during the famine he supplied 
 his brothers and his aged father with corn, and 
 saved them from starvation. Joseph’s history is 
 contained in Genesis from Chapter xlii. to I. You 
 may read another very interesting account of one 
 who was inspired by God with such wisdom that 
 he could interpret dreams which nobody else could 
 understand, in Daniel ii. Now all those who pre¬ 
 tended to be able to unravel mysteries of this kind, 
 and were not taught of God , were wicked impos¬ 
 tors and priests of idolatry. 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 31 
 
 | . / 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 II. Meonen. Under this head are included, not 
 only jugglers, who deceived the people by feats of 
 legerdemain, but also astrologers, who pretended, 
 by means of observations upon meteors and the 
 heavenly bodies, to foretell events. They divided 
 the heavens into apartments or habitations, to 
 each one of which they assigned a ruler or presi¬ 
 dent. This fact develops the origin of the word 
 Beelzeboul, or the lord of the (celestial) buildings. 
 (Matt. x. 25, xii. 24-27; Mark, iii. 22; Luke, xi. 
 15-19.) The study of astrology was interdicted to 
 the Hebrews—“ There shall not be found among 
 you any one that maketh his son or his daughter 
 to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or 
 an observer of times ” &c. (Deut. xviii. 10.) 
 
 God threatens Babylon with judgments for her 
 wickedness, and the prophet Isaiah says in deri- . 
 
32 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 sion, “ Let now the astrologers, the star-gazers, 
 the monthly prognosticators, stand up and save 
 thee from these things that shall come upon thee. 
 Behold, they shall be as stubble, the fire shall 
 burn them; they shall not deliver themselves 
 from the power of the flame,” &c. (Is. xlvii. 13, 
 14.) Daniel, it is true, gained some knowledge 
 of the art, but he did not practise it. Is it not a 
 burning shame, that, in the nineteenth century, 
 there should be found Christian booksellers, 
 who display the monthly horoscope at their win¬ 
 dows? and that in enlightened Philadelphia, there 
 should be a sufficient number of heathen to sus¬ 
 tain the “ monthly prognosticators,” in the publi¬ 
 cation of their silly predictions ? 
 
 III. Menachesh. The augur, who found 
 omens of good or evil in the flight or screams of 
 birds. This was an invention of the Chaldceans, 
 but they did not long remain the sole proprietors 
 of the art, for the Greeks and Romans soon be¬ 
 came as much addicted to it as their teachers in 
 superstition. Indeed, it was their favourite mode 
 of divination. It is believed that this was one of 
 the abominations with which Manasseh, king of 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 33 
 
 i 
 
 | 
 
 Judah, provoked the Lord to anger. (2 Chron. 
 xxxiii. 6.) 
 
 IV. Mecascheph. Magician, sorcerer, or jug¬ 
 gler. They deceived the people by false mira¬ 
 cles—and no doubt, like Jannes and Jambres, 
 the opposers of Moses (2 Tim. iii. 8,) at the 
 court of Pharaoh, were frequently, by the direct 
 aid of Satan, enabled to perform real mira¬ 
 cles. (Exod. vii. viii.) There are accounts in 
 the Acts of the Apostles of two sorcerers. At 
 the time of the great persecution of the followers 
 of Christ, which commenced with the murder of 
 Stephen, the disciples were scattered abroad, and 
 went every where preaching the word. Philip, 
 (probably not one of the twelve, but the deacon 
 of whom we read, 1 Tim. iii. 13,) went down to 
 Sychar, the metropolis of Samaria, and preached 
 there with great power, and by the grace of God 
 performed many astonishing miracles, so that a 
 great multitude believed the gospel. Among 
 those who were apparently converted, was a ma¬ 
 gician, called Simon, “ who had bewitched the 
 people of Samaria "by his sorcery.” Simon made 
 a profession of faith in Jesus, and was baptized 
 
34 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 with the other converts. The event proved that 
 he was not, at that time at least, a child of God— 
 for, when Peter and John had come to the help of 
 Philip, and in answer to their prayers, by the im¬ 
 position of the Apostles’ hands, the extraordinary 
 gifts conveyed by the descent of the Holy Ghost, 
 on the day of Pentecost, had been conferred upon 
 the young converts, Simon offered to buy this 
 power with money. This was very wicked—it 
 was insulting God to imagine that the Holy Spirit 
 could be purchased with money; besides, Simon 
 evidently desired this gift to promote his own 
 selfish views, and not God’s glory. Peter re¬ 
 buked him very sharply—“ Thy money perish 
 with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift 
 of God may be purchased with money. Thou 
 hast neither part nor lot in this matter, for thy 
 heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent, 
 therefore, of this thy wickedness, and pray God, 
 if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be for¬ 
 given thee, for I perceive that thou art in the gall 
 of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity.” (Acts, 
 viii.) 
 
 Whether Simon repented or not, is uncertain; 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 35 
 
 it is true, he asked the Apostle to pray for him, 
 that the threatened judgments of God might be 
 averted, but if he did not pray himself his soul 
 must have been lost. There is a narrative, in the 
 thirteenth chapter, of another sorcerer, who en¬ 
 deavoured to turn away Sergius Paulus from the 
 faith, but the hand of the Lord came upon him, 
 and he was struck blind. (Acts, xiii. 8-11.) 
 
 These sorcerers were in direct league w T ith the 
 devil, and practised their witchcraft through his 
 aid. Now, though it is generally believed that 
 Satan has not such power at this day, as he had 
 before Jesus died, yet such persons still exist, and 
 by false miracles, tricks, &c., they deceive great 
 numbers. It is very wicked to have any dealing 
 with them, or to have recourse to fortune-tellers, 
 diviners, charmers, &c., because, 
 
 1. It is imitating idolatrous heathens. 
 
 2. Such persons are held in abhorrence by the 
 Lord, and their very existence forbidden. “ And 
 the soul that turneth after such as have familiar 
 spirits, and after wizards, I will even set my face 
 against that soul, and will cut him off from among 
 his people.” (Lev. xx. 6.) 
 
36 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 3. God threatens to punish those who consult 
 them. (Lev. xx. 6.) 
 
 4. It is setting an awful example to others, and 
 is often productive of the greatest evils, decep¬ 
 tion, disappointment, and incredible mischief. 
 
 V. Ciiobher. Exorcist, charmer. This was 
 one who pretended to drive away evil spirits by 
 performing certain ridiculous ceremonies; or, 
 who professed to have intercourse with devils 
 through sacrifices and offerings. Animals were 
 also exorcised. Whenever it was believed that 
 a beast was possessed, an exorcist was sent 
 for, to drive out the evil spirit, which he profess- 
 to be able to effect, by muttering some myste¬ 
 rious and unmeaning words, and going over a 
 routine of senseless mummery. An allusion is 
 made to this practice by the Psalmist: “ Their 
 poison is like the poison of a serpent; they are 
 like the deaf adder that stoppeth his ear ; which 
 will not hearken to the voice of charmers, charm¬ 
 ing never so wisely.” (Ps. Iviii. 4, 5.) 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 3? 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 VI. Schoel-obh. One who had a spirit of divi¬ 
 nation, or a familiar spirit. This endowment was 
 claimed by women as well as men. There is one 
 remarkable instance which you may read, 1 Sam. 
 xxviii. Saul acted wickedly in inquiring of the 
 witch of Endor, instead of asking counsel of the 
 Lord, and God punished him with an awful judg¬ 
 ment for this transgression. When Paul and Silas 
 were at Philippi, they were greatly troubled by a 
 young woman who had a spirit of divination, and 
 who used to come when they were at prayer, and 
 cry out, “ these men are the servants of the most 
 high God, which teach us the way of salvation.” 
 Paul being grieved, turned and said to the spirit, “ I 
 command thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come 
 out of her.” The evil spirit immediately obeyed. 
 
 D 
 
38 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS'. 
 
 It seems the poor young woman was maintained 
 by certain men, who made money by her divina¬ 
 tions, and when they saw that the hope of their 
 gains was gone, they became very angry, and 
 having laid hands on Paul and Silas, hurried them 
 before the magistrate, and accused them of trou¬ 
 bling the city, and teaching things unlawful for 
 Romans to receive or observe. This was enough 
 in those days to insure persecution to the Apostles; 
 and accordingly, after they had been severely 
 beaten, they were thrown into the inner prison. 
 No doubt Satan rejoiced that things had taken 
 such a turn, and that he could thus be revenged 
 on these men of God. But his triumph was of 
 short duration. At midnight Paul and Silas, with 
 their feet fast in the stocks, prayed and sang 
 praises to God, and the prisoners heard them . 
 What must the prisoners have thought? How 
 strange to hear songs of rejoicing in a place which 
 usually resounded with groans and cries of dis¬ 
 tress ! But, after all, it was not to be wondered at, 
 for this abode of guilt and wretchedness had become 
 a tabernacle of the righteous, and there the voice of 
 rejoicing is always heard. (Ps. xviii. 15.) Plow 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 39 
 
 sweet were those strains which broke the silence of 
 midnight, and echoed from the inner prison through 
 every cell of that gloomy dungeon! They prayed 
 and sang praises to God! They were bloody 
 from the stripes they had received, faint and 
 weary with fatigue, and their feet being fast in the 
 stocks, their bodies were kept in a position which 
 alone was distressing in the extreme. Probably 
 they had slept a few hours and now awoke, and 
 the first thing they do, is not to complain and be¬ 
 moan their hard lot, hut to pray and sing praises 
 to God! David says: “ At midnight I will rise to 
 give thanks unto thee, because of thy righteous 
 judgments,” (Ps. cxix. 62), and at midnight Paul 
 and Silas prayed and sang praises to God! The 
 prisoners heard them and God heard them. Sud¬ 
 denly the foundations of the prison were shaken 
 by a mighty earthquake, and immediately all the 
 doors were opened, and every one’s bands were 
 loosed. The fetters which bound Paul and Silas 
 fell off like the green withes from the limbs of 
 Samson. “ The right hand of the Lord is exalted, 
 the right hand of the Lord doeth valiantly!” 
 Every one of the prisoners was suddenly set at 
 
40 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS* 
 
 liberty; God hereby signifying, that the Apostles 
 in preaching the gospel, were public blessings to 
 mankind. The jailor, awaking out of his sleep, 
 and seeing the prison doors open, drew out his 
 sword and would have killed himself, supposing 
 the prisoners had been fled. But Paul cried with 
 a loud voice, “ do thyself no harm, for we are all 
 here.” Here was another admirable trait of Chris¬ 
 tian character. Paul and Silas did not count the 
 keeper of the prison their enemy, though he had 
 thrust them into the inner dungeon, and after¬ 
 wards, to aggravate their distress, had made their 
 feet fast in the stocks! This latter precaution was 
 altogether unnecessary; the jailor might have been 
 content, w r hen he had secured his prisoners, (meek 
 and inoffensive as they were,) in the hold whence 
 they could not possibly escape, without subjecting 
 them to the additional constraint of the stocks. 
 But Paul and Silas loved their enemies. They 
 had so learned Christ that they rejoiced in doing 
 good to them, who despitefully used them and 
 persecuted them. They preached the gospel of 
 peace to the trembling jailor, the Spirit of truth 
 set their testimony home to his conscience, 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 45 
 
 and he with all his house was made a tro¬ 
 phy of victorious grace! What a triumph was 
 here. Satan was vanquished in one of his dun¬ 
 geons! He had instigated wicked men to thrust 
 God’s servants into prison, and was glad when he 
 saw that Paul and Silas were fast in the stocks, 
 but he could not keep them bound in afflictions 
 and iron. Not only were their chains broken, but 
 Satan’s captives burst forth into the glorious li¬ 
 berty of children of God. How easy it is for 
 God to make the wrath of man to praise him, and 
 after baffling and breaking the power of Satan, to 
 bring light out of darkness and order out of con¬ 
 fusion ! (Acts, xvi.) 
 
 VII. Jiddeoni. Wizard. We find such cha¬ 
 racters often condemned in the Old Testament 
 in strong language, and all intercourse with them 
 strictly prohibited. “ Regard not them that have 
 familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards to be 
 defiled by them.” (Lev. xix. 31.) Amongst the 
 “ much wickedness which Manasseh wrought to 
 provoke the Lord to anger,” it is related of him that 
 “ he used enchantments, and dealt with familiar 
 spirits and wizards.” (2 Kings, xxi. 6.) Of good 
 
 n 2 
 
42 
 
 FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 King Josiah it is said: “ Moreover, the workers 
 with familiar spirits, and the wizards, and the 
 images, and the idols, and all the abominations 
 that were spied in the land of Judah and in Jeru¬ 
 salem, did Josiah put away,” &c. (2 Kings, xxiii. 
 24.) Wizards pretended to be able to cure or in¬ 
 flict sickness at their option, and in short, to have 
 power to reward their friends and punish the ob¬ 
 jects of their malice whenever they saw proper. 
 
 VIII. Doresch-el Hammethim. Necro¬ 
 mancers. These were false prophets, who con¬ 
 sulted departed spirits concerning future or secret 
 things. Such characters are designated in Scrip¬ 
 ture by the term, “ those who have familiar spi¬ 
 rits.” Isaiah reproaches the idolaters of Judah for 
 applying to them instead of to the Lord. “ When 
 they shall say unto you, seek unto them that have 
 familiar spirits and unto wizards that peep and 
 mutter, should not a people seek unto their God?” 
 (Isaiah, viii. 19.) And again, when God threatens 
 Jerusalem by the same prophet, he says: “ Thou 
 shalt be brought down, and shalt speak out of the 
 ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the 
 dust, and thy voice shall be as one that hath a fa- 
 
FALSE PROPHETS. 
 
 43 
 
 miliar spirit out of the ground, and thy speech 
 shall whisper out of the dust. (Isaiah, xxxix. 4.) 
 
 The way in which inquiry was made of those 
 who had familiar spirits was this. The necro¬ 
 mancer having repaired at night to the grave of 
 the dead person from whose soul the information 
 was desired, burnt a certain kind of incense, and 
 then holding a rod of myrtle in his hand, muttered 
 some mysterious words, and pretended to hear an 
 answer to his question, coming out of the ground. 
 These are the principal kind of false prophets, of 
 which mention is made in the Bible. The pre¬ 
 ceding statements show how completely Satan 
 had blinded the eyes of the heathen, leading them 
 captive at his will. Oh! how thankful should we 
 be that our lot has been cast in a Christian land, 
 where the gospel is preached in simplicity and 
 power, and that we have God’s Word as a lamp 
 to our feet, and a light to our path. 
 
44 
 
 ORACLES OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 ORACLES OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 The various oracles of heathen nations origi¬ 
 nated in the superstitious rites and ceremonies to 
 which we have referred in the last chapter. The 
 word, oracle , denotes something which has been 
 delivered by supernatural wisdom. The term is 
 used in the Old Testament to signify the Most Holy 
 place, from which the Lord revealed his will to 
 Israel. In the description of the temple, which 
 Solomon built, we read (1 Kings, vi. 5,) “ And 
 against the wall of the house he built chambers 
 round about, both of the temple and of the ora- 
 cle .” And again, in the 19th verse—“ The ora¬ 
 cle he prepared in the house within, to set there 
 the ark of the covenant of the Lord.” While 
 Israel kept her covenant with the Lord, counsel 
 was always asked of God, in difficult or critical 
 circumstances, and then Jehovah directed his peo- 
 
ORACLES OE THE HEATHEN. 
 
 45 
 
 pie what course to take. This institution of the 
 Lord was also imitated by Satan. He gave verbal 
 responses to his priests, couched in ambiguous 
 language, so that, let the event prove what it 
 might, the credit of the oracle would still be sus¬ 
 tained. The Lord answered his priests from one 
 particular place, the holy of holies, within the 
 tabernacle or temple, and Satan likewise chose 
 certain places, in which he established his ora¬ 
 cles. There were three which were very cele¬ 
 brated. 
 
 1. The oracle of Jupiter-Ammon, in Egypt. 
 This was the most ancient. It is said to have 
 been instituted in honour of Ham, the son of 
 Noah, and was situated in the midst of the vast 
 sandy desert of Libya. Alexander the Great 
 undertook a journey to this temple, in order that 
 he might be proclaimed as the son of Jupiter-Am- 
 mon, through the oracle. This was easily obtain¬ 
 ed by bribing the priestess. 
 
 2. The Dodonian Oracle , so called from Do- 
 dona, a city of Epirus, in which it was estab¬ 
 lished. 
 
 3. The Delphian or Pythian Oracle , at Delphi, 
 
46 
 
 ORACLES OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 in Greece. This was the most renowned. There 
 are several points of resemblance between some 
 of the orgies of Satan and the institutions of Je¬ 
 hovah, which are so striking that it will not be 
 unprofitable to advert to them, inasmuch as they 
 furnish additional evidence of the truth, that Sa¬ 
 tan’s favourite mode of disseminating error, is to 
 disguise it in the garb of truth. 
 
 1. The temple of the Delphian idol was built in 
 the form of the tabernacle, and was surrounded 
 with curtains of leather, or covered with various 
 kinds of skins. 
 
 2. In the vestibule or porch of the Delphian 
 temple was an altar, upon which fire was kept 
 constantly burning, like that which was main¬ 
 tained on the altar of burnt-offerings in the taber¬ 
 nacle. “ The fire upon the altar shall be burning 
 in it; it shall not be put out; and the priest shall 
 burn wood on it every morning, and lay the 
 burnt-offering in order upon it; and he shall burn 
 thereon the fat of the peace-offerings. The. fire 
 shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall 
 never go out.” (Lev. vi. xii. xiii.) This fire was 
 called in Greek “ hestia,” which is evidently de- 
 
ORACLES OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 47 
 
 rived from the Hebrew “ esch-jab,” the fire of 
 the Lord. Hence we have the origin of the Latin 
 goddess, Vesta, upon whose altar the fire was 
 never permitted to go out. 
 
 3. The golden tripod, (which was designed to 
 represent the ark of the covenant, Jehovah’s foot¬ 
 stool or dwelling-place, from which he spoke to 
 Moses, Exod. xxv. 21, 22,) was a stool with three 
 feet, and like the covering of the ark or mercy- 
 seat, was surrounded with a golden crown. It 
 stood over the mouth of a cave, out of which the 
 unclean spirit ascended into the priestess, who sat 
 upon it, who then, as though possessed by the de¬ 
 vil, whilst writhing in convulsions, gave her re¬ 
 sponses with foaming mouth and compressed lips, 
 in such a manner that the voice appeared to pro¬ 
 ceed, sometimes out of her body, and sometimes 
 out of the ground. 
 
 4. The Pythian orgies were celebrated every 
 seventh day, like the Jewish Sabbath ; and every 
 seventh year, a grand festival, corresponding to 
 the jubilee celebration of the Jews, was observed 
 with great pomp. At this festival, the psean or 
 song of victory was chaunted; this anthem com- 
 
48 
 
 ORACLES OP THB HEATHEN. 
 
 menced and closed with the, formula, “ Elleleu 
 ia,” from which circumstance, Apollo, (the Py¬ 
 thian idol,) was also called Elelleus and Ia'ios. 
 This evidently was an imitation of the solemn 
 Hallelujahs with which the God of the Hebrews 
 was worshipped before the tabernacle at Shiloh, 
 on each returning Sabbath and Sabbatical year. 
 
 The introduction of these rites into the worship 
 of the Delphian idol, may be accounted for in the 
 following way. Some of the Phoenicians or 
 Canaanites, who had been spectators at the Jew¬ 
 ish worship, (Josh. ix. 29,) or had, like the 
 Gibeonites, embraced it, were persecuted as Jews 
 by the enemies of the Hebrews, and in order to 
 escape from their cruelties, passed over into 
 Greece with a number of their countrymen, and 
 having built the temple of Delphi in the province 
 of Phocis, combined with their idolatrous rites, 
 some of the ceremonies and institutions of the true 
 worship, which they had been accustomed to ob¬ 
 serve among the Jews. This temple thus became 
 the tabernacle of Satan, and “a breathing hole of 
 hell.” 
 
PRIESTS, SACRIFICES, CEREMONIES, &C. 49 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 PRIESTS, SACRIFICES, CEREMONIES, &C., OF THE 
 
 HEATHEN. 
 
 The power of the priests over the minds and 
 consciences of the common people was very great. 
 Of this fact, the idolatrous Jeroboam was well 
 aware; indeed he could nof have devised a more 
 effectual means for sustaining the worship of the 
 golden calves, than by appointing priests for this 
 special service. “ He made a house of high 
 places, and made priests of the lowest of the peo¬ 
 ple, which were not of the sons of Levi. And 
 Jeroboam ordained a feast in the eighth month, 
 on the fifteenth day of the month, like unto the 
 feast that is in Judah ; and he offered upon the 
 altar, (so did he in Bethel,) sacrificing unto 
 the calves that he had made: and he placed in 
 Bethel the priests of the high places which he had 
 e 
 
50 PRIESTS, SACRIFICES, CEREMONIES, &C. 
 
 made.” (1 Kings, xii. 31, 32.) These men greatly 
 hindered the prophets of the Lord. When Amos- 
 prophesied against Jeroboam and Israel, and show¬ 
 ed them what the consequences of their departure 
 from God would be, the priest of Bethel, Ama- 
 ziah, sent and contradicted him. (Amos, vii. 10- 
 13.) It will be remembered that the principal 
 opponents of Elijah were uniformly, the priests of 
 Baal; the prophet at length, however, succeeded 
 in having these wicked men destroyed. The cir¬ 
 cumstances are detailed at length in 1 Kings, 
 chapter xviii. Under the New Testament dis¬ 
 pensation, the Apostles suffered most of the perse¬ 
 cutions which they endured, at the instigation of 
 the idolatrous priests. 
 
 The frequent sacrifices of animals, fruits, vege¬ 
 tables, &c., were powerful instruments in the 
 hands of Satan in promoting idolatry, especially 
 when, as “ prince of the power of the air,” (Eph. 
 ii. 2,) he caused fire to fall upon the offerings and 
 consume them, as in the instance recorded in 
 Job i. 16. “ While he was yet speaking, there 
 
 came also another, and said, the fire of God is 
 fallen from heaven, and hath burnt up the sheep. 
 
OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 51 
 
 and the servants, and consumed them ; and I only 
 am escaped alone to tell thee.” It is true, the fire 
 is called “ the fire of God,” but it will be borne in 
 mind, that in a verse preceding this, the Lord 
 had said to Satan, “ Behold, all that he hath is in 
 thy power; only upon himself put not forth thy 
 hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of 
 the Lord.” This plainly intimates that the ca¬ 
 lamity was occasioned through the agency of 
 Satan. 
 
 It is more than probable that this power was 
 often exercised, in order to confirm the apostate 
 Israelites in their rebellion ; for we find that the 
 priests of Baal readily accepted the challenge of 
 Elijah, and were at once prepared to decide 
 whether Jehovah, (1 Kings, xviii. 24,) or Baal 
 were God, by this simple test. On this occasion, 
 the devil was deprived of a license, which had 
 been permitted him at other times. It must be 
 admitted, however, that deceptive arts were freely 
 practised, and that the sacrifices were probably 
 more frequently consumed by fire, which the 
 priests themselves secretly kindled, than by 
 flames lighted by the breath of Satan; the object 
 
52 PRIESTS, SACRIFICES, CEREMONIES, &C. 
 
 being always attained, provided the prejudices of 
 the people in favour of idolatry were strengthen¬ 
 ed. Fire from the Lord always consumed the 
 sacrifices laid upon his altars, and as every thing 
 pertaining to a feast was freely brought to them, 
 such as bread, flesh, salt, wine, cakes, incense, 
 &c., these oblations were frequently called “ the 
 bread of God.” Speaking of the priests of the 
 Lord, Moses says, “ The offerings of the Lord 
 made by fire, and the bread of their God they do 
 offer,”—“ thou shalt sanctify him therefore ; for 
 he offereth the bread of thy God, he shall be holy 
 unto thee,” &c. (Lev. xxi. 6, 8,17,22.) Again— 
 “ Neither from a stranger’s hand shall ye offer 
 the bread of your God.” (Lev. xxii. 25.) This 
 latter command Ezekiel upbraids Israel with hav¬ 
 ing transgressed—“ Ye have brought into my 
 sanctuary strangers, uncircumcised in heart, and 
 uncircumcised in flesh, to be in my sanctuary, to 
 pollute it, even my house, when ye offer my 
 bread” &c. (Ezek. xliv. 7 ; Conf. Mai. i. 7; Ps. 
 1. 10; Is. xlvi. 16.) The oblations are also called 
 “ the offering made by fire.” (Numb, xxviii. 2.) 
 Hence, the heathen supposed that their imaginary 
 
OP THE HEATHEN. 
 
 53 
 
 deities devoured the sacrifices; that they held 
 regular feasts, regaled themselves with the in¬ 
 cense offered to them, and sucked up the blood 
 of the slain bullocks like flies. The fat and 
 choice pieces were laid on the altars of Jehovah, 
 but the idol-gods received only the offals, such as 
 the gall, the bones, &c., whilst the priests or 
 worshippers retained all that was worth having; 
 and thus the devil was disgraced even in the 
 honours paid him. Among the various rites 
 which were borrowed by idolaters from the Jew¬ 
 ish institutions, was that of circumcision. This 
 was practised extensively by the Egyptians 
 and Moors, and was through them introduced 
 among many other nations, and used as an 
 initiatory ceremony. The Sabbath was also 
 counterfeited, as is evident from the many festi¬ 
 vals which were celebrated every seventh day. 
 The institution of cities of refuge, appointed un¬ 
 der the Levitical law, was also borrowed by the 
 heathen. These cities of refuge were intended 
 by the Lord as an asylum for those who should 
 -undesignedly kill any one. In the East, from 
 time immemorial, the punishment of murder or 
 
 e 2 
 
54 PRIESTS, SACRIFICES, CEREMONIES, &C. 
 
 manslaughter has been, to a great extent, a mat¬ 
 ter not so much of public justice as of private re¬ 
 venge, and the mercy of this institution will at 
 once be apparent, when it is remembered how 
 blood-thirsty the relatives of one who had met 
 with a violent death always were. The refugees 
 were safe in these cities. There were three such 
 towns on each side of Jordan: “ If a man lie not 
 in wait, but God deliver him into his hand, then 
 I will appoint thee a place whither he shall flee.” 
 (Ex. xxi. 13.) “ Ye shall appoint you cities to 
 
 be cities of refuge for you ; that the slayer may 
 flee thither, which killeth any person at una¬ 
 wares. And they shall be unto you cities of re¬ 
 fuge from the avenger; that the man-slayer die 
 not, until lie stand before the congregation in 
 judgment. And of these cities which shall give, 
 six cities shall ye have for refuge. Ye shall give 
 three cities on this side Jordan, and three cities 
 shall ye give in the land of Canaan, which shall 
 be cities of refuge.” (Numb. xxxv. 11-15.) 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 55 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 It is not difficult to trace many of the tradi¬ 
 tions of the heathen to their true origin, and we 
 will therefore devote a few pages to draw a paral¬ 
 lel between facts stated in the Bible and the per¬ 
 verted stories of heathen mythology. Owing to 
 their proximity to, and their frequent intercourse 
 with the Jews, the Phoenicians had acquired some 
 knowledge of the true God and his worship, and 
 either had a confused recollection of accounts of 
 certain miracles, which the Lord had performed, 
 or else purposely misrepresented the statements 
 they had heard, and mingled with them inven¬ 
 tions of their own. The Greeks and Romans 
 borrowed their mythology from the Phoenicians, 
 and the garbled histories of the latter were still 
 further corrupted by the nations whom they had 
 instructed. 
 
56 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 That the heathen had some knowledge of the 
 creation—of the state of pristine purity—of the 
 fall of man—and of the deluge, is evident from 
 the writings of some of their poets and philoso¬ 
 phers ; and we shall therefore leave these general 
 facts, and collate a few histories of fictitious per¬ 
 sonages with the accounts which the Bible fur¬ 
 nishes of the original characters, from which the 
 traditions were borrowed: e. g. The story of 
 Saturn was briefly this. It was said of him that 
 he was the son of Heaven and Earth, that he 
 married his sister, and became the father of the 
 human race; that he usurped his father’s throne, 
 and devoured his children. This may all be 
 traced to the history of Adam. He derived his 
 origin from Heaven and Earth—was married to 
 Eve, who was “ bone of his bone and flesh of his 
 fleshis the common parent of mankind—af¬ 
 fected to be equal with God, and by this rebellion 
 brought ruin and wo upon his whole posterity. 
 The fable of Pandora was, that the gods had 
 intrusted to her a box, in which all the miseries 
 which afflict the human race were locked up, 
 with a strict charge not to open it; but that she, 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN 
 
 57 
 
 SATURN. 
 
 disregarding their injunction, and unable to re¬ 
 strain her curiosity, had taken off the lid, and 
 thus suffered all the ills of life to escape—sweet¬ 
 ened, however, by hope, which still remained to 
 comfort mankind. It is almost unnecessary to 
 remark that Eve is the original of which Pandora 
 
58 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 is the copy. Jubal, the inventor of music is the 
 Apollo, and Tubal-Cain, the Vulcan, of my¬ 
 thology. Noah was known to the heathen under 
 various names. He is called Saturn. This 
 deity was worshipped as the father of mankind, 
 and was said to have been the first who planted 
 the vine. The period during which he reigned 
 was known as the Golden Age, because all men 
 were then united by the bands of brotherly love. 
 The story of Saturn’s having devoured all his 
 children, excepting Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto, 
 with whom he crossed the sea in safety, relates 
 no doubt to the deluge, which overwhelmed the 
 human race, with the exception of Noah and his 
 three sons and their families. 
 
 Janus was another name given to Noah, from 
 the Hebrew word Jajin, meaning wine. (“ Noah 
 began to be a husbandman and planted a vine¬ 
 yard.” Gen. ix. 24.) Janus was further honour¬ 
 ed by the heathen, as presiding over covenants. 
 This probably originated in the covenant, which 
 God made with Noah: “ And, behold, I establish 
 my covenant with you, and with your seed after 
 you; and with every living creature that is with 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 59 
 
 you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast 
 of the earth with you; from all that go out of the 
 ark to every beast of the earth. I will establish 
 my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be 
 cut off any more by the waters of a flood ; neither 
 shall there any more be a flood to destroy the 
 earth. And God said, this is the token of the 
 covenant which I make between me and you, and 
 every living creature that is with you, for per¬ 
 petual generations: 1 do set my bow in the cloud, 
 and it shall be for a token of a covenant between 
 me and the earth. And it shall come to pass, 
 when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow 
 shall be seen in the cloud: and I will remember 
 my covenant, which is between me and you and 
 every living creature of all flesh; and the waters 
 shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh. 
 And the bows shall be in the cloud; and I will 
 look upon it, that I may remember the everlast¬ 
 ing covenant between God and every living crea¬ 
 ture of all flesh that is upon the earth.” (Gen. ix. 
 9-16.) 
 
 Janus was also worshipped as the restorer of 
 the worship of the gods, and as presiding over 
 
60 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 agriculture, ships, and navigation. He was re- 
 presented with two faces, referring to Noah’s 
 knowledge of the times before and after the flood. 
 Deucalion, Ogyges, Xisuthrus, Prometheus, Bac¬ 
 chus, &c., were the names either of imaginary 
 characters, or of real personages, portions of 
 whose history were derived from that of Noah. 
 Japhet, Shem, and Ham, were the three sons of 
 Noah. 
 
 Japhet was the Neptune of the ancients. This* 
 deity had dominion over the sea. We read, (Gen., 
 x. 5,) of the sons of Japhet: 44 By these were the 
 isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands ; every 
 one after his tongue, after their families, in their 
 nations.” 
 
 The history of Shem, distinguished for his love 
 to God, furnished the mythology of the heathen 
 with the story of Pluto, who being hated by his bro¬ 
 thers on account of his piety, was made the God 
 of the infernal regions. Ham is the Jupiter-Am- 
 mon of the Egyptians. Egypt is called the land 
 of Ham. 
 
 The anointed pillar, which the patriarch Jacob 
 set up at Bethel, in commemoration of the remark- 
 
MYTHOLOGY OP THE HEATHEN. 
 
 61 
 
 able manifestation of the divine presence which 
 he there enjoyed, may have given rise to the 
 Betylia, which were rude monuments of stone, 
 erected by the heathen in honour of the pretended 
 apparitions of their gods. Jacob was on his way 
 from Beersheba to Haran, or Charran, situated 
 in the north-western part of Mesopotamia, on a 
 river of the same name, running into the Eu¬ 
 phrates. He had undertaken this journey at the 
 instance of his parents, who were fearful that 
 he might choose a partner for life from among 
 the daughters of Heth, who were idolaters. Re¬ 
 becca had another reason for urging him to 
 take this journey. Jacob had supplanted his 
 brother, and had obtained by fraud the bless¬ 
 ing designed for Esau, and she knowing the vio¬ 
 lence of her eldest son’s temper, was extremely 
 solicitous to have Jacob stay away from home for 
 a season, to give his brother’s fury time to turn 
 away. “ And he lighted upon a certain place, 
 and tarried there all night, because the sun was 
 set: and he took of the stones of that place, and 
 put them for his pillows, and lay down in that 
 place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a 
 
 F 
 
62 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reach¬ 
 ed to heaven : and behold the angels of God as¬ 
 cending and descending on it. And, behold, the 
 Lord stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God 
 of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: 
 the land whereon thou best, to thee will I give it, 
 and to thy seed : and thy seed shall be as the dust 
 of the earth: and thou shalt spread abroad to the 
 west, and to the east, and to the north, and to 
 the south: and in thee, and in thy seed, shall 
 all the families of the east be blessed. And, 
 behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in 
 all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee 
 again into this land: for I will not leave thee 
 till I have done that which I have spoken to thee 
 of. And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he 
 said, surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew 
 it not. And he was afraid, and said, how dread¬ 
 ful is this place ! This is none other but the house 
 of God, and this is the gate of heaven. And Ja¬ 
 cob rose up early in the morning, and took the 
 stone he had put for his pillows, and set it up for 
 a pillar and poured oil upon the top of it. And 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 63 
 
 lie called the name of that place Bethel,” i. e. 
 God’s house. 
 
 How sublime was that simple transaction! 
 how solemn was that hour ! Jacob was alone in 
 a land of idolaters, and the first altar that had 
 ever been built there to the honour of Jehovah, 
 was that rude pile of stones, upon which he 
 poured his libation! The first prayer that had 
 ever been offered in that region by mortal lips to 
 the God of heaven, was that which came up from 
 Jacob’s heart, and the first pledge of entire conse¬ 
 cration to the Lord’s service, which had ever been 
 heard in that land, was Jacob’s vow, “ The Lord 
 shall be my God.” 
 
64 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 Joshua, the renowned captain of the Israelites, 
 is the far-famed Apollo of the Greeks. “ And 
 they had a king over them, which is the angel of 
 the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew 
 tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath 
 his name Apollyon,” (Rev. ix. 11,) i. e. a de¬ 
 stroyer , so called from his having slain the 
 giant Typhon, &c., &c., the parallel to which is 
 found in Joshua’s expelling the Canaanites. This 
 Apollo presided over the Delphian oracle. The 
 story of his conquering the giant Typhon, who 
 had an enormous bedstead, finds an immediate 
 parallel in the history and name of Og of Bashan, 
 of whose iron bedstead we have an account, 
 (Deut. iii. 11,) in these words: “For only Og, 
 king of Bashan, remained of the remnant of the 
 giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 65 
 
 iron; is it not in Rabbath of the children of Am¬ 
 mon ? Nine cubits was the length thereof, and 
 four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a 
 man.” Now the word Og, in Hebrew, signifies 
 to boil or burn, and is synonymous with the 
 Greek typho , which means to kindle or burn. In 
 this way, Og is called Typhon, or, by transposi¬ 
 tion, Python. Apollo, after his victory over the 
 Pythian giant, instituted the Pythian oracle; 
 and Joshua, having slain Og on the borders of 
 the promised land, set up the tabernacle at Shi¬ 
 loh. 
 
 The story of Hercules’ having destroyed the 
 giants, with the assistance of Jove, who hurled 
 stones upon them from heaven, may have origi¬ 
 nated in Joshua’s contests with the Canaanites; 
 for we read, that after the confederate kings of 
 the Ammonites had been discomfited before Israel, 
 “ it came to pass, as they fled from before Israel, 
 and were in the going down to Beth-horon, that 
 the Lord cast, down great stones from heaven 
 upon them unto Azekah, and they died; they 
 were more which died with hail-stones than they 
 
 f 2 
 
66 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 whom the children of Israel slew with the sword.” 
 (Josh. x. 11.) 
 
 Again: the giants were represented as having 
 been greatly terrified at the news of Hercules’s 
 coming, and the same remark is made concern¬ 
 ing the Canaanites and Joshua. The harlot Ra- 
 hab tells the spies whom Joshua had sent out, 
 “ I know that the Lord hath given you the land, 
 and that your terror is fallen upon us, and that 
 all the inhabitants of the land faint because of 
 you.” (Josh. ii. 9.) 
 
 The exploits and character of Samson corres¬ 
 pond in many respects with the accounts pre¬ 
 served in mythology, concerning Hercules, e. g. 
 It was related of this hero that he killed the 
 famous Nemean lion; a similar exploit is record¬ 
 ed of Samson: “ Then went Samson down, and 
 his father and mother to Timnath, and came to 
 the vineyards of Timnath: and behold a young 
 lion roared against him, and the Spirit of the 
 Lord came mightily upon him, and he rent him 
 as he would have rent a kid, and he had nothing 
 in his hands,” &c. (Judges, xiv. 5, 6.) 
 
 Another point of similarity is, the inordinate 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 67 
 
 7 
 
 lust of Samson, which eventually made him the 
 slave of Delilah and the Philistines; just as Her¬ 
 cules became, for similar reasons, the slave of 
 Omphale. (Judges, xvi.) The club of Hercules 
 is Samson’s jaw-bone of the ass, with which he 
 slew the Philistines. (Judges, xv. 14-16.) The 
 centaurs, hydras, and other monsters, which Her¬ 
 cules overcame, are the Philistines slain by Sam¬ 
 son. The tradition of Hercules’ burning himself 
 on Mount Oeta, refers to the voluntary death of 
 Samson, of which we read in Judges, xvi. The 
 Philistines had got Samson into their power, 
 through the artifices of Delilah, and having de¬ 
 termined upon making a great feast to their god, 
 Dagon, they sent for Samson ; and when the peo¬ 
 ple saw him they praised their god, as though 
 their idol had delivered their great enemy into 
 their power. Samson’s eyes had been put out, 
 and now he was brought before them, in order 
 that they might mock his misery. There was a 
 very great concourse of people on the occasion. 
 The house was crowded in the inside, and the 
 roof was also filled with spectators: about three 
 thousand men, women, and children were gazing 
 
68 
 
 MYTHOLOGY OF THE HEATHEN. 
 
 upon Samson as he made sport. He requested 
 the boy who led him, to take him to the pillars 
 which supported the house, that he might lean 
 against them. The lad did as desired, and Sam¬ 
 son having prayed to God to strengthen him only 
 this once, took hold of the pillars, one with his 
 right hand, the other with his left, and bowed him¬ 
 self with all his might—“ and the house fell upon 
 the lords and upon all the people that were 
 therein; so the dead which he slew at his death, 
 were more than they which he slew in his life.” 
 (Judges, xvi.) 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALD.EAXS. 69 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDEANS. 
 
 The origin of idolatry has been traced to the 
 time of Nimrod, and as already stated, the Chal- 
 daeans were the first who practised the abomina¬ 
 ble rites, which were so readily imitated by sur¬ 
 rounding nations. Their principal god was Bel us 
 or Baal; called Zeus by the Greeks, and Jupiter 
 by the Latins. Hence the name Jupiter-Belus. 
 The Babylonians and Assyrians contracted the 
 appellation into Bel. It was a common thing for 
 them to give the name of this idol to distinguished 
 men, e. g. Daniel was called Bel-teshazzar, (Dan. 
 iv. 19;) Gideon was surnamed Jerub-baal, (Judges, 
 vi. 32 ;) and also Jerub-boschet; the latter termi¬ 
 nation, “ boschet ,” meaning “ abominable,” was 
 used, (2 Sam. xi. 21,) as a term of reproach to 
 Baal. In the same way we account for the va¬ 
 riations in the names of Esbaal, called also Isch- 
 
70 THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDEANS. 
 
 boschet, and Meribbaal, known also by the ap¬ 
 pellation of Mephiboschet. (2 Sam. ii. 8, and iv. 
 4.) The Phcenicians also used Baal as a sur¬ 
 name : thus we read of Ethbaal or Ithobalus. 
 (1 Kings, xvi. 31.) Such names as Hannibal, 
 (the grace of God,) Asdrubal, (the help of God,) 
 Adherbal, (the glory of God,) &c., were com¬ 
 mon among the Carthaginians; and we find the 
 name Belenus even among the ancient Gauls. 
 Thus we see that Bel or Baal, (meaning Lord,) 
 was worshipped by almost every idolatrous na¬ 
 tion. Originally, this idol represented nothing 
 more nor less than the sun, which rules the day, 
 (Gen. i. 6,) and it is for this reason that we so 
 frequently find Baal associated in Scripture with 
 Ashtaroth, or the moon, and also with the whole 
 host of heavenly bodies; e. g. “And they forsook 
 the Lord, and they served Baal and Ashtaroth,” 
 (Judges, ii. 13;) and again—“The children of 
 Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served 
 Baal and Ashtaroth, and the gods of Syria, and the 
 gods of Zidon, and the gods ofMoab,” &c. (Judges, 
 x. 6.) And when the reformation brought about 
 by good King Josiah is spoken of, we read, “ The 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CIIALD.EANS. 71 
 
 king commanded Hilkiah the high-priest, and 
 the priests of the second order, and the keepers 
 of the door, to bring forth out of the temple of the 
 Lord, all the vessels that were made for Baal, 
 and for the grove, and for all the host of heaven; 
 and he burnt them without Jerusalem, in the 
 fields of Kidron, and carried the ashes of them 
 to Bethel.” (2 Kings, xxiii. 4.) 
 
 This false god was worshipped by the Palmy- 
 rians, under the name of Aglibelus, i. e. “ He 
 who discovers or enlightens,” as the sun with his 
 beams; or Malacbelus, i. e. king of the stars. 
 
 Nimrod, who is mentioned as having been a 
 mighty hunter before the Lord, (Gen. x. 8, 9,) 
 the founder of the Babylonian and Assyrian mo¬ 
 narchy, was surnamed Belus or Lord; after his 
 death, his memory was greatly venerated in As¬ 
 syria and Babylon, and at length he was wor¬ 
 shipped as the god Bel, and idols of a peculiar 
 form were set up as his images. To this Isaiah 
 refers, (xlvi. 1, 2,) “Bel boweth down, Nebo 
 stoopeth; their idols were upon the beasts, and 
 upon the cattle: your carriages were heavy 
 loaden; they are a burden to the weary beast. 
 
72 THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDA3ANS. 
 
 They stoop: they bow down together; they could 
 not deliver the burden, but themselves have gone 
 into captivity.” God threatens to overthrow the 
 idols—“ Declare ye among the nations, and pub¬ 
 lish and set up a standard; publish and conceal 
 not; say, Babylon is taken, Bel is confounded, 
 Merodach is broken to pieces; her idols are con¬ 
 founded, her images are broken in pieces.” (Jer- 
 1. 2.) And again—“ I will punish Bel in Baby¬ 
 lon ; and I will bring forth out of his mouth that 
 which he hath swallowed up, and the nations shall 
 not flow together any more unto him ; yea, the 
 wall of Babylon shall fall.” (Jer. li. 44.) 
 
 The temple of Bel in Babylon was most mag¬ 
 nificent. It had the appearance as though eight 
 towers were built, one on top of the other. Each 
 of these towers was fifty feet high, so that the 
 whole height of the temple was four hundred 
 feet or one stadium. The foundation covered an 
 area of four stadia square, or sixteen hundred 
 feet on each of the sides. An account is given of 
 the commencement of this tower in Gen. xi. 2, 3. 
 The builders presumed that they could erect a 
 tower whose top should reach heaven, but God,. 
 
Tower of Baheh 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALD JEANS. 73 
 
 to show them how vain it is “ to build the wall” 
 without him, confounded their language, and scat¬ 
 tered them abroad upon the face of all the earth.” 
 Upon the summit of this temple or tower was an 
 observatory, from which the Babylonians made 
 their astronomical calculations. They had at¬ 
 tained such a knowledge of the science of astro¬ 
 nomy, that when Alexander the Great took 
 possession of Babylon, he found observations 
 made by them, extending as far back as 1903 
 years. Their calculation reached to 114 years 
 after the deluge, and to the fourth year after the 
 building of the tower at Babel. This temple of 
 Jupiter-Belus, Nebuchadnezzar enlarged by build¬ 
 ing edifices on each side, to the extent of two 
 stadia; so that its whole circumference was 
 twelve stadia, or 4800 feet, 1800 feet more 
 than that of the temple at Jerusalem, which was 
 3000 feet. This immense pile was enclosed by 
 a high wall, in which at convenient distances, 
 were gates of fine brass. It is probable that Ne- 
 buchadnezzar used the brazen vessels taken from 
 the temple at Jerusalem, in the construction of 
 these gates. (Dan. i. 2; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 7.) 
 
 G 
 
74 THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDEANS. 
 
 Xerxes upon returning from his expedition 
 into Greece, razed this edifice to the ground, and 
 left it a heap of ruins, after plundering the temple 
 of its immense riches, among which were many 
 images and statues of solid gold. One of these 
 is particularly mentioned by Diodorus Siculus, as 
 having been forty feet high, and is probably the 
 image which Nebuchadnezzar set up in the plain 
 of Dura, which is represented in Scripture, how¬ 
 ever, to have been ninety feet high. (Dan. iii. 1.) 
 The difficulty in reconciling the discrepancy in 
 these statements, is by no means formidable. 
 The Scriptural accounts speak of the height of 
 the whole statue, including the pedestal, whilst 
 the heathen historian refers only to the image; 
 for it is farther stated, that it was six cubits broad. 
 (Dan. iii. 1.) Now, if the height of the image 
 alone had been sixty cubits, (or ninety feet,) i. e. 
 ten times longer than broad, it would have been 
 out of all proportion; as in no instance is the 
 height of the human form more than six times its 
 breadth. 
 
 Upon the return of Alexander the Great to 
 Babylon, subsequent to his Jewish expedition, he 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDJEANS. 75 
 
 was anxious to rebuild this temple, and left for 
 this purpose 10,000 men, who required two 
 months to remove the old rubbish. After this 
 had been, with great labour, effected, the further 
 progress of the work was arrested by the sudden 
 death of Alexander. 
 
 In connexion with the account of the image 
 before alluded to, we find an interesting narrative 
 of the constancy of three of the children of God, 
 whom neither threats nor entreaties could induce 
 to bow down to it, and worship like the idolatrous 
 multitude around them. The haughty king of 
 Babylon had made a decree, that, whoever re¬ 
 fused, at the sound of sackbut, psaltery, and harp, 
 to bow down to the great image which he had 
 set up, should be cast into the midst of a burning 
 fiery furnace, and when news was brought him 
 that the three Jews, whom he had set over the 
 affairs of Babylon, presumed to disobey his man¬ 
 date, he ordered them to be brought before him. 
 They were brought, and Nebuchadnezzar asks— 
 “ Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abedne- 
 go ? Do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the 
 golden image which I have set up ? Now, if ye be 
 
76 THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDEE AIN'S* 
 
 ready, that at what time ye hear the sound of the 
 cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulci¬ 
 mer, and all kinds of music, ye fall down and 
 worship the image, which I have made, well; 
 but if ye worship not , ye shall be cast the same 
 hour, into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; 
 and who is that god that shall deliver you out of 
 my hands?” But they were not to be cajoled by 
 promises nor terrified by threats, into disobe¬ 
 dience of the command given to them by the 
 Lord Jehovah, “ Thou shalt have none other 
 gods before me.” They refused to worship the 
 king’s golden image, telling Nebuchadnezzar, 
 that if their God saw fit, he was well able to de¬ 
 liver them out of the furnace, and if such was not 
 the Lord’s pleasure, they would rather be burnt 
 up, than violate the law of their God. This an¬ 
 swer threw the vindictive monarch into a greater 
 rage than ever; and full of fury, he gave orders 
 to have the furnace seven times more than it was 
 wont to be heated, and commanded his' mightiest 
 men to take these three Jews and throw them 
 into the fire. It was done—Shadrach, Meshach, 
 and Abednego fell into the flames of the furnace, 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDiEANS. 77 
 
 which was so hot that the men who cast in 
 the servants of the Lord, were burned to death. 
 The Lord in whom they trusted, was able to de¬ 
 liver them, and did save them. The Son of God 
 came to their rescue—the flames had no power 
 over them, and they walked together with the 
 Saviour, unhurt, through the midst of the fire. 
 Thus God magnified his power in the sight of 
 these people, and his servants by their steadfast¬ 
 ness were enabled to glorify him. Nebuchad¬ 
 nezzar made a decree, “ That every people, 
 nation, and language, which speak any thing 
 amiss against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, 
 and Abednego, shall be cut in pieces, and their 
 houses shall be made a dunghill; because there 
 is no other God that can deliver after this sort. 
 Then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and 
 Abednego in the province of Babylon.” (Dan. iii.) 
 
 2. Nebo was another idol of the Babylonians, 
 from which the names Nebuchadnezzar, Nebusa- 
 raddan, and also Abed-nego were derived. (Is. 
 xlvi. 1; Jer. xxxix. 11.) 
 
 3. Merodach was the name of another of the 
 principal gods of Babylon. “ Bel is confounded— 
 
 g 2 
 
78 THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDiEANS. 
 
 Merodach is broken in pieces.” (Jer. 1.2.) Hence 
 we have the names, Evil-Merodach, Mardocem- 
 padus, or Merodach-Baladan. The latter person¬ 
 age was probably invested with divine honours 
 after his death, and worshipped as the god Mero¬ 
 dach ; though some consider Nebo and Merodach 
 as one and the same, because they stand asso¬ 
 ciated with Bel, in almost the same words. (Is- 
 xlvii. 1 ; and Jer. 1. 2.) Another supposition is, 
 that Nebo was the name of an ancient prophet of 
 Babylon, who was deified; and Merodach, that 
 of one of the first kings of Chaldsea, to whom 
 divine honours were paid after his death. 
 
 4. Succoth-Benoth was also a Babylonian 
 idol, which the Samaritans worshipped. (2 Kings, 
 xvi. 30.) “ Every nation made gods of their 
 
 own, and put them in the houses of the high 
 places which the Samaritans had made, every 
 nation in their cities wherein they dwelt. And the 
 men of Babylon made Succoth-Benoth,” &c. 
 The meaning is literally, “ The tents of daugh¬ 
 ters ,” hence the term has been understood as 
 applying, not to a single idol-god, but to the 
 temples of Mylitta, or Venus, in which the 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF THE CHALDEANS. 79 
 
 grossest profligacy and licentiousness were prac¬ 
 tised by women in honour of this pretended god¬ 
 dess. Perhaps, however, a particular image, or 
 even the whole worship of Venus may have been 
 designated by this name. 
 
 5. Sesach, or Sheshach, appears to have been 
 the name of an idol, worshipped at Babylon. 
 “ And all the kings of the north, far and near, 
 one with another, and all the kingdoms of the 
 world, which are upon the face of the earth: and 
 the king of Sheshach shall drink after them.” 
 (Jer. xxv. 26.) And again—“ How is Sheshach 
 taken! and how is the praise of the whole earth 
 surprised 1 How is Babylon become an astonish¬ 
 ment among the nations.” (Jer. li. 41.) The 
 name, Meshach, which was given to one of 
 Daniel’s associates, was derived from this idol. 
 (Dan. i. 17.) The festival Sacaa , which was 
 celebrated by the Babylonians with luxurious 
 banqueting, was probably instituted in honour of 
 Sheshach. It is believed that the wicked king, 
 Belshazzar, held the great banquet of which we 
 have an account, (Dan. v.) in honour of this god. 
 Whilst in the midst of his drunken revelry, a 
 
80 THE IDOL-GODS OP THE CHALDEANS. 
 
 mysterious hand appeared, writing on the wall 
 the doom of the idolatrous king and the fate of 
 
 his empire, and “ that same night was Belshazzar 
 
 / 
 
 king of the Chaldseans slain.” (Dan. v. 30.) 
 
 There were many other idols to which divine 
 honours were paid at Babylon, whose names are 
 now unknown. Their worship was sustained and 
 promoted, not only by the priests, but by the ma¬ 
 gicians, astrologers, and sorcerers, of whom fre¬ 
 quent mention is made by the prophets. (Dan. 
 ii. 2.) 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, &C. 81 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, ARABIANS, AND 
 
 PERSIANS. 
 
 Nisroch, an Assyrian idol, was worshipped at 
 Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, under the form 
 of an eagle. It is supposed by some that Belus, 
 or Nimrod, who founded Nineveh, was adored in 
 the temple of Nisroch. Sennacherib, the king of 
 Assyria, who defied the armies of the living God, 
 and in the pride of his heart, vainly imagined 
 that Jehovah could no more protect his people 
 than the gods of the heathen nations whom he 
 had conquered, could preserve theirs, was mur¬ 
 dered in the temple of Nisroch by his own sons, 
 after the destroying angel had passed through his 
 camp, and slain 185,000 of his soldiers, and he 
 had returned home terror-stricken and ashamed. 
 “ It came to pass as he was worshipping in the 
 house of Nisroch, his god, that Adrammelech 
 
82 IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, 
 
 and Sharezer, his sons, smote him with the 
 sword.” (2 Kings, xix. 37.) 
 
 Nergal was an idol of the Cuthites, 2 Kings, 
 xvii. 36 ; “ The men of Cuth made Nergal” their 
 god. They had been transplanted into Samaria, 
 in place of the Israelites, who had before inhabit¬ 
 ed it. The word, Ner, in Hebrew, signifies a 
 “ light,” or “ firegalal, in the same language, 
 means to revolve —or, the word galah, may be 
 taken as the root, the meaning of which is, to re¬ 
 veal or discover ; and then we have as the signi¬ 
 fication of Nergal, a revolving fire or light; or a 
 fire which reveals, i. e. the Sun, which, as has 
 already been remarked, was adored by almost 
 every nation, but particularly by the Chaldseans 
 and Persians, whose neighbours the Cuthites 
 were. 
 
 That the Arabians regarded the stars as gods, 
 and the Sun as the Supreme Deity, has been 
 stated in a previous section. The Sabeans were 
 a numerous sect among the Arabians; and in 
 order to distinguish them from the magicians in 
 Chaldsea and Persia, they were called image-wor¬ 
 shippers, because they dedicated statues to the 
 
ARABIANS, AND PERSIANS. 83 
 
 different stars, and presumed that the power and 
 influence ascribed to the heavenly bodies, was 
 communicated to these images. Opposed to this 
 class, were the Magi, or Fire-worshippers, who 
 held those who paid honour to images in utter 
 contempt. This sect originated in Persia, but 
 soon extended their worship into India. Zoroas¬ 
 ter is said to have been the founder, or more pro¬ 
 perly the reformer of this denomination, if indeed 
 the changes introduced by him into the popular 
 religion can be considered a reformation. He 
 was a famous prophet of the Magi, and, like 
 Mahomet, an arch-deceiver. According to Orien¬ 
 tal writers, he lived during the reign of the Per¬ 
 sian king Darius Hystaspis. He is said to have 
 served under a seer of Israel; and if this account 
 be true, Daniel was, no doubt, the prophet in 
 question. Zoroaster commenced his reformation 
 in Media. The Magi supposed that there were 
 two reigning deities; the one was Light and the 
 author of good—the other was Darkness and the 
 author of evil; but Zoroaster introduced a higher 
 Essence, a Supreme God, whom he regarded as 
 the maker of light and darkness; and who, out of 
 
64 
 
 IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, 
 
 these, had created all things according to his will. 
 This idea was borrowed from Scripture—“ I am 
 the Lord, and there is none else, there is no God 
 besides me: I girded thee though thou hast 
 not known me; that they may know from the 
 rising of the sun, and from the west, that 
 there is none besides me. I am the Lord and 
 there is none else. I form the light, and 
 create darkness : I make peace and create evil.” 
 {Isaiah, xlv. 5, 6, 7.) Wherever his influence 
 and principles extended, fire temples were built; 
 not only in order to afford greater facilities for 
 worship, but also to protect the sacred fire, which 
 was formerly liable to be extinguished by the rain 
 and wind, as the altars on which it was kept were, 
 before his time, built under the open sky. The 
 followers of Zoroaster uniformly professed to 
 worship, not the fire itself, but the god of which 
 they considered it the emblem; and because the 
 Sun was regarded by them as the most glorious 
 fire, they supposed that the throne of deity was 
 established there in its greatest splendour, and, 
 therefore, in performing their devotions, they 
 were accustomed to turn their faces eastward; 
 
ARABIANS, AND PERSIANS. 
 
 85 
 
 first towards the Sun, which they called Mithras, 
 and then towards the holy fire. There is a mark¬ 
 ed reference to this custom in Ezekiel, viii. 15, 
 16 : “ Then said he unto me, hast thou seen this, 
 O son of man? Turn thee yet again, and thou 
 shalt see greater abominations than these. And 
 he brought me into the inner court of the Lord’s 
 house; and behold, at the door of the temple of 
 the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were 
 about five and twenty men, with their backs to¬ 
 wards the temple of the Lord, and their faces to¬ 
 ward the east; and they worshipped the Sun 
 toward the east.” Zoroaster pretended that he 
 had been taken up into heaven—that the Supreme 
 Being had spoken to him out of a flame of fire— 
 that he had brought back with him from heaven 
 the first fire, which had been kindled in the tem¬ 
 ple ; and that from this source the sacred spark had 
 been communicated to other altars. This was the 
 reason why the Persians preserved a constant 
 flame, and regarded it as sacrilegious to permit 
 the everlasting fire, (as it was called,) to be ex¬ 
 tinguished. Wherever the kings of Persia went, 
 sacred fire was carried before them upon silver 
 
 H 
 
86 
 
 IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, 
 
 altars. Nothing unclean was used as fuel. No¬ 
 dead bodies were burnt by them, lest offence 
 should be given to their god, if he were fed on 
 carcasses; their fires were therefore sustained by 
 the choicest wood, which was anointed with oil, 
 after the bark had been peeled off. They never 
 presumed to blow with the mouth upon their fires- 
 in order to ignite them, but made use of a fan— 
 it was death to transgress this rule, or to throw 
 any unclean thing into the flames. It was not 
 until a late period that the Persians erected 
 statues in honour of their gods, and worshipped 
 them. This practice was, however, at length in¬ 
 troduced by Artaxerxes, the son of Darius, and 
 father of Ochus. The figure of Mithras presented 
 in the plate, is one of the most common emblems- 
 under which the Sun was worshipped. It repre¬ 
 sents a man with a lion’s head, holding a torch 
 in each hand—a serpent entwining his neck and 
 shoulders, overtops him by the head. There are 
 four wings to this figure, two of which fall to the 
 earth, and the other two are raised towards hea¬ 
 ven. A long fillet, that hangs waving in the 
 wind, proceeds out of his mouth. The wings 
 
t 
 
 MITHRAS. 
 
ARABIANS, AND PERSIANS. 87 
 
 denote the swiftness of the Sun’s course; the 
 two that are raised upwards, denote his rising, 
 and the two which hang down, his setting. The 
 serpent is emblematical of the ecliptic. The 
 torches denote the light and heat emitted by the 
 Sun. 
 
 Among the various ceremonies observed by the 
 Persians in honour of Mithras, not the least re¬ 
 markable was the dedication to it of chariots and 
 horses, which were emblematical of the swiftness 
 of its motion. The horses were led out on par¬ 
 ticular occasions, towards the east, and solemnly 
 sacrificed at the rising of the Sun. The idola¬ 
 trous kings of Judea adopted this practice, which 
 was abolished by Josiah. “ And he took away 
 the horses that the king of Judah had given to 
 the Sun, at the entering in of the house of the 
 Lord, by the chamber of Nathan-melech, the 
 chamberlain, which was in the suburbs, and 
 burnt the chariots of the Sun with fire.” Chariots, 
 with four horses, were dedicated to the Sun, be¬ 
 cause he pursues his course through four seasons. 
 Chariots of a single span were consecrated to the 
 Moon. Three-horse chariots were devoted to the 
 
88 
 
 IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, 
 
 infernal gods, whilst Jupiter was honoured by 
 dedicating to him chariots drawn by six horses. 
 Another common emblem of the Sun was that of 
 a young man driving a span of horses. This has 
 been supposed to bear some allusion to Elijah’s 
 ascension into heaven, of which many heathen 
 nations had no doubt heard. In support of this 
 suggestion, it has been remarked, that the Greek 
 word helios, which means the Sun, closely re¬ 
 sembles the name of Elias. We find the account 
 of Elijah’s ascension into heaven, in 2 Kings, ii. 
 “ And it came to pass when the Lord would take 
 up Elijah into heaven by a whirlwind, that Elijah 
 went with Elisha from Gilgal. And Elijah said 
 unto Elisha, tarry here, I pray thee ; for the 
 Lord hath sent me to Bethel. And Elisha said 
 unto him, as the Lord liveth, and as thy soul 
 liveth, I will not leave thee. So they went down 
 to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets that 
 were at Bethel came forth to Elisha, and said 
 unto him, knowest thou that the Lord will take 
 away thy master from thy head to-day 1 And he 
 said, yea, I know it; hold ye your peace. And 
 Elijah said unto him, Elisha, tarry here, I pray 
 
ARABIANS, AND PERSIANS. 89 
 
 thee; for the Lord hath sent me to Jericho. And 
 he said, as the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liv- 
 eth, I will not leave thee. So they came to Jeri¬ 
 cho. And the sons of the prophets that were at 
 Jericho came to Elisha, and said unto him, 
 knowest thou that the Lord will take away thy 
 master from thy head to-day ? And he answered, 
 yea, I know it; hold ye your peace. And Elijah 
 said unto him, tarry, I pray thee, here; for the 
 Lord hath sent me to Jordan ; and he said, as the 
 Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, I will not 
 leave thee. And they two went on. And fifty 
 of the sons of the prophets went, and stood to 
 view afar off: and they two stood by Jordan. 
 And Elijah took his mantle, and wrapt it to¬ 
 gether, and smote the waters, and they were 
 divided hither and thither, so that they two went 
 over on dry ground. And it came to pass, when 
 they were gone over, that Elijah said unto Eli¬ 
 sha, ask what I shall do for thee, before I be 
 taken away from thee. And Elisha said, I pray 
 thee let a double portion of thy Spirit be upon me. 
 And he said, thou hast asked a hard thing; never¬ 
 theless, if thou see me, when I am taken from 
 
 ji 2 
 
DO IDOLATRY OF THE ASSYRIANS, &C. 
 
 thee, it shall be so unto thee; but if not, it shall 
 not be so. And it came to pass, as they still 
 went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared 
 a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted 
 them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a 
 whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it, and 
 he cried, my father, my father! the chariot of 
 Israel and the horseman thereof. And he saw 
 him no more: and he took hold of his own clothes, 
 and rent them in two pieces.” (2 Kings, ii. 1-12.) 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 91 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 The Egyptians were from a very early period 
 addicted to idolatry. • The Sun and Moon, to¬ 
 gether with twelve other primary gods, which 
 were, in all probability, so many constellations, 
 were the principal objects of their worship. 
 Their supreme idol was Jupiter-Hammon, Am¬ 
 mon, or Amun—evidently derived from Ham, 
 who, with his son Mizraim, took possession of 
 Egypt and Lybia, and was subsequently adored 
 by his idolatrous descendants as the Supreme 
 Being. The temple and oracle of Jupiter-Ammon 
 in the sandy deserts of Lybia, have been noticed 
 in a previous chapter. A similar temple, if not 
 more than one, stood in the city of No-Ammon, 
 or as the Greeks termed it, Diospolis, i. e. “Jupi¬ 
 ter’s city.” “ The Lord of hosts, the God of Is¬ 
 rael, saith, behold I will punish the multitude of 
 
92 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 No, and Pharaoh, and Egypt, with their gods 
 and their kings ; even Pharaoh, and all them that 
 trust in him.” (Jer. xlvi. 25.) “ I will pour out my 
 fury upon Sin, the strength of Egypt; and I will 
 cut off the multitude of No.” (Ez. xxx. 15.) “ Art 
 thou better than populous No, that was situate 
 among the rivers, that had the waters round 
 about it, whose rampart was the sea, and her 
 wall was from the sea?” (Nahum, iii. 8.) 
 
 2. Osiris was one of the chief deities of Egypt, 
 and, together with Isis, most generally worshipped 
 in Egypt. Some authors have alleged that Osi¬ 
 ris is Joseph, the great patriarch, whom God so 
 highly exalted in Egypt; others again affirm that 
 Moses was his prototype, and the supporters of 
 both theories have drawn beautiful parallels be¬ 
 tween the traditions concerning Osiris, and the 
 histories of these two great men. But there is 
 one fact, which is too stubborn to be removed, 
 and which strikes a death-blow at both supposi¬ 
 tions—for, it is certain, that the worship of Osiris 
 was more ancient than either Moses or Joseph, as 
 is evident from the circumstance that the Israel¬ 
 ites imitated the ceremonies observed in the wor- 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS 
 
 93 
 
 OSIRIS. 
 
 ship of Osiris, in the adoration of the golden calf. 
 Another opinion is, that Osiris and Jupiter-Am- 
 mon are the same, and that Ham, the son of 
 Noah, was deified after his death, and worshipped 
 as that god. There is no doubt, however, that 
 Osiris was intended to represent the Sun; whether 
 
94 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF TIIE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 it was, that the priests of Egypt, to conceal the 
 true history of a prince of that name, gave out 
 that he was the Sun; or, whether, acknowledging 
 him to have been a mortal who had conferred 
 many blessings upon their country, they taught 
 that he had been translated to that luminary, it is 
 at least certain, they agreed that he had become 
 that radiant orb, which diffuses light and heat 
 over all the earth, and that divine honours should 
 be paid to him. There were several symbols 
 under which Osiris was worshipped. That in the 
 plate consists of the body of a man, with an eagle’s 
 head, surmounted by a helmet, on which is a 
 figure of the Sun. The eagle’s head, no doubt, 
 refers to the piercing sight of that bird, which the 
 ancients admired on account of its soaring and 
 daring flights, calling it “the bird of Jove;” and 
 also because they supposed its vision to be unim¬ 
 paired by gazing at the Sun. But the most com¬ 
 mon figure under which Osiris was worshipped, 
 was that of an ox; and not only were divine 
 honours paid to the golden images representing 
 this creature, but also to the real animal itself; 
 for it is well established, that the Egyptians kept 
 
 r 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 95 
 
 in the temple of Osiris a living ox, which they 
 worshipped. In Heliopolis this idol was known 
 by the name of Mnevis ; in Memphis, it was called 
 Apis. The beast selected as the object of adora¬ 
 tion, was required to have the following marks. 
 His body must be all over black, except one 
 white spot on the forehead, and another on his 
 back in the shape of an eagle, or according to 
 others, of a half-moon; the tuft at the extremity 
 of the tail was to be bifurcate, and under the 
 tongue there must be a wart. Whenever an ox 
 answering this description was found, it was 
 brought with great rejoicings into the temple of 
 Osiris—there it was kept and worshipped till its 
 death, when it was solemnly interred, and a 
 substitute, with the requisite qualifications was 
 sought. If it happened to live too long, accord¬ 
 ing to their rule, it was drowned in the Nile, 
 for the sacred books of the priests prescribed to 
 this divinity a precise day, beyond which he was 
 not permitted to live; and if his natural death did 
 not occur within the limits there laid down, he 
 was thrown into the river. But, when the ox 
 died a natural death, they gave it magnificent 
 
 i 
 
96 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 obsequies, and on such occasions, were so lavish 
 in their expense, that they who were appointed 
 for its retinue, not unfrequently ruined their for¬ 
 tunes. It once occurred in the time of Ptolemy, 
 the son of Lagus, that fifty talents, or $76,000, 
 were borrowed to defray the charges of its funeral 
 rites. Sometimes it happened that several years 
 elapsed before another Apis could be found. At 
 the very time when Cambyses, king of Persia, 
 was at Memphis, they had just found a beast to 
 suit them, and were exulting with the most ex¬ 
 travagant demonstrations of delight, because the 
 god Apis had once more made his appearance. 
 Cambyses bade them bring the animal before 
 him, and when it had accordingly been led into 
 his presence, he stabbed it in the flank with his 
 dagger, and laughed the priests to scorn for wor¬ 
 shipping a beast, as though it were a god. 
 
 At a later period, the Persian king, Ochus, or¬ 
 dered Apis to be dragged out of his temple, and 
 after sacrificing an ass to their god, compelled 
 the priests to eat the victim. The emperor Au¬ 
 gustus, when requested to visit the temple of this 
 idol, replied that he worshipped the gods and not 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS 
 
 97 
 
 I 
 
98 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 dumb beasts. The mode of consulting Apis was 
 the following. They who were desirous of ascer¬ 
 taining the mind of the god, previously burnt in¬ 
 cense upon an altar filled with oil from the lamps 
 lighted on the occasion, and laid down a piece of 
 money upon the altar, at the right side of the 
 statue of Apis. Then, having applied their mouth 
 to the ear of the god to interrogate him, they 
 went away, stopped their ears till they got with¬ 
 out the precincts of the tbmple, and whatever 
 they heard first was received as an answer from 
 the idol. 
 
 The children of Israel, when in Egypt, had 
 been spectators at the festivals, held in honour of 
 this idol, and hence their worshipping the Lord 
 under the figure of a golden calf, is easily ac¬ 
 counted for. Aaron made the image after the 
 model of Apis, and the Israelites adored it accord¬ 
 ing to the Egyptian custom with feasting, dancing, 
 and singing. Moses had gone up to commune 
 with the Lord on Mount Sinai, and delaying some¬ 
 what longer than the Israelites thought desirable, 
 they came to Aaron and said, “ Up, make us 
 gods which shall go before us; for, as for this 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 99 
 
 Moses, the man that brought us up out of the 
 land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of 
 him.” Aaron consented—perhaps, because he 
 saw that expostulation would be useless, or be¬ 
 cause he thought that by suffering them to dis¬ 
 grace themselves, he could inspire them with an 
 utter abhorrence of such practices for the future. 
 The people brought to Aaron all the gold orna¬ 
 ments they could collect, and he made out of 
 them a molten'calf . It is impossible to justify 
 Aaron’s conduct in this particular; he ought 
 rather to have died than connived at their sin. 
 God saw them in the midst of their idolatrous 
 worship, and his anger was kindled against them. 
 He sent Moses down in haste from the Mount, 
 telling him that the people which he brought out 
 of Egypt had corrupted themselves: “ I have seen 
 this people, and beloved, it is a stiff-necked peo¬ 
 ple; now therefore let me alone, that my wrath 
 may wax hot against them, and that I may con¬ 
 sume them, and I will make of thee a great na¬ 
 tion.” But Moses would not let the Lord , long- 
 suffering and gracious, alone . He pleads for 
 Israel with holy importunity; reminds Jehovah 
 
100 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, 
 and prevails, having power with God; and the 
 Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do 
 unto his people. 
 
 Moses and his servant Joshua went down to¬ 
 gether, and as they drew near the camp, they 
 heard the noise of the people as they shouted, 
 and Joshua exclaims, “ There is a noise of war 
 in the camp;” but Moses tells him, “ It is not the 
 voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is 
 the voice of them that cry for being overcome; 
 but the noise of them that sing, do I hear.” 
 And now they are near enough to see the palf 
 and the dancing. Moses cannot contain his in¬ 
 dignation. He throws down the tables of the tes¬ 
 timony, upon which the law of God was written, 
 the first commandment of which, “ Thou shalt 
 have no other gods before me,” Israel had so 
 shamefully transgressed, rushes in among the 
 people, takes the calf which they had made, and 
 burns it in the fire; and having ground it to 
 powder, and strewed it upon the water, he makes 
 the children of Israel drink of it. The anger of 
 Moses is still more excited, when he sees, that 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 101 
 
 according to the custom of Egypt, the worship¬ 
 pers of the golden calf have made themselves 
 naked. He places himself in the gate of the camp, 
 and calls out, “ Who is on the Lord’s side, let 
 him come unto me.” All the sons of Levi an¬ 
 swered to the call, and Moses sends them out, 
 after bidding them gird on their swords, and 
 commands them to spare neither son nor brother, 
 nor neighbour nor companion, but to hew down 
 every idolater they met. 
 
 The Levites did as commanded, and three 
 thousand corpses in the camp of Israel testified 
 that it is a fearful thing to tempt God, and incur 
 his wrath by worshipping graven images. Nor 
 was this all. A plague from the Lord fell upon 
 the surviving idolaters ; and worse than all, the 
 Lord Jehovah withdrew, and refused to go up 
 with the people; but, at the intercession of Moses, 
 upon the repentance of Israel, he was entreated, 
 and pardoned their iniquity. (Ex. xxxii. xxxiii. 
 xxxiv.) 
 
 We find a reference to this, and similar trans¬ 
 gressions, in Ezekiel, xxvi. 18. “ But the house 
 
 of Israel rebelled against me in the wilderness ; 
 
 i 2 
 
102 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 
 
 they walked not in my statutes, and they despised 
 my judgments, which if a man do, he shall even 
 live in them ; and my Sabbaths they greatly pol¬ 
 luted : then I said, I will pour out my fury upon 
 them in the wilderness, to consume them.” 
 
3S0L-G0BS OF EGYPT. 
 
 103 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 * i. ^ ^ 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 The wicked Jeroboam established the worship 
 *of the golden calves at Bethel and Dan, in order 
 to prevent the kingdom from returning to the 
 house of David. “ If,” said he in his heart, “ this 
 people go up to do sacrifice in the house of the 
 Lord at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this 
 people turn again unto their lord, even unto Re- 
 hoboam, king of Judah, and they shall kill me, and 
 go again to Rehoboam, king of Judah. Where¬ 
 upon the king took counsel, and made two calves 
 of gold, and said unto the people, it is too much 
 for you to go up to Jerusalem : behold thy gods, 
 O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land 
 of Egypt. And he set the one in Bethel, and the 
 other put he in Dan.” (1 Kings, xii. 26-29.) 
 
 We learn how it was that Jeroboam acquired 
 such partiality for the idolatry of Egypt, by re- 
 
104 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT 
 
 ferring to the eleventh chapter of the same book. 
 “ Solomon sought to kill Jeroboam: and Jero¬ 
 boam arose, and fled into Egypt, and was in 
 Egypt until the death of Solomon. (1 Kings, xi. 40.) 
 
 3. Isis was a divinity of the Egyptians, the 
 images of which were made in the figure of a 
 
YUOL-GODS OF EGYPT 
 
 105 
 
 ISIS. 
 
 woman, with the horns of an ox. All cows were 
 consecrated to Isis. It is well established that the 
 Moon was the object adored under the name and 
 character of this idol. There was a famous tem¬ 
 ple of Isis at Busiris. The worship of this deity 
 was blended with that of Osiris, and similar cere- 
 
106 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 monies were observed in their adoration. The 
 goddess Cybele of the Greeks and Romans, cor¬ 
 responded to the Isis of the Egyptians. 
 
 Isis was usually delineated with a cymbal in 
 her hand, and a crown, in the form of a tower 
 upon her head. The image of her son, Harpoc- 
 rates, was generally associated with her, and re¬ 
 presented a young man, pressing his finger upon 
 his lips, in token of the secrecy which was en¬ 
 joined upon the worshippers of Isis, whose mys¬ 
 teries like those of Ceres, it was considered sacri¬ 
 lege to reveal. 
 
 4. Serapis was another idol of the Egyptians, 
 entirely distinct from Apis or Osiris, (with which 
 it has been supposed to be synonymous,) inas¬ 
 much as its worship was introduced 1000 years 
 afler the period in which Moses lived, and shortly 
 before the death of the Egyptian king Ptolemseus 
 Soterus, who is said to have brought the know¬ 
 ledge of it from Pontus into Egypt, and to have 
 erected a temple in Alexandria, which was called 
 Serapseeum, in honour of this imaginary deity. 
 It is believed that Pluto was worshipped in Egypt 
 under the name of this idol, and the figures of 
 
IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 107 
 
 Serapis, which have been preserved, appear to 
 corroborate this opinion. He is usually repre¬ 
 sented as a man of a grave and dignified appear¬ 
 ance, preceded by an animal with three heads, a 
 lion’s head being in the midst, with a wolf’s 
 head on the left, and a dog’s head on the right 
 hand. It is well known that Pluto is accompanied 
 by the three-headed monster Ceberus, in all the 
 symbols intended to represent the ruler of the 
 infernal regions. 
 
 5. Baal-zephon. The name of this deity im¬ 
 ports that he was adored as the “ god of scrutiny.” 
 Its temple and image were situated on the shore 
 of the Red Sea. When Moses had brought the 
 children of Israel out of Egypt, and Pharaoh had 
 set out in pursuit, the Lord bade Moses, “ Speak 
 unto the children of Israel, that they turn and en¬ 
 camp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the 
 Sea, over against Baal-zephon: before it shall ye 
 encamp by the Sea. For Pharaoh will say of the 
 children of Israel, They are entangled in the land, 
 the wilderness hath shut them in.” (Ex. xiv. 2, 3.) 
 And again: The Egyptians pursued after them 
 (all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh, and his 
 
108 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 horsemen, and his army,) and overtook them en¬ 
 camping by the Sea, beside Pi-hahiroth before 
 Baal-zephon.” (Ex. xiv. 9.) The reason why 
 this site was chosen for the temple of Baal-zephon 
 was, in order that all fugitives from Egypt might, 
 by its influence, be detained and hindered from 
 escaping. Perhaps it was, with a view to cast 
 eternal reproach upon this idol-god, that Jehovah 
 commanded his people to come within the reach 
 of its pretended power. In sight-of this impotent 
 thing, Pharaoh and all his host, who pursued the 
 Israelites, sank like lead to the bottom, when God 
 called back to their accustomed bed, the waters of 
 the Red Sea. Baal-zephon was also the name of 
 a city. One of the journeys of the Israelites in 
 the wilderness is thus stated: “ And they removed 
 from Etham and turned again unto Pi-hahiroth, 
 which is before Baal-zephon: and they pitched 
 before Migdol.” (Numb, xxxiii. 7.) Here we find 
 Baal-zephon associated with the names of cities, 
 in such a way as to show that it also was the name 
 of a place. 
 
 6. Chiun, or Cijjun, the Persian and Arabian 
 name for the planet Saturn, was another imagi- 
 
IDOL-GODS OF EGTTT. 
 
 109 
 
 nary divinity, worshipped in Egypt. “ Have ye 
 offered unto me sacrifices and offerings in the 
 wilderness forty years, O house of Israel ? But 
 ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and 
 Chiun your images, the star of your god, which 
 ye made to yourselves.” (Amos, v. 26.) The 
 name under which Chiun was known in Egypt, 
 was Remphan, so called by the martyr Stephen, 
 who testified that the Jews had learned to serve 
 it from the Egyptians. “ Yea, ye took up the 
 tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of your god 
 Remphan, figures which ye made to worship 
 them.” (Acts, vii. 43.) 
 
 7. The Egyptians are said to have worshipped 
 fire also, under the name, Seraphim. 
 
 8. There were many animals to which at a very 
 early period, divine honours were paid in Egypt; 
 such as dogs, cats, sheep, oxen, birds, reptiles, 
 &c. Whatever living creature was the first to 
 meet them in the morning, was adored as their 
 god. The images of sacred animals were de¬ 
 posited in their temples. Whoever killed a beast 
 forfeited his life. This accounts satisfactorily for 
 the unwillingness of the Israelites to offer sacri- 
 
110 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 fices in Egypt. “ And Pharaoh called for Moses 
 and for Aaron, and said, go ye, sacrifice to your 
 God in the land. And Moses said, it is not meet 
 so to do; for we shall sacrifice the abomination 
 of the Egyptians to the Lord our God: lo, we 
 shall sacrifice the abominations of the Egyptians 
 before their eyes, and will they not stone us 
 (Ex. viii. 25, 26.) 
 
 The abhorrence of the Egyptians against herds¬ 
 men, whose office, it is well known, was by them 
 considered most disgraceful, is notorious; but 
 when it is remembered, that shepherds and herds¬ 
 men generally used the flesh of their cattle as 
 food, it can well be imagined that the idolatrous 
 Egyptians would detest the sacrilegious men who 
 were in the habit of eating up their country’s 
 gods. Hence it was necessary that Joseph should 
 prepare the mind of Pharaoh to receive his 
 brethren, before presenting them to the king, be¬ 
 cause their occupation had been “ about cattle” 
 from their earliest youth. “ And Joseph said 
 unto his brethren, and unto his father’s house, I 
 will go up and show Pharaoh, and say unto him, 
 my brethren and my father’s house, which were 
 
IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 Ill 
 
 in the land of Canaan, are come unto me; and 
 the men are shepherds, for their trade hath been 
 to feed cattle; and they have brought their flocks, 
 and their herds, and all that they have. And it 
 shall come to pass, when Pharaoh shall call you, 
 and shall say, what is your occupation ? that ye 
 shall say,[thy servant’s trade hath been about cattle 
 from our youth even until now, both we and also 
 our fathers; that ye may dwell in the land of 
 Goshen: for every shepherd is an abomination 
 unto the Egyptians.” (Gen. xlvi. 31-34.) This 
 passage of Scripture, (and indeed the whole con¬ 
 text), developes a noble trait in Joseph’s charac¬ 
 ter. He was high in power in the land of Egypt, 
 was invested with little less than the authority of 
 royalty itself; but all the splendour of the court 
 of Pharaoh could not make him forget his poor 
 old father, or his wicked brethren, who had sold 
 him as a slave. Let us learn from this, to leave 
 vengeance to the Lord : “ If our enemy hunger, 
 let us feed him; if he thirst, let us give him water 
 to drink; for, in so doing, we shall heap coals of 
 fire on his head.” An infinitely greater instance 
 of forbearance and forgiveness is furnished by 
 
IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT 
 
 112 
 
 DIANA iELURUS. 
 
 the blessed Saviour. When he hung bleeding on 
 the cross, suspended by the soreness of his 
 wounds, and the cruel men who nailed him to the 
 tree stood around him, mocking and reviling, he 
 prayed, “ Father, forgive them—they know not 
 what they do.” 
 
 But to return to the Egyptians. It was even 
 customary at one time, to take sacred animals 
 with them as tutelary deities, when they went to 
 
IDOL-GODS OP EGYPT. 
 
 113 
 
 war. The figure in the plate is a representation 
 of Diana iEIurus, who was worshipped under the 
 form of a cat. It was well said by one of the 
 ancients, that it was a happy thing for mankind 
 that the theology of Egypt was not relished by 
 all nations, because, had this been the case, the 
 world would soon have been inhabited by beasts 
 instead of men. 
 
 9. Finally, satyrs or devils were adored, un¬ 
 der the figure of a goat. Under this form the idol 
 Pan was worshipped. The most horrible ob¬ 
 scenity and prostitution was practised at their 
 festivals. Jeroboam introduced this vile abomi¬ 
 nation also : “ And he ordained him priests for the 
 high places, and for the devils, and for the calves 
 which he had made.” (2 Chron. xi. 15.) This, 
 too, in the face of the solemn prohibition of Jeho¬ 
 vah : “ They shall no more offer their sacrifices 
 unto devils, after whom they have gone a whoring. 
 This shall be a statute for ever unto them through¬ 
 out their generations.” (Lev. xvii. 7.) 
 
 In the Egyptian plagues, the Lord God threw 
 
 <' 
 
 down the idol-gods of the Egyptians, thereby 
 showing their impotence : “ Against all the gods 
 
 K 2 
 
114 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF EGYPT. 
 
 of Egypt, I will execute judgment; I am the Lord.” 
 (Ex. xii. 12; and Numb, xxxiii. 4.) 
 
 There are three kinds of priests mentioned in 
 Scripture as prominent among the Egyptians, viz. 
 “ Wise men, magicians, and sorcerers,” (Ex. vii. 
 11, and Gen. xli. 8,) but the distinction between 
 them cannot be accurately defined, as they ap¬ 
 pear to have been consulted almost indiscrimi¬ 
 nately. 
 
ID0L-G0D8 OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 115 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 Baal was the common appellation of almost 
 every heathen idol, but it was the proper and 
 peculiar name of the great divinity of the Phoe¬ 
 nicians, which was worshipped in Tyre and Si- 
 don, and from these cities introduced into the 
 land of Israel by Jezebel. Of Ahab it is said— 
 “ And it came to pass, as if it had been a light 
 thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam, the 
 son of Nebat, that he took to wife Jezebel, the 
 daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Zidonians, and 
 went and served Baal, and worshipped him. And 
 he reared up an altar for Baal in the house of 
 Baal, which he had built in Samaria.” (1 Kings, 
 xvi. 31, 32.) There was a festival held every 
 five years in honour of this idol, which correspond¬ 
 ed to the Olympian games, occurring once in four 
 years, and celebrated in honour of Jupiter and 
 
116 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 Hercules. Baal was known to the Greeks under 
 the name of the Tyrian Hercules. The Tyrians 
 themselves, however, designated their idol by the 
 name Melacarthus, which is composed of two 
 Phoenician words, melee and kartha , meaning 
 king, or lord of the city. The Grecians, having 
 noticed some similarity between the ceremonies, 
 observed at the festivals of Baal, and those which 
 were common at home in the worship of Plercu- 
 les, supposed that they were both alike, and hence 
 arose the name of the Tyrian Plercules. We are 
 told in 2 Macc. iv. 18, 19, “Now, when the 
 game that was used every fifth year was kept at 
 Tyrus, the king being present, this ungracious 
 Jason sent special messengers from Jerusalem, 
 who were Antiochians, to carry three hundred 
 drachms of silver to the sacrifice of Hercules, 
 which even the bearers thereof thought fit not to 
 bestow upon the sacrifice, because it was not 
 convenient, but to be reserved for other charges.” 
 
 Melee and Baal, with the surname Kartha, are 
 synonymous. The former meaning “ king,” the 
 latter “ lord, of the city.” Melee was also used 
 alone, like Baal. Hesychius tells us that Melee 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 117 
 
 was the name of Hercules among the Amathu- 
 sians, who were a colony of Tyrians in Cyprus. 
 The worship of this idol was introduced among 
 the Israelites, more especially in the days of Ahab 
 and his successors; as is evident by a reference 
 to the following Scriptures, 1 Kings, xvi. 31, 
 (quoted above,) 1 Kings, xviii. 21, where Elijah 
 calls on the children of Israel to take a decided 
 stand on the side either of God or of Baal: “ How 
 long halt ye between two opinions ? If the Lord 
 be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow 
 him.” 
 
 Jehu, the successor of Jeroboam, after putting 
 the children of Ahab to death, and appearing ani¬ 
 mated by zeal for the glory of Jehovah, soon fell 
 into the sins of Jeroboam: “ And Jehu gathered 
 all the people together, and said unto them, Ahab 
 served Baal a little, but Jehu shall serve him 
 much.” (2 Kings, x. 18.) Now, although this 
 was said with a view to decoy the priests of Baal 
 into one place, in order to kill them, and although 
 the artifice was successful, yet it is expressly 
 stated, that “ Jehu took no heed to walk in the 
 law of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart; 
 
118 IDOL-GODS OF THE FIHENICIANS. 
 
 for he departed not from the sins of Jeroboam, 
 which made Israel to sin.” So that the declara¬ 
 tion which he made in order to deceive the priests 
 of Baal, proved in the end but too true. His 
 hypocrisy probably did more to promote the 
 worship of Baal, than all the altars and high 
 places which Ahab had consecrated to that idol. 
 
 The Lord complains of his covenant people 
 through the prophet Hosea: “ She did not know 
 that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and mul¬ 
 tiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared 
 for Baal.” (Hos. ii. 8.) Temples and altars were 
 erected to Baal. (1 Kings, xvi. 32; 2 Kings, x. 
 21, 23.) “ Jehu and Jehonadab, the son of Re- 
 
 chab, went into the house of Baalf &c. Its 
 images were set up, as we learn from the 26th 
 and 27th verses of the same chapter: “And they 
 brought forth the images out of the house of Baal, 
 and burned them. And they brake down the 
 image of Baal, and brake down the house of 
 Baal,” &c. Groves were planted to promote its 
 worship: “Ahab made a grove” for Baal. (1 
 Kings, xvi. 33.) Prophets and priests were ap¬ 
 pointed to maintain its worship, (2 Kings, x. 19,) 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 119 
 
 who presided at the festivals of Baal, (2 Kings, x. 
 20,) and burnt incense. Jeremiah chides Judah 
 thus: “ According to the number of thy cities 
 were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the 
 number of the streets of Jerusalem, have ye set 
 up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to 
 burn incense unto Baal.” (Jer. xi. 13.) Various 
 kinds of sacrifices were offered, (2 Kings, x. 19, 
 24,) whilst the prophets and worshippers of Baal 
 cut and wounded their flesh, (1 Kings, xviii. 28,) 
 and leaped upon the altar, (verse 26,) after kneel¬ 
 ing before the images, praying to them and kissing 
 them. (1 Kings, xix. 18.) These details con¬ 
 cerning the worship of Baal are furnished in the 
 course of a very interesting account of the means 
 employed by Elijah, to rid Israel of the priests of 
 this idol. The Lord, in order to punish Ahab for 
 his wickedness, had withheld the rain, so that for 
 three years there was a most distressing drought 
 in the land : “ After many days the word of the 
 Lord came to Elijah, saying, go show thyself 
 unto Ahab; and I will send rain upon the earth.” 
 Elijah accordingly went, and when on his way, 
 he was met by Obadiah, the governor of Ahab’s 
 
120 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 house, a good man, who had hid a hundred of the 
 Lord’s prophets at the risk of his own life, at a 
 time when Jezebel was persecuting the priests of 
 the Lord. Obadiah had been sent by Ahab to 
 look for water, for the drought had become so 
 excessive that the horses and cattle were on the 
 point of perishing. He was rejoiced to meet Eli¬ 
 jah, but when the prophet bade him “go and tell 
 Ahab, behold, Elijah is here,” he was greatly 
 distressed : “ As the Lord thy God liveth, there is 
 no nation or kingdom whither my lord hath not 
 sent to seek thee: and wdien they said, he is not 
 there, he took an oath of the kingdom and nation 
 that they found thee not. And now thou sayest, 
 go, tell thy lord, behold, Elijah is here. And it 
 shall come to pass, as soon as I am gone from 
 thee, that the Spirit of the Lord shall carry thee 
 whither I know not; and so, when I come and 
 tell Ahab, and he cannot find thee, he shall slay me: 
 but I, thy servant, fear the Lord from my youth.” 
 Elijah assures his friend that he is sincere in his 
 determination to show himself to Ahab that very 
 day, and so Obadiah went back to his master and 
 delivered the prophet’s message. When Ahab 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHCENICIANS. 121 
 
 and Elijah met, the first word that the king ad¬ 
 dressed to him was, “ Art thou he that troubleth 
 Israel?” “ No,” said the prophet, “I have not 
 troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father’s house, 
 in that ye have forsaken the commandments of 
 the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim.” Vir¬ 
 tue is as bold, as guilt is cowardly. Elijah had 
 been hunted by this wicked king through every 
 province of his empire, and yet when they meet, 
 Ahab seems abashed in his presence, and the ser¬ 
 vant of the Lord commands , after throwing back 
 upon his persecutor the imputation of troubling 
 Israel. He bids him gather all Israel to Mount 
 Carmel, together with the prophets of Baal, and 
 of the groves, 850 in all. He is obeyed. And 
 now Elijah comes to the people and asks, “ How 
 long halt ye between two opinions ?” He calls on 
 them to decide whether Jehovah or Baal be God, 
 by a simple test. Let the prophets of Baal take 
 a bullock and cut it in pieces, and lay it on wood, 
 and put no fire under, and he will dress the other 
 bullock, and put kindling wood around it without 
 fire, and the God that answereth by fire, let him 
 be God. The challenge is accepted—the priests 
 
 L 
 
122 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 of Baal take their bullock, and lay it on the altar 
 in the mode prescribed—and from morning till 
 noon “ they called on the name of Baal, saying, 
 O Baal, hear us! But there was no voice, nor 
 any that answered; and they leaped upon the 
 altar that was made.” Elijah now begins to taunt 
 them—“ Cry aloud; for he is a god : either he is 
 talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a jour¬ 
 ney, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be 
 awaked !!” The silly prophets, supposing Elijah 
 to be in earnest, began to cry out louder than 
 ever; and not content with this, “ cut themselves- 
 with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out 
 upon them.” But all their cries could not wake 
 Baal out of his sleep. Mid-day was past, and still 
 the wished-for fire had not appeared. They con¬ 
 tinued prophesying until the time of the offering, 
 of the evening sacrifice, but there was still 
 “ neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any 
 that regarded.” After the impotence of Baal 
 had been fairly exposed, Elijah calls the people,. 
 
 * 4C Come near unto me.” The people do as de¬ 
 sired, and he proceeds to repair the altar of the 
 Lord that was broken down. Having taken- 
 
Elijah’s Sacrifice, 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 123 
 
 twelve stones, according to the number of the 
 tribes of the sons of Jacob, he builds with them 
 an altar in the name of the Lord, and makes a 
 trench round about it. The wood and the bullock 
 having been adjusted, he bids them fill four bar¬ 
 rels with water, and pour it on the sacrifice and 
 on the wood. This is repeated again and again, 
 until the altar is drenched, and the trench is full 
 of water. By this means he proves that he does 
 not intend to deceive them by any fire which might 
 have been secretly prepared under the altar. 
 “ And it came to pass at the time of the offering 
 of the evening sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet 
 came near, and said, Lord God of Abraham, 
 Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this day that 
 thou art God in Israel, and that I am thy servant, 
 and that I have done all these things at thy word. 
 Hear me, O Lord, hear me ; that this people may 
 know that thou art the Lord God, and that thou 
 hast turned their heart back again. Then the 
 fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the burnt 
 sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the 
 dust, and licked up the water that was in the 
 trench. And when all the people saw it, they 
 
124 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 PRIESTS OF BAAL. 
 
 fell on their faces ; and they said, the Lord, he is 
 the God ; the Lord, he is the God ! And Elijah 
 said unto them, take the prophets of Baal; let not 
 one of them escape. And they took them ; and 
 
 Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, 
 and slew them there.” (1 Kings, xviii.) 
 
 The priests of JBaal and of other idols were 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 125 
 
 called Camarim, (corresponding to the Black 
 friars of the Papists,) because, instead of being 
 arrayed in white, like the priests of the Lord, 
 they were clothed in black. They had a house 
 appropriated to the keeping of their vestments. 
 (2 Kings, x. 22.) “ I will also stretch out mine 
 hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of 
 Jerusalem; and I will cut off the remnant of Baal 
 from this place, and the name of the Chemarims 
 with the priests.” (Zeph. i. 4; Coll. Hos. x. 5; 
 2 Kings, xxiii. 5.) 
 
 The name of Baal was actually applied to Je¬ 
 hovah, and in view of this circumstance, the pro¬ 
 phet Hosea was commissioned to say to Israel— 
 u And it shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that 
 thou shalt call me Ishi, (my husband); and shall 
 call me no more Baali, (my lord).” It was for this 
 reason, that the image of this divinity is called 
 “ the image of jealousy, which provoketh to 
 jealousy.” The Lord represents himself as pro¬ 
 voked to jealousy against Israel, like a husband 
 against an unfaithful and adulterous wife. Ma- 
 nasseh had set up the images of Baal and other 
 idols in the temple of the Lord. “ He set a graven 
 
 l 2 
 
126 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 image of the grove he had made, in the house, of 
 which the Lord said to David, and to Solomon 
 his son, “ In this house and in Jerusalem, which 
 I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, will 
 
 1 put my name forever.” (2 Kings, xxi. 7, and 
 
 2 Chron. xxxiii. 3.) “ The children of Judah 
 
 have done evil in my sight, saith the Lord: they 
 have set their abominations in the house which is 
 called by my name to pollute it.” Good king Josiah 
 destroyed these abominations, (2 Chron. xxxiv. 
 4,) but his successors restored them, (2 Kings, 
 xxiii. 37, and 2 Chron. xxxvi. 12.) 
 
 Baal was associated with various surnames— 
 e. g. Baal-Zebub, Baal-Samen, Baal-Peor, Baal- 
 Berith, Baal-Zephon—the last named was men¬ 
 tioned among the Egyptian idols; of the rest we 
 shall speak when we treat of the deities of the 
 different nations who worshipped them. 
 
 Baal-Samen, “ the lord of heaven,” was an 
 idol of the Phoenicians, corresponding to the Jupi- 
 ter-Olympius of the Grecians. It was to the image 
 of this pretended deity, that Antiochus consecrated 
 the temple at Jerusalem, and caused a statue to 
 be placed on the altar of burnt-offerings; of which . 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 127 
 
 we read in the books of the Maccabees : “ Now, 
 the fifteenth day of the month, Cisleu, in the one 
 hundred forty and fifth year, they set up the 
 abomination of desolation upon the altar, and 
 builded idol-altars throughout the cities of Judah 
 on every side.” (1 Macc. i. 54.) 
 
 And again—“Not long after this, the king sent 
 an old man of Athens to compel the Jews to de¬ 
 part from the laws of their fathers, and not to live 
 after the laws of God: and to pollute also the 
 temple in Jerusalem, and to call it the temple of 
 Jupiter-Olympius; and that in Garizim, of Jupiter, 
 the Defender of strangers,” &c. (2 Macc. vi. 
 1 , 2 .) 
 
 Baal-Zebub, “ the lord of flies,” was another 
 Phoenician divinity, the images of which were made 
 with heads, representing a fly. The Syrians were 
 accustomed to compose their idols of the human 
 form and that of some inferior animal. In order 
 to cast reproach upon this idol-god, it was some¬ 
 times called by the Jews, Beel-Zebub, “ lord of 
 uncleanness.” The proper appellation, however, 
 was Baal-Zebuch, or Baal-Zebuchim, “ the lord 
 of sacrifices ;” but, in derision, the Jews termed 
 
128 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 it, sometimes Baal-Zebub, and sometimes Beel- 
 Zebub. In all probability, Pluto, the god of the 
 infernal regions, who was worshipped by the 
 Phoenicians, was synonymous with Beelzebub, or 
 the devil. In the New Testament he is called the 
 'prince of devils. He presided over the infernal 
 river, Acheron, a name derived apparently from 
 the city of Accaron, or Ekron, where Pluto or 
 Beel-Zebub was adored with distinguished honours. 
 Hence the oracle of Baal-Zebub at Ekron, which 
 king Ahaziah consulted, after (2 Kings, i. 2,) be¬ 
 ing injured by a fall through a lattice in his upper 
 chamber, was none other than the temple conse¬ 
 crated to Pluto, in which necromancy was prac¬ 
 tised by such characters as Saul employed. (1 
 Sam. xxviii. 8-11.) 
 
 It is not difficult to account for the name of 
 Baal-Zebub. Flies and vermin in general were 
 regarded as among the greatest plagues of the 
 East, and the former were peculiarly objects of 
 dislike, because they sucked up the blood of vic¬ 
 tims offered to the gods. According to pagan 
 theology, this inconvenience or nuisance was at¬ 
 tributed to the agency of some deity, who of 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 12$ 
 
 course had power also to remedy the evil; and 
 none could be found more likely than Pluto, the 
 author of all evil, and the ruler of hell. It is 
 true, nevertheless, that the Greeks had a distinct 
 deity, whose business it was to drive away the 
 flies, whom they worshipped as Jupiter-Apo- 
 mu’ios. 
 
 Ashtakoth, or Asiitoreth, was a goddess wor¬ 
 shipped by the Sidonians. It is related of Solo¬ 
 mon that he went after Ashtaroth, the goddess of 
 the Zidonians, and after Milcom, (or Moloch,) the 
 abomination of the Ammonites. (1 Kings, v. 33.) 
 Compare also, 2 Kings, xxiii. 13 ; Judges, ii. 13, 
 and x. 6; 1 Sam. vii. 3, 4, xii. 10, and xxxi. 10. 
 She is the same as Astarte, or Venus Urania, so 
 often mentioned by profane writers. Ashtaroth 
 was known to the Egyptians, and worshipped by 
 them under the name of Tsurot, from which the 
 Hebrews derived Ashtaroth, meaning “ herds,” 
 or “ flocks,”—hence, its images had the head of 
 a sheep. 
 
 Diana, (or the moon,) was also worshipped 
 under the name of Astarte, or Astroarche, 
 i. e. “queen of heaven.” The Israelitish women 
 
130 IDOL-GODS OF TIIE PHOENICIANS. 
 
 brought offerings of cakes (Jer. vii. 18,) to the 
 queen of heaven, in order to conciliate her good 
 will and insure favourable weather, (Jer. xliv. 17, 
 19,) so that the fruits of the field might be abun¬ 
 dant. Groves and well-watered places were the 
 favourite resorts of her worshippers; and to this 
 circumstance the name Aschera, or Ascheroth, 
 by which she is also designated, may be attri¬ 
 buted. “ And the children of Israel did evil in 
 the sight of the Lord, and forgot the Lord their 
 God, and served Baalim and the groves,” or 
 Ascheroth. (Judges, iii. 7. Compare Judges, ii. 
 13; 1 Kings, xvi. 31, 32; 2 Kings, xxi. 3, 7.) 
 The temple of this idol was known as the house 
 of Ashtaroth, in which the Philistines deposited 
 as a trophy, the coat of mail and weapons of king 
 Saul. (1 Sam. xxxi. 10.) 
 
 The festivals of Astarte, or Ashtaroth, were 
 carnivals of licentiousness—the utmost indecency 
 and profligacy were practised, and not one of the 
 abominations into which Israel was decoyed, 
 was more hateful to Jehovah than the worship of 
 Baal and “ the groves.” At a later period than 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE PHOENICIANS. 131 
 
 that, in which allusions are made in the Old Tes¬ 
 tament to this goddess, various rites and ceremo¬ 
 nies, borrowed from Jewish customs, were intro¬ 
 duced into her worship. 
 
132 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, MIDI ANITES, 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, MIDI ANITES, SE- 
 CHEMITES, AMMONITES, AND PHILISTINES. 
 
 Baal-Peoe, or Peor, from the mountain of 
 that name, towards the wilderness, (Numb, xxiii. 
 28,) was worshipped by the Moabites and Midian- 
 ites.—“ Israel joined himself unto Baal-Peor: 
 and the anger of the Lord was kindled against 
 Israel.” (Numb. xxv. 3.) For this cause, the 
 Lord says to Moses, in the 17th and 18th verses, 
 “ Vex the Midianites, and smite them : for they 
 vex you with their wiles, wherewith they have 
 beguiled you in the matter of Peor,” &c. The 
 temple of this idol is called the house of Peor. 
 (Deut. iii. 29.) It was a vile thing, of hideous 
 form, and the most horrible rites were performed 
 in its service. (Hosea, ix. 10 ; Ps. cvi. 28 ; Coll. 
 Numb. xxv. 1-3.) 
 
 Some have supposed, and apparently with very 
 
iECIIEMITES, AMMONITES, AND PHILISTINES. 133 
 
 BAAL-PEOR, OR PRIAPUS. 
 
 good reason, that Baal-Peor, and the Roman 
 Priapus, were the same; also, that it is synony¬ 
 mous with Miplezeth, in honour of which, king 
 Asa’s mother, or rather grandmother, Maecha, 
 had instituted in a grove, shameful ceremonies, 
 over which she presided, similar to the filthy 
 M 
 
1 34 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, MIDIANITES, 
 
 rites practised at the worship of Venus. Asa re¬ 
 moved her from being queen, and cut down her 
 idol. (2 Chron. xv. 16.) The literal meaning of 
 Miplezeth is, “ an image of terror,” implying 
 that all servants of the true God might well be 
 terrified at its horrible worship. Idols in general 
 are termed, in Scripture, an abomination. The 
 heathen themselves worshipped them with fear 
 and trembling, as they well might, who were un¬ 
 der the spirit of bondage. 
 
 Chamos, or Chemosh, was the principal god 
 of the Moabites, who are therefore termed the 
 people of Chemosh. (Numb. xxi. 29 ; Jer. xlvii. 7, 
 13, 46.) Solomon consecrated a temple to this 
 idol also, (1 Kings, xi. 7; and 2 Kings, xxiii. 13,) 
 near Jerusalem. The ceremonies observed at its 
 worship appear to have been similar to the rites 
 practised in honour of Baal-Peor ; though others 
 suppose that Chamos corresponded to the Roman 
 Bacchus, the god of wine. 
 
 Baal-Berith was an idol of the Sechemites, 
 who built a temple to promote its worship. After 
 the death of Gideon, the Judge of Israel, who so 
 valorously freed her from the yoke of her op- 
 
SECIIEMITES, AMMONITES, AND PHILISTINES. 135 
 
 pressors, and zealously served Jehovah, the peo¬ 
 ple of God went after Baalim, and made Baal-Be- 
 rith their god. (Judges, viii. 33.) Mention is made 
 of this idol-god, in connexion with the history of 
 Israel in Judges, ix. 4, where it is said that the 
 men of Shechem gave Abimelech three score 
 and ten pieces of silver out of the house of Baal- 
 Berith, to assist him in the prosecution of his am¬ 
 bitious purposes. This generosity, Abimelech 
 soon gave them cause to regret, for, owing to a 
 quarrel which ensued between him and the Shee- 
 hemites, he fought against their city, and having 
 forced the outer walls, drove the inhabitants be¬ 
 fore him with terrible slaughter, compelling the 
 survivors to take refuge in the hold of the house 
 of their god, Baal-Berith, (verse 46.) Abimelech 
 set fire to the building, and thus destroyed those 
 who had fled to it for protection. 
 
 The meaning of Baal-Berith is “ lord of cove¬ 
 nants,” similar to the “ Zeus horkios” of the 
 Greeks, or the Jove, who was invoked when any 
 thing was to be ratified by an oath. Calmet thinks 
 that Baal-Berith was the same as Dagon, the 
 chief divinity of the Philistines. 
 
136 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, MIDIANITES, 
 
 Moloch, also Malcom, (Zeph. i. 5,) or Milcom, 
 (1 Kings, xi. 33, 2 Kings, xxiii. 14,) likewise 
 called Adrammelech and Anammelech, among 
 the Samarians, (2 Kings, xvii. 31,) means a king, 
 (Amos, v. 26, Acts, vii. 43,) and is therefore re¬ 
 garded by some as the same as Baal, (Jer. xix. 5, 
 and xxxii. 35,) and as representing the Sun, which 
 was called king of the stars. The worship of 
 Moloch is forbidden under terrible penalties. (Lev. 
 xviii. 21, and xx. 2, 5.) 
 
 Solomon worshipped Moloch among the idols 
 whom he set up as his gods, (1 Kings, xi. 7.) 
 Jehovah, through his prophet Jeremiah, complains 
 that his covenant people had “ built the high places 
 of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hin- 
 non, to cause their sons and their daughters to 
 pass through the fire to Moloch, which I com¬ 
 manded them not; neither came it into my mind, 
 that they should do this abomination, to cause 
 Judah to sin.” (Jer. xxxii. 35.) 
 
 The passage in Jeremiah, xix. 5, to which allu¬ 
 sion was made on a preceding page, appears still 
 further to confirm the opinion that Moloch was 
 the Baal of the Ammonites, and essentially the 
 

SECHEMITES, AMMONITES, AND PHILISTINES. 137 
 
 same as that idol. “ They have built, also, the 
 high places of Baal, to bum their sons with fire 
 for burnt-offerings unto Baal, which I commanded 
 not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind.” 
 
 The planet Mars is said to have been the Mo¬ 
 loch of the Egyptians. It is reckoned among the 
 idols of the Canaanites : “ They sacrificed their 
 sons and their daughters unto devils, and shed 
 innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and 
 their daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols 
 of Canaan,” &c. (Ps. cvi. 38.) Here, there is 
 an evident allusion to Moloch. This idol was, 
 however, more especially the god of the Ammon¬ 
 ites, and is expressly called “ the abomination of 
 the children of Ammon.” (1 Kings, xi. 7.) Ac¬ 
 cording to the most authentic accounts, its image 
 was a brazen statue, with the head of an ox, high 
 horns, and extended hands, as though it were 
 reaching out for something, which was offered or 
 promised to it. In honour of this vile thing, its 
 idolatrous worshippers caused their children to 
 pass through the fire, ostensibly with a view to 
 purify them. The priest, or else the father of 
 the child, led it barefoot over a blazing pile: if 
 
 m 2 
 
1S8 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, MIDIANITES, 
 
 « 
 
 the poor victim survived, it was pronounced to be 
 purified; but if, as usually happened, the wretch¬ 
 ed sufferer perished in the flames, prosperity and 
 happiness were promised as the certain reward of 
 the parents. Others burnt and sacrificed their 
 offspring by placing them in the fiery arms of 
 the monster, made red-hot by means of a furnace 
 at the base of the image. The piteous outcries of 
 the unhappy children were the signal for drums 
 to beat and trumpets to sound, lest the screams 
 of their burning offspring might waken up the 
 sleeping pity of their unnatural and deluded pa¬ 
 rents. It is difficult to conceive how they could 
 possibly be reconciled to this barbarous immola¬ 
 tion of their children. The mind sickens at the 
 thought of the deep degradation, to which these 
 wretched idolaters must have sunk, before they 
 could find motive sufficient to induce them to 
 consent to the horrid sacrifice, in the assurance 
 of the priests, that their remaining children would 
 be blessed with long life and prosperity, and that 
 their private loss would prove the public gain. 
 
 It appears from Amos, v. 26, and Acts, vii. 
 43, that Moloch was sometimes drawn on a cha- 
 
SECHEMITES, AMMONITES, AND PHILISTINES. 139 
 
 DAGON. 
 
 riot through the streets, or carried about in a 
 tabernacle, with great pomp. Solomon built a 
 temple to this idol, and the Israelites worshipped 
 it in the valley of Gehinnom, also called Tophet , 
 a “ drum” from the use made of this instrument 
 at the festivals of Moloch. (Jer. vii. 21.) 
 
 Daoon was the great idol of the Philistines, 
 
140 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, MIDIANITES, 
 
 corresponding to the Neptune of other heathen 
 nations. Dagon was worshipped as the deity 
 who presided over fishing and navigation, and its 
 images, according to the traditions of the Rab¬ 
 bins, were made in the figure of a mermaid; the 
 upper part being like the human form, and the 
 lower part like a fish. This may be accounted 
 for, from the circumstance of the Philistines 
 dwelling near the sea, and worshipping fishes as 
 gods. There were splendid temples of this idol at 
 Askelon, Gath, Gaza, and particularly at Ashdod. 
 This house was burnt during the wars of the 
 Maccabees, by the Jewish leader Jonathan. It 
 was to Ashdod that the ark of the covenant was 
 brought in triumph by the Philistines, after their 
 victory over Israel, and placed before Dagon as 
 a trophy, as though won through the help and in¬ 
 fluence of this idol. But God vindicated his own 
 glory, and Dagon fell prostrate and broken before 
 the ark of Jehovah. “ And when they of Ashdod 
 arose early on the morrow, behold, Dagon was 
 fallen upon his face to the earth before the ark of 
 the Lord. And they took Dagon, and set him in 
 his place again. And when they arose early on 
 
SECHEMITES, AMMONITES, AND PHILISTINES. 141 
 
 the morrow-morning, behold, Dagon was fallen 
 upon his face to the ground before the ark of the 
 Lord ; and the head of Dagon, and both the palms 
 of his hands, were cut off upon the threshold ; 
 only the stump of Dagon was left to him.” (1 
 Sam. 3-5.) It was to the temple of Dagon at 
 Gaza that the Philistines repaired “ to offer a 
 great sacrifice, and to rejoice; for they said, our 
 god hath delivered Samson, our enemy, into our 
 hand.” (Judges, xvi. 23.) This building must 
 have been very large, since Samson, after tearing 
 away the pillars, which supported it, buried under 
 its ruins more than three thousand men. The 
 head of Saul was also placed in one of the tem¬ 
 ples of this god. We read in the first book of 
 Samuel, that after the great discomfiture sus¬ 
 tained by the Israelites from the Philistines, when 
 the conquerors “ came to strip the slain, they 
 found Saul and his three sons fallen in Mount 
 Gilboa. And they cut off his head, and stripped 
 off his armour, and sent in the land of the Philis¬ 
 tines to publish it in the house of their idols, and 
 among the people. And they put his armour in 
 the house of Ashtaroth.” (1 Sam. xxxi. 10.) This 
 
142 IDOL-GODS OF THE MOABITES, &C. 
 
 latter quotation is a sufficient proof that Dagon 
 and Ashtaroth, which have sometimes been con¬ 
 founded, were distinct deities. At Joppa, this idol 
 was known as Derceto. It is not improbable, as 
 pagan theology gives Neptune his Amphitrite to 
 share in his liquid empire, that the Dagon of 
 Gaza and Ashdod corresponded to Neptune, and 
 Derceto of Joppa to Amphitrite. In some other 
 places this false god was called Atargatis, and its 
 temples Atargation. Maccabeus slew twenty-five 
 thousand men at the temple of Atargatis. (2 
 Macc. xii. 26.) 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE SYRIANS. 
 
 143 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE SYRIANS. 
 
 \ , 
 
 The Syrians had many gods, of which frequent 
 mention is incidently made in Scripture. We 
 read of the ungodly king Ahaz, that, “ in the 
 time of his distress, he sacrificed to the gods of 
 Damascus, which smote him; and he said, be¬ 
 cause the gods of the kings of Syria help them, 
 therefore, will I sacrifice to them, that they may 
 help me.” (2 Chron. xxviii. 22, 23.) The Sun 
 was the principal object of their worship, and 
 was adored at Hemath, under the name of Asima, 
 or “ the fire of heavenat Ava, it was called 
 Nibchaz, or “ the swift god,” and Tartak, “ the 
 chariot of the Sun.” “ The Avites made Nibhaz 
 and Tartak, and the Sepharvites burnt their child¬ 
 ren in fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, 
 the gods of Sepharvaim.” (2 Kings, xvii. 31.) 
 At Damascus, the god Rimmon, or the Sun, had a 
 
144 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF TIIE SYRIANS. 
 
 famous temple. The signification of Rimmon is, 
 “ that which comes from above.” (2 Kings, v. 
 18.) The passage reads thus : “ In this thing the 
 Lord pardon thy servant, that when my master 
 goeth into the house of Rimmon to worship there, 
 and he leaneth on my hand, and I bow myself in 
 the house of Rimmon; when I bow down myself 
 in the house of Rimmon, the Lord pardon thy 
 servant in this thing. And Elisha said unto him, 
 go in peace.” This Scripture has been too often 
 distorted and wrested from its true meaning, for 
 us to pass it over without a word of explanation. 
 Some have argued from this passage that a man 
 may be placed under such peculiar circumstances 
 that he may have license to commit sin. This is 
 a fearful delusion. Naaman did not ask leave to 
 worship Rimmon. On the contrary, he had ex¬ 
 pressly declared, that he would “ henceforth offer 
 neither burnt-offering nor sacrifice unto other 
 gods, but unto the Lord.” If he had made any 
 such request, the prophet of the Lord never 
 would have said, “Go, in peace;” for, “there 
 is no peace to the wicked” idolater, “ saith my 
 God.” Elisha was not a dauber with untem- 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE SYKIANS. 
 
 145 
 
 *. 
 
 pered mortar; and he had too much of the spirit 
 of his station, ever to encourage or connive at 
 idolatry. All that Naaman asked was this:— 
 As a chief officer of the king of Syria, it was his 
 duty to support his royal master, who, according 
 to Eastern custom, was in the habit of leaning 
 upon his favourites, whenever he took part in 
 any public ceremony. Naaman was the king’s 
 servant: as such, his master had a right, ac¬ 
 cording to the usages of that country, to lean 
 upon him. Naaman asked for permission to 
 “ abide in his calling with God.” It was granted : 
 “ Go, in peace.” Besides, it will be remembered, 
 we live in a day of greater light and knowledge 
 than he; and even if it be admitted, that Naaman 
 showed more anxiety to preserve his temporal 
 station and dignity than might be tolerated in a 
 sincere disciple of the Lord Jesus, in our day, 
 since Christ by his death “ has purified us to 
 himself a peculiar people,” the Apostle’s de¬ 
 claration meets this objection—“ The time of 
 former ignorance God winked at, but now com- 
 mandeth all men every where to repent.” “ A 
 
146 
 
 ID0L-G0D3 OF THE SYRIANS. 
 
 bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking 
 flax shall he not quench.” 
 
 Thamus, or Tammutz, according to some, is 
 the Syrian god Adonis, whom the poets feigned 
 to have been the paramour of Venus. She be¬ 
 wailed his untimely end, (he having been killed, 
 whilst hunting, by a wild boar,) and changed him 
 into a beautiful flower, the anemone. In order to 
 testify their grief for his death, people of dissolute 
 habits of both sexes, made great lamentations at 
 the festivals of Venus, accompanied by a band, who 
 performed a funeral dirge in honour of Thamus. On 
 the day succeeding this exhibition, they manifest¬ 
 ed the most extravagant demonstrations of joy, as 
 though they were celebrating his restoration to life. 
 Others have supposed that the Egyptian god Osi¬ 
 ris, the spouse of Isis, was the same as Thamus; 
 and the story of Osiris having been slain by Ty- 
 phon, and lamented by Isis and the Egyptians, 
 would appear to sustain this theory. The dif¬ 
 ference in the name admits of a ready explana- 
 tion. Osiris was also called Ammutz by the 
 Egyptians, and from this Thamutz may readily 
 be derived. The abominable and obscene cere- 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE SYRIANS. 
 
 147 
 
 monies which were practised at the festivals of 
 both Osiris and Thamutz, show that these deities 
 were closely allied, if not one and the same. The 
 Israelites having witnessed such scenes among 
 the Egyptians, introduced them into the temple 
 and worship of the Lord. King Josiah purified 
 Israel of this abomination. “ Fie brake dow r n 
 the houses of the Sodomites, that were by the 
 house of the Lord, where the women wove hang¬ 
 ings for the grove.” (2 Kings, xxiii. 7.) 
 
 Gad and Meni were two Syrian deities, 
 which, according to Luther, corresponded to the 
 idols Mars and Mercury, worshipped by the Greeks 
 and Romans. (Is. lxv. 11.) “But ye are they 
 that forsake the Lord, that forget my holy moun¬ 
 tain, that prepare a table for Gad, and that fur¬ 
 nish a drink-offering to Meni.” In our version, 
 Gad is translated “ that troop,” and Meni, “ that 
 number.” Others derive the word from an old 
 Arabic root, and regard Gad as the same with 
 Apollo, i. e. the Sun, which we have already 
 shown to have been the principal god of many 
 heathen nations. 
 
 Meni represents the Moon, to which meat and 
 
 
148 
 
 IDOL-GODS OF THE SYRIANS. 
 
 drink-offerings were brought, to secure fair 
 weather. After the Lord had told Jeremiah that 
 he would not hear him in behalf of Israel, and that 
 the prophet should, therefore, “ not pray, nor lift 
 up cry, nor make intercession” to him, he gives 
 the reason of this interdict. “ Seest thou not 
 what they do in the cities of Judah, and in the 
 streets of Jerusalem ? The children gather wood, 
 and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women 
 knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of 
 heaven, and to pour out drink-offerings unto other 
 gods, that they may provoke me to anger.” (Jer. 
 vii. 17, 18.) In a subsequent chapter we have 
 the answer which the wicked men, whom Jere¬ 
 miah had reproved on account of their idolatry, 
 returned to him; which has a direct reference to 
 the custom of making offerings to the moon. 
 “ As for the word which thou hast spoken unto 
 us in the name of the Lord, we will not hearken 
 unto thee: but we will certainly do whatsoever 
 thing goeth out of our mouth, to burn incense to 
 the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink-offer¬ 
 ings unto her, as we have done, we, and our 
 fathers, our kings, and our princes, in the cities 
 
IDOL-GODS OF THE SYRIANS. 
 
 149 
 
 of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: for 
 then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, 
 and saw no evil. But since we left off to burn 
 incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out 
 drink-offerings unto her, we have wanted all 
 things, and have been consumed by the sword 
 and by the famine. And when we burnt incense 
 to the queen of heaven, and poured out drink- 
 offerings unto her, did we make her cakes to wor¬ 
 ship her, without our men ?” (or, husbands .) The 
 ancient German words, “gade” and “ maen,” the 
 former of which means God, and the latter, moon, 
 seem to corroborate the explanation given above 
 of the names Gad and Meni. 
 
150 THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME, 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 
 
 Among all the superstitious nations of antiqui¬ 
 ty, Greece claims an unenviable precedence, as 
 the home and the workshop of idolatry. No 
 people under the sun had more fables concerning 
 the origin and genealogy of the gods, current 
 among them than they. Their poets, particularly 
 Homer and Hesiod, reduced the vain and silly 
 traditions of their mythology to a kind of system, 
 and ascribed to the different deities their peculiar 
 names, offices, arts, rank, and exploits; among 
 which latter, some very disreputable actions were 
 included. The number of gods in Greece was 
 about three thousand ; these were arranged under 
 the two principal divisions of primary and se¬ 
 condary divinities; the latter of which were wor¬ 
 shipped as particularly superintending human 
 affairs, and as the ministers, or ambassadors, of 
 
 \ 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 151 
 
 the superior deities. It is barely possible to dis¬ 
 cern through this dark and confused theory, the 
 outlines of the original from which it was bor¬ 
 rowed ; but there cannot be much doubt, that this 
 fundamental point in their theology, was derived 
 from a vague and distorted notion of the a ngels. 
 This immense host of false gods was subdivided 
 into celestial, terrestrial, marine, and infernal 
 deities. We will briefly mention the names and 
 offices of the most distinguished. 
 
 The chief of the celestial gods were— 
 
 1. Jupiter, or Jove, called Zeus by the 
 Greeks, and worshipped as the Great Supreme, 
 the king of gods and men. He was called the 
 son of Saturn and Cybele, or Rhea, and was 
 fabled to have been saved from the jaws of his 
 father by a stratagem of Rhea, who substituted a 
 stone for the infant Jupiter ; Saturn having swal¬ 
 lowed it, she concealed her son on Mount Ida in 
 Crete. The name, Jove, is probably derived from 
 the Hebrew Jehovah. 
 
 The Grecians represented Jupiter by a statue 
 with three eyes; intimating that this deity ob¬ 
 served all things in heaven, earth, and hell; or 
 
152 THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 
 
 that he was acquainted with the present, past, 
 and future. The Romans placed his image on a 
 throne of ivory, with three thunderbolts in his 
 right hand, a sceptre in his left, and an eagle by 
 his side. The statue of Jupiter, sculptured by 
 Phidias, was considered one of the seven wonders 
 of the world. The most shameful debaucheries 
 were ascribed to this deity by the ancient poets 
 and historians. 
 
 When Paul and Barnabas were preaching the 
 gospel at Lystra, in Lycaonia, they met with a 
 poor cripple, who had never walked: “ The same 
 heard Paul speak; who steadfastly beholding him, 
 and perceiving that he had faith to be healed, 
 said with a loud voice, stand upright on thy feet. 
 And he leaped and walked. And when the peo¬ 
 ple saw what Paul had done, they lifted up their 
 voices, saying in the speech of Lycaonia, the 
 gods are come down to us in the likeness of men. 
 And they called Barnabas, Jupiter; and Paul, 
 Mercurius, because he was the chief speaker.” 
 (Acts, xiv. 9-12.) The priest of Jupiter and the 
 people made preparations to sacrifice to the Apos¬ 
 tles, who with difficulty dissuaded their idolatrous 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 153 
 
 admirers from putting their purpose into execu- 
 tion. Jupiter had many surnames—such, for ex¬ 
 ample, as Ammon, Belus, Olympius, Xenius, i. e. 
 “ the guardian of strangers.” There is an allusion 
 to this deity in the Apocrypha. (2 Macc. vi. 2.) 
 The wife of Jupiter and queen of the gods, was 
 called Juno. 
 
 2. Apollo, or the Sun, the offspring of Jove 
 and Latona. There is a passage in Revelation, 
 to which we have already adverted, in which Apol- 
 lyon is spoken of as “ the angel of the bottomless 
 pit.” (Rev. ix. 11.) The meaning of Apollo is, 
 “ The Destroyer;” this god was so named from 
 the exploits which he was said to have per¬ 
 formed, such as slaying the Pythian giant or ser¬ 
 pent, &c. Cicero mentions four gods of this name. 
 (Vide page 65.) 
 
 3. Diana, the Moon, daughter of Jove and 
 twin-sister of Apollo, was worshipped as presiding 
 over births and fruitfulness. She was worshipped 
 as the goddess of the chase, fishing, and journeys, 
 particularly such as are performed during the 
 night season. Ephesus was the place in which 
 she was adored with the greatest honours, and 
 
154 THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 
 
 her temple was, in fact, the most renowned in all 
 Asia. The figure in the plate represents the sta¬ 
 tue of the Ephesian Diana. The breasts and heads 
 of beasts, with which she is covered, are emble¬ 
 matical of the fruitfulness which her influence was 
 supposed to promote. Diana was known under 
 three names. As a celestial deity she was called 
 Phcebe; as a terrestial goddess, Diana; whilst He¬ 
 cate was the appellation under which she was 
 worshipped as one of the deities presiding over the 
 infernal regions. The temple of Diana, at Ephe¬ 
 sus, was considered one of the wonders of the 
 world. All the provinces of Asia Minor contri¬ 
 buted for upwards of 200 years towards its erec¬ 
 tion. There were in it 420 pillars, erected by as 
 many kings. This magnificent building was de¬ 
 stroyed by fire in the 106 Olymp., on the very 
 day that Alexander the Great was born. “ Diana 
 of the Ephesians” is mentioned in the book of 
 Acts, in an interesting connexion. 
 
 The preaching of Paul had been attended with 
 the demonstration of the Holy Spirit and with 
 power, and so mightily did the Word of God grow 
 and prevail, that a certain Demetrius, a silver- 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 155 
 
 smith, who had made a living by manufacturing 
 silver shrines for Diana, excited first his fellow- 
 craftsmen, and then the citizens of Ephesus, against 
 the ministers of Jesus Christ; being apprehensive, 
 from the number of conversions, that he would 
 soon be left without employment; and not only so, 
 but also, “ that the temple of the great goddess Di¬ 
 ana should be despised, and her magnificence 
 should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world 
 worshippeth.” A great excitement was raised, 
 and the rabble assembled in the streets, crying out, 
 “ great is Diana of the Ephesians!” The whole 
 city was full of confusion, and the lives of the dis¬ 
 ciples were in great jeopardy, but the Lord pre¬ 
 served them in a remarkable manner. (Acts, xix.) 
 
 The Persians worshipped Diana under the name 
 of Zaretis, and her temple in the City of Elimais 
 was called Zara, which Antiochus Epiphanes at¬ 
 tempted to plunder, but was defeated. (1 Macc. 
 vi. 1-4.) 
 
 4. Mars, the son of Jove and Juno, was the 
 god of war, and according to Luther, is the same 
 with Gad. (Is. Ixv. 11.) 
 
 5. Mercury, the son of Jove and Maia, was 
 
156 THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME 
 
 MERCURY. 
 
 the god of eloquence. An allusion is made to this 
 in Acts xiv. 12, where it is said, the Lystrians 
 called Paul, Mercury, because he was “the chief 
 speaker.” This god was worshipped as presiding 
 also over merchants, thieves, &c., and was called 
 the messenger of the gods. Mercury, who, in ad¬ 
 dition to the duties assigned him as the servant of 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 157 
 
 the gods, was fabled to have been the conductor 
 of departed souls to the place of reward and pun¬ 
 ishment, was usually represented as a young man, 
 with wings attached to his ears and feet, holding 
 
 4 
 
 in his hand a caduceus or staff, around which ser¬ 
 pents are entwined. Luther regards Meni, (Is. 
 lxv. 11,) as being the same idol. 
 
 6. Venus, the goddess of love and voluptuous 
 debauchery, was worshipped principally at Paphos 
 in Cyprus, and was known under the various sur¬ 
 names of Ashtaroth, Astarte, Mylitta, Urania, &c. 
 
 7. Saturn, the son of heaven and earth, has 
 been spoken of in connexion with Noah, in the 
 chapter on the “ Mythology of the Heathen.” 
 
 II. The principal terrestrial gods were— 
 
 1. fEouus, the god of winds. 
 
 „ 2. Ceres, the goddess of agriculture. 
 
 3. Janus, who presided over treaties. 
 
 4. Pales, the god of herds and pastures. 
 
 5. Pan, a god of shepherds or herdsmen, and 
 hunters. This deity was fabled to have dwelt in 
 mountains and in woods. He was represented as 
 a man with two horns, having the beard, legs, and 
 tail of a goat, and a red face, alluding probably 
 
 o 
 
158 THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 
 
 to his incessant playing on the flute, which instru¬ 
 ment, in addition to a shepherd’s crook, completed 
 the accoutrements of this ridiculous abomination* 
 
 6. Priapus, who presided over gardens, was 
 probably the same as Baal-Peor of the Moabites. 
 
 7. Bacchus, the god of wine, and son of Jupiter 
 and Semele, was worshipped with ceremonies call¬ 
 ed Bacchanalia, which consisted in inordinate eat¬ 
 ing, drinking, and abominable licentiousness. We 
 read in the book of the Maccabees, among the per¬ 
 secutions which the Jews were compelled to under¬ 
 go, that, “ in the day of the king’s birth, they were 
 brought, every month, by bitter constraint, to eat of 
 the sacrifices : and when the feast of Bacchus was 
 kept, the Jews were compelled to go in procession 
 to Bacchus, carrying ivy.” More than a distant 
 allusion seems to be made to the worship of Bac¬ 
 chus, by the prophet Hosea, when he says, (iv. 
 11,) “whoredom and wine, and new wine, take 
 away the heart.” Cicero mentions six deities of 
 this name. 
 
 8. Vulcan, the son of Jove and Juno, was 
 worshipped as the god of fire, and as presiding 
 over blacksmiths, &c. 
 
THE IDOL-GODS OF GREECE AND ROME. 159 
 
 III. The principal marine deities were Neptune 
 and Amphitrite. 
 
 IV. The chief of the infernal gods was Pluto, 
 worshipped by the Phosnicians as Beelzebub, who 
 is called in Scripture the “ prince of devils.” 
 (Matt. xii. 24, Mark iii. 22, Luke xi. 15.) As the 
 Greeks were anxious to adore all the gods, and 
 were fearful of offending any deity, by omitting 
 his name or worship, they erected altars to the 
 “ unknown god.” It was in reference to this that 
 Paul in his sermon on Mars-hill, said to the . 
 Greeks: “ Whom, therefore, ye ignorantly wor¬ 
 ship, him declare I unto you.” (Acts xvii. 23.) 
 
 The various sects of philosophers among the 
 Greeks, promoted idolatry to the utmost extent of 
 their influence, and viewed any innovations with 
 a jealous eye; hence the enmity which the Epicu¬ 
 reans and Stoics manifested against Paul, of whom 
 some said : “ What will this babbler say ?” 
 
 Others : “He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange 
 gods : because he preached unto them Jesus and 
 the resurrection.” (Acts, xvii. 18.) The most 
 noted of these sects were the Platonics, Peripate¬ 
 tics, Stoics, Epicureans, and Pythagoreans. 
 
160 IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 We have observed, that many Jewish rites were 
 borrowed by the heathen and engrafted upon their 
 false religions; but it is equally true on the other 
 hand, that the Israelites learned many idolatrous 
 customs from distant as well as neighbouring 
 nations. In Chaldcea, even the patriarchs were 
 somewhat infected with this plague. To this fact 
 Joshua adverts, when in the commencement of his 
 well-known address to the children of Israel, he 
 says : “ Your fathers dwelt on the other side of 
 the flood in old time, even Zerah, the father of 
 Abraham and the father of Nahor: and they served 
 other gods .” (Josh. xxiv. 2.) 
 
 Eusebius informs us, that Serug, the son of Re- 
 gu, first introduced it into their families. (Gen. 
 xi. 20.) At all events, it is certain, that Jehovah 
 commanded Abraham to leave his country and 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 161 
 
 friends, because they had been contaminated with 
 idolatry. (Compare Gen. xii. 1, and Josh. xxiv. 
 2.) From this period until the days of Jacob, ido¬ 
 latry was unknown in the family of the patriarchs. 
 But when Rachel had brought her father’s Tera- 
 phim, or household gods out of Syria, (Gen. xxxi. 
 19, 30-34,) and some of her husband’s family had 
 defiled themselves with the idols of the Sichemites, 
 among whom they had dwelt, (Judges, ix. 46,) 
 Jacob insisted upon the removal of this stumbling- 
 block, and buried all the images under an oak at 
 Sechem. (Gen. xxxv. 1-4.) 
 
 The slavery of the Israelites ought to have laid 
 them under additional obligations to obey and 
 worship the true God, as this was, no doubt, one 
 object of their afHiction. During the time of their 
 bondage, they went after the strange gods of 
 Egypt, as we learn from the admonition of Jo¬ 
 shua. “ Now, therefore, fear the Lord, and serve 
 him in sincerity and truth; and put away the gods 
 which your fathers served on the other side of the 
 flood, and in Egypt, and serve ye the Lord.” 
 This is still further confirmed by the prophet Eze¬ 
 kiel, when he says of the children of Israel: 
 
 o 2 
 
162 IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 “ They committed whoredoms in Egypt.” (Ezek. 
 xxiii. 3.) The context showing that idolatry was 
 the sin designated by this term. The nineteenth 
 and twenty-first verses of the same chapter con¬ 
 tain a repetition of the charge. With a knowledge 
 of this fact, it is more easy to account for the ido¬ 
 latry of the Israelites, so shortly after their deli¬ 
 verance from the house of bondage. They re¬ 
 lapsed into their old idolatrous habits, so soon as 
 they lost sight of Moses. (Exod. xxxii. 1-6.) Je¬ 
 hovah, on various occasions, most solemnly de¬ 
 nounced, in their hearing, all idolatry, worshipping 
 of graven images, and every kind of heathenish 
 superstition. The second commandment of the 
 Decalogue was framed expressly as a barrier 
 against all such transgressions. And, in addition 
 to this, we find the most pointed prohibitions in the 
 Old Testament writings, e. g. “ Take ye there¬ 
 fore good heed unto yourselves, for ye saw no 
 manner of similitude on the day that the Lord 
 spake unto you in Horeh , out of the midst of the 
 fire , lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a 
 graven image, the similitude of any figure, the 
 likeness of male or female, the likeness of any 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 163 
 
 beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any 
 winged fowl that flieth in the air, the likeness of 
 any thing that creepeth on the ground, the like¬ 
 ness of any fish that is in the waters beneath the 
 earth; and lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, 
 and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and 
 the stars, even ail the host of heaven, shouldst be 
 driven to worship them, and serve them which the 
 Lord thy God hath divided unto all nations under 
 the whole heaven.” (Deut. iv. 15-20.) Notwith¬ 
 standing this and similar warnings, in their wander¬ 
 ings through the wilderness, they appear actually to 
 have carried about with them the images of Moloch 
 and other idols, (Amos, v. 25,26, Acts, vii. 41,43,) 
 and at their entrance into the land of Canaan, we 
 find them joining themselves to Baal-Peor, the god 
 of the Moabites. (Numb. xxv. 42, 43). During the 
 lifetime of Joshua, Israel preserved the worship of 
 Jehovah pure, but after his death, “ arose another 
 generation which knew not the Lord forgetting 
 the solemn charge, which had been given them, 
 to drive out every idolater from the promised land, 
 they suffered a few tribes to remain among them, 
 and the consequence was, the service of the Lord 
 
164 IDOLATRY OF THE FEOFLE OF GOD. 
 
 was corrupted by the abominations tolerated in 
 their midst, (Jud. ii. 7-17, Judg. iii. 1-7), and 
 by intermarriages between the Israelites and their 
 idolatrous neighbours. “ They served Baalim ,” 
 offered sacrifices to the gods of Canaan, (Ps. 
 clxvi. 38,) worshipped Baal and Ashtaroth, (or, 
 the groves ,) (Judges, ii. 13, iii. 7), and burnt in¬ 
 cense to the gods of the Syrians, Sidonians, Mo¬ 
 abites, Ammonites, (Ps. cvi. 34-39,) and Philis¬ 
 tines, (Judges, x. 6.) It is true, there were short 
 intervals during this long season of apostacy, in 
 which Israel seemed to relent, whenever men full 
 of faith and the Holy Ghost were raised up, but 
 there seemed to be an almost irresistible propensity 
 to settle down on the lees of idolatry, so soon as 
 God called his zealous servants to their rest. Dur¬ 
 ing the lifetime of Gideon, for example, the people 
 seemed to be engaged in the work of the Lord, 
 and to be doing whatsoever their hand found to do, 
 with their might, but “ as soon as Gideon was 
 dead, the children of Israel turned again, and went 
 a whoring after Baalim, and made Baal-Berith 
 their god. And the children of Israel remem¬ 
 bered not the Lord their God, who had delivered 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 165 
 
 them out of the hands of all their enemies on every 
 side.” (Judges, viii. 33, 34.) In honour of these 
 idols they built altars, and planted groves, in 
 which they instituted “ high places,” and prac¬ 
 tised all‘manner of obscene wickedness under the 
 cover of tents erected for the purpose. (2 Kings, 
 xxiii. 7.) When God called Gideon to deliver 
 Israel from the yoke of the Midianites, the first 
 blow that this servant of the Lord struck, was at 
 the altar of Baal, and the grove contiguous to it. 
 (Judges, vi. 25-32.) 
 
 In order to guard more effectually against this 
 idolatry, to which the Israelites were so prone, 
 the Lord commanded expressly, “ Thou shalt not 
 plant thee a grove of any trees near unto the 
 altar of the Lord thy God, which thou shalt 
 make thee.” (Deut. xvi. 21.) And again: “ Ye 
 shall utterly destroy all the places wherein the 
 nations which ye shall possess, served their gods, 
 upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and 
 under every green tree. And ye shall overthrow 
 their altars, and break their pillars, and burn their 
 groves with fire; and ye shall hew down the 
 graven images of their gods, and destroy the 
 
166 IDOLATRY OF TIIE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 names of them out of that place.” (Deut. xii. 2, 3.) 
 The practice of choosing and worsh ipping house¬ 
 hold gods was also introduced into Israel, as we 
 see in the case of Micah and the tribe of Dan. 
 (Judges, xvii. and xviii.) Through the influence of 
 Samuel, Saul, and David, idolatry was again abo¬ 
 lished in Israel, (1 Sam. vii. 3, 4), and the land 
 seemed to breathe freely, as though a heavy load 
 had been removed from its bosom. The people 
 of God prevailed against their enemies, and pros¬ 
 pered at home as well as abroad; but upon the 
 death of the man after God’s own heart, this mo¬ 
 ral plague again broke out. It was introduced by 
 Solomon’s wives, who seduced him from the wor¬ 
 ship of the true God, and taught him to burn in¬ 
 cense, offer sacrifice, and build temples to the idols 
 of their different countries. It appeared as though 
 Satan had at length succeeded in lifting up the 
 flood-gates and removing the barriers, which had 
 hitherto, in a great measure, restrained the deso¬ 
 lating torrent that now swept every thing before 
 it. “ Then Solomon built a high place for Che- 
 mosh, or Chamos, the abomination of Moab, in 
 the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Moloch, 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 1G7 
 
 the abomination of the children of Ammon. And 
 likewise did he for all his strange wives, which 
 burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods.” (1 
 Kings, xi. 7, 8.) After the division of the king¬ 
 dom, Jeroboam instituted the worship of the 
 golden calves and satyrs , to which allusion has 
 several times been made, (1 Kings, xii. 28-33); 
 2 Chron. xi. 15). Ahab established the altars 
 of Baal, (1 Kings, xvi. 31-33), and from this time 
 forward, idolatry was practised by every king of 
 Israel, and their example was followed by the 
 people. The last king, Iloshea, was not quite so 
 wicked as his predecessors. “ He did that which 
 was evil in the sight of the Lord, but not as the 
 kings of Israel thqt were before him.” (2 Kings, 
 xvii. 2.) In proof of this, it may be mentioned, 
 that after the two golden calves had been carried 
 away by the Assyrian kings, (Hos. x. 6), he per¬ 
 mitted his subjects to return to Jerusalem, to wor¬ 
 ship the true God, and did not hinder them, when 
 after their return from celebrating the passover 
 with Hezekiah at Jerusalem, they broke in pieces 
 the images, cut down the groves, removed the 
 high places, and destroyed every vestige of ido- 
 
168 IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 latry throughout the land of Samaria. (2 Chron. 
 xxx. 10-18.) For further details of the idolatry 
 of the kingdom of Israel, we refer the reader to 
 the books of the prophets Hosea and Amos, and 
 also to the sixteenth and twenty-third chapters of 
 Ezekiel. 
 
 In Judah, the state of religion was not much bet¬ 
 ter than in Israel; for although they had the tem¬ 
 ple and the ordinances of the true worship among 
 them, the Jews paid divine honours to a countless 
 multitude of false gods. This the prophet Jere¬ 
 miah laments: “ Where are thy gods that thou 
 hast made thee ? Let them arise, if they can save 
 thee in the time of thy trouble; for according to 
 the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah.” 
 (Jer. ii. 28.) And again: “ According to the num¬ 
 ber of thy cities were thy gods, and according to 
 the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye 
 set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to 
 burn incense unto Baal.” (Jer. xi. 13.) They 
 became more and more addicted to idolatry, which 
 was maintained and promoted by their wicked 
 kings. It was they who consecrated horses to the 
 sun, (2 Kings, xxiii. 11, 12), and built altars to 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 169 
 
 the abominations of the heathen. High places, 
 pillars, groves, &c., were set up on every spot 
 which appeared convenient for their idolatrous 
 worship. “ Judah did evil in the sight of the 
 Lord, and they provoked him to jealousy with 
 their sins which they had committed, above all 
 that their fathers had done. For they also built 
 them high places, and images, and groves, on 
 every high hill, and under every green tree. And 
 there were also Sodomites in the land; and they 
 did according to all the abominations of the na¬ 
 tions which the Lord cast out before the children 
 of Israel.” (1 Kings, xiv. 22-24.) Isaiah upbraids 
 them thus : “ Are ye not children of transgression 
 —a seed of falsehood; inflaming yourselves with 
 idols, under every green tree, slaying the chil¬ 
 dren in the valleys, under the clifts of the rocks 1” 
 (Isaiah, lxvii. 4.) Ezekiel threatens in the name 
 of the Lord. “ Then shall ye know that I am the 
 Lord, when their slain men shall be among their 
 idols, round about their altars, upon every high 
 hill, in all the tops of the mountains, and under 
 every green tree, and under every thick oak, the 
 place where they did offer sweet savour to all 
 
 F 
 
170 IDOLATRY OF TIIE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 their idols.” (Ezek. vi. 13.) Queen Maecha 
 planted a grove for Miplezeth; Ahaziah and his 
 mother, Athahliah, introduced the worship of Baal 
 into Jerusalem. “ He also walked in the ways of 
 the house of Ahab, for his mother was his coun¬ 
 sellor to do wickedly. Wherefore he did evil in 
 the sight of the Lord, like the house of Ahab ; for 
 they were his counsellors, after the death of his 
 father, to his destruction.” (2 Chron. xxii. 3, 4; 
 2 Chron. xxiii. 17 ; Jer. xix. 5.) Manasseh went 
 so far as to set up the image of Baal in the temple 
 of the Lord; “ He set a graven image of the 
 grove that he had made in the house, of which the 
 Lord said to David, and to Solomon, his son, in 
 this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen 
 out of all the tribes of Israel, will I put my name 
 forever.” (2 Kings, xxi. 7 ; 2 Chron. xxxiii. 3.) 
 Ezekiel and Jeremiah both complain of this insult 
 offered to the Lord Jehovah. (Ezek. viii. 3 ; Jer. 
 vii. 30.) 
 
 Images of reptiles and beasts, such as were 
 commonly deposited in the idol-temples of the 
 Egyptians, were also set up in the Lord's house , 
 or their pictures drawn on its walls. “ He brought 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 171 
 
 me to the door of the court; and when I looked, 
 behold a hole in the wall. Then he said unto me, 
 son of man, dig now in the wall; and when I had 
 digged in the wall, behold a door. And he said 
 unto me, go in, and behold the wicked abomina¬ 
 tions that they do here. So I went in and saw; 
 and behold every form of creeping things, and 
 abominable beasts, and all the idols of the house 
 of Israel, portrayed upon the wall round about.’* 
 (Ezek. viii. 7-10.) 
 
 They worshipped brazen serpents. It is re¬ 
 lated of Hezekiah, (2 Kings, xviii. 4,) that “ he 
 removed the high places, &c., and brake in pieces 
 the brazen serpent that Moses had made: for unto 
 those days did the children of Israel burn incense 
 to it.” They paid divine honours to the sun. 
 When the Lord was showing Ezekiel the abomi¬ 
 nations committed in his house, after pointing out 
 different causes of offence, he says : “ Turn thee 
 yet again, and thou shaft see greater abominations 
 than these. And he brought me into the inner 
 court of the Lord’s house ; and behold, at the door 
 of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and 
 the altar, were about five and twenty men, with 
 
172 IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 their backs toward the temple of the Lord, and 
 their faces toward the east; and they worshipped 
 the sun toward the east.” (Ezek. viii. 16.) 
 
 They consecrated to the snn, chariots and 
 horses , which were kept in the temple . Josiah 
 took away the horses, which the kings of Judah 
 had given to the sun, at the entering in of the 
 house of the Lord, by the chamber of Nathan- 
 melech, the chamberlain, which was in the sub¬ 
 urbs, and burnt the chariots of the sun with fire.” 
 (2 Kings, xxiii. 11.) 
 
 They sacrificed to the moon as queen of hea¬ 
 ven , (Jer. vii. 18,) and erected altars to the stars, 
 and worshipped them as the host of heaven. (2 
 Kings, xxi. 3-5.) 
 
 False prophets and diviners were encouraged , 
 (2 Chron. xxxiii. 6,) prostitution of the most hor¬ 
 rid kind was maintained, (1 Kings, xiv. 24, 2 
 Kings, xxiii. 7,) and the gods of all the heathen 
 nations with whom the Israelites became ac¬ 
 quainted, were invoked. They worshipped the 
 idols of Syria, (2 Chron. xxviii. 23-25,) Assyria, 
 Egypt, and Chaldsea, (Ezek. xvi. 26-29, xxiii. 
 11-27, and viii. 14.) Moloch had his altars in 
 
IDOLATRY OP THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 173 
 
 the vale of Tophet and Ben-Hinnom, (2 Kings, 
 xxiii. 10; Jer. vii. 31, xxxii. 35; 1 Chron. xxviii. 
 3,) and, in short, both Israel and Judah served 
 Satan with their whole heart, and soul, and mind, 
 and strength. 
 
 After the Babylonian captivity, synagogues 
 were established among the Jews in every city; 
 to these they repaired on the Sabbath and also 
 during the week, for worship, and to hear Moses 
 and the prophets read and expounded. These 
 institutions preserved them in the knowledge of 
 Jehovah and his law, and restrained them from 
 adopting the idolatrous customs and superstitions 
 of the neighbouring nations. When the Syrian 
 king, Antiochus the Great , attempted to subvert 
 the worship of the living God, and to force upon 
 the Jews the vile ceremonies of Grecian idolatry, 
 the Maccabees resisted the encroachments of his 
 tyranny, and expended treasure and blood in the 
 defence of their rights, which they, at length, 
 with God’s help, successfully vindicated. 
 
 From this time forward, the Jews were vigi¬ 
 lant in detecting and avoiding the least approach 
 to idolatry. Images and pictures were their ab- 
 
 p 2 
 
174 IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 horrence—no sculptors were tolerated among 
 them—not a statue was to be seen in their syna¬ 
 gogues, and might not even so much as be named 
 in connexion with the temple. In short, every 
 thing of the kind was banished from Jerusalem. 
 So jealous were they of the glory of God, that 
 they rebelled against their rulers whenever the 
 attempt was made to set up images or statues 
 amongst them, and preferred death to their tolera¬ 
 tion. Frequent petitions were addressed to the 
 Roman government to forbid the passage of 
 troops through their country, because the Roman 
 legions were always furnished with standards, 
 which consisted principally of images. Hence 
 it is easy to understand why the Roman army, 
 at the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, is 
 termed “the abomination of desolation.”— 
 “When ye therefore shall see the abomination of 
 desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand 
 in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him under¬ 
 stand,) then let them which be in Jerusalem, flee 
 into the mountains,” &c. (Matt. xxiv. 15, 16.) 
 That this “abomination of desolation” refers to 
 Roman armies is plain, by a reference to the 
 
IDOLATRY OF THE FEOPLE OF GOD. 175 
 
 parallel passage in Luke, xxi. 20, where the Sa¬ 
 viour says, “And when ye shall see Jerusalem 
 compassed with armies, then know that the deso¬ 
 lation thereof is nigh.” 
 
 In the New Testament, converts to Christianity 
 from among the heathen are warned to guard 
 against relapsing into their former idolatrous 
 habits. When the dissension arose among the 
 brethren about circumcising the Gentile con¬ 
 verts, after Peter and Paul and Barnabas had 
 each given his opinion, the Apostle James, who 
 evidently was the president of the convention, 
 closes his counsel thus—“W T herefore my sen¬ 
 tence, (or opinion,) is, that we trouble not them, 
 which from among the Gentiles are turned to God: 
 but that we write to them, that they abstain from 
 pollutions of idols , and from fornication, and 
 from things strangled, and from blood.” (Acts, 
 xv. 20.) The Apostle John concludes his First 
 General Epistle with this affectionate counsel: 
 “ Little children, keep yourselves from idols.” 
 
 In the writings of the Apostles, there are special 
 and repeated cautions against the use of all things 
 offered to idols. (1 Cor. viii. 10-13; x. 19-32.) 
 
176 IDOLATRY OF THE FEOPLE OF GOD. 
 
 It was a common custom among the heathen, 
 for the priest to sprinkle the thing sacrificed to 
 idols with wine, and before the libation was 
 poured out, to hand the cup around to the by¬ 
 standers for them to taste. After the sacrifice 
 had been performed with the usual ceremonies, 
 they who had brought the offering usually made 
 a great feast in the temple, when that which re¬ 
 mained of the sacrifice was eaten by the com¬ 
 pany, who sang the praises of their gods, and 
 danced and leaped about the altar, as the priests 
 of Baal did, when Elijah urged them in mockery 
 to be more earnest in their prayers. To these 
 festivals, Christians who had heathen relatives 
 and friends, were often invited, and were pressed 
 to drink of their cup, and to partake of the things 
 offered to idols. But, because this was a great 
 scandal, and a stumbling block, which was cal¬ 
 culated particularly to offend such who were 
 weak in the faith, the great Apostle of the Gen¬ 
 tiles warns the disciples against all participation 
 in such festivals—terming them “ the table of de¬ 
 vils,” and “the cup of devils.” 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 177 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 The subject which has been investigated in the 
 preceding pages, is one fraught with melancholy 
 reflections. It is humiliating even to fallen human 
 nature, to be compelled to acknowledge that the 
 practice of bowing to stocks and stones should 
 ever have prevailed to a great extent in any one 
 country. What must it be then, when it is re¬ 
 membered, that without excepting even the chosen 
 people of God, every nation, upon whom the 
 light of heaven has shone, has, at one period or 
 other of its history, been addicted to idolatry? 
 Let it never be forgotten, that the origin of all 
 this defection from reason and holiness, is to be 
 traced to that one transgression in Eden, which 
 “ brought death into the world, and all our wo.” 
 
 So long, indeed, as we continue in alienation 
 from God, we are worshipping idols , for every 
 
178 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 thing is an idol that usurps that place in our 
 affections which belongs to God, and worship is 
 nothing but supreme love. 
 
 It is now considered altogether too revolting to 
 every dictate of reason, to adore the work of our 
 own hands by outward acts of worship; because 
 Bible light and knowledge have chased away from 
 our land the midnight gloom in which six hun¬ 
 dred millions of our benighted fellow men, are 
 still groping their downward way, dishonouring 
 God by deeds of darkness, and stumbling over 
 their idol-altars into hell. “ Thanks be to God 
 for his unspeakable gift!” Thanks for every 
 drop of blood shed upon the cross, and for the 
 knowledge of the Saviour’s death and resurrec¬ 
 tion ! Let us not forget that necessity is laid upon 
 us to extend this saving knowledge to those who 
 have never heard of the Man of Calvary; but let 
 each one, according to the measure of the grace 
 of Christ given to him, exert his influence that 
 the Saviour’s last command, “ Go ye into all the 
 world, and preach the gospel to every creature,” 
 may come into speedy accomplishment. If there 
 were but one Prcetorian cohort in the sacra- 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 179 
 
 mental host of God, composed of spirits such as 
 Nitsflman and Dober of the Moravian Church, 
 who first planted the ensign of dying love on the 
 West India Islands, the fulness of the Gentiles 
 would, ere long, come pouring and pressing into 
 the kingdom of heaven, and the Word of God, 
 which is a lamp to our feet, would soon gleam 
 through the shades of death as a beacon-light to 
 the millions who still groan in spiritual bondage, 
 and stumble and fall on the dark mountains of 
 sin. But before God’s sons can be brought from 
 far, and his daughters from the ends of the earth, 
 the Church, the Lamb’s bride, purchased with 
 his own precious blood, must array herself in 
 the beauty of holiness, gird herself with Im¬ 
 manuel’s strength, and put away her idols ! 
 The IDOLATRY OF THE ClIURCH OF ClIRIST is nOW 
 the great stumbling-block in the highway of our 
 God. Oh! that the day would dawn when Covet¬ 
 ousness, the Great Dagon of worldly Christians, 
 shall fall before the Ark of God, never to rise 
 again ! 
 
 It is true, we rejoice in the light of revelation, 
 and in all the social, political, and religious privi- 
 
180 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 leges, which emanate from the Bible, yet how 
 many, even in the noon of this gospel-day, “ fear 
 the Lord, and worship their graven images.” 
 They cannot “ pass by a particle of shining 
 dust, without kneeling and cringing before it!” 
 Gold is their god ! At the altar of this idol, 
 they offer their morning and evening sacrifice. 
 Many are ambitious of the honours of this world, 
 careless and forgetful of, nay even despising, 
 “ the honour that is of God.” They too are idol¬ 
 aters. Temptations to apostacy from God still 
 abound, and always will abound, so long as the 
 world lieth in wickedness, and so long as the 
 carnal mind retains its enmity against God ! 
 
 It is worthy of remark, that the moral desola¬ 
 tion which covered the vineyard of the Lord with 
 blight, in the season preceding the reformation 
 effected by Samuel, Saul, and David, must be 
 ascribed to a neglect on the part of Israel to 
 carry out the commands of Jehovah. The peo¬ 
 ple of God had been repeatedly charged to drive 
 out all the idolatrous nations from Canaan—not 
 to rest until they were every one expelled—but, 
 after the greater part of this work had been ac- 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 181 
 
 complished, and their strongest foes had been 
 subdued, their zeal relaxed, and several idolatrous 
 tribes were suffered to retain their possessions. 
 Ere long we find God’s people mingling with 
 them and intermarrying, and then, the next step 
 was soon taken, “ they forsook the Lord, and 
 served Baal and Ashlaroth.” This presents an 
 important caution to the Christian. Let him be¬ 
 ware of the idolatrous Jebusites, who still lurk 
 in the fastnesses of his heart, and see to it that 
 he makes no compromise with sin . Down to the 
 latest point of time, the injunction, “ Watch and 
 pray,” needs to be sounded in his ears, and the 
 affectionate counsel of the beloved disciple should 
 be graven on the heart, and bound as a frontlet 
 between the eyes of every follower of Jesus— 
 “ Little children, keep yourselves from 
 idols.” 
 
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