I 
 
 i 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
ORIENTAL RECORDS 
 
 HISTORICAL. 
 
ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 HISTORICAL 
 
 CONFIRMATORY OF THE 
 
 OLD AND NEW TESTAMENT SCRIPTURES. 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM HARRIS RULE, D.D. 
 
 E^r]pdudr] 6 x^P'^'os Kol to ciudos avTov e^errecre, to 5e p^fJi-o- 
 Kvpiov /xeVfi els tov nloiva. 
 
 Multa terricolis linguae, coslestibus una. 
 
 LONDON : 
 SAMUEL BAGSTER AND SONS, 
 
 IS, PATERNOSTER ROW. 
 
 ^ . \ 
 
7?^ 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Preface ...... i 
 
 The Institution of the Sabbath . . . i 
 
 Site of the Cave of Machpelah ... 6 
 
 Burial, not Burning . . . . .10 
 
 Witchcraft a Capital Crime . . 24 
 
 Spirit-Worship . . . . • 3^ 
 
 Divination . . . . . 41 
 
 Death for Heresy . . . . .48 
 
 The Fallen Angels .... 50 
 
 Demoniacs . . . . . -55 
 
 Human Sacrifices .... 64 
 
 The Sin of Asking for a King . . .68 
 
 Assyria — The Occupation of Samaria . . 73 
 
 „ The Samaritan Pentateuch . . -7^ 
 
 Naaman in the House of Rimmon . . 82 
 
 Merodach-Baladan and Hezekiah . . -87 
 
 Pharaoh Necho and Josiah ... 90 
 
 Babylon— The Fall of Babylon . . -95 
 
 Cyrus — The Name of Cyrus . . . 106 
 
 „ The Religion of Cyrus and the Persians . 1 1 1 
 
 r;inA o>i •^ri 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Zerubbabel . . . . . 119 
 
 Kings of the North and South — Canopus Inscription 
 
 and Rosetta Stone . . . -135 
 
 Destruction of the Temple and City of Jerusalem 147 
 Tombs of the Kings . . . . -152 
 
 The "House of Prayer for all People" . . 159 
 
 The Magi who came to Worship Jesus . .166 
 
 The Fame of Jesus in Syria . . . 173 
 
 Polyglot Inscriptions — Pilate's Writing on the Cross . 177 
 Carmen Christo Quasi Deo . . . 183 
 
 Primeval Faith — Revelation . . , .190 
 
 Supremacy and Unity of God . . . 195 
 
 The Future State — Egypt . . . .213 
 
 „ „ Assyria . . . 223 
 
 Sacrifice ...... 233 
 
 Appendix — Notes on the Curetonian Gospels . 238 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 First Lines of the first Creation-tablet, from " Trans- 
 actions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology," 
 Vol. IV., Part i. . On Cover of the Book. 
 
 Gen. i. 6-8. From MS. of the Samaritan Pentateuch 
 
 in the British Museum . . . -76 
 
 Name of a Queen, from a Sarcophagus in " Tombs of 
 
 the Kings " near Jerusalem . . -152 
 
 Luke xi. 24-26 in ancient Syriac, from the Curetonian 
 Gospels in the British Museum (Add. 14, 451, of 
 the Fifth Century) . . . 175,238 
 
PREFACE 
 
 T will be perceived that the title-pages of this 
 volume and the one preceding' indicate a shade 
 of difference in the contents. In the first, I restrict 
 myself, almost entirely, to monumental confirmation 
 of the several statements in the Old Testament to 
 which the records relate, but in the second I take 
 a somewhat wider range, yet not so wide as will soon 
 be practicable. 
 
 The ground which lies before us is not yet fully 
 occupied ; and with the additional material which 
 will, most probably, soon come to hand, further 
 study of a much enlarged collection may be expected 
 to throw great light on the long continued corruption 
 of the Israelites by communication with their neigh- 
 bours in general, and their Egyptian masters and 
 Assyrian and Babylonian conquerors in particular. 
 When the study now anticipated is accomplished, 
 much additional aid will be obtained for a more sure 
 and enlightened exposition of both the Old Testa- 
 ment and the New, and especially of such portions of 
 the latter as relate to the infant Asiatic churches, 
 influenced as they were by idolatries which have not 
 hitherto been so well understood by expositors as are 
 those of Greece and Rome. The false worship, the 
 false teachings, and the evil customs of those remote' 
 
 ' Oriental Records. Monumental, 
 
11 PREFACE. 
 
 ages, the entire picture of heathen Hfe, as we find it 
 self-recorded, must be made widely known before the 
 exact adaptation of the censures of Prophets and 
 Apostles to the case of those whom they address can 
 be fully appreciated. 
 
 To attempt so complete an exposition would now 
 be premature. The Oriental mythologies are not yet 
 ascertained sufficiently by those most diligent and 
 most successful investigators whose attention is per- 
 severingly directed to the very subject, and whose 
 discoveries multiply almost from day to day, and 
 enrich the new literature which has come into 
 existence. 
 
 I must acknowledge my consciousness that the 
 present work is but rudimental, and profess a hope 
 that, if my own life be spared for the completion of 
 another labour, which is now demanding incessant 
 care, it may be permitted me to pursue this long 
 cherished object yet further. But I rejoice in the 
 assurance that younger men, all over Europe, are 
 busily pursuing this line of study, and will consecrate 
 their powers to the glory of God, in direct relation to 
 that Divinely inspired book, which becomes more and 
 more manifestly precious, as witnesses rise up from 
 the dust of antiquity to vindicate its perfectness from 
 the disparagement of scepticism, and the contradiction 
 of grosser unbelief 
 
 W. H. RULE. 
 
 Croydon, 
 yune 2ist, 1877. 
 
ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 THE INSTITUTION OF THE 
 SABBATH. 
 
 Genesis II. 2, 3. 
 
 FTER the creation of man, the first great event 
 on record is the institution of the Sabbath. 
 Much has been said of a division of time into weeks 
 anciently observed, and some classical quotations are 
 current, but I shall not repeat them. There cannot 
 be any contemporaneous monument of that event, but 
 it is undeniable that a Sabbatic tradition can be traced 
 in history, although for the most part faintly. Moses 
 writes that " on the seventh day God ended His work 
 which He had made : and He rested ' on the seventh 
 day from all His work which He had made. And 
 God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, be- 
 cause that in it He had rested from all His work 
 which He had created and made." (Gen. ii. 2, 3.) 
 When collating the Chaldean deluge tablet with the 
 
 * mtf « he ceased from." 
 
2 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Mosaic history of the deluge, I have shown that, 
 according to both these documents, there was a 
 weekly division of time observed by Noah. I am not 
 able to make so confident a use of some passages 
 from the Greek classics as others have done to prove 
 the prevalence of a Sabbatic tradition, but am glad to 
 find more direct evidence from higher antiquity. 
 
 There is a standard astronomical work that was 
 common to both Babylonians and Assyrians. It 
 consists of seventy tablets, and was compiled in this 
 form for Sargon, king of Agane, in the sixteenth 
 century before Christ. This, however, is but one out 
 of many of the same kind, all representing a system 
 of combined science and superstition cultivated during 
 many centuries, and perhaps more ancient than Baby- 
 lon itself. It is translated by the Rev. A. H. Sayce, 
 M.A., who presented the translation and memoir to 
 the Society of Biblical Archaeology. On one of the 
 tablets are found these words : " The moon a rest, on 
 the seventh day, the 14th day, the 21st day, the 28th 
 day, causes." ' In the course of his memoir Mr. Sayce 
 remarks that the days on which the quarters of the 
 moon began were called "days o{ sidunil''' or rest, and 
 on those days certain works were forbidden. This is 
 supported by another inscription, of which the trans- 
 lation is published by Mr. Fox Talbot as it stands on 
 the fifth Creation-tablet : " Every month without fail 
 he made holy assembly days. In the beginning of the 
 month, at the rising of the night, it (the moon) shot 
 forth its beams to illuminate the heavens. On the 
 
 * Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, Vol. III., p. 145, 
 207, 213, 313. 
 ' DI^TU " peace." 
 
THE INSTITUTION OF THE SABBATH. 3 
 
 seventh day he appointed a holy day, and to cease 
 from all business he commanded." From the same 
 tablet Mr. Talbot translates an account of Hasisadra 
 curing Isdubar of a cutaneous disease which he 
 understands to be leprosy. Be that as it may, for 
 the meaning of rarely occurrent words must, as yet, 
 be doubtful, the general drift of the inscription 
 scarcely can be, and the numbers could hardly be 
 mistaken. The lines run thus : " Every day (Ha- 
 sisadra) ascended to the deck of the ship (the ark, as 
 it lay on its resting-place). The first day, he brought 
 ointment for his leprosy; the second day, he brought 
 musk ; the third day, he brought . . . . ; the fourth 
 day, he opened his ulcer ; the fifth day, ointment he 
 spread on it ; the sixth day, he brought balsam. On 
 the seventh day, he gave him a dress of honour, and 
 exalted the man." The same is repeated further on.' 
 
 Mr. Sayce has more recently published a trans- 
 lation of what he calls "a Babylonian Saints' 
 Calendar," which bears traces of an Accadian 
 original, and if so, it represents a distinct historic 
 source. Not only is there a Sabbath marked therein 
 on the 7th, 14th, 2 1st, and 28th days of the month, 
 but one also on the 19th, for which there may have 
 been some special and independent reason, and on 
 each of these days there is the following entry, of 
 great importance with regard to the manner in which 
 the Sabbath should be kept : 
 
 " A Sabbath. The prince of many nations the flesh 
 of birds (and) cooked fruit eats not. The garments 
 of his body he changes not. White robes he puts not 
 on, sacrifice he offers not. The king in his chariot 
 
 ^ Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archceology, Vol. IV., p. 67-69. 
 
 2* 
 
4 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 rides not. In royal fashion he legislates not. A 
 place of garrison the general by word of mouth 
 appoints not. Medicine for his sickness of body he 
 applies not." ' 
 
 Mr. Sayce observes that what he has translated 
 Sabbath is expressed by two Accadlan words which 
 literally signify dies iiefastiis, and a bilingual syllabary 
 makes them equivalent to yum sulumi, or day of 
 completion of labours. He further says that the word 
 Sabbath itself was not unknown to the Assyrians, 
 and occurs, under the form of Sabbatu, in one of the 
 Western Asiatic Inscriptions (II. 32, 16), where it is 
 explained as a day of rest for the heart. Now this 
 fact, literally set before us, has very great importance. 
 It contributes evidence to show that in the transition 
 of mankind from the service of the true God to 
 creature-worship, the weekly observance of a day of 
 rest was changed into a quarter-monthly. The 
 original Sabbath followed six working-days, and was 
 commemorative of the creation, and the communion 
 of the Creator with His favoured creatures on the 
 first entire day of their existence. The Babylonian 
 Sabbath was made to bear another significance. 
 Nearly the same as to time. It seemed to have 
 another reason, the original reason having passed 
 out of mind, and to depend on the moon, which was 
 said, being now deified, to cmise a day of rest, peace, 
 repose from labour. The writing of Moses and the 
 method of the astrologers so far differ, but the reason 
 of the difference Is palpable, and the fact of differing 
 is accounted for at once by the departure of the 
 
 ^ Records of the Past, Vol. VII., p. 157. 
 
THE INSTITUTION OF THE SABBATH. 5 
 
 Babylonians from the faith and worship of their 
 fathers to the worship of the sun and moon. 
 
 The quarter-monthly Sabbath is reproduced in some 
 part of India. A missionary, writing from Ceylon, 
 describes a revival of Buddhist zeal in that island, and 
 gives one proof of it in "the revival of a Buddhist 
 Sunday, if," he asks incredulously, "Buddhism ever 
 had one before. // occurs on the day of the 7noon^s 
 change, four times a month, commonly known as 
 * Poga Day.' Recently, however, a much stricter 
 keeping of it has been called for, and now the 
 Buddhist bazaar, or market, and the boutiques, or 
 shops, are all closed on Poga days. In 1864 (when 
 last in Ceylon), I never saw or heard of such obser- 
 vance : now, we can get nothing from Buddhists on 
 Poga days." ' 
 
 ^ JVesleyan Missionary Notices for September, 1875. 
 
t^ 
 
 SITE OF THE CAVE OF 
 MACHPELAH. 
 
 Genesis XXIII. 17-20. 
 
 E cannot yet explore the patriarch's burial-place 
 at Hebron, and ascertain by actual inspection 
 the exact reason of its name, machpelah, or double. 
 Conjecture does not satisfy. It remains for some 
 reverent inquirer to gain access, and search the place 
 beneath-ground for what information it may yield. 
 The patriarch Abraham was buried there,^ as were 
 Isaac and Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, and Leah. No- 
 thing is known of the funeral rites that were observed 
 when its venerable purchaser was laid there out of 
 sight. We do indeed know that when Jacob died in 
 Egypt, his son "Joseph commanded his servants the 
 physicians to embalm his father ; and the physicians 
 embalmed Israel. And forty days were fulfilled for 
 him, for so are fulfilled the days of those which are 
 embalmed ; and the Egyptians mourned for him 
 threescore and ten days." (Gen. 1. 2, 3.) With great 
 state, and a procession almost royal, the body was 
 conveyed to Hebron. No doubt it was thoroughly 
 mummified. Probably a sarcophagus had been pre- 
 pared for its reception, for we cannot conceive that so 
 great care as was displayed in the embalming and 
 the burial could have been preceded by a negli- 
 gence foreign from the habits of the Egyptians, and 
 
SITE OF THE CAVE OF MACHPELAH. 7 
 
 SO utterly unlike the filial reverence and love con- 
 stantly and assiduously displayed by Joseph during 
 the seventeen years of his father's life in Egypt. It 
 is almost equally improbable that the sarcophagus 
 would have been bare, without a sentence engraven 
 to betoken faith in immortality or to honour the 
 departed in sight of the Egyptians ; or that no 
 written papyrus would be laid within the mummy- 
 cloths. And unless Machpelah has been rifled at 
 some time when Judea was overrun with a hostile 
 army, or held in absolute possession by Gentiles, it 
 may even now be hoped that the time is coming 
 when in that cave some kind of monumental con- 
 firmation to the narrative of Jacob's burial written in 
 the last chapter of the book of Genesis, and of Joseph's 
 also, will be found. 
 
 In the Holy Land there is a great scarcity of 
 Biblical monuments. Josephus, indeed, is supposed 
 to refer to the tombs of the patriarchs in Hebron 
 when he says, that in his time monuments of the 
 children of Abraham were shown in this very little 
 city of Hebron, and that they were all of the finest 
 marble, and sumptuously wrought ; ' but it does not 
 appear that any remains of such monuments have 
 been heard of since his time. 
 
 Unless Josephus writes carelessly, we must under- 
 stand him to affirm that then, or at least within 
 memory of persons then living {until now), while he 
 was writing his books on the Jewish war, about 
 A.D. 70, soon after the fall of Jerusalem, those fine 
 
 * . . . . Tovs re TraiSas auTOU [AjSpci/Aov] Aeyouai Traraflrji/at els Ai-yvTrroi' ivOev 
 SiV KoX TO. (j-vrifJieia /u-expt tov vvv ev TrjSe ttj 7I"oAi;(vtj SeiKWTai, ndvv /caA^s fxapfjidpov 
 Koi (^lAoTiju,"? elpyaa-fjieva. Bell. yud. IV., ix. 7. 
 
8 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 marble monuments were shown, having been pre- 
 served with sacred care for seventeen hundred years. 
 But there is reason to believe that the Hebron known 
 to Josephus did not occupy the same site as the 
 Hebron of to-day. The famous turpentine-tree, called 
 the oak of Mamre, and mentioned by Josephus, was 
 six stadia from Hebron ; but Sozomen, writing about 
 the middle of the fifth century, gives for the distance 
 of the same tvQQ fifteen stadia, showing a difference of 
 nine. Again, in the twelfth century, Rabbi Benjamin 
 of Tudela, who visited Hebron, says that "this city 
 was formerly situated in the mountain, but was then 
 in ruins, that the town he saw was on lower ground, 
 and that the field of Machpelah, where was the great 
 high place which they called Saint Abraham, and 
 close to that temple, the tombs of Abraham, Isaac, 
 Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, and Leah ; a position corres- 
 ponding, as nearly as may be, to the present position 
 of the mosque of the Friend of God, as the Arabs call 
 it, and the cave wherein the bodies of Abraham and 
 the others are said to be deposited, and is conse- 
 quently regarded with an awful reverence by the 
 Mohammedans." ' 
 
 But if Josephus is to be understood literally, that 
 the bodies were buried in that very town^ ev ryhe rfj 
 irokLXvr), and if that very town was in the site described 
 by Sozomen and Rabbi Benjamin, the remains of the 
 lost monuments may yet be found by excavation 
 there, that is to say, on the top of the hill, instead of 
 the lower ground. 
 
 It will be remembered that when the Prince of 
 Wales was in Palestine in 1862, admission for him 
 
 * Itinerarium R. Benjaminisy Lugd. Batav., 1633, p. 48. 
 
SITE OF THE CAVE OF MACHPELAH. 9 
 
 and his attendants to enter the mosque was with 
 great difficulty obtained, that he might get a glance, 
 at least, of the cave bought of the Hittites by Abra- 
 ham, or some part of it. A continuous tradition, 
 traced through a succession of historians and tra- 
 vellers from Flavins Josephus, down to the present 
 Dean of Westminster, who accompanied his Royal 
 Highness, and wrote an interesting account of that 
 visit,' seemed to mark the place, but a difficulty has 
 been created by the shifting of the site, and a question 
 of identity is raised. There is, certainly, a most 
 distinct historical certification of the burial, recorded 
 in the book of Genesis. But the cave has to be 
 searched, and this may soon be accomplished. 
 
 While the antiquarian regrets the scarcity of monu- 
 ments in a land so famous for the greatest events 
 in the history of mankind, he cannot fail to be 
 impressed with the prophetic sentence of desolation : 
 " I will scatter you among the heathen, and will draw 
 out a sword after you, and your land shall be deso- 
 late, and your cities waste." (Lev. xxvi. 33.) "In 
 all your dwelling-places the cities shall be laid waste, 
 and the high places shall be desolate ; that your 
 altars may be laid waste, and may be cut down, and 
 your works may be abolished." (Ezek. vi. 6.) Hence 
 it has come to pass that the explorers of Palestine, 
 stimulated by the expectation of finding objects of 
 great archaeological interest, have set out in earnest 
 search, have persevered nobly, and, after all, find little 
 of the kind at first expected. Their labours are 
 indeed rewarded, but not quite according to the hopes 
 of the original projectors. 
 
 ^ The Times, April 26, 1862. 
 
lO 
 
 BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 
 
 Genesis XXIII. 19. 
 
 BRAHAM bought the cave Machpelah, or 
 double, of Ephron the Hittite, for four hundred 
 shekels of silver, that he might bury his dead out of 
 sight. (Gen. xxiii.) He found this cave ready pre- 
 pared as a place of sepulture, being one of the 
 sepulchres of which the Hittites offered him the 
 choice. This incident brings us one of numberless 
 evidences that the custom of burying or entombing 
 the dead was not peculiar to the Hebrews, but pre- 
 vailed with other peoples before them. As for the 
 purchase made by Abraham at Hebron, I have 
 written a few lines only ; and my only purpose, at 
 present, is to remind the reader that the custom of 
 depositing the bodies of the deceased in graves, 
 vaults, or cells excavated in the rock, tended to keep 
 up a belief in the immortality of man, and a future 
 resurrection. The cremation of the dead had no 
 such significance, nor could it seem to anticipate a 
 restoration of the body. 
 
 It would be undertaking an interminable and 
 useless work to set about collecting evidences of 
 that custom and the correspondent belief from the 
 early seats of postdiluvian population. Examples 
 cannot but occur to every reader, such as the vast 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 11 
 
 burying-places at Warka and Mugheir at a very early 
 period, and the sepulchres and tombs in Chaldea, 
 Babylonia, Assyria, and Persia. We read of tombs 
 in South Arabia before the exode of Israel from 
 Egypt, and again in Palestine. Some Phoenician 
 sepulchral epigraphs were discovered a few years ago^ 
 and I notice one of them, not on account of anything 
 singular therein, but because, in common with others, 
 it bears witness to religious care for the bodies of the 
 departed. It is inscribed on a sarcophagus dis- 
 covered in Sidon which once contained the remains 
 of a king Ashmunezer, son of Tabnith, also king of 
 the Sidonians, who, during his life, appears to have 
 given directions for his interment, and for the due 
 care of his tomb.' It has been translated into German 
 to the effect following : 
 
 " When I fall asleep at the end of my days, then 
 let there be rest, caring for the dead. And I shall lie 
 in this stone coffin, and in this grave, at the place 
 which I have built, founding an ornament for the 
 whole kingdom. And let not any man open this 
 resting-place, nor let him seek for treasure with us, 
 for with us no treasure shall be placed ; neither let him 
 take away the stone coffin where I lie, nor let him 
 overweight the strength of this coffin by laying a 
 second coffin upon it. But if a man sells our grave 
 he is made a curse to himself, we banish him out 
 of the whole kingdom ; and any man who opens the 
 lid of this grave, or who removes the stone coffin in 
 which I lie, or who overloads the support of this 
 coffin, may God deny him a resting-place for his soul, 
 
 ^ Zwei Sidonische Inschriften, und eine altphonische Konigsinschrift 
 zuerst herausgegehen und erkl'drt von Dr. F. E. C. Dietrich, Marburg, 1855. 
 
12 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 and let him not be buried in his grave. May God 
 make him without son or name. Instead of him 
 sleeping, may he quake before the mighty, before the 
 holy, and before them that shall follow him. The 
 renowned king who shall reign among us after I have 
 disappeared from the seat of government, if there is a 
 man who opens the lid of this resting-place, or who 
 takes away this stone coffin, this king shall curse him. 
 When a man violates it, that man may God doom to 
 exile, to starvation, to breaking down, to offence and 
 curse, as long as he lives under the sun, as one for 
 whom no mercy is prepared." 
 
 After this execration he recounts his good deeds: 
 chiefly that he has built a house for his mother, a 
 temple for Elon, god of the Sidonians, and another 
 temple for Ashtoreth ; and winds up with a curse to 
 all eternity on the man that shall rifle his tomb. This 
 may indicate some features in the religious belief of 
 the Sidonians, while it shows what care they wished 
 to have taken of their mortal remains, but it leaves 
 unaltered the fact that every tomb hitherto dis- 
 covered, of any importance, has been broken open 
 and robbed of every thing valuable it contained. 
 
 Some writers on Christian martyrology have kept 
 up a tradition, very remarkable if true, that confessors 
 of Christ thrown into fires, or into river or sea, or 
 exposed to wild beasts, have been miraculously 
 delivered, but that the same persons, after such 
 deliverance, have been slain by the sword of the 
 executioner. 
 
 Some who credit the tradition ask how immunity 
 from one kind of martyrdom, and subjection to the 
 other, is to be accounted for; and the answer 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 1 3 
 
 suggested is that the destruction of bodies unburied was 
 believed by people in general to be incompatible 
 with a future resurrection from the dead; and that a 
 miraculous exemption from the devouring flames and 
 flood, and from the jaws of lions, was intended to 
 quicken the faith of Christian confessors in the pro- 
 mises of immortal bliss. These notions we may safely 
 dismiss, and they do not appear to have been en- 
 couraged by the most eminent of the Christian fathers; 
 but they serve now to show the existence of a heathen 
 superstition. It is quite probable that sincere, but 
 half-taught Christians, might be haunted with a fear 
 that bodies not duly laid to sleep the sleep of death 
 in the graves prepared for them, might not wake up 
 to life again, but our Lord provided for his people a 
 sentence of infallible assurance to the contrary, " Fear 
 not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill 
 the soul; but rather fear Him which is able to destroy 
 both soul and body in hell." (Matt. x. 28.) Never- 
 theless, without any such fear of annihilation at the 
 pleasure of a persecutor, both Jews and Christians 
 were careful to give decent burial to the bodies of 
 martyrs, and it is recorded how devout brethren carried 
 Stephen, the first of them, to interment. (Acts viii. 2.) 
 But the traces of primeval faith in the resurrection 
 of the body are by no means uniform in the funeral 
 customs of antiquity. They prevail chiefly in the 
 East, and an association of memory of the present 
 life with hope of the future chiefly appears in what is 
 known of the rites of sepulture. As the prophet 
 speaks of warriors lying in the chambers of the dead, 
 with the weapons they had used in life laid under their 
 heads, so do the archaeologists tell us of similar deposits 
 
14 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 in the coffins or ossuaries of very remote antiquity, 
 and to a much less extent, if at all, in cinerary urns. 
 
 There are also traces of unbelief, or perhaps we 
 should rather say of ignorance ; and if so, vestiges 
 of belief among the descendants of Shem and Ham 
 are all the more instructive. Some recent accounts 
 of incineration by a learned Frenchman, as distinct 
 from inhinnation, are very helpful to a due considera- 
 tion of the subject, which has a twofold importance, 
 first, in relation to the faith of the Hebrews, who so 
 carefully buried their dead, and then with regard to 
 the practice of what is now euphemistically called 
 cremation, and which some persons wish to see intro- 
 duced into England ; not perceiving, as we must 
 presume, that it has hitherto been taken for a symbol 
 of unbelief I do not charge with unbelief well mean- 
 ing persons who fancy that for sanitary reasons it 
 would be better to burn departed friends than bury 
 them, for I seriously believe the contrary. In the 
 treatises to which I refer, M. Alexandre Bertrand' 
 makes a wide distinction between the Etruscans, in- 
 habitants of Etruria a few centuries before the founda- 
 tion of Rome, and the old, or rather, the pre-Etruscans, 
 otherwise old Italics, a people of very remote antiquity, 
 and to be strongly distinguished from the Etruscans 
 who brought their religion and civilization from the 
 East. Perhaps they were identical with the Pelasgi, 
 and some of the Homeric heroes. He notes the 
 uniformity of their religious ritual, so far as there are 
 any vestiges of it, and maintains that always, or very 
 nearly always, they burnt their dead. 
 
 The old Italics laid the ashes of their dead in 
 
 " Rwue Archeologique, Avril et Septembre, 1874. 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 1 5 
 
 earthen jars. First, a pit was dug in the ground of 
 size and shape sufficient to receive the jar, or, as the 
 Romans would say, the cinerary urn, and then lined 
 at the bottom and sides with stones rudely squared, 
 and laid together without cement. The jar was then 
 let down into its little pit, and covered with a lid of 
 the same material, somewhat resembling an inverted 
 bowl. One or two flat stones were laid on the top of 
 the pit. The cemetery, if it might be so called, con- 
 sisted of lines of these deposits ; but no inscription 
 recorded the name of the person whose charred flesh 
 and calcined bones were thrown into it. Buckles 
 perhaps, or a razor, or a piece of coat-of-mail, was 
 sometimes dropped into the jar, and when not entirely 
 corroded with the damp of ages, is all that remains to 
 tell that the contents of the jar ever had any relation 
 to humanity. There was not a word in remembrance 
 of any life led in this world, or in token of hope for 
 the world to come. 
 
 Here let us borrow a sentence or two of M. Ber- 
 trand : " We have on many occasions pointed out 
 how necessary it was to avoid confounding, when 
 studying Italian antiquities, the cemeteries for in- 
 cineration with those for inhumation, or even with 
 the mixed cemeteries where the two rites have been 
 observed. We have always been convinced that there 
 are two traditions, or to speak more correctly, two 
 religions absolutely distinct, and some facts of charac- 
 ter and significance altogether unlike mere individual 
 fancies. A remarkable letter from our friend, Count 
 G. Conestabile, touching the funeral rites of the 
 Etruscans, confirms us more and more in this way of 
 viewing the subject. The Count, whose opinion we 
 
1 6 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 solicited, comes to the conclusion that the funeral 
 rites were dominant among the Etruscan aristocracy, 
 that is to say, the Etruscans, not the old Italics, but 
 they who much later came from the East, where 
 Shemitic faith, or its vestiges, still existed, was inhu- 
 mation. This was that of the primitive Tusci." 
 
 This distinction, to which the Italian archaeologues 
 are led by researches conducted in a purely scientific 
 spirit, confirms me in the constant belief that the 
 resurrection of the dead was contemplated in Abra- 
 ham's faith ; and that the solemnity with which he 
 conducted the purchase of a burial-place for his 
 family was not only intended as a declaration of 
 assurance that his children in after generations would 
 be laid in that spot, but was a practical profession of 
 his hope and theirs that their bodies would not 
 eternally perish, but be raised to life again. To burn 
 and to bury were acts equally significant, the one of 
 annihilation, the other of hope. This view of the 
 matter agrees with the confession of St. Paul before 
 a Roman governor and a Jewish king : " Now I stand 
 and am judged for the hope of the promise made ot 
 God unto our fathers, under which promise our twelve 
 tribes, instantly serving God day and night, hope to 
 come. For which hope's sake, king Agrippa, I am 
 accused of the Jews. Why should it be thought a 
 thing incredible with- you that God should raise the 
 dead .? " (Acts xxvi. 6-Z) 
 
 Methinks I see Abraham the pilgrim laying his 
 dead out of sight in the cave of Machpelah, and 
 calmly rejoicing in the assurance that they and he would 
 be translated thence into that heavenly country where 
 God had prepared for him a city. (Heb. xi. 14-19.) 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 1 7 
 
 Israelites, no less than heathens, had a horror of 
 leaving their bodies to be unburied : and that horror, 
 common to mankind, was encouraged by their in- 
 spired teachers, who regarded the denial of burial as 
 a mark of infamy. " Thus saith the Lord concerning 
 
 Jehoiakim he shall be buried with the burial 
 
 of an ass, drawn and cast forth beyond the gates of 
 Jerusalem." (Jer. xxii. i8, 19.) "His dead body 
 shall be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the 
 night to the frost." (Jer. xxxvi. 30.) " The dogs," 
 said Elisha, " shall eat Jezebel in the portion of 
 Jezreel, and there shall be none to bury her." (2 Ki. 
 ix. 10.) The dogs did so eat her there, leaving " no 
 more of her than the skull, and the feet, and the palms 
 of her hands." (2 Ki. ix. 35.) 
 
 With the Greeks and Latins, however, the horror of 
 lacking burial did not so much arise from a thought 
 of ignominy as of privation in the future state. The 
 soul of Patroclus, for example, is said to appeal to 
 Achilles for the benefit of funeral rites : *' Art thou 
 asleep, Achilles, and forgettest me ? Thou didst not 
 forget me when I was alive ; but, now that I am 
 dead. Bury me as quickly as possible that I may 
 go into the gates of Hades. Souls from afar hasten 
 me, those ghosts of the departed ! They will not 
 suffer me to mingle (with them) across the flood, nor to 
 venture rashly through the broad gates of the house 
 unseen." ' Palinurus, too, accidentally drowning, 
 
 EvSet?, avTap cju-eio A.«A.ao-joieVo? enKev, Axi^^ev ; 
 Oil ix€V fiev ^coovTOs a.KriSei,<;, aWa OavovTOi' 
 ®dTTTe fxe OTTirdxi-a-ra, TrvAas atSao irep-qa-Q}. 
 T^Ae /xe eCpyovcrt, xj/vxo-i-, elSoiXa KafnovToiV, 
 OuSe fi.e TTw? ixCaye<T9at vnep TTora/xoto eSxri-v' 
 
 'AAA.' avTws aAaArjioiai av evpvnvKes alSos S<a. Iliad., xxlii. 69-74. 
 H 3 
 
1 8 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 prays to be admitted into peaceful rest : " Extend 
 thy right hand to a wretch, and carry me with thee 
 through the waves, that I may rest at once in a 
 peaceful abode in death." ' Every scholar knows how 
 a conclamation was thrice pronounced at the grave of 
 the deceased, as if to be assured that the departed 
 soul had already entered into rest, and if there did 
 not seem to be any sign of disquiet the inquiring 
 survivor, being satisfied, would say conclamatmn est ! 
 and go his way. 
 
 With newly converted heathens, a remarkable in- 
 stance of popular apprehension, that the souls of those 
 who lay unburied could not be saved in the other 
 world, appears in ecclesiastical history, and we see 
 that it occasioned to St. Augustine the writing of his 
 work De Civitate Dei. When the Goths under Alaric 
 invaded Italy, and, after a great slaughter in Rome, 
 heaps of corpses lay unburied, the Christians in 
 Africa were distressed with the fear that their 
 brethren so fallen, and so abandoned, would have 
 no part in the resurrection of the dead. For their 
 comfort, the Bishop of Hippo wrote concerning the 
 burial of human bodies, to prove that although it 
 were denied to Christians they would suffer no loss 
 by the denial. He had heard members of his flock 
 ask with an air of pious, but superstitious dread, how 
 many Christians lay unburied, and he would tell 
 them that to a pious faith, the want of a grave could 
 cause no fear, since it is written that a hair of our 
 head shall not perish, and that though beasts devour 
 the body, that will not prevent the resurrection. The 
 
 ^ Da dextram misero, et tecum me tolle per undas, 
 Sedibus ut saltern placidis in morte quiescam. Mneid., VI., p. 370, 371. 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 1 9 
 
 Truth never would have said that they who kill the 
 body have no power to kill the soul, if anything an 
 enemy can do to the bodies of his victims could be 
 an obstacle to their enjoyment of life in the world to 
 come. " May God save us," he exclaimed, " from 
 doubting anything that He who is the Truth hath 
 said ! " The earth, he knew, had not covered a great 
 number of the Christians fallen in that carnage, but 
 none of them could be separated from the heaven 
 and earth which He fills with His presence, and 
 knows where to find and call them up again at the 
 resurrection. The Gentiles cannot destroy the bodies 
 of Christians that lie unburied, for He has promised 
 that not only the earth, but all the elements in whose 
 bosom these bodies of ours may be confusedly 
 mingled, shall render them up to life eternal, in that 
 day which the Most High has appointed for calling 
 up the dead to life." ' In Africa, then, if there were 
 no other evidence, we should learn from Augustine 
 that care of the bodies of the dead was significant of 
 belief in the reality of a future state. 
 
 Passing from Numidia, early in Christian history, 
 to Egypt, in far distant ages, we see how intimately 
 care for the dead was inwrought with the entire 
 system of Egyptian faith and worship. The splendid 
 sepulchres, the elaborate ritual, the costly and re- 
 verent preparation of the mummies, so effectually 
 preserving them from corruption that human bodies 
 which lived three thousand years ago are still found, 
 hard as fossils, and yet are human flesh, flesh so 
 entire that when portions of it have been slowly 
 
 ^ August., de Civ. Dei., Lib. I., cap. xii. De Sepultura humanorum 
 corporum. 
 
 3* 
 
20 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 macerated, kneaded soft, and exposed to the atmo- 
 sphere, it has passed through the ordinary processes 
 of putrescence and dissolution, as if the patient had 
 breathed his last but a few days before. The mum- 
 mification of the body was intended to express a 
 belief that after the revolution of many ages it would 
 be reunited to the soul that left it, or, in other words, 
 that there would be a resurrection of the dead, and, 
 after the resurrection, a life immortal. 
 
 Belief like that of Abraham, when he buried his 
 wife Sarah in the cave of Machpelah, was confessed 
 by Joseph when he caused the Egyptian physicians 
 to embalm the body of his father Jacob, and when he 
 directed that his own body, also, should be buried 
 with his father's. The faith of the Egyptians was 
 greatly depraved, there can be no doubt ; nay, it was 
 utterly changed, and .become almost as different from 
 God's original teaching as darkness when the light is 
 quenched from day departed, yet it contained this 
 vestige of the original truth of the resurrection of the 
 body. It is set forth in what is called " the Book of 
 the Dead," a collection of mystic sentences, inde- 
 finitely large, apportioned into chapters, of which 
 the 155th comes to our present point. Ideally, it is 
 to be addressed to the god Osiris by the soul of the 
 deceased Egyptian when it enters into the world of 
 immortality, the body remaining in the mummy- 
 chest : 
 
 " Hail, my father Osiris ! Thy limbs are with thee ; 
 thou dost not corrupt ; thou dost not turn to worms. 
 Thou dost not putrefy. Thou dost not decay. Thou 
 
 dost not change into worms I am ! I live ! I 
 
 live ! I grow ! I grow ! I wake in peace. I am not 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 21 
 
 corrupted. I am not suffocated there. I grow tall. 
 My substance is not sent away. My ear does not 
 grow deaf. My head does not separate. My tongue 
 has not been taken away. My eye-brow is not 
 plucked out. No injury is done to my body." ' 
 
 In the common mind of antiquity, Jewish, Christian, 
 and Pagan too, the custom of decent burial was 
 associated with the hope of resurrection. Of the 
 Jews Tacitus affirms, having knowledge only of their 
 custom, without any information of its origin, that 
 "they preserved the bodies of the dead, after the 
 manner of the Egyptians, rather than burn them." ' 
 
 "Nature," says Philo the Jew, "allots to all human 
 beings a habitable home, not only while they are alive, 
 but after death, and Nature herself not only looks for 
 the first birth, but for a perfect transmigration out of 
 this life." ' 
 
 So long as Christianity and Paganism existed side 
 by side. Christian burials and heathen burnings of the 
 dead were taken for distinctive marks. The heathens, 
 indeed, thought it ignominious for a human body to 
 be exposed to vultures and jackals, and cruel to 
 deprive a disembodied soul of rest, by withholding 
 those last rites which could so easily be rendered, 
 whether the body were burnt or buried ; but the 
 Christians had reasons of their own for preferring 
 the grave to the pyre. They not only bore in mind 
 
 ^ Translated by Samuel Birch, LL.D,, in Egypt's Place in Universal 
 History, by Baron Bunsen, Vol. V. 
 
 * Corpora condere quam cremare, e more ^gyptio. Tacit. Hist., 
 Lib. V. 
 
 'Ai/flpwwois KoX TratTL ^^epaatots ot/cetOTtpov 17 (^uais X'^pioj' d7reVetju.e yriv, ov /ixdcoi' 
 ^U)(TLV, aWa Kttl d7ro0ai'ou<ri»', Iv, ^ avrq koI ttji/ ttpmttjv vnoSexriTai yiveatu, Koi rr}v 
 CK Tov /Si'ou Te\evTaCav avd\v(n.v. In Flaccum. 
 
2 2 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 the examples found in the Old Testament Scriptures, 
 but they considered that the example of their Sa- 
 viour's burial in Joseph's tomb ought to be religiously- 
 followed. So said Augustine, "Whatever was done 
 on the cross of Christ, in his burial, in his resurrec- 
 tion, on the third day, in his ascension into heaven, 
 and his sitting at the Father's right hand, was so 
 done that in those things, not merely spoken 
 mystically, but actually performed, that life should 
 be prefigured which the Christian leads." ' 
 
 Minutius Felix, discoursing with his friend Coecilius 
 on the resurrection of the body, and referring to the 
 different funeral customs of Christians and heathens, 
 expresses himself thus : " Every corpse, whether it is 
 dried up into dust, or is dissolved in moisture, or is 
 reduced to ashes, or wastes away in putrefaction, is 
 lost to us, but is reserved for God, the keeper of the 
 elements. We do not fear, as you imagine, any 
 damage which may be done to the tomb, but we 
 observe the old and better custom of burying in the 
 earth." ^ 
 
 Very much more might be adduced to prove that 
 the Christians who had cast off heathenism uniformly 
 rejected burial with incineration, and were said to 
 execrate the funeral pyres. They well knew the 
 lowering influence of such practices on the public 
 
 * Quicquid gestum est in cruce Christi, in sepultura, in resurrectione 
 tertio die, in ascensione in Coelum, et in sede ad dextram Patris, ita 
 gestum est, ut his rebus, non mystice tantum dictis, sed etiam gestis 
 configuraretur vita Christiana quae hie geritur. Ad Laur., Cap. 53. 
 
 ' Corpus omne, sive arescit in pulverem, sive in humorem solvitur, vel 
 in cinerem comprimitur, vel in nidorem tenuatur, subducitur nobis; sed 
 Deo, elementorum custodi, reservatur. Nee, ut creditis, ullum damnum 
 sepulturae timemus, sed veterem et meliorem consuetudinem humando 
 frequentamus. Octavii, Cap, XI. 
 
BURIAL, NOT BURNING. 23 
 
 mind, and the spirit which usually actuated those 
 who followed them. They understood how powerful 
 was the humanizing tendency of their own funeral 
 solemnities, and they felt how closely associated in 
 the Christian mind is reverent care for the body of 
 the departed with a consolatory faith in all that Holy 
 Scripture teaches concerning the resurrection of the 
 dead. Not without careful deliberation, not in haste 
 or superstition, but in disregard of adverse opinion,, 
 they followed the old and better custom, and de- 
 voutly committed ashes to ashes, and dust to dust, in 
 sure and certain hope of a resurrection to everlasting 
 life. 
 
 And who is there that would not have the mortal 
 remains of his beloved parent, or wife, or infant child 
 laid gently in the coffin with every circumstance of 
 humane and Christian tenderness, and await, amidst 
 reverential silence the hour of interment ? Who would 
 not have the long-loved countenance seen, if seen at 
 all, in the peaceful and solemn tranquillity of death, 
 while yet the features show the calm repose which tells 
 that there is no more pain nor sorrow, and then tend 
 with assiduous affection, for the sake of the undying 
 soul, the frame which was its earthly tenement, and 
 so follow it to its last resting-place, where the dust 
 shall bide until the trumpet sounds, when the dead 
 shall be raised incorruptible.? 
 
 Better it is for the living to mingle in prayer at the 
 last funeral solemnities for preparation to die in faith 
 in Him who has gone to prepare a place for us in 
 heaven, where He is the first-fruits of them that sleep, 
 than to be beating the drums of Tophet, or carrying 
 the parricidal torch in Hindostan. 
 
24 
 
 WITCHCRAFT A CAPITAL CRIME. 
 
 Exodus XXIL i8; Leviticus XX. 27; 
 Deuteronomy XVIII. 9-12. 
 
 N an account of the RoUin Papyri in the 
 Imperial Library of Paris, pubHshed by M. 
 Pleyte in 1868/ I find the following note on Papyrus, 
 1888. 
 
 "This document dates from the time of Rameses 
 III., Prince of Heliopolis. M. Chabas published it in 
 an hieroglyphic transcription of the Harris Papyrus, 
 p. 169, et seq., and added a commentary with the 
 translation of that papyrus. M. Deveria, publishing 
 the judicial Papyrus of Turin, has also discussed the 
 RoUin and Lee Papyri, these last being in relation 
 with his manuscript. I may therefore be excused 
 from writing an extended comment thereupon, and 
 simply transcribe the translation of M. Chabas, adding 
 the corrections or remarks of M. Deveria. 
 
 Line i. "It has happened [happened] to him to 
 make magic writings pour repousser (and) to torment 
 [force] to make some [certain] gods of menh [wax] 
 and some men [certain figures] of the same substance 
 to paralyse the limbs [give paralysis to the arms] of 
 men ; (2) and to do by the hand of the slave Kamin that 
 
 ' Les Papi/rus RoUin de la Bibliothique Imperiale de Paris, publics et 
 commentes par W. Pleyte, Leide, iS6S. 
 
WITCHCRAFT A CAPITAL CRIME. 25 
 
 which Pharaoh does not permit a chief of his house 
 to do and other great crimes [and to place them in 
 the hand of Paibakakamin; but the sun-god has not 
 suffered this major-domo to act nor the other great 
 criminals] by saying that they would produce [let 
 them penetrate] (3) in making them produce them- 
 selves [penetrate], 
 
 "And he has addicted himself to doing the villanies 
 {meckancetes) which he has committed, from which 
 Pharaoh does not permit him to draw any profit, and 
 he has been very cunning, and found out the true 
 means for all the (4) abominations and all the villanies 
 of which his heart had conceived the thought, and has 
 really practised them with some very great crimes. 
 
 " So because the abominations which he (5) has 
 committed are worthy of death ; for they are the 
 greatest abominations of the world which he has com- 
 mitted, consequently he is convicted of abominations 
 worthy of death which he has committed. He shall 
 therefore die." 
 
 M. Pleyte would assign to this Papyrus the date 
 B.C. 1260. 
 
 More than two hundred years before this date de- 
 nunciations of death for witchcraft were Avritten in 
 the Mosaic law. "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to 
 live.'" "A man also or woman that hath a famihar 
 spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put to death : 
 they shall stone them with stones : their blood shall 
 be upon them."' "When thou art come into the land 
 which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not 
 learn to do after the abominations of those nations. 
 There shall not be found among you any one that 
 
 ^ Ex. xxii. iS. ' Lev. xx. 27. 
 
26 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the 
 fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, 
 or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a con- 
 suiter with famihar spirits, or a wizard, or a necro- 
 mancer. For all these things are an abomination unto 
 the Lord."^ 
 
 But there is an essential difference between the 
 accidental sentence recorded in this papyrus in the 
 reign of Rameses III., and the absolute and unexcep- 
 tional condemnation in the law of Moses. Four 
 centuries and a half before this Pharaoh, Joseph in 
 Egypt practised divination," and according to the 
 record now before us the kindred art of witchcraft 
 was in effect permitted by Pharaoh, being so limited 
 by the same authority that the wizard might not 
 derive any profit from it. The abomination com- 
 plained of in the papyri did not lie in the art itself, 
 but in the crimes committed by its aid, whereas the 
 abomination condemned in the Pentateuch lay in the 
 art itself. The crimes punished by Pharaoh were 
 offences against the royal authority of Pharaoh, and 
 the property or life of man, but the crime of witchery 
 was to be punished amongst the Israelites as an offence 
 to God. In modern legislation witchcraft is punished 
 as a civil offence, while, as a religious offence it should 
 still be marked and condemned wherever it exists, for 
 it is a remnant of Paganism, and implies a belief in 
 powers which are not, and a sinful mistrust of the 
 power and goodness of Almighty God. The ignorant 
 and superstitious are to be plainly taught, and the im- 
 postors, yet only as stick, ought to be punished by the 
 civil magistrate. 
 
 * Deut. xviii. 9-12. " Gen. xliv. 5. 
 
WITCHCRAFT A CAPITAL CRIME. 27 
 
 But the reason of the Mosaic prohibition above 
 quoted should be fully understood. It will be re- 
 membered that when Moses and Aaron presented 
 themselves before Pharaoh demanding the release of 
 the Israelites, Pharaoh employed the wise men and 
 the sorcerers to encounter them with their enchant- 
 ments, which they did, and for a time they seemed 
 able to contend successfully with the representatives 
 of the God of the Hebrews, but after a time their 
 powers failed. Moses and Aaron stood alone in 
 possession of miraculous power, which the baffled 
 magicians of Egypt acknowledged to be the power of 
 God. There had been an open contest between the 
 God of Israel and the gods of Egypt. 
 
 Now the magicians had believed, or pretended to 
 believe, as was the common faith of Egypt, that the 
 worshipper, invoking the god by name, identified him- 
 self with the god, and that the name of the god was 
 in itself a power. Jamblicus is the most accessible 
 authority on this subject, and although he is com- 
 paratively modern, a few words from him are sufficient 
 to express the doctrine. " If names were given arti- 
 ficially, you might use them or not at discretion ; but 
 if they perfectly correspond to the nature of things, 
 as they most entirely harmonise with nature itself they 
 are exceedingly agreeable to the gods. Hence it is 
 evident how the speech of holy nations is preferred to 
 that of other men." No other language than this can 
 adequately express their meaning or convey their 
 force. "Therefore the gods delight to be invoked 
 with Egyptian rites, because the Egyptians, first of 
 mortals, attained to knowledge of the gods." Hence 
 it follows that these rites or forms which are most 
 
28 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 united to the gods, and which unite us to them, have 
 in them a power almost equal to that of the gods 
 themselves.'" 
 
 The names of gods were therefore assumed by the 
 magicians, who fancied themselves thereby identified 
 with them, and quite competent to act as gods. So 
 in the " Harris Papyrus " there is a charm to protect 
 its wearer from crocodiles. The writer says, " Do not 
 attack me. I am Ammon. I am Assur, the good 
 guardian. I am the grand master of the sword. Do 
 not rise ! I am Mont. Do not attempt to catch me ! 
 I am Set Do not lift your two feet against me ! I 
 am Sothis. Do not touch me ! I am Sethis. Then 
 they (crocodiles) that are in the water must not come 
 out ; they that have come out must not go in again ; 
 and they that are floating on the water must lie on 
 the wave as if they were dead ; and their mouths 
 must be shut, as the seven great secrets are shut up, 
 shut up for ever." 
 
 Another against the bite of serpents, written on 
 a small papyrus in the Louvre : " It is like Set, the 
 asp, the malignant serpent, whose poison burns. The 
 (serpent) that comes to enjoy the light, let him be 
 hidden. He who dwells in Thebes approaches to 
 thee ; go away, remain in thy hole. I am Isis, the 
 widow broken down with grief Wouldest thou rise 
 up against Osiris ? He lies in the midst of the waters 
 where the fishes eat, where the birds drink, where the 
 nets take their prey, so long Osiris lies still and 
 sufl'ers it. Turn, lord of On, thy heart is satisfied and 
 triumphant. They who are in the tomb are in accla- 
 mations ; they who are in the coffin are given up to 
 
 ' yamhlicus de Mysteriis, VII., 5. 
 
WITCHCRAFT A CAPITAL CRIME. 29 
 
 gladness, when they see the son of Osiris overthrow- 
 ing his father's enemies, receiving the white crown of 
 his father Osiris, and punishing the wicked. Come, 
 arise ! Osiris-Sap, for thine enemies are beaten." 
 
 The same idea of wonderworking, of subduing 
 adverse powers, and of moving heaven as well as 
 earth, is carried even into the realm of death. " The 
 Book of the Dead " consists of chapters replete, as 
 was believed, with supernatural power. When the 
 dead body had been disembowelled for embalming, a 
 small scarabeus of marble covered with gold, was put 
 into the place of the heart, and these words were pro- 
 nounced magically, "My heart is my mother, my 
 heart is in my transformations." At the end of one 
 of the chapters, one of the most obscure and mystic 
 of the whole, we read, " If this chapter is known, he 
 (the dead person) shall be proclaimed justified in the 
 land of Ker-neter (the departed) ; he shall do all that 
 the living do. This is what a great god has com- 
 posed. This chapter was found in Sessennu (Hermo- 
 polis), written in blue on a cube of Haematite under 
 the feet of this god ; it was found in the days of king 
 Mycereinus, the justified, by his royal son Har-du-duf, 
 when he was travelling to inspect the accounts of the 
 temples. He retraced in it a hymn while he was 
 in ecstasy, he carried it in the king's chariots, when he 
 saw what was written there. This is a great mystery. 
 One neither sees nor hears anything more in reciting 
 this chapter pure and holy. Do not approach women 
 any more. Eat neither flesh nor fish, put it in the 
 place of the person's heart, repeat it over magically, 
 My heart is my mother," etc' 
 
 * Egyptian Book of the Dead, Chapter 64. 
 
30 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 In the same way all the affairs of the Egyptian, in 
 life and in death, were carried on under the rules of 
 magic, or enchantment, and the injunction, Thou shalt 
 not suffer a witch to live,^ does not refer merely to 
 a superstitious or artful woman practising that parti- 
 cular kind of trickery known with us as witchcraft, 
 but to the sort of enchantment prevalent in Egypt, 
 and in another form in Chaldea, Babylonia, and 
 Assyria. It was, in short, practical idolatry, and 
 was fully equivalent with denial of the true and 
 only God. To practise their accustomed acts among 
 the Hebrews would be to set up heathen gods among 
 them. Death was the penalty already appointed for 
 that crime. It was treason against the King of heaven 
 and earth. 
 
 I : n;;nn ^ib noto the mag-icians of Eg-ypt, also called D'?^?Q worked 
 n^T'^r^? with their magic arts, undoubtedly such as were in all ages in 
 that country used by all the ministers of their religion. 
 
31 
 
 SPIRIT-WORSHIP. 
 
 Deuteronomy XXXIL 17, etc. 
 
 15*^1 XPOSITORS have not succeeded in efforts to 
 pWi\ describe all the objects and forms of "strange 
 worship " ' mentioned in the Old Testament Some 
 Israelites killed and sacrificed their victims in the 
 open fields (Lev. xvii. 3-5) ; offering them to devils ' 
 (Deut. xxxii. ly) ; and to new gods come newly up 
 {ibid). They ate sacrifices of the dead (Ps. cvi. 28) ; 
 sacrificed their sons and daughters unto devils ^ (Ps. 
 cvi. 37) ; prepared a table for that troop/ and furnished 
 the drink offering for that number.^ (Is. Ixv. ii.) 
 Manasseh and Ahab, each of them made a grove, or 
 mystic tree.^ (2 Ki. xxi. 3.) Kings and people gave 
 horses to the sun, wrought abominations with familiar 
 spirits,' and burned incense to the sun, moon, planets, 
 and constellations.^ (2 Ki. xxiii. 11, 24, 25.) Apart 
 from the worship of the greater gods, whose names 
 are familiar, there was much creature-worship, not 
 merely the worship of creatures, but superstitious in- 
 vocations and objurgations of demons, or ge^iii^ 
 monsters, powers, " that troop," " that multitude." A 
 few passages of the Sacred Text are noted here, and 
 
 ^ This conveniently comprehensive name rm Xvr\ys, is Talmudical. 
 
 ^ rmUN. This object has a prominent place in many Assyrian sculptures. 
 
32 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 any one may refer to the places in a Reference-Bible, 
 and find many more. 
 
 Having endeavoured to point out the nature and 
 sinfulness of the witchcraft practised by Egyptian 
 magicians in my note on the law, " Thou shalt not 
 suffer a witch to live," I will now try to illustrate, by 
 examples from another source, this sort of strange 
 worship into which the Hebrews fell after their de- 
 liverance from Egypt, as above referred to. The 
 religion of Egypt was greatly different from that of 
 Chaldea, Assyria, and Babylonia. The Egyptian 
 concentrated his thoughts on Ra, Horus, Osiris, 
 Amon, Isis, and a few lesser gods, and strangely 
 associated, or rather identified himself with his gods. 
 The high seats of Egyptian theosophy were in Egypt, 
 and there continued until Judaism, Christianity, and 
 at last Islam, swept away that singular religion from 
 the face of the earth, but left its material creations to 
 deliver its history to us of the present century. The 
 spirit-worship afterwards adopted by the Israelites 
 came to them, through the Babylonians, from a 
 very remote source. For what I have to say on 
 this subject I must acknowledge myself indebted to 
 M. Francois Lenormant, who is allowed precedence 
 in the study of the Accadian language, or dialect, 
 said to be the most difficult and most barbaric of 
 those which are found written in the cuneiform 
 character, or perhaps originally in the yet more 
 simple lineal stamping on the bricks from Warka. 
 He has written an important volume.' 
 
 ' La Magie chez les Chaldeens, et les Origines Accadiennes, par Francois 
 Lenormant, Paris, 1874, now about to be published in English by S. Bagster 
 and Sons. 
 
SPIRIT-WORSHIP. 33 
 
 The Accadlan language, it should be explained, is 
 that of the Accads. The first impression would be 
 that it takes its name from the city of Accad, built 
 by Nimrod in Shinar, but Assyriologists concur in 
 placing the seat of that language far to the north. 
 The ancient city now known as Nisibis, or Nisibin, 
 on the river Khabour, at about lat. 370 N. and long. 
 41° 15' E., may have been called the city of Accad, 
 or mountaineers. The mountaineers who spoke it 
 may have had this city for their capital. They 
 roamed, it is believed, in the vast Iranian plateau, 
 or highland S.W. of the Caspian, in the wilds of Great 
 Media. But, like other geographical questions of the 
 kind, this is difficult. 
 
 Those rude mountaineers are said to have had a 
 superstition of their own, which gave them great 
 influence in the times of darkness. They travelled 
 southward very early, bringing with them their pecu- 
 liar language and rudiments of a literature as rude as 
 themselves. It was accepted, perhaps for the sake of 
 the incantations written in it ; and they, the en- 
 chanters, existed as a distinct and honoured caste. 
 For many ages the Accadian language was used for 
 religious and scientific writings in Babylonia and 
 Assyria, just as was Latin in Europe until sometime 
 after the invention of printing ; the Assyrian lan- 
 guage being used for historical records and official 
 documents. The oldest bricks found in the ruins of 
 Erech, or Warka, a city probably founded by Nimrod 
 (Gen. X. 11), are stamped with a primitive character, 
 almost simply rectilineal, not yet arrow-headed, and 
 very differently arranged from the later inscriptions. 
 All that is most ancient, and most purely Accadian, 
 H 4 
 
34 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 is of the character now described, but in later times, 
 and certainly when Assyria and Babylonia were in 
 communication with Palestine, the Assyrian element 
 and the Accadian were mingled in one system, the 
 latter being distinctly magian. The tablets which 
 constituted the library of Assurbanipal in Nineveh 
 were many of them translated from the Accadian 
 originals, laid up in Erech the sacred city, chief seat 
 of science and religion, and among them there is a 
 very large work on magic, supposed to cover not 
 fewer than two hundred tablets. In the same library 
 there is one tablet showing that there were in the 
 Assyrian pantheon no fewer than seveft gods of 
 highest rank, fifty gods of heaven and earth, three 
 hundred spirits of heaven, and six htmdred spirits of 
 earth. These last were probably contributed from the 
 old books of Accad. 
 
 These old books, so far as they can be traced, 
 enable M. Lenormant to gain a knowledge of the 
 religious system of the Accads, which serves as a key 
 to much that is written in the Scriptural passages now 
 before us, and others of the kind. It is founded on 
 a belief of innumerable personal spirits dispersed 
 throughout all nature, sometimes confounded with 
 the things they animate, and sometimes separate 
 from them. These spirits, everywhere present, pro- 
 duce all the phenomena of nature ; they direct and 
 animate all the beings of creation. They are the 
 cause of both good and evil. They guide the move- 
 ments of the heavenly bodies, keep the seasons in 
 order, cause winds to blow, rains to fall, storms to 
 rage, and sun to shine. By their fostering care the 
 earth yields her fruits, infants are born, and by their 
 
SPIRIT-WORSHIP. 35 
 
 adverse influence men fall sick and die. Everywhere 
 they swarm, in earth, and air, and sky. They have a 
 well-defined personality, above the rank of men, and 
 inferior to gods. But among them there is no trace 
 of a supreme God, nor any first principle to rule them 
 all. It is mere naturalism or fetishism, such as pre- 
 vails with the Tartars and the Mongols. 
 
 As evil and good, adversity and prosperity, death 
 and life, are side by side in the world, suggesting 
 dualism in the later scheme of Zoroaster, so the 
 magician-priests of Accad conceived the spiritual 
 world to consist of spirits essentially good and 
 naturally bad. Throughout the universe opposing 
 bands were in never-ceasing conflict, and mankind 
 rejoiced or were troubled by their alternate victories 
 and defeats. To the spirit-worshippers there was 
 universal discord, and no being, great or small, could 
 find shelter from the universal war. Mankind, if 
 there be any standard of right and wrong in the 
 Accadian hymns, could only sin by neglecting magi- 
 cal ceremonies, and a man could only be safe when 
 propitiating angry spirits by the ministry of authorised 
 magicians. All his happiness was supposed to come 
 by the favour of good spirits, and all his misery from 
 the malice of bad ones. For prayer he used enchant- 
 ments, and the enchantments were couched in myste- 
 rious words which only skilled magicians were able 
 to pronounce. In reality, the supernatural power of 
 the magician was considered to be the only buckler 
 of defence against convulsions of nature, and violence 
 of devils. Such was the spirit of the wretched super- 
 stition which fascinated, enslaved, and ruined the 
 children of Israel. 
 
 4* 
 
36 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 A large tablet from the royal palace of Nineveh ' 
 contains a set of twenty-eight forms of deprecatory 
 incantation against the action of evil spirits, sorceries, 
 diseases, and misfortunes. The following are ex- 
 amples from a sort of litany : 
 
 "The bad god, the bad demon. The demon of 
 the desert, the demon of the mountain. The demon 
 of the sea, the demon of the marsh. The bad genius, 
 the huge urtLkii (spectre). The wind that is bad by 
 itself. The bad demon that seizes the body, that 
 shakes the body. 
 
 " Spirit of heaven, remember it. Spirit of earth, re- 
 member it. 
 
 " That which never lets one prosper, that which is 
 not favourable. That which forms knots (to injure 
 one), the angry ulcer. The ulcer that eats out the 
 flesh, the spreading ulcer, the ulcer which gives ex- 
 treme pain. The ulcer that breaks out in many 
 places, the malignant ulcer. Spirit of heaven," etc. 
 
 Other sentences which describe bodily ailments 
 with excessive minuteness. 
 
 " He that is dying of hunger in irons. He that is 
 dying of thirst in irons. He that is hungry in a 
 ditch. Supplicant (reduced to eat) the dust. He 
 who in the earth or in the river perishes and dies. 
 The woman-slave who has no more a master. The 
 free woman who has no husband. He who leaves his 
 name to infamy. He whose name is forgotten. He 
 who in hunger cannot find relief. He who falls sick. 
 Spirit of heaven, etc. 
 
 " Two bands of white stuff serving for phylacteries 
 
 * Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, by Sir H. C. Rawlinson and 
 Mr. Norris, Vol. II., plates 17, 18. 
 
SPIRIT-WORSHIP. 37 
 
 on the bed that is laid on the floor. As talisman 
 with the right hand if he writes. Two bands of black 
 stuff serving for the left hand if he writes. The bad 
 demon, the bad alal (destroyer), the bad gigim. The 
 bad telal (warrior). The bad god, the bad maskim 
 (ensnarer). The phantom, the spectre, the vampire. 
 The incubus, the succubus, the servant(.?). The bad 
 sortilege, the philtre, the poison that flows. That 
 which gives pain, that which acts, that which is bad. 
 Their head on his head. Their foot on his foot. 
 They shall never seize him. They shall never return. 
 Spirit of heaven, etc. 
 
 " The sea .... the sea. The desert without water. 
 The waters of the Tigris, the waters of the Euphrates. 
 The mountain of darkness, the mountain of the East. 
 The volcanic mountain. That they may close their 
 depths. Spirit of heaven," etc. 
 
 From the same collection : 
 
 "The plague and the fever which lay waste the 
 country. The sickness .... which devastates the 
 country, bad for the body, fatal for the bowels. The 
 evil demon, the bad destroyer, the bad gigim. The 
 wicked man, the evil eye, the lying(i*) mouth, the 
 noisome tongue. From the man, son of his god, that 
 they come out of his body, that they come out of his 
 bowels. They shall never get possession of my body. 
 They shall never do any mischief before me, they 
 shall never walk behind me. They shall never enter 
 into my house. They shall not have access to my 
 building. They shall never come into the house 
 where I dwell. 
 
 " Spirit of heaven, remember it. Spirit of earth, 
 remember it. 
 
38 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 " Spirit of Moul-ge, lord of the countries, remem- 
 ber it. 
 
 "Spirit of Nin-ge-lal, lady of the countries, re- 
 member it. 
 
 " Spirit of Nin-dar, mighty warrior of Moul-ge, 
 remember it. 
 
 " Spirit of Pa-ku, sublime intelligence of Moul-ge, 
 remember it. 
 
 " Spirit of En-zuna, eldest son of Moul-ge, remem- 
 ber it. 
 
 " Spirit of Tish-khu, lady of the armies, remem- 
 ber it. 
 
 " Spirit of Im, king whose impetuosity is benefi- 
 cent, remember it. 
 
 " Spirit of Oud, (the sun) king of justice, remem- 
 ber it. 
 
 " Spirits of Annuna-ge (the earth), great gods, do 
 you remember it." 
 
 Then there is a grand conjuration, supported with 
 invocations to several of these friendly spirits. 
 
 "The evening of bad luck, the region of heaven 
 whence comes mischief 
 
 " The fatal day, the region of the sky which por- 
 tends evil. 
 
 " The fatal day, the region of the sky where an 
 unlucky token rises. 
 
 " messengers of pestilence. 
 
 " Ravagers of Nin-ki-gal. 
 
 " Thunder which spreads terror over the land. 
 
 " The seven gods of the vast heaven. 
 
 " The seven gods of the vast earth. 
 
 " The seven gods of the fiery spheres. 
 
 " The seven gods of the heavenly legions. 
 
SPIRIT-WORSHIP. 39 
 
 " The seven gods of mischief. 
 
 " The seven evil phantoms. 
 
 " The seven phantoms of flaming fire. 
 
 " The seven gods of the sky. 
 
 " The seven gods of the land. 
 
 " The bad demon, the bad alal, the bad gigim, the 
 
 bad god, the bad maskim.'' 
 After copious examples of magical incantation, 
 M. Lenormant gives another which, vain though it 
 be, is suggestive of a better hope. It conveys the 
 idea of intercession in heaven, when there is no re- 
 source left on earth. A sick person has used these 
 objurgations without finding any relief, and a pitying 
 spirit hastens to intercede, and the intercession is 
 effectual. 
 
 " Silik-mulu-khi has succoured him. He has gone 
 into the presence of his father Hea, and has appealed 
 to him : ' My father, that pain of the head came out 
 of hell. To the suiferer of the sickness it has been 
 said. Use the remedy; this man knows it not, but he 
 is submissive to a remedy.' Hea answered his son 
 Silik-mulu-khi : * My son, thou dost not know the 
 remedy, but I teach thee the remedy. That which I 
 know thou knowest. Come, my son Silik-mulu-khi. 
 Take a bucket ; take water out of the river. On this 
 water put thy sublime lip ; make it sparkle with 
 purity. Succour the man, son of his god ; bind his 
 head. Let the malady of his head fly off". Let the 
 malady of his head be dissipated like the dew-drops 
 of a night' " 
 
 Then the magician who pronounces this charm, 
 proceeds to apply the remedy which is therein pre- 
 scribed : brings the water from the river, sips it with 
 
40 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 his " sublime lip," binds the aching head, and bathes 
 the parched skin, pronouncing a few more magic 
 words : 
 
 " May the precept of Hea heal him! May Davkina 
 (Hea's wife) heal him ! May Silik-mulu-khi, eldest 
 son of the ocean, form the image that shall help 
 him." 
 
 It is easy to conceive how attractive such rites 
 would be to the poor Israelites. A busy pagan 
 priesthood, meddling with their affairs, having a 
 separate ceremony for every passing incident, no 
 doubt employing real remedies to do what enchant- 
 ments could not effect, and professing to hold com- 
 merce with good spirits, to exert power over bad 
 ones, and to have interest with a heavenly intercessor 
 in the last resort, would charm the simpletons, 
 although they could not charm the spirits of light 
 nor the demons of darkness, but were at the beck of 
 Ahab and Jezebel, and all the recreant kings of Israel 
 and Judah. These were the priests that shouted to 
 Baal on the height of Carmel. These were the false 
 prophets that beset Micah, and conspired against 
 Jeremiah. They set up Assyrian gods in the temple, 
 prepared the chamber of imagery, and fell prostrate 
 to worship the orient sun. It was not only the 
 attraction of idol-worship, but the officious attentions 
 of magicians that seduced the Israelites from the 
 worship of the Lord their God. 
 
41 
 
 DIVINATION. 
 
 Isaiah XLVII. 12, 13. 
 
 NDER the general title of Divination we may 
 include various forms of Chaldean superstition, 
 prevalent not only in Chaldea, Babylonia, and Assyria, 
 but far and wide over western and central Asia, bor- 
 rowed by the Hebrews, and marked by the sacred 
 writers with the strongest reprobation. The prophet 
 Isaiah spake thus to Babylon : Daughter of the 
 Chaldeans: "Stand now with thine enchantments, and 
 with the multitude of thy sorceries, wherein thou hast 
 laboured from thy youth ; if so be thou shalt be able 
 to profit, if so be thou mayest prevail. Thou art 
 wearied in the multitude of thy counsels (or consulta- 
 tions, "n^DV^). Let now the astrologers, the star- 
 gazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand up and save 
 thee from these things that shall come upon thee." 
 (Is. xlvii. 12, 13.) They seem to have trusted not so 
 much in the gods as in sorcery and incantations. 
 They did not so earnestly pray to their gods as 
 practise occult arts for attaining their own objects, 
 and the curious books of the Chaldeans will therefore 
 furnish authentic material for explaining many pas- 
 sages of prophetic writings. 
 
 For example : we learn from Ezekiel (Eze. xxi. 
 21, 22) that Nebuchadnezzar, in perplexity, stood at 
 the parting of the way, at the head of the two ways. 
 
42 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 to use divination : he made his arrows bright, he 
 consulted with teraphim ; he looked into the liver of 
 the victim sacrificed ; at his right hand was the 
 divination for Jerusalem ; and then the priests gave 
 him an oracular response : To appoint captains ; To 
 open the mouth in the slaughter ; To lift up the voice 
 with shouting ; To appoint rams against the gates ; 
 To cast a mount ; To build a fort. St. Jerome ex- 
 plains that brightening the arrows was a Babylonian 
 custom. They divined by arrows, putting them into 
 a quiver, with names written on the shafts, shaking 
 them together, and drawing one out. The name 
 written on the arrow would then determine the lot. 
 This, he notes, the Greeks called belo7nancy, or rabdo- 
 mancy: divination by arrows or by rods. The Ba- 
 bylonians, we learn, had a goddess called Allat, whose 
 title was, lady of the arrow, or the rod." Hosea 
 lamented that the Hebrews had fallen into the same 
 custom : " My people ask counsel at their stocks, and 
 their staff declareth unto them .... they have gone 
 a whoring (that is to say, they have committed apos- 
 tasy), from under their God." (Hos. iv. 12.) How dis- 
 tinctly all such practices were forbidden, every one 
 knows.' 
 
 Not only Nebuchadnezzar, all the kings of Baby- 
 lon, consulted the diviners, and awaited omens before 
 going on any expedition. A tablet in the British 
 Museum contains the history of Sargon I. and his 
 son Narum-sin, divided into fourteen paragraphs, 
 each paragraph containing the account of a war, 
 
 * Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archceology, Vol. III., p. 148 v. 
 See also Eze. viii. 17. 
 
 * Deut. xviii. 10-12. 
 
DIVINATION. 43 
 
 or other memorable event. At the head of each is 
 the description of an omen from the moon under 
 which the work was undertaken." 
 
 A great astrological work of the Babylonians and 
 Assyrians, filling seventy tablets, was drawn up for 
 the library of Sargon, king of Agane, in the sixteenth 
 century before Christ. Twenty-five of these tablets 
 contain the signs of heaven and earth, according to 
 their good presage and their bad presage. During 
 every day of the year all persons and things are 
 supposed to be held under the dominion of sun, moon, 
 and stars. Lucky and unlucky days are tabulated as 
 punctually as fairs and festivals in a modern almanac. 
 Two or three examples will be sufficient. First, we 
 take the lines that are perfect from a list of twenty- 
 nine stars with their influences when in the ascen- 
 dant : 
 
 " If the star of the Dog, forces are in the country. 
 
 " If the star of the Bear, misfortune is in the land. 
 
 " If the star Biazi, abundance of rain, 
 
 " If the star of the Fish, justice is in the land. 
 
 "If the star Alhil, peace is in the land. 
 
 " If the star Tartakhi, they are decreeing evil in 
 the land. 
 
 " If the star of Concealment, destruction is in the 
 land. 
 
 " If the star of Cu-khia, the house is purified. 
 
 " If the star of Destiny, pestilences are in the 
 country. 
 
 " If the star Irbie^ blessing is in the land. 
 
 " If the star of the Bright Body, strength is in the 
 land. 
 
 * Records of the Past, Vol. V., p. 57. 
 
44 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 " If the star of the Rising Day, misfortunes are in 
 
 the land. 
 " If the star Dilme, happiness in the land they 
 
 measure out. 
 "If the star of the stone Absia, prodigies are in 
 
 the country. 
 " If the star of the stone of the bronze Fish, posses- 
 
 sionQ) of a good heart : there is peace(.?). 
 " If the star of Alabaster, blessing is in the land. 
 " If the star of Gold, obedience is in the land. 
 " If the star of Bronze, forces are in the land. 
 " If the star of the Prophet(.?), peace is in the land. 
 " If the star of the Lion of the Sun, forces are in 
 
 the land." 
 From a table of portents we extract a few lines 
 bearing record of eclipses, and what were said to be 
 their doleful consequences : 
 
 " On the 1 6th day an eclipse takes place. The 
 king dies, and the marshes the streams irrigate. 
 
 " On the 20th day an eclipse happens. The king 
 on his throne is slain, and a nobody on the throne 
 seizes. 
 
 "On the 15th day an eclipse takes place. The 
 king of Dilmun with the crown they slay him, and 
 some one on the throne seizes. 
 
 "On the 2 1st day an eclipse takes place. Devasta- 
 tion or rapine in the country is. Corpses in the 
 country are." 
 
 Scores more of the same sort, all of them betraying 
 utter ignorance of the true God, and, compared with 
 more ancient documents, a very near approach to 
 utter atheism.' 
 
 Transactions of the Society oi Biblical Archceology, Vol. III., p. 145, seq. 
 
DIVINATION. 45 
 
 Not only were there omens and portents in the 
 skies, but on the earth, and notably by dogs : 
 
 " If a blue dog enters into a palace, that palace is 
 
 burned. 
 " If a yellow dog enters into a palace, exit from 
 
 that palace will be baleful. 
 " If a spotted dog enters into a palace, that palace 
 
 no peace to the enemy gives. 
 " If a dog to the palace goes, and no one kills, that 
 
 palace its peace fails. 
 " If a dog to the palace goes, and on a bed lies 
 
 down, that palace none with his hand takes. 
 " If a dog to the palace goes, and on a throne lies 
 
 down, that palace is burned. 
 " If a dog to the palace goes, and on the royal 
 
 parasol lies down, that palace its peace to the 
 
 enemy gives. 
 " If a dog into a temple enters, the gods to the 
 
 country grant no favour. 
 " If a white dog into a temple enters, the founda- 
 tion of that temple is not stable. 
 " If a blue dog into a temple enters, that temple 
 
 sees plenty. 
 " If a yellow dog into a temple enters, that temple 
 
 sees plenty. 
 " If a spotted dog into a temple enters, that temple 
 
 do the gods love. 
 " If dogs crouch and into a temple enter, none this 
 
 temple with his hand takes." 
 Besides these omens there is a multitude of birth- 
 portents, absurdly monstrous, indicating a depravity 
 of perception quite incompatible with the idea of 
 intellectual advancement which obtains, when the 
 
46 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 external grandeur of Golden Babylon is mistaken for 
 moral greatness, or when the " wisdom and the tongue 
 of the Chaldeans " is thought of in association with 
 the undoubted excellence of Daniel's wisdom. 
 
 The monthly prognosticators of whom Isaiah 
 speaks, were probably representatives of the gods to 
 whom the months were dedicated, as may be gathered 
 from a list of the months, and their patron deities. 
 
 The cuneiform text, contained in the inscriptions 
 published by the Trustees of the British Museum,' 
 was translated by the late Mr. G. Smith,' and is 
 appended by Mr. Sayce to his "Babylonian Saints' 
 Calendar." ' 
 
 1 " The month Nisan to Anu and Bel. 
 
 2 " The month lyyar to Hea the lord of mankind. 
 
 3 "The month Sivan to the moon-god, the eldest 
 
 son of Bel. 
 " The month Tammuz to the warrior Adar. 
 
 5 "The month Ab to Allat, the mistress of the 
 
 wood of the right hand. 
 
 6 "The month Elul to Istar, the lady of battle. 
 
 7 " The month Tisri to the sun-god, the warrior of 
 
 the world. 
 
 8 " The month Marchesvan to the lord, the prince 
 
 of the gods, Merodach. 
 
 9 " The month Chisleu to the mighty hero Nergal. 
 
 10 " The month Tebet to Pap-Succal, the messenger 
 
 of Anu and Istar. 
 
 11 "The month Sebat to Rimmon, the minister of 
 
 heaven and earth. 
 
 ' JV.A.I. IV., 33. 
 
 ' Appendix to his History of Assur-hani-pal. 
 
 3 Records of the Past, Vol. VII., p. 169. 
 
DIVINATION. 47 
 
 12 " The month Adar to the seven great gods. 
 
 1 3 " The month Ve-Adar to Assur, the father of the 
 
 gods," 
 So with the ancient Persians, each month had its 
 angel-patron, as also has each day; the angels of 
 the days being of inferior dignity to those of the 
 months.' 
 
 ^ Hyde's Religio Veterum Persarum, Cap. xix. 
 
48 
 
 DEATH FOR HERESY. 
 
 E could find many very old examples of putting 
 heretics to death, and an apologist might as 
 easily contend that the reason for the deed was 
 generally political. But let us hear a king of Assyria 
 making heresy the criminal offence : 
 
 " Ashur-Akh-Bal, servant of Ashur, priest of Bel 
 and Ninib, beloved by Anu and Dagon, worshipper of 
 the great gods : the great king, the king of the 
 nations, the king of Assyria .... The noble hero 
 who went forth in the armed service of Ashur his 
 lord against the kings of the four regions of the world 
 as none had ever done before ; and smote the heretics 
 who worship not the exalted things, in battles too 
 numerous to be counted. 
 
 " Ashur- Akh-Bal, the glorious ruler, the favourite 
 of the great gods. The sun of great splendour, the 
 conqueror of cities and lands with all their people ; 
 the king of kings, the chastiser of heretics; the scourge 
 of those who worship not the sacrifices ; the great smiter 
 of the disobedient ; the destroyer of riders who reject 
 my royalty, and of heretics and rebellious men.'' ' 
 
 Titles are these too grand to be forgotten, even 
 when the power they indicate has perished. The 
 spirit of Ashur-Akh-Bal is no less clearly expressed 
 
 ' "Standard Inscription of Ashur-Akh-Bal," translated by H. Fox 
 Talbot, F.R.S., Records of the Past, Vol. VII., p. 9. 
 
DEATH FOR HERESY. 49 
 
 in another of his inscriptions, from which the follow- 
 ing sentences are extracted : 
 
 " The man who shall not spare the face of these my 
 tablets, who shall injure the written records of my 
 name, who shall destroy these sculptures, or tear 
 them off, or hide them in the earth, or bury them in 
 the ashes, or burn them with fire, or drown them in 
 the waters : or who shall remove them from their 
 place and throw them down where they will be 
 trampled on by animals, and shall place them in the 
 pathway of the cattle : or who shall falsify my tablets, 
 which are now sculptured with good and pious words, 
 and shall write on the face of my records anything 
 that is bad and impious : or who shall change the 
 words so as to confound the meaning ; whether he be 
 a nobleman, or an officer, or any one else among my 
 people, or who shall scrawl on the tablets I have 
 written, and shall say that they are not true ; or, out 
 of contempt, shall turn the face of my tablets back- 
 ward : 
 
 " May Ashur the great lord, the god of Assyria, the 
 lord of all royal crowns, curse his reign and destroy 
 his works ! May he shake the foundations of his 
 kingdom ! May want and famine, sickness and dis- 
 tress, prevail throughout his land." ' 
 
 It was more than political passion that moved the 
 ancestors of the Pharisees, on whom came all the 
 righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood 
 of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias, son of 
 Barachias, whom they slew between the porch and 
 the altar. (Matt, xxiii. 35.) 
 
 ^ "Monolith Inscription of Ashur-Akh-Bal," translated by H. Fox 
 Talbot, F.R.S., Records of the Past, Vol. VII., p. 15. 
 
 H 5 
 
50 
 
 THE FALLEN ANGELS. 
 
 Job IV. 17-19; XV. 15, 16. 
 
 HEN, or by what means, the fall of the angels 
 was made known to man, it is not possible to 
 say, and there is no direct revelation of that event in 
 Holy Scripture. Yet it appears to be distinctly re- 
 cognised. St. Peter speaks of their sin and punish- 
 ment as an example of God's vengeance on the 
 disobedient. " If God spared not the angels that 
 sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered 
 them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto 
 judgment .... the Lord knoweth how to reserve 
 the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished." 
 (2 Pet. ii. 4-9.) St. Jude says that "the angels which 
 kept not their first estate, but left their own habita- 
 tion, (the Lord) hath reserved in everlasting chains, 
 under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day." 
 (Jude 6.) Beyond these allusions to an event believed 
 at the time when these two Apostles wrote, and 
 apparently sanctioned the belief, we have no direct 
 information. 
 
 There are, however, three passages in the book of 
 Job, whence we learn that such belief was current in 
 Arabia when that book was written. Eliphaz the 
 Temanite, reasoning with Job concerning the liability 
 of all creatures to fall into sin, sought to fortify his 
 
THE FALLEN ANGELS. 5 1 
 
 argument by allusion to something which had taken 
 place in heaven. " Shall mortal man be more just 
 than God ? Shall a man be more pure than his 
 Maker.? Behold he (his Maker) put no trust in his 
 servants ; and his angels he charged with folly : how 
 much less in them that dwell in houses of clay.'' " (Job 
 iv. 17-19.) Eliphaz again, discoursing on the sinful- 
 ness of men, alleges the sinfulness of angels : " God 
 putteth no trust in his saints ; yea, the heavens are 
 not clean in his sight. How much more abominable 
 and filthy is man, which drinketh iniquity like water?" 
 (Job XV. 15, 16.) Bildad the Shuhite, speaking like a 
 Sabian, takes up the same argument, and like Eliphaz, 
 who had asked, " Shall man be more just than God 
 .... more pure than his Maker .? " attributes sin to 
 the gods : " Behold, even to the moon (which is 
 deified) and it shineth not; yea, the stars (also deified) 
 are not pure in his sight : how much less man, that 
 is a worm .'' and the son of man, which is a worm } " 
 (Job XXV. 5, 6.) I suppose the Shuhite to speak as a 
 Sabian, figuratively ; for the waning of the moon, 
 literally speaking, could have no lvalue in a moral 
 argument ; neither could purity or impurity, so speak- 
 ing, be attributed to the stars. Job, in the land of 
 Uz, was a worshipper of the true God, his " servant, 
 Job;" and both Eliphaz and Bildad speak as men who 
 have some knowledge of him. So had Melchisedek, 
 so had Balaam the Moabite, and many others ; but 
 their knowledge was generally very imperfect, and 
 their notions very erroneous. In the present case 
 they spoke like Arabs, and it is evident from some 
 observations of Job, that the worship of the heavenly 
 bodies was common in his neighbourhood. I suppose, 
 
52 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 therefore, that these friends of his represent the 
 opinions of their countrymen ; and I venture to think 
 that what they say of holy ones, heavens, servants 
 and angels of God in the heavenly world, must be 
 understood in the sense familiar to Nabathaean Arabs 
 of their day ; and I accept it as evidence that those 
 Arabs had a tradition of sins of angels. 
 
 Here, then, late in the New Testament, and early 
 in the Old, we find mention of an extra-biblical belief 
 in the revolt of some spirits in heaven, and their con- 
 sequent expulsion into a state of degradation and 
 misery. The later allusions are far more distinct than 
 the former, which merely intimate that a belief was 
 entertained among the Temanite and Shuhite Arabs 
 that angels or gods had been guilty of some trans- 
 gression. We can perceive no more than the indis- 
 tinct vestige of a failing tradition. Yet the credit 
 given by two of our Lord's Apostles to the tradition 
 challenges our respect, to say the very least. 
 
 Among the most recent Assyrian discoveries is a 
 large clay tablet, found at Nineveh, and translated by 
 Mr. Smith, containing a myth of certain rebelHous 
 angels. They had been created, it says, in the lower 
 part of heaven, and there they devised an evil work. 
 They were seven in number. The first and second of 
 them were of dreadful form, but the inscription is 
 much obliterated, and cannot be perfectly deciphered. 
 The third had the form of a leopard ; the fourth (had 
 that of) a serpent. The fifth was a dreadful monster, 
 but its form is lost. The sixth, however shaped, was 
 a violent "striker, which to God and king did not 
 submit." The seventh was a messenger of evil. These 
 details are simply mythical. 
 
THE FALLEN ANGELS. 53 
 
 " The seven of them, messengers of the god Anu 
 their king, from city to city went round. The tempest 
 of heaven was strongly bound to them ; the flying 
 clouds of heaven surrounded them ; the downpour of 
 the skies, which in the bright day makes darkness, 
 was attached to them with a violent wind, an evil 
 wind, they began ; the tempest of Vul was their 
 might, at the right hand of Vul they came, from the 
 surface of heaven like lightning they darted ; des- 
 cending to the abyss of waters, at first they came. 
 In the wide heavens of the god Anu the king, evil 
 they set up, and an opponent they had not." ' 
 
 Bel hears of the mischief the banded angels have 
 done, and he calls in the sun-god, the moon-god, 
 and Ishtar, to suppress the rebellion, but so far were 
 they from doing that, that the rebellious angels 
 brought over Shamas (the sun), and Anu, and Vul, 
 and Ishtar, attached them to their party, and fixed 
 them in the government of heaven. Thenceforth the 
 Assyrian heaven is wretchedly debased, all the gods 
 are in confusion, and from that time good and evil 
 have been contending in the universe, without arriving 
 at such an issue that any can say whether evil or 
 good has the best of the fight. The tablet is much 
 defaced, and the translation is very incomplete, but 
 at last it appears that " Bel, seeing the confusion in 
 heaven, resolves to place there the sun, the moon, 
 and Venus, which typifies the stars, that these 
 heavenly orbs may rule and direct the heavens." If 
 so, we may suppose that the myth confounds the 
 
 * Assyrian Discoveries. An account of Explorations, etc., in 1S73 and 
 1874, by George Smith, London, 1875, fourth edition, p. 394, Hnes 
 15-27. 
 
54 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 fall of angels and the chaos which preceded the 
 creation into one unintelligible maze. 
 
 All that we can learn from it is, that some event 
 which it was not within the scope of divine revela- 
 tion to make known in the Old Testament, left its 
 memory in the traditions of the East, among the 
 descendants of Abraham especially; that it is not 
 essential to the system of saving truth, but may be 
 usefully referred to for the same end as St. Peter and 
 St. Jude had in view; and the moral drawn from it by 
 the Arabian friends of Job is in full agreement with 
 the teaching of these Apostles.' 
 
 My own reason for quoting the Assyrian, or per- 
 haps more properly, the Chaldean legend, is to ex- 
 hibit the harmony of tradition with revelation ; for 
 although the fall of the angels cannot be said to have 
 been revealed to these two Apostles, it must be granted 
 that two inspired men have given it their sanction, 
 and so it is brought within the circle of truths revealed ; 
 and the tablet before us becomes most certainly a 
 Biblical monument. 
 
 I refrain from pursuing the subject any further, but 
 leave it for further reflection. I do not at present 
 discuss the sentence of our Lord where he says, that 
 he saw Satan as lightning fall from heaven. 
 
 * They gave it their sanction as a tradition, if not as a fact, and so 
 made use of it for popular illustration, as St. Jude also makes of the legend 
 of a dispute of Michael the archangel and Satan over the body of Moses. 
 (Jude 9.) 
 
55 
 
 DEMONIACS. 
 
 ROM Assyrian and Egyptian monuments con- 
 siderable light has been cast on passages of the 
 Old Testament relating to witchcraft and incantation. 
 All such arts are treated by the sacred writers in 
 terms of condemnation and abhorrence; and any 
 further information we gain from paganism in its 
 lowest forms, Talmudic Judaism, and the archives of 
 the Inquisition. I now propose to make some obser- 
 vations on demonology so far as it relates to certain 
 passages in the New Testament. 
 
 Early in the Gospels we read of diabolic agency: 
 " Jesus was led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to 
 be tempted of the devil." (Matt. iv. i.) The fame of 
 Jesus " went throughout all Syria, and they brought 
 unto him all sick people that were taken with divers 
 diseases and torments, and those which were possessed 
 with devils, and those which were lunatic, and those 
 which had the palsy, and he healed them." (Matt. 
 iv. 24.) Both in the Gospels and in the Acts of the 
 Apostles there are very remarkable instances of 
 demoniacal possession. One such occurs in the 
 narrative of St. Paul's visit to Philippi, where a 
 damsel having a spirit of divination cried after Paul 
 and Silas, " These men are the servants of the most 
 high God, which shew unto us the way of salvation." 
 (Acts xvi. 16-18.) The pythoness, like the demoniac 
 
56 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 of Gadara, acknowledged Christ, and the evil spirit 
 was cast out of both. To deny the existence of evil 
 spirits, and their malignant operations, which began 
 with our first parents, would be inconsistent with 
 rational belief How much of imposture, delusion, 
 and falsehood soever there has been in cases of pos- 
 session imagined or pretended, it is nevertheless true, 
 that Satan, the devil, Beelzebub, are names of an evil 
 one that exists ; and that unclean spirits have actually- 
 caused sickness and insanity. Demonology, however, 
 has entered into the false religions of the world, and 
 corrupted the true; and, as an occult art, it has been 
 a mischievous craft and an abomination, but the 
 belief in wicked spirits can be traced far back in the 
 history of mankind. 
 
 A tribe of Accads, or mountaineers, the Scyths of 
 Iran, a region in ancient Media in very remote 
 antiquity, amongst the earliest migrations by which 
 the post-diluvian generations dispersed themselves 
 over the world, appear to have been the first pro- 
 pagators of this dark science. They came down 
 southward, and first made themselves known to 
 posterity in Chaldea. They wrote in clay, in a 
 primitive character, out of which came the cuneiform ; 
 and their language is now called Accadian. The 
 tablets were written and baked in Erech (Gen. x. lo), 
 copied ages afterward, and copies have been lately 
 found in the ruins of Nineveh, brought over to London, 
 and translated. A learned French Assyriologue, M. 
 Francois Lenormant, has made them the subject of 
 special study, and I have elsewhere made use of his 
 labour. Babylonians and Assyrians imbibed the super- 
 stition. The Jews during the Babylonish captivity 
 
DEMONIACS. 57 
 
 were deeply tainted with it, and it became very 
 greatly aggravated among them in succeeding ages. 
 The fundamental doctrine of the Accads was, that 
 every disorder of the body or the mind, and every 
 disastrous event, was the work of an evil spirit. 
 They named and classified those malignant agents. 
 They believed in good spirits also, and called upon 
 the good ones to deliver them from the bad ones. 
 Their mention of gods was less frequent, and any 
 imperfect notion of one supreme God which lingered 
 among them was but faintly perceptible in the wording 
 of their enchantments. Their notions and their prac- 
 tices spread throughout the East, and whether from 
 them, or other emigrants from the sub-Caucasian 
 region, or, which I venture to think most likely, from 
 the very tenants of the ark, and their immediate 
 progeny, the superstition flowed into Africa, and in 
 another form appeared among the old Egyptians, 
 and ripened into the fetishism of the negroes. 
 
 In the " former prophets " of the Old Testament it 
 shows itself distinctly in the history of king Saul. 
 That king was troubled by an evil spirit, and I ven- 
 ture to express an opinion that in that case, as in 
 others generally, the visitation was retributive; that 
 they who believed in the power of demons, feared 
 them, or invoked them, were more or less abandoned 
 to their pernicious influence. " The Spirit of the Lord 
 departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord 
 troubled him. And Saul's servants said unto him, 
 Behold, now, an evil spirit from God troubleth thee^ 
 (i Sam. xvi. 14, 15.) 
 
 Not only is the existence and operation of evil 
 spirits acknowledged in Holy Scripture, but it is 
 
58 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 distinctly said that the Israelites, soon after their de- 
 liverance from Egypt, worshipped the same demons 
 as the Gentiles. " The children of Israel .... shall 
 no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after whom 
 they have gone a whoring " (Levit. xvii. 7) ; which 
 is the significant phrase applied to apostasy from 
 God. " They provoked him to jealousy with strange 
 gods ; with abominations provoked they him to anger. 
 They sacrificed unto devils, not to God, to gods whom 
 they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, 
 whom your fathers feared not." (Deut. xxxii. 17.) 
 Devil-worship, with sacrifices to appease the spirits 
 of darkness, was part of the false religion they 
 adopted, according to the prophetic song of Moses. 
 The same accusation is laid against them most 
 emphatically by the Psalmist ; " Yea, they sacrificed 
 their sons and their daughters 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." 
 (Ps. cvi. 37, 38.) This was the sin of Ahaz, the king 
 who brought the Assyrian idolatry to Jerusalem, 
 setting up the altar, the imagery, and the worship he 
 had seen in Damascus in the temple of God, fraught 
 as that worship was with the demonolatry of the 
 Accads, and its degrading magic. 
 
 From the return of the Jews and rebuilding of 
 Jerusalem to the time of our Lord's ministry, the 
 process of deterioration had been steadily advancing, 
 for even in the reign of Antiochus the apostasy of mul- 
 titudes to idolatry was the crying sin which aroused 
 the zeal of Judas Maccabeus, and serves to account 
 for the extraordinary prevalence of demoniacal 
 
DEMONIACS. 59 
 
 possession. It is a most notable fact that the Rab- 
 binical expositors of Holy Scripture went very far 
 beyond the letter of the text. First of all, the Tar- 
 gumists, in their earliest translations. For example : 
 
 The Alexandrian translators in their Greek Tar- 
 gum, in the third century before Christ, instead of 
 the Hebrew of Ps. xci. 5, 6, which is faithfully repre- 
 sented in our English Bible, "Thou shalt not be 
 afraid for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that 
 flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in 
 darkness, nor for the destruction that wasteth at 
 noon-day," write, " Thou shalt not be afraid of the 
 nocturnal terror, of the arrow that flieth by day, of 
 the thing that walketh about in darkness, of the 
 sudden sickness and the noon-day demon'' ' The 
 Chaldee Targum, of a later age, goes to a greater 
 length : " Thou shalt not be afraid of the terror of 
 the {mazikin) violent demons that go about at night, 
 nor of the arrow of the angel of death which destroy- 
 eth by day, nor of the death that walketh in darkness, 
 nor of the shidin (destroying demons) that smite in 
 clear day." ^ 
 
 In a passage where the Hebrew is difficult, and our 
 English is poetical, " Satyrs shall dance there," the 
 Alexandrian Targum, as I take leave to call it, says, 
 " Demons shall dance there." ^ Aquila and Theodo- 
 tian treat the difficulty as one of zoology, but the 
 Chaldee Targumist cuts the knot, and writes down 
 devils.^ (Is. xiii. 22.) 
 
 ^ Sai(j.oviov ixetrquPpLvov. 
 
 : ND>3'n n^Di «mn -j^Vm N-n: p n^b^bi x^Mii ymi xm^i p "jmn vh ' 
 ! «-in'"iQ2 pin^i p'^ r)3?^DD -j'^hd ah^pi n «mn p 
 
 3 5ai/x6via. 4 7'TttJ. 
 
6o ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Some of their chief commentators have gone so far 
 astray in their speculations, or have borrowed so 
 freely from the Talmud, that one might almost fancy 
 they were themselves possessed. For example : on 
 these plain words, " I will visit their transgression 
 with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes " (Ps. 
 Ixxxix. 32), Yarkhi asserts that the stripes were to be 
 stripes of man, or of Adam, human chastisement or 
 chastisers, as are the shidim, or devils, such as were 
 the sons of Adam, " according to our faith." He had 
 learnt this from the Talmudists, who write that the 
 first Adam, when he was rebuked of God for having 
 eaten of the tree of life, was excommunicated for a 
 hundred and thirty years, and did not beget any 
 children after his own likeness until that time had 
 expired. The words of the Talmud are these : 
 " R. Jeremiah, son of Elieser, said : In all those years, 
 while Adam was under the curse of excommuni- 
 cation, he begat spirits, devils, and spectres of the 
 night. And Adam lived a hundred and thirty years, 
 and then begat children in his own image and like- 
 ness." ' Other Talmudic sages descant at pleasure 
 on this monstrous invention, which I quote sparingly 
 for the sake of observing that it is no more than the 
 natural fruit of the demonology taught in Chaldea by 
 the barbarians from the north, learned by the Jews in 
 Babylon, grafted on Jewish credulity, and so incor- 
 porated with the tradition that was rife when our 
 Lord was in Jerusalem, and perpetuated in the writ- 
 ings of the Rabbis. 
 
 This was among the traditions which He rebuked. 
 But the people were debased by the paganism 
 
 ^ Buxtorf, Lex. Rah. Chal. Talm., s. v. 11®. 
 
DEMONIACS. * 6 1 
 
 inherited from their fathers, and had become as justly 
 hable to the retributive penalty of actual demoniacal 
 possession as was their first king when he forsook his 
 God, and the Spirit of the Lord left him, and an evil 
 spirit from God troubled him. It is not unlikely that 
 the Yezideans, or devil-worshippers of Syria and 
 Persia, with some other heathens, are in the same 
 state. There is an example of the kind in Abyssinia, 
 as we have heard from credible witnesses, and, among 
 others, the present Bishop of Jerusalem, who found 
 the Falashas, of Abyssinian Jews, chiefly proficient 
 among the Boudas, or sorcerers. Those Boudas are 
 reputed to have power to metamorphose their neigh- 
 bours into hyaenas, and other beasts, to destroy their 
 health, or to kill them, or to drive them mad. The 
 people when sick or in trouble believe themselves to 
 be bewitched, or possessed, and so the superstitious 
 are suffered to become the degraded slaves of super- 
 stition.' 
 
 So it came to pass in Palestine. Because of that 
 sinful dread of devils which destroyed all power to 
 exercise faith in God, men were tormented by the 
 spirits they feared. But the Saviour, setting aside 
 the enchanters as he put out the hired mourners from 
 the house of Jairus, by his own divine power, not by 
 charms or conjurations, cast out the devils, at the 
 same time condemning the superstitions, and treating 
 ''the doctrine" which inculcated the fear and wor- 
 ship of devils with contempt. His disciples were 
 invested with power to do the same, but once when 
 they were exulting in having successfully exercised 
 the gift, he gave them the following instructive 
 
 ' Rev. Samuel Gobat's journal in Abyssinia, p. 189, 229, 245. 
 
62 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 exhortation, " He said unto them, I beheld Satan as 
 lightning fall from heaven. Behold, I give unto you 
 power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over 
 all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by 
 any means hurt you. Nevertheless, in this rejoice 
 not, that the spirits are subject unto you ; but rather 
 rejoice, because your names are written in heaven." 
 (Luke X. 18-20.) 
 
 Then the world began to be delivered from the 
 scourge. The Jewish exorcists were practising their 
 art among the Gentiles, but it was checked by 
 Christian influence. In Ephesus, for example, when 
 " God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul : 
 so that from his body were brought unto the sick 
 handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed 
 from them, and the evil spirits went out of them. 
 Then certain of the vagabond Jews, exorcists, took 
 upon them to call over them which had evil spirits 
 the name of the Lord Jesus, saying. We adjure you 
 by Jesus whom Paul preacheth. And there were 
 seven sons of one Sceva, a Jew, and chief of the 
 priests, which did so. And the evil spirit answered 
 and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who 
 are ye .? And the man in whom the evil spirit was, 
 leaped on them, and overcame them, and prevailed 
 against them, so that they fled out of that house 
 naked and wounded." (Acts xix. 11-16.) Both Jews 
 and Greeks were associated in the same superstitious 
 practices, and the immediate effect of this incident 
 was, that fear fell on them all, many persons were 
 converted to faith in Christ, many who used curious 
 arts brought their books together and burnt them at 
 great pecuniary loss, and we may well suppose that 
 
DEMONIACS. 6^ 
 
 the craft of exorcism, like that of making silver 
 models of the temple of Diana, came to nought at 
 Ephesus. Simultaneously with the spread of Chris- 
 tianity, demonology, and all the arts attendant, died 
 away, the progress of heavenly truth compelling the 
 retreat of the powers. of darkness. 
 
64 
 
 HUMAN SACRIFICES. 
 
 MiCAH VI. 6-^. 
 
 HE prophet Micah the Morasthite, or native of 
 Moresheth, was a Phoenician by birth, if not 
 by descent. Jerome is no doubt correct, for he 
 follows Eusebius, and also possesses local knowledge, 
 when he says, in the prologue to his commentary on 
 the book of Micah, that Morashti (for ns^nic) was in 
 his day a small village near Eleutheropolis, a city of 
 Palestine. Micah himself calls the place Moresheth- 
 Gath, which indicates its neighbourhood to the city of 
 that name. Jerome, still calling it Morashti, says that 
 there was the tomb of this prophet' 
 
 The Moabites wrote a dialect of the same language 
 in the Phoenician character, as we see by the stele of 
 Mesha at Dibon. No doubt the language and religion 
 of the Phoenicians prevailed over a considerable tract 
 of country, and Mesha and Micah were alike familiar 
 with the same idolatrous customs, human sacrifice in- 
 cluded. The king, we remember, made his first-born 
 son a burnt offering to Chemosh his god. (2 Ki. iii. 27.) 
 The prophet, speaking under a deep sense of the guilt 
 of sin, and apprehension of its punishment, enquires : 
 " Wherewithal shall I come before the Lord, and bow 
 myself before the high God .? Shall I come before 
 
 ^ Ad Eutychium. Efist. xxvii. 
 
HUMAN SACRIFICES. 65 
 
 him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old ? 
 Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or 
 with ten thousands of rivers of oil ? Shall I give my 
 first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body 
 for the sin of my soul ? " (Mic. vi. 6, 7.) 
 
 The idea entertained by Mesha, and adopted for 
 the sake of illustration by Micah, was that of the 
 substitution of one person as a victim to atone for the 
 sin of another. The issue of a battle, in the first case, 
 proved the futility of such an expedient ; and the 
 answer to a question, in the second, implied it. Now 
 I have spoken above of the Accadian origin of kindred 
 superstitions, and two cuneiform texts, translated by 
 Mr. Sayce, evidence their prevalence in Chaldea. The 
 first is from a diglot tablet, of which the text is Acca- 
 dian and the version Assyrian. The first words are 
 lost ; then follows, " . . . . the sin may he extirpate ; 
 and the offspring who raised the head among man- 
 kind, his offspring, for his life he gave ; the head of 
 the offspring for the head of the man he gave ; the 
 front of the offspring for the front of the man he gave ; 
 the breast of the offspring for the breast of the man 
 he gave." The other is a passage from a set of astro- 
 nomical tablets, " In the month Sivan, from the first 
 day to the thirtieth day, an eclipse failed ; the crops 
 of the land (were) not prosperous. When the air-god 
 is fine, prosperity! on the high places the son is burnty ' 
 
 Here, as the translator well observes, we have clear 
 indications of the sacrifice of children, as it took place 
 at Carthage, in Phoenicia, and in Palestine. I do not 
 know from what source Mr. Sayce derives his in- 
 formation that " the horrible practice was of common 
 
 * Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archceology, Vol. IV., p. 25. 
 H 6 
 
66 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 occurrence" among the Hebrews, in the same sense 
 as it was common among the Phoenicians and Ara- 
 maeans. We know that it became prevalent, never 
 absolutely common, among the Hebrews, so far, and 
 for so long as they followed the idolatrous customs of 
 Canaanites and Assyrians ; but the offering of human 
 sacrifices, common with those heathens, was at the 
 worst no more than part of the strange worship with 
 which the Hebrews were for a time corrupted. 
 
 His suggestion, too, that " the biblical narrative of 
 the sacrifice of Isaac " is a parallel to these instances, 
 is equally inadmissible. Abraham, indeed, must have 
 been familiar with the custom in Chaldea and Meso- 
 potamia of offering such sacrifices, and before he was 
 better taught, he might with less horror have heard 
 the divine command to offer up Isaac as a burnt 
 sacrifice. But the narrative in Genesis shows how 
 the interposition of the angel to stay the hand of 
 Abraham when about to slay Isaac, and the substitu- 
 tion of a ram for the expected human victim, tended 
 to the eventual abolition of all such sacrifices. The 
 same meliorating influence was apparent in the answer 
 divinely given to the Phoenician prophet after his 
 impassioned question : " He hath shewed thee, O man, 
 what is good ; and what doth the Lord require of 
 thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk 
 humbly with thy God .?" (Mic. vi. 8.) 
 
 We have also to be careful, lest by regarding those 
 pagan sacrifices as vicarious, we fancy them in some 
 low degree to resemble the one vicarious offering 
 which atones for the sins of all mankind. That a 
 sinner, oppressed with guilt, should think to pacify 
 some angry god by casting to him another living 
 
HUMAN SACRIFICES. 67 
 
 person instead of himself: the son for the father, 
 bodily : head for head, front for front, and breast for 
 breast, terror and self-love quenching in his own 
 breast the last spark of natural affection, is not to be 
 compared with the amazing love of Christ, who freely 
 gave himself up for us all ; and the compassion of God 
 the Father, who so loved the world that He spared 
 not His only begotten Son, but gave Him up for 
 us all, that whosoever believeth in Him should not 
 perish, but have everlasting life. These two things 
 differ the one from the other as far as the glory and 
 beauty of heaven differ from the gloom and selfish- 
 ness of this poor world, where no man can by any 
 means redeem his brother, nor give his soul a ransom 
 for him. 
 
68 
 
 THE 
 SIN OF ASKING FOR A KING. 
 
 Judges VIII. 22, 23; i Samuel VIIL 6, 7. 
 
 HE men of Israel said unto Gideon," after 
 he had slain Zebah and Zalmunna, kings of 
 Midian, " Rule thou over us, both thou and thy son, 
 and thy son's son also, for thou hast delivered us from 
 the hand of Midian." To this request for the estab- 
 lishment of an hereditary monarchy Gideon promptly 
 replied, " I will not rule over you, the LORD shall rule 
 over your (Jud. viii. 22, 23.) This was their first 
 petition for a king. It was renewed a few years later, 
 when they said to Samuel, " Make us a king to judge 
 us like all the nations." Their demand displeased 
 the prophet, who prayed to the Lord concerning it, 
 and received for answer, " They have not rejected 
 thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not 
 reign over them!' (i Sam. viii. 6, 7.) 
 
 Certainly, a desire for royal government does not 
 in itself imply rejection of Divine government, or it 
 could never be a religious duty to honour the king 
 and to pray for him, as in Holy Scripture we are 
 taught to do, but the sin of the Israelites consisted in 
 rejecting the Divine government, administered as it 
 then was by judges, or by priests or prophets, in 
 order to have an earthly king. The sin was further 
 aggravated by the circumstance that kings were 
 
THE SIN OF ASKING FOR A KING. 69 
 
 supposed to possess divine powers, or to participate in 
 divine attributes. 
 
 How great a tyrant, and how unworthy a pretender 
 to godlike majesty the king desired by the IsraeHtes 
 was Hkely to be, may be partly gathered from the 
 expostulation of Samuel in reply to this request 
 (i Sam. viii. 10-17), and more perfectly from what 
 has been related in preceding pages concerning the 
 kings of Egypt, and more especially Rameses II., the 
 chief oppressor of their fathers. 
 
 Of all neighbouring nations, Egypt was, at that 
 time, the greatest and best known. The customs of 
 Egypt, with the grandeur of the Pharaohs, were pre- 
 sent in the imagination of the Hebrews, and most 
 especially in times of national distress, when their 
 trust in the God who delivered them out of the land 
 of Egypt, and the house of bondage, should have been 
 the strongest But they were haunted with the delu- 
 sion that the Egyptian kings, and perhaps all other 
 kings, were more than men ; and perhaps they 
 fancied that a king might be found for them as 
 much a god as Amen-Ra, a man-god visible and near 
 at hand. By entertaining such a thought they became 
 incapable of entire allegiance to the Lord God, their 
 heavenly Lawgiver and King. 
 
 There is abundant evidence that the kings of Egypt 
 and Ethiopia were counted little inferior to gods. A 
 tablet inscription found by M. Mariette at Jebel 
 Berkel, in the ruins of the great temple of Napata, 
 in the ancient border-land between the two countries, 
 makes the matter clear. It is on a monument raised 
 in memory of the enthronement of a king named 
 Aspalut, in the twenty-sixth dynasty, B.C. 664-525, 
 
70 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 much later, indeed, than the time of Samuel and 
 Saul, but representing a standard of royal dignity 
 much lower than that assumed in the days of the 
 judges, an exorbitant folly not peculiar to one country, 
 nor limited to one age, but common to the Pharaohs, 
 the Caesars, and the Czars, and shared by many 
 other sovereigns, ancient and modern, throughout 
 heathendom. 
 
 Aspalut, an Ethiopian, was chosen by the priests 
 from among themselves. The army being at their 
 service, was gathered round the temple, while they 
 said prayers to Amen-Ra, their chief god. Before 
 addressing the god, they had said to the soldiers, 
 " Let us go, and crown for ourselves a king that shall 
 be like a young bull (for strength), whom none shall 
 be able to resist." On this appeal, the whole multi- 
 tude of armed men groaned aloud, and cried, " Our 
 master is among us, but we know him not. O that 
 we might know him, march under him, and serve him 
 as the two worlds (Upper and Lower Egypt) serve 
 Horus, son of Isis, as soon as he shall be seated on 
 the throne of his father Osiris ! O that we might 
 adore his double plume ! " ' Then the soldiers talked 
 together ; then they raised a shout of praise to the 
 god ; then they declared that the king is his image 
 on earth ; then they renewed the lament, " Our 
 master is with us, but we know him not. Let us 
 lie prostrate before him. Let us say in his presence, 
 We come to thee, O Amen ! Give us our master to 
 give us life. We do not speak to thee like them who 
 know thee not. He is to be our guide to thee." On 
 this a company of twenty-four delegates, representing 
 
 * The Sovereign of all Egypt wore two feathers in his royal cap. 
 
THE SIN OF ASKING FOR A KING. 7 1 
 
 the chief officers of state, went into the temple to 
 consult the god, and to receive a king at his hand. 
 At their entrance the clergy asked them wherefore 
 they were come, and they replied, " We are come to 
 the god Amen-Ra, for him to give us our master ; we 
 do not speak like those who know him not ; he is our 
 guide." Before introducing them to the god, the 
 priests went into the sanctuary to announce the 
 arrival of the delegates, and with sacrifices propitiate 
 his favour. This ceremony being done, the delegates 
 were admitted into the sanctuary, and repeated their 
 prayer, " We come to thee, Amen-Ra ; give us a 
 master." 
 
 The god consenting, some royal brothers were pre- 
 sented to him, but he refused them all, and called for 
 Aspalut, who he approved, by repeating to him 
 almost the very words of their prayer. Then Aspalut 
 entered the inmost chamber of the sanctuary, stood 
 face to face with the god (or some priest who per- 
 sonated the god), received from the god his father 
 the diadem and the sceptre, and came forth king.' 
 
 The pretensions of the Pharaohs to divinity were 
 very ancient, so that this ceremony at the election of 
 Aspalut contains nothing new on that score, but one 
 might almost think that the choice of king Saul had 
 suggested the very form of priestly election employed 
 in that case. No one can affirm that the form of 
 election of Saul at Mizpeh suggested the ceremonial 
 employed at Djebel Barkal for the elevation of 
 Aspalut to the throne of Egypt ; it looks not impro- 
 bable. That, however, is a conjecture of extremely 
 
 ^ Sur la stele de I'intronisation trouvee au Djebel-Barkai, par G. 
 Maspero, Revue Archiologique, Mai, 1873. 
 
72 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 slight importance ; but the stele before us, with cir- 
 cumstances previously noted in relation to the Pha- 
 raohs, powerfully suggests that if the appointment of 
 a king had been left to the Hebrews, they would have 
 followed the customs of the heathen, in which case 
 there would have been at that early date, eleven or 
 twelve hundred years before Christ, a total apostasy 
 of the Hebrew nation under a king elected after the 
 custom of the heathen. 
 
 Kings commonly pretended to be sons, or at least 
 more distant descendants of gods; and therefore 
 Alexander the Great thought it necessary to call 
 himself son of Ammon,' no Pharaoh being regarded 
 a mere mortal. The heathens of Palestine were 
 no less high-minded, and in the first line of the 
 Moabite stone, we find Mesha calling himself son of 
 Chemosh. 
 
 ^ The same as Amen-Ka. 
 
73 
 
 ASSYRIA, 
 
 THE OCCUPATION OF SAMARIA. 
 
 2 Kings XVIL 24. 
 
 IMMEDIATELY after carrying away the Is- 
 raelites to Nineveh, Tiglath-Pileser " brought 
 men from Babylon," at that time a town of Assyria, 
 " and from Cuthah, and from Ava (or Ivah), and from 
 Hamath (in Upper Syria), and from Sepharvaim (two 
 towns on the Euphrates), and placed them in the 
 cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel, 
 and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities 
 thereof" (2 Ki. xvii. 24.) It is not likely that these 
 people were mingled indiscriminately in their transfer 
 from their several towns to Samaria, but that each 
 town migrated in mass, and that the inhabitants of 
 the same town remained together in their new homes. 
 Indeed the people of the place, fenced by its own 
 walls, and governed by its king, although all were 
 subject to a King of kings, had a sort of independent 
 nationality. 
 
 " 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, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, 
 and the men of Hamath made Ashima. And the 
 
74 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak, and the Sepharvites 
 burnt their children in fire to Adrammelech and 
 Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim." (2 Ki. xvii. 
 
 29-31.) ^ 
 
 Our information concerning the objects of worship 
 here specified is very incomplete. What were the 
 Succoth-benoth made by the Babylonians has only 
 been conjectured. Ashima, Nibhaz, and Tartak may 
 have been too insignificant for human memory, but 
 bricks from the dust of Babylonia may haply be 
 turned to disclose their names again. Adrammelech 
 and Anammelech, a pair of gods for the two Sipparas, 
 on the east and west banks of the Euphrates, might 
 represent in the Assyrian superstition the male and 
 female powers of the sun. Even the geography of 
 the passage just quoted is in part forgotten, for the 
 site of Ava or Ivah has to be recovered. Until very 
 lately Cuth was more than doubtful, but since the 
 expedition of Dr. Oppert to Mesopotamia all doubt 
 has been removed, and he places Cutha on the map. 
 
 Learning from R. Benjamin of Tudela that Babel, 
 the royal city, and Hillah, the later town, are five 
 miles apart; and comparing the distance from Babel 
 to Cutha as it is laid down by the French commission, 
 we may conclude that as Nebuchadnezzar saw it from 
 the roof of his castle, it lay nearly due east at about 
 twelve miles distance. Its ruins are buried in the 
 mounds now called by the Arabs A I Hyniar, or 
 Oheymir. The mound El Karneh (the Treasure) is 
 a heap of bricks from the collapse of ancient build- 
 ings. Some of them have inscriptions, and near at 
 hand there is a pavement of Nebuchadnezzar. The 
 inscriptions tell that the inhabitants worshipped 
 
ASSYRIA. — THE OCCUPATION OF SAMARIA. 75 
 
 Nergal, the lion-god of the Assyrians, and in one of 
 those mounds at Cutha there are the ruins of his 
 temple.' 
 
 Temples were no doubt built by the Cuthites and 
 others to their gods in the cities of Samaria, and 
 when one of the Israelitish priests was sent back by 
 the king to teach those heathens how to worship " the 
 god of the land," " he came and dwelt at Beth-el, and 
 taught them how they should fear the Lord." (2 Ki. 
 xvii. 28.) At this time, therefore, we may conclude 
 that the Lord was acknowledged God of the land, 
 and that in each of the Assyrian towns the new in- 
 habitants had an idol of their own, the god in its own 
 place. At Beth-el there ought to have been a house 
 for the service of the Lord, but that is doubtful. 
 Afterwards, by leave of Alexander the Great, there 
 was a temple on Mount Gerizim, and now, at the foot 
 of Gerizim, at the ancient Shechem, afterwards Nea- 
 polis, now pronounced Nabhis, a synagogue. 
 
 The recent discovery of Cutha, with its temple to 
 Nergal, enables us to read the Scriptural narrative 
 with a broader apprehension of its verity, and a more 
 vivid perception of its facts. 
 
 * Menant, Bahylone et la Chaldee, p. 190, 261. 
 
76 
 
 ASSYRIA. 
 
 THE SAMARITAN PENTATEUCH. 
 2 Kings XVII. 24-28. 
 
 HE Book of the Law' of Moses, separate from 
 the other portions of the Old Testament, in a 
 distinctively Samaritan text, and in possession of a 
 people bearing a name distinct from Hebrew or Jew; 
 spoken of by the Jews as a sect with whom they have 
 no dealings, and who, while they retained their posi- 
 tion in Samaria, a country once inhabited by Israelites, 
 were expressly distinguished from the " lost sheep of 
 the house of Israel," becomes in effect an historic 
 Gentile monument. It is a monument of the period 
 which began with the schism of Jeroboam, and ter- 
 minated with the last deportation of Israelites from 
 Samaria to Assyria, B.C. 975-721. 
 
 After the schism, the tribes of Judah and Benjamin 
 remained in Judea, and worshipped the Lord in his 
 temple at Jerusalem. The northern tribes who then 
 occupied Samaria had a new religion of their own, or, 
 to speak more correctly, the greater part of the popu- 
 lation fell into gross idolatry: some retained a belief 
 in the true God, but were for the most part debarred 
 
 * Book of the Law, mm "IDD, is conventionally the title of the Penta- 
 teuch. 
 
1 1> ^ li 
 
 
 CQ 
 
 o 
 
 C) 
 
 ^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 CO 
 
 I 
 
 VO 
 
 ^^3 
 
ASSYRIA. THE SAMARITAN PENTATEUCH. 77 
 
 from worshipping him at Jerusalem, and had no 
 means for the observance of the Mosaic law in Sa- 
 maria. The population, after being much wasted in 
 war with their neighbours, was carried away captive 
 into Assyria, with the exception of a few whom the con- 
 queror thought not worth the trouble of conveyance. 
 A mongrel heathen population was then brought in 
 to take their place; and for want of a truer name the 
 strangers were called Samaritans. Fearing the anger 
 of the God of the land, they besought the king of 
 Assyria to send over some one to teach them His 
 ways. The king, having many Hebrew priests 
 among the captives, sent one of them to teach the 
 new inhabitants how they ought to serve the LORD. 
 (2 Ki. xvii. 24-28.) 
 
 This priest brought over the book of the law with 
 him, which was as much of the Bible as the Israelites 
 of the ten tribes had at the time of their secession ; 
 and we do not know that the few prophecies as yet 
 delivered were at that time collected as books having 
 the authority which we call canonical. As the Sama- 
 ritans never became proselytes, and had thenceforth 
 no dealings with the Israelites in regard to sacred 
 things, they would not receive any of the Scriptures 
 that were afterwards written. But the five books of 
 Moses were still retained ; they are preserved with 
 religious care by their descendants now remaining on 
 the site of the ancient city, and wherever you find a 
 copy of the same, it is known as "The Samaritan 
 Pentateuch." 
 
 Representing, with a few obvious exceptions, the 
 work of Moses, the volume lay out of sight of Euro- 
 peans until early in the seventeenth century, when a 
 
78 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 French priest brought home a copy to Paris, where it 
 was published in the year 163 1. In the synagogue of 
 the Samaritans at Nablus {Neapolis), the Shechem of 
 Genesis, the Sychem or Sychar of the New Testa- 
 ment, there is a very old copy, which they say is the 
 book originally given to their ancestors. This is 
 hardly credible, but all who have seen the manuscript 
 say that it is of great age, and it is probably the 
 archetype of the few other copies that exist. All 
 the manuscripts that we know are written in the 
 same character, and in the same style of primitive 
 simplicity. There are no vowels, nor is there any 
 interpunctuation beyond a single point (.) after each 
 word, except when the word finishes close on the 
 left-hand margin. After allowing for inevitable varia- 
 tions in the writing, each one of the copies is probably 
 as good as any other; and when closely literal colla- 
 tion is made, the variants are found to be of extremely 
 slight importance, except as will be presently ex- 
 plained. Even if these manuscripts are not very 
 ancient, it will hardly be disputed that they are copied 
 from an ancient source. 
 
 An exact fac-simile of the second section of the 
 book of Genesis (Gen. i. 6-S), as divided by the Sama- 
 ritans, obtained by tracing from the manuscript pre- 
 sented by Archbishop Usher to the Cottonian Library,' 
 written in the year of our Lord 1362, is before the 
 reader. 
 
 The document, thus perpetuated for 2,600 years, or 
 not much less, if any, contains direct confirmation of 
 statements made in the second book of Kings and 
 
 ^ British Museum : Cottonian MSS., Claudius, B. VIII. 
 
ASSYRIA. THE SAMARITAN PENTATEUCH. 79 
 
 elsewhere, concerning the schism of the Israelites in 
 the time of Rehoboam king of Judah. Being copied 
 from a writing older than the establishment of syna- 
 gogues, this manuscript is not divided into the Para- 
 shioth, or Sabbath Lessons, which became necessary 
 when Moses was read every Sabbath-day.' But more 
 valuable to the student than even the archaic simpli- 
 city of the page are the plain traces of sectarian 
 hostility, characteristic of the people and the time. 
 Such, especially, is the reading in Deuteronomy 
 (Deut xxvii. 4), where the word Gerizim was sub- 
 stituted for Ebal^ in order to produce a belief that 
 God had commanded an altar to be erected on 
 Gerizim, the mount of blessings, where the Sama- 
 ritans offered their sacrifices, and subsequently built 
 their temple, as if to rival the worshippers in the 
 temple at Jerusalem. On that spot their descendants 
 continue to sacrifice a lamb every Passover, and thus 
 perpetuate the memory of a schism which, first in 
 the history of the world, divided the Church of 
 God. 
 
 The title of the Samaritan Pentateuch to be 
 counted among ancient monuments of the authen- 
 ticity of sacred history is clear enough when we 
 consider that, with the exceptions now mentioned, 
 it answers to the original text of the law, word for 
 word, and that these exceptions are confirmatory of 
 what we read in our own Hebrew Bible of the schism 
 and constant enmity of the Samaritans. Both the 
 Samaritan and the Judaean manuscripts have various 
 
 ^ The Samaritans now possess and read in private the Books of Joshua 
 and Judges. The Prophets they may read, but do not hold them to be of 
 divine authority. 
 
8o ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 readings, and a few of the Samaritan, but very few, 
 are not found in the Judaean. These few, however, 
 they who have collated them pronounce to be 
 generally of little value, and differing no more than is 
 inevitable on whichsoever side of any controversy the 
 variant may be quoted/ 
 
 Between the 17th and i8th verses of the 20th chap- 
 ter of the book of Exodus, interrupting the sublime 
 narrative of the giving of the law, the following 
 sentences are boldly interpolated : " And it shall be 
 when the Lord thy God shall bring thee into the 
 land of the Canaanite, whither thou goest to possess 
 it, that thou shalt set up for thyself great stones, and 
 thou shalt plaster them with lime. And thou shalt 
 write upon the stones all the words of this law. And 
 it shall be when ye pass over Jordan, ye shall set up 
 these stones which I command you this day, on 
 Mount Gerizim. And thou shalt build there an altar 
 to the Lord thy God, an altar of stones ; thou shalt 
 not lift up iron upon it. With plain stones shalt thou 
 build the altar of the Lord thy God, and thou shalt 
 offer up upon it sacrifices to the Lord thy God. And 
 thou shalt sacrifice peace-offerings, and thou shalt eat 
 there, and rejoice before the Lord thy God. That 
 mountain beyond Jordan, after the way from the 
 rising of the sun in the land of the Canaanite, who 
 dwelleth in the West, over against Gilgal, near by the 
 oak of Moreh, over against Shechem." This forgery 
 tallies with the words of the Samaritan woman : "Our 
 fathers worshipped in this mountain ; and ye say that 
 
 ' Any student who wishes to examine the Samaritan Pentateuch would 
 probably turn to Blayney's Pentateuchus Hehrceo-Samaritamis Charactere 
 Chaldaico edit us, Oxon., 1790. 
 
ASSYRIA. THE SAMARITAN PENTATEUCH. 8 1 
 
 in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to wor- 
 ship " (Jno. iv. 20) ; and the book of the law, in this 
 and other places so daringly corrupted, brings literal 
 confirmation to the entire history of the Samaritans, 
 as related in the Kings, referred to in the Gospel 
 according to St. John, and repeated by Josephus and 
 other historians. 
 
82 
 
 NAAMAN IN THE HOUSE OF 
 RIMMON. 
 
 2 Kings IV. 17, 18. 
 
 OW came it to pass, that when Naaman the 
 Syrian professed to EHsha the prophet his 
 determination not to offer burnt-offering or sacrifice 
 to any other god, but only to the LORD, he desired 
 pardon of the Lord that when his master, the king of 
 Syria, should go into the house of Rimmon, to wor- 
 ship there, leaning on his hand, he, Naaman, should 
 bow himself in the house of Rimmon ? The case may 
 be stated thus : The king of Syria, an avowed wor- 
 shipper of this god, falls down before its image, and 
 one of his chief servants, being an avowed worshipper 
 of the God of Israel, bows down at the same time. 
 The question is : Will this prostration be regarded 
 as his own voluntary act, in breach of his declared 
 intention.'* and supposing that it be so regarded, 
 may he be forgiven ? 
 
 Until the case be fully understood the question 
 cannot be fairly entertained ; and one could scarcely 
 venture even to conjecture a reply, which, if mistaken, 
 might mislead and trouble the inquirer. 
 
 When Selden counted Rimmon among the Syrian 
 or Assyrian gods, he said that the only known men- 
 tion of him was in the passage now quoted. But the 
 
NAAMAN IN THE HOUSE OF RIMMON. 83 
 
 name occurs frequently in the Assyrian inscriptions, 
 and the difficulty of understanding this incident is 
 therefore considerably lessened. An obelisk found in 
 the south-east palace of Nimrud, the ancient Calah, 
 and now in the British Museum, bears mention of 
 him. The inscription relates the doings of Shamas- 
 Rimmon, son and successor of Shalmaneser II., also 
 conjectured to be the same as Shamas-Vul, or Shamsi- 
 Vul. This king is named after two gods : Shamas, 
 the sun, and Rimmon. Mr. Smith placed his acces- 
 sion at B.C. 825, and that of his successor at 8io.' 
 
 At the time of Naaman's visit to Elisha, B.C. 894 
 or thereabouts, Vul-Cush, now known as Vul-Nirari, 
 was king of Assyria ; he had made himself formid- 
 able west of the Euphrates, and during his reign laid 
 Samaria under tribute. Damascus and all Syria had 
 been kept in terror by hostile incursions of the kings of 
 Nineveh, nearly three centuries before this visit. Tig- 
 lath Pileser I. had attempted the conquest of Damascus, 
 which was actually accomplished soon afterwards by 
 Shalmaneser II. At this time the city is under tri- 
 bute, and the Assyrians, almost everywhere trium- 
 phant, are only prevented from annihilating this 
 remnant of Syrian royalty by the payment of heavy 
 gifts, which serve at once to purchase temporary 
 respite, and to invite Vul-Nirari to make a sweeping 
 sequestration at his earliest opportunity. One condi- 
 tion of forbearance in this, as in all such cases, we 
 may venture to affirm, was to acknowledge the gods 
 of the conqueror ; and it is almost certain that while 
 Ben-Hadad, or any other Syrian, held his throne 
 at Damascus, Rimmon, reputed god of tempests in 
 
 * Assyrian Eponym Canon, p. 60. S. Bagster and Sons. 
 
 7* 
 
84 ORIENTAL RECORDS. • 
 
 Assyria, would have a temple there ; and the vassal 
 king, himself a heathen, would be under the political 
 necessity of worshipping therein, if indeed he had not 
 already received Rimmon-worship among the customs 
 of his fathers. To cease from the worship or to with- 
 hold the tribute would be regarded as a declaration of 
 revolt, and visited with instant and inexorable ven- 
 geance. Probably the king of Syria who had sent his 
 afflicted servant to Samaria to seek relief, and had 
 obtained it from a prophet of the LORD, would have 
 been considered guilty of disloyalty to the Assyrian 
 god if he had exempted Naaman from his attendance 
 in the temple, while he had not shared in Naaman's 
 conversion. Just one passage from the inscription of 
 Shamas-Rimmon, which must have been written but 
 a few years later, describing a triumphant expedition 
 of his forces from Nineveh to the Mediterranean Sea, 
 leaving Damascus unvisited for that time, will help 
 to show how terrible the name of an angry Assyrian 
 must have been in those days, both in Syria and 
 Palestine. 
 
 " The kings of the country of Nahri (Mesopotamia), 
 all of them, by the will of Asshur,Shamas, and Rimmon, 
 the gods my defenders, a fixed tribute of horses 
 trained to the yoke for the future over them I ap- 
 pointed. At that time from the country of Tsilar, 
 and the land of Edanni, as far as the sea of the setting 
 sun (the Mediterranean, perhaps about Tyre and 
 Sidon), like Rimmon (with the fury of a tempest from 
 the north), my storm over them I poured. Exceeding 
 fear into them I infused." ' 
 
 Weighing the sacred obligations of loyalty to his 
 
 * Records of the Past, Vol. I., p. 19, first edition. 
 
NAAMAN IN THE HOUSE OF RIMMON. 85 
 
 king, duty to his country, and worship to his god, who 
 is the Lord, the God of Elisha, and no doubt consider- 
 ing this last to be greatest, he was perplexed. Healed 
 of his leprosy, he has incurred a new duty, and wishes 
 to know whether he can still be free to perform the 
 others also, and how far. He therefore puts the ques- 
 tion to the prophet, and Elisha does not forbid him to 
 bow down when his royal master leans, on his hand in 
 the house of Rimmon, but rather encourages him to 
 do so. He bids him go ifi peace. 
 
 May we not consider his position to be fairly repre- 
 sented thus.^ It was certainly the duty of the king to 
 pay the tribute and the homage, or not to withhold it 
 without sufficient reason. Jeremiah, we remember,, 
 maintained this principle of justice in Jerusalem 
 against those who would have withheld the tribute 
 from Babylon. The king of Syria could not, as a 
 heathen, have objected to pay tribute to the Assyrian, 
 Naaman, for his part, openly declared himself a wor- 
 shipper of the one true God, and of Him only, reject- 
 ing every other. He solemnly bound himself, taking 
 home with him to Damascus two mules' burden of 
 earth, and had for witnesses a numerous retinue of his 
 countrymen, with whom he returned healed and con- 
 verted. He appeared thus in Damascus, a denier of 
 the god worshipped in his own country, and he re- 
 solved to sustain this character, whether standing at 
 his master's side in the palace or bowing down with 
 him in the temple. He went to Samaria a leper, he 
 comes back in health ; but he renounces his gods, gives 
 praise to the LORD, the God of Israel, and lets Asshur, 
 Shamas, and Rimmon, with the pollution of his leprosy, 
 all go together. He builds an altar, whereon to offer 
 
86 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 a separate sacrifice ; and when he appears in the house 
 of Rimmon, and as the king's chief attendant bows 
 down there, his hand presents no gift, and the bare 
 prostration, made for a reason quite foreign to the 
 place, is rather a silent protest against the god than a 
 recognition of him. It has more of contempt than 
 reverence. He does not worship Rimmon, but his 
 presence in the heathen crowd with no spot of leprosy, 
 a thankful and honest dissentient from all idolatry, is 
 in truth the best thing that could be in that place and 
 at that time. The votaries of Ben-hadad's triad were 
 singing hymns, no doubt, but Naaman is now silent, 
 and the silence is as a protest against the praise. It 
 as good as tells them that he has often sung those 
 hymns in vain ; he has had recourse to gods and spirits, 
 he has tried the virtue of incantations and drugs, and 
 charms, but they have all failed. He comes without 
 a victim or a gift to say that he owes nothing here. 
 He has established another altar, and if that establish- 
 ment is as complete as is his gratitude and his faith, 
 he has some servant of the God he has chosen to help 
 him to do fit worship, and the God of Jacob is as well 
 acknowledged there as ever he was at Bethel, or 
 Hebron, or Shiloh, or even by the Jews at Jerusalem. 
 Every day he does fall prostrate, but not before any 
 image ; and the contrast between the official bending 
 down and the reverent worship, the sacrifice, the 
 psalm, the godly life and glad confession, is wonderful. 
 Then let not the example of Naaman in the house of 
 Rimmon be quoted in justification of any cowardly 
 attempt to hide the lamp under the bushel, yielding 
 countenance to idolatry of any sort, either at home or 
 abroad. 
 
37 
 
 MERODACH-BALADAN AND 
 HEZEKIAH. 
 
 2 Kings XX. ; Isaiah XXXIX. 
 
 ERODACH (or Berodach) Baladan appears 
 just once on the page of Sacred History. He 
 heard that Hezekiah had been sick, and recovered, 
 and he sent him a present, with congratulation. He is 
 called king of Babylon, but was an utter stranger to 
 Hezekiah, who seems to have known little or nothing 
 of him, or of Babylon; for when Isaiah asked him 
 whence the men came, he could only tell him that 
 they came from Babylon, and of Babylon he could 
 only say that it was a far country ; so that now, for 
 the first time, we gain intelligence of communication 
 between Hebrews and Babylonians. And why a king 
 of Babylon should make an overture of amicable rela- 
 tion to a king of Jerusalem is not explained. We 
 only hear that the frank reception given by Hezekiah 
 to the stranger was unwise, and a remonstrance of 
 Isaiah portended the coming Babylonian captivity. 
 
 But Assyrian annals help to dispel the obscurity 
 which has hitherto covered this brief episode in 
 Hebrew history. Assyria hated and conquered Me- 
 rodach-Baladan, who appears there also suddenly, and 
 soon passes out of sight. But the kings of Assyria 
 
88 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 were the great enemies of the king of Babylon and the 
 kings of Israel and Judah; and however unwise it 
 might be in the king of Judah to accept alliance with 
 the Babylonian, nothing can be clearer than that they 
 were all ready to ally against the common enemy, an 
 enemy so powerful that a much stronger alliance was 
 requisite for any hope of successful resistance. 
 
 Merodach-Baladan was not first of the name, for 
 another, called Merodach-Baladan I., was king of 
 Babylon in the year 1320 before Christ',' made grants 
 of land, enjoyed all the honours of royalty, and at 
 least had a grandfather among his predecessors. But 
 an historical tablet of Tiglath Pileser IL, the powerful 
 king, king of nations, king of Assyria, has among the 
 titles of that sovereign " High Priest of Babylon," 
 showing that he regards Babylonia as a subject 
 state. He claims possession of the whole of Kar- 
 duniyas (Babylonia) to its utmost extent, and he 
 carries on sanguinary expeditions throughout the 
 regions of Chaldaea and Elam and the bordering 
 countries. After a time he says, " Maruduk-bal- 
 iddina (M. Baladan) son of Yakin, king of the sea- 
 coast, from which to the kings my fathers, formerly 
 none came and kissed their feet ; terrible fear of 
 Assur my lord overwhelmed him, and to Sapiya he 
 came, and kissed my feet ; gold, the dust of his 
 country, in abundance, cups of gold, instruments of 
 gold, precious stones, the product of the sea, planks 
 of wood . . . carried by sailors(.^), costly garments, gum, 
 oxen, and sheep, his tribute, I received." Many cities, 
 " which the Babylonians call strong," he subdues, and 
 
 * Smith's Assyrian Discoveries, p. 238, 239. 
 
MERODACH-BALADAN AND HEZEKIAH. 59 
 
 sets Up his image over them." This Tiglath Pileser 
 reigned from B.C. 745 to 727. 
 
 But Merodach-Baladan could not be held in vas- 
 salage, and the inscription of Sennacherib, from B.C. 
 705 to 681, again contains his name, and acknowledges 
 him, notwithstanding the boast of Tiglath Pileser 11. 
 as king of Babylonia : " In my first expedition, of 
 Merodach Baladan, king of Karduniyas, with the 
 army of Elam his helpers, in the vicinity of Kisu, I 
 accomplished his overthrow. In the midst of that 
 battle he abandoned his camp, alone he fled, his life 
 he saved. Chariots, horses, carriages, and mules, which 
 in the midst of the fight he had abandoned, my hand 
 captured. Into his palace, which is in Babylon, joy- 
 fully I entered, and I opened also his treasure house ; 
 gold, silver, precious stones, everything," etc., etc., 
 '* as spoil I counted." ' On the same cylinder is re- 
 corded the attack on Hezekiah, whose sickness at 
 this time took place, and the final flight of Merodach 
 Baladan, who had sent messengers to Hezekiah, 
 whether as to a fellow suflerer, or a coveted ally, it is 
 not possible to determine. All that Isaiah said to 
 the king, all that is recorded in the duplicate narra- 
 tion from Scripture quoted above, and all that the 
 Assyrian annals contain, are in perfect harmony. No- 
 thing could be more natural than the amicable com- 
 munication of two sufferers under the same ruthless 
 conqueror. I have noticed elsewhere the exact re- 
 lation between Hezekiah and the Assyrians, and the 
 offence which brought down their force upon him at 
 this time. (2 Ki. xviii. 14.) 
 
 * Smith's Assyrian Discoveries, p. 254, seq. * Ihid., p. 295, seq. 
 
90 
 
 PHARAOH NECHO AND JOSIAH. 
 
 2 Chronicles XXXV. 
 
 FTER all this, when Josiah had prepared the 
 temple, Necho, king of Egypt, came up to 
 fight against Carchemish by Euphrates, and Josiah 
 went out against him. But he sent ambassadors to 
 him, saying, What have I to do with thee, thou king 
 of Judah ? I come not against thee this day, but 
 against the house wherewith I have war ; for God 
 commanded me to make haste : forbear thee from 
 meddling with God, who is with me, that he destroy 
 thee not. Nevertheless, Josiah would not turn his 
 face from him, but disguised himself that he might 
 fight with him, and hearkened not unto the words of 
 Necho from the mouth of God, and came to fight in 
 the valley of Megiddo. And the archers shot at 
 king Josiah ; and the king said to his servants, Have 
 me away, for I am wounded. His servants therefore 
 took him out of that chariot, and put him in the 
 second chariot that he had ; and they brought him to 
 Jerusalem, and he died, and was buried in one of the 
 sepulchres of his fathers. And all Judah and Jeru- 
 salem mourned for Josiah." (2 Chr. xxxv. 20-24.) 
 
 It would not seem to fall within the scope of the 
 sacred historian to say why Pharaoh Necho "came 
 up to fight against Carchemish by Euphrates," nor to 
 explain why " Josiah went out against him." But it 
 
PHARAOH NECHO AND JOSIAH. 9 1 
 
 is not SO with the annals of Assurbanipal, king of 
 Assyria, to whom Carchemish belonged, and speak- 
 ing strategetically, it was the key to his dominions 
 beyond the Euphrates. Herodotus and Josephus 
 have noted the event, but neither the one nor the 
 other adds anything material to the narrative before 
 us ; from the annals, however, in the king's own 
 library, we have the following information. 
 
 Esarhaddon, father of Assurbanipal, had over- 
 thrown Tirhakah, king of Egypt and Ethiopia, taken 
 possession of his country, and appointed " kings and 
 governors in the midst of Egypt {kings here being 
 equivalent to viceroys). But Tirhakah, not actually 
 dispossessed of Upper Egypt and Ethiopia, trusted 
 in his own might, and instead of paying tribute, made 
 war upon his conqueror, killed and plundered as he 
 passed through the intermediate provinces until he 
 came to Memphis, the city which Esarhaddon had 
 taken, and added with its dependencies to the boun- 
 daries of Assyria. In that metropolis " he sat " 
 enthroned again. The report of this event reached 
 Assurbanipal as he was " going in state in the midst 
 of Nineveh," and with heart bitter and afflicted he 
 gathered powerful forces, and directed his march to- 
 wards Egypt and Ethiopia. Twenty- two tributary kings, 
 through whose countries he passed, came and kissed 
 his feet. Tirhakah, "in the midst of Memphis," 
 heard of the progress of his expedition, and " to 
 make war, fighting and battle," gathered his army, 
 and sent it out against him. " In the service of 
 Assur, Ishtar, and the great gods my lords," says the 
 royal annalist, "on the wide battle-field I accom- 
 plished the overthrow of his army. Tirhakah in the 
 
92 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 midst of Memphis, heard of the defeat of his army ; 
 the terror of Assur and Ishtar overcame him, and he 
 went forward. Fear of my kingdom overwhelmed 
 him, and his gods glorified me before my camp. 
 Memphis he abandoned, and to save his life he fled 
 into Thebes. That city (Memphis) I took, my army 
 I caused to enter, and rest in the midst of it. Necho, 
 king of Memphis and Sais, Sarludari, king of Pelu- 
 sium, Pisan-hor, king of Natho," and seventeen others. 
 " These kings, prefects and governors, whom in the 
 midst of Egypt, the father my begetter had appointed ; 
 who, before the advance of Tirhakah, their appoint- 
 ments had left, and fled to the desert, I restored ; and 
 the places of their appointments, in their possessions, 
 I appointed them. Egypt and Ethiopia, which the 
 father my begetter had captured, again I took: the 
 bonds more than in former days I strengthened, and 
 I made covenants. With abundant plunder and 
 much spoil, in peace I returned to Nineveh. After- 
 wards all those kings whom I had appointed sinned 
 against me. They did not keep the oath of the great 
 gods ; the good I did to them they despised, and their 
 hearts devised evil ; seditious words they spoke, and 
 evil counsel they counselled among themselves." ' 
 
 The evil counsel was that they should enter into an 
 alliance by treaty with Tirhakah, offensive and defen- 
 sive, against Assyria. The Assyrian- generals in 
 Egypt detected the plot, intercepted the correspon- 
 dence, took the kings that were implicated in it, " in 
 bonds of iron and fetters of iron bound their hands 
 and feet." The people of Sais, Mendes, and Zoan 
 were on the point of rising in revolt, and of these 
 
 ^ Column I., lines 83-124; II., 1-4, transcribed. 
 
PHARAOH NECHO AND JOSIAH. 93 
 
 *' small and great with the sword they caused to be 
 destroyed. One they did not leave in the midst." 
 They dismantled the disaffected cities, and then, to 
 borrow again the words of the annals, " These kings 
 who had devised evil against the army of Assyria, 
 alive to Nineveh into my presence they brought. To 
 Necho .... of them, favour I granted him, and a 
 covenant .... Observances stronger than before I 
 caused to be restored, and with him I sent. Costly 
 garments I placed upon him, ornaments of gold ; his 
 royal image I made for him, bracelets of gold I 
 fastened on his limbs, a steel sword its sheath of gold, 
 in the glory of my name more than I write I gave 
 him. Chariots, horses, and mules for his royal riding 
 I appointed him ; my generals, as governors, to assist 
 him with him I sent. The place where the father my 
 begetter, in Sais to the kingdom had appointed him, 
 to his district I restored him ; and Neboshazban his 
 son in Athribes I appointed. Benefits and favours 
 beyond those of the father my begetter, I caused to 
 restore, and gave to him." ' 
 
 Necho, at first made king of Memphis by Esarhad- 
 don, who remained so faithful that he was restored 
 by Assurbanipal on his first expedition to Egypt, 
 but was afterward involved in the guilt of a con- 
 spiracy against his sovereign whom he represented in 
 the government of Memphis and Sais, — this same 
 Necho, although carried to Nineveh in irons as a 
 traitor, on some account found favour enough to be 
 pardoned, set at liberty, and actually raised to the 
 dignity of a Pharaoh, or king of Egypt. Yet now he 
 makes use of that very dignity to employ the strength 
 
 ' Column II., 31-49, transcribed. 
 
94 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 of Egypt for the humiliation of Assyria. All Egypt 
 and Ethiopia wage war against their conqueror, and 
 Pharaoh Necho, who owes all his worldly fortune to 
 Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal, leads the Egyptian 
 army through Palestine, hoping to reach Nineveh by 
 way of Carchemish, and overthrow the empire. 
 
 Josiah, himself a tributary to Nineveh, and bound 
 by what would then be called a covenant to uphold 
 the empire, would not break faith, whatever Necho 
 might say about having the command of God, whether 
 he might wish him to understand by DTi^i^ the God of 
 Israel or the gods of Egypt. He was neither pre- 
 sumptuous nor self-righteous, as some commentators 
 have guessed he might have been, but faithful to an 
 obligation for which he ventured and lost his life. 
 The archers shot him. He died, and was buried 
 honourably in the sepulchres of his fathers. All 
 Judah and Jerusalem mourned for him. Jeremiah 
 lamented for him. All the singing men and singing 
 women spake of Josiah in their lamentations, and 
 made them an ordinance in Israel, "written in the 
 lamentations." His acts, and his goodness ; his 
 deeds, first and last, are written in the book of the 
 kings of Israel and Judah. (2 Chr. xxxv. 23-27.) 
 
95 
 
 BABYLON. 
 
 THE FALL OF BABYLON. 
 
 Daniel V. 25-31. 
 
 HE fall of Babylon, with the death of Belshaz- 
 zar and the transfer of the kingdom to the 
 Medes and Persians, is related with extreme brevity 
 in the book of Daniel (Dan. v.), at the close of a cir- 
 cumstantial narrative of an idolatrous and drunken 
 banquet, where the young king drank wine before a 
 thousand of his lords, with his princes, his wives, and 
 his concubines ; and while he tasted the wine, sent 
 for the golden vessels which his father Nebuchad- 
 nezzar had taken out of the temple at Jerusalem ; 
 and they all drank in them. Belshazzar was a very 
 young king, and from the little that is known of him 
 we may infer that he was a dissolute and reckless 
 youth. When he came to the throne, some months 
 or perhaps a year before this fatal night, the Medes 
 and Persians were laying siege to Babylon. 
 
 The capture of the city is noticed very briefly by 
 Herodotus, and described at length by Xenophon. 
 Neither of them could have copied from the Bible, 
 where the manner of the capture is not described, but 
 only predicted with the usual obscurity of prophetic 
 writing, the prediction gaining clearness only in the 
 event of its fulfilment 
 
96 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Herodotus, repeating what he has heard in Baby- 
 lon, speaks of Cyrus as the General commanding 
 the Medo-Persian army, and observes that "if the 
 Babylonians had suspected or discovered what Cyrus 
 was doing, instead of letting the Persians get into the 
 city, they might have destroyed them utterly. For 
 having shut all the gates that command the river, 
 they would have gone out on the footways that were 
 on both sides of the stream, and caught them as in a 
 trap. But as it was, the Persians came upon them by 
 surprise, and owing to the great extent of Babylon 
 (as they say who live there), they who were taken in 
 one extremity of the city, knew nothing of the cap- 
 ture of others in the centre, but (for this happened 
 during a feast) went on dancing and revelling all the 
 while, until they learnt it all too certainly." ' 
 
 Xenophon, having access to original records, ex- 
 hibits the incidents of that memorable event with 
 more perfect knowledge, and relates them so gra- 
 phically that a mere summary of his narrative would 
 be inadequate to convey any just impression of its 
 value. It shall therefore be given in free translation, 
 condensed but slightly. 
 
 Daniel had said : " In that night was Belshazzar the 
 king of the Chaldeans slain. And Darius the Median 
 took the kingdom, being about threescore and two 
 years old." (Dan. v. 30, 31.) The wisdom of Daniel 
 was displayed on this occasion, by his interpretation 
 of the writing on the wall. In early life he had made 
 extraordinary proficiency in the learning and tongue 
 of the Chasdim, not the Arameans of Babylon, but 
 such Chaldees, or Chasdim, as were at Ur in the time 
 
 * Herodot., Hist., I., 191. 
 
BABYLON. THE FALL OF BABYLON. 97 
 
 of Abraham. Belshazzar and his court could under- 
 stand what was written or spoken in Aramean/ and 
 perhaps also in the language of the Chasdim, the 
 cuneiform that we see stamped on bricks but written 
 so variously, often in ideograph, as not to be read by- 
 syllables, but by signs, requiring a key for their ex- 
 planation. The words, or signs, as read by Daniel, 
 were Mejte, Men^, Tekel, Upharsin, " Number, Number, 
 Weight, and Divisions,'" and explained by him to 
 mean that God had numbered, weigked^^nd divided the 
 Babylonian kingdom, and given it to the Medes and 
 Persians ; Darius being king of the Medes, and 
 Cyrus, a Persian general over the united besieging 
 army. Isaiah (xiii.) and Jeremiah (1. 41) had foretold 
 the event now impending, and its consequences, at 
 great length ; but three long chapters are too much to 
 be transcribed, and should be perused attentively 
 before reading the following account by Xenophon, 
 who served in the army of the younger Cyrus, had 
 access to the Persian archives at Ecbatana, and drew 
 thence a description which has the value of an authen- 
 tic historical document,^ bearing every mark of truth- 
 fulness. 
 
 As soon as Cyrus (i) came before Babylon, he dis- 
 tributed his forces all round the city, to cover a circle 
 of more than forty-eight miles, the mere circuit of 
 the walls, and then drove round the line of encamp- 
 ments with some of his captains, and other friends of 
 the allies. Having surveyed the walls, he was preparing 
 to march away, when a deserter came, and advised 
 
 * n^D'^^». " pnDi Vpn «2d wn. 
 
 ' Xervophontis Opera edidit Gustavus Sauppe, Vol. I., Cyropsedia, Lipsiae, 
 1S65, Lib. vii., cap. 5. 
 
 H 8 
 
98 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 him to remove the army ; " because," said he, " when 
 surveyed from the walls, the line seems very weak, nor 
 can it possibly be otherwise ; for when made to cover 
 so great a length of wall, it is impossible for it to be 
 very deep." On this hint Cyrus put his troops through 
 various movements, with the view of ascertaining the 
 effect produced on the men when the columns were 
 weakened by extension, or strengthened by giving 
 them solidity ; and, after careful observation, brought 
 them all into camp together, assembled his officers, 
 and addressed them thus : 
 
 " Fellow-soldiers : we have surveyed this city on 
 all sides, and I confess myself unable to see how any 
 one is to take these strong and lofty walls by assault. 
 But, on the other hand, the greater number of men 
 there be within, so long as they will not come out to 
 give us battle, by so much the sooner will the place be 
 reduced by famine, and unless you have any better 
 method to propose, our men must sit down and lay 
 siege" (2). On this, Chrysantas, a Persian general, ob- 
 served that there was a river which flowed through 
 Babylon, having a width of not less than two stadia, as 
 if to hint that possibly an entrance might be effected 
 that way. " Yes, indeed ! " remarked Gobryas, a 
 noble Assyrian, " and the depth ? If two men could 
 stand in it, one on the other's head ; the topmost 
 would be under water, so that the city seems to be 
 made stronger by the river than by the walls." "Then," 
 said Cyrus, " let us see, Chrysantas, if all this is more 
 than we can overcome. We shall have, as quickly as 
 possible, to measure out for ourselves how much is to 
 be each man's work, and then dig out a ditch on both 
 sides the wall {departing from the river east and west) 
 
BABYLON. — THE FALL OF BABYLON. 99 
 
 as broad and as deep as we can make it, working hard 
 at it, night and day." 
 
 Forthwith, measuring in a wide sweep around the 
 walls, he marked distances for mountain-like masses 
 of earth to be piled up, beginning at the bank of the 
 river. Beyond these was dug an exceeding deep 
 ditch, sending up the earth right and left, the men so 
 forming the embankment towards the walls as to work 
 under cover. First of all, he raised towers at the 
 edge of the river to the height of 240 feet at least, on 
 footings made strong by palm-trees ; and some even 
 loftier than that. And this he did, both with the 
 design of seeming to prepare for a grand attack upon 
 the walls, as is usual in besieging cities, and also that, 
 when the river should escape into the ditch, the rush 
 of water might not carry away the towers. He also 
 raised other towers on the embankment for more 
 complete protection. The besieged meanwhile de- 
 rided the besiegers for taking all this trouble, while 
 they had within their walls the means of keeping up 
 a supply of provisions for twenty years. When Cyrus 
 heard this, he divided his army into twelve parts, that 
 one part might be on guard each month in the year ; 
 but the Babylonians again, when they heard this, 
 laughed yet the more, thinking how much better pro- 
 tected they were, having Phrygians, Lydians, Arabs 
 and Cappadocians for their guards, all of whom they 
 considered far more trusty fellows than the Persians. 
 
 In due time the ditches were completely excavated 
 (3). Cyrus, too, heard that there was to be a feast in 
 Babylon, when all the Babylonians would be drinking 
 and making merry the whole night through, according 
 to custom. On that night, therefore, as soon as it fell 
 
 8* 
 
lOO ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 dark, he took many men, and opened the ditches to 
 the river. This done, the river emptied itself into 
 them as the night advanced ; and in the channel of 
 the river through the city, the water sank so low that 
 men could ford it. While thus the river ebbed away, 
 Cyrus gave orders to the Persian Chiliarchs ; to two 
 commanders, one of horse and one of foot, he gave 
 each his thousand, and ordered the remainder of the 
 army to follow in the rear, and come up as they 
 should be appointed. They all made ready. Cyrus 
 himself, riding down into the dry river-bed, sent for- 
 ward the scouts, both horse and foot, with orders to 
 examine the ground, and report whether it was pass- 
 able. They at once reported that it was so ; and 
 Cyrus, calling up the chiefs of both horse and foot, 
 thus addressed them : 
 
 " Friends, the river offers an entrance into the city. 
 We go in boldly, fearing nothing. We know what 
 they are against whom we go. We know who are 
 fighting with us. If they were all awake and watch- 
 ing, full armed and in good order, we should conquer 
 them ; but now we come upon them at a time when 
 many of them are asleep, many drunken, and all in 
 disorder. And when they find that we are actually 
 inside, how much more than ever will they now be 
 helpless with terror." 
 
 Having added a few directions for throwing brands 
 upon the house-tops, or setting the gates on fire, he 
 cried : 
 
 " But take your arms ! I will go before you. You 
 Gadatas, and you Gobryas ! Show me the way, for 
 you know it ; and when we get in, make for the king 
 as quickly as possible." " Yes, indeed," said his com- 
 
BABYLON. THE FALL OF BABYLON. 10 1 
 
 panion to Gobryas, " that will be nothing wonderful 
 if the palace-gates are open, as is likely ; for in this 
 night the city will be all drunk. The guards at the 
 gate we will kill, for the guard is always there." " Of 
 course," cried Cyrus, " but go on, go on ! that we may 
 take them by surprise." 
 
 As the words were on their lips, in they went. 
 Some were struck dead as they lay; some fled within; 
 some shrieked for help. The Persians that were near 
 Gobryas joined in the clamour, as if they, too, were 
 drunken ; and making their way among the crowd, 
 got into the palace. Some of the party of Gobryas 
 and Gadatas found the palace-gates shut. Others, 
 having orders to look after the guards, fell upon them as 
 they were drinking in a place gay with blazing lights, 
 and dealt with them as enemies at once. Then, as 
 the shrieks and confusion on the outside grew louder, 
 they within heard the noise, and the king commanded 
 some to go and see what was the matter. These, 
 rushing out, flung open the gates. Gadatas and his 
 company, now having the gates wide open before 
 them, threw themselves into the palace, and as the 
 Babylonians were trying to escape, cut them down 
 right and left, until they reached the king, whom they 
 found standing erect, and grasping his sword, but 
 petrified with fear. Gadatas, Gobryas, and their men, 
 seized him. He, and all they who stood by him, were 
 cut down instantly; one striving in vain to escape, 
 another snatching at a weapon, another vainly strug- 
 gling to defend himself While this was going on, 
 Cyrus despatched parties of horse through the ways 
 of Babylon, with orders to kill all whom they found 
 out of doors, but to proclaim aloud, in the Syrian 
 
I02 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 language, to all that were in their houses, that they 
 should stay there, and that whosoever durst come out 
 should suffer death. 
 
 On this, note : — 
 
 I. As soon as Cyrus. A singular instance of nomi- 
 nal prediction. " Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, 
 to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden. (Is. xlv. i.) 
 
 2 sit down and lay siege. Xenophon makes 
 
 the operations of the siege the one subject of this 
 part of his narrative. Jeremiah (1. 14, 15, 29.) "Put 
 yourselves in array against Babylon round about : all 
 ye that bend the bow, shoot at her, spare no arrows, for 
 she hath sinned against the Lord. Shout against her 
 round about .... call together the archers against 
 Babylon, all ye that bend the bow, camp against it 
 round about." 
 
 3 ditches were completely excavated, etc. Jere- 
 miah foretells the suddenness of the catastrophe : 
 ^'Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed." (Jer. 
 li. 8.) There were two kings with the besiegers, 
 Darius and Cyrus, so says the Prophet, "The Lord 
 hath raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes." 
 (Jer. li, II.) But the device was executed by Cyrus, 
 so the text: "for his device is against Babylon, to 
 destroy it." (Jer. li. 11.) " The Lord hath both devised 
 and done that which he spake against the inhabitants 
 of Babylon." (Jer. li. 12.) The sudden surprise and 
 slaughter were foretold. "I have laid a snare for thee, 
 and thou art also taken, O Babylon, and thou wast 
 not aware : thou art found, and also caught, because 
 thou hast striven against the Lord." (Jer. 1. 24.) The 
 drying up of the Euphrates : "A drought is upon her 
 
BABYLON. — THE FALL OF BABYLON, 1 03 
 
 waters ; and they shall be dried up." (Jer. 1. 38.) 
 The breaking into the city by the river-gates : " I will 
 loose the loins of kings, to open before him (Cyrus) 
 the two-leaved gates, and the gates shall not be shut. 
 I will go before thee, and make the crooked places 
 straight. I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and 
 cut in sunder the bars of iron." (Is. xlv. i, 2.) The 
 Slaughter : "A sword is upon the Chaldeans, saith the 
 Lord, and upon the inhabitants of Babylon, and upon 
 her princes, and upon her wise men. A sword is upon 
 the liars, and they shall dote ; a sword is upon her 
 mighty men, and they shall be dismayed. A sword 
 is upon their horses, and upon their chariots, and upon 
 all the mingled people that are in the midst of her, 
 and they shall become as women ; a sword is upon 
 their treasures, and they shall be robbed." (Jer. 1. 
 35-37-) 1^^^^ sudden terror of the king Belshazzar. 
 " The king of Babylon hath heard the report of them, 
 and his hands waxed feeble ; anguish took hold of 
 him, and pangs as of a woman in travail." (Jer. 1. 43.) 
 " One post shall run to meet another, to show the king 
 of Babylon that the city is taken at one end, and that 
 the passages are stopped." (Jer. li. 31, 32,) The actual 
 killing of the king, as related by Daniel, was remem- 
 bered in Babylon, and archived in Ecbatana. 
 
 It remains further to be observed : — 
 
 1. That Babylon was taken by Cyrus the Great, in 
 the year 538 before Christ, and the capture was im- 
 mediately recorded by Daniel, historian and prophet. 
 
 2. That Herodotus visited Babylon about a century 
 later, where he heard a distinct account of the event, 
 and wrote his history about B.C. 430, when men were 
 
I04 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 living whose fathers would have related to them what 
 they themselves had witnessed. 
 
 3. That Xenophon, an eloquent and famous Greek, 
 who entered the service of a successor of Cyrus the 
 Conqueror, and resided at Ecbatana, wrote his bio- 
 graphy of that prince from the archives of the Medo- 
 Persian empire, preserved there ; and however opinions 
 may vary ^s to the degree of artistic license in which 
 Xenophon may sometimes have indulged, there can- 
 not be the shadow of a doubt as to the substantial 
 truth of every lineament in his picture' of the capture 
 of the Golden City. . 
 
 Such an agreement of histories is very satisfactory, 
 but this is more than satisfactory — wonderful is " the 
 burden of Babylon, which Isaiah, the son of Amoz, 
 did see," a hundred and seventy five years before that 
 memorable night. He saw in vision the banner lifted 
 up, and the waving of the captain's hand. He heard 
 the voice that bade the mighty ones go into the gates 
 of the nobles. He heard the howling of the affrighted 
 multitudes, beheld the drooping of the hands, and saw 
 the melting of the hearts when every one that was 
 found should be thrust through, and every one that 
 was joined with them should fall by the sword. He 
 plainly declared that the Lord would stir tcp the Medes 
 against them. Jeremiah too, nearly sixty years before 
 
 * Let the succession of dates be shown to the eye of the reader. 
 
 B.C. 712 Isaiah (xiii.) saw the burden of Babylon. 
 
 B.C. 595 Jeremiah predicted the overthrow of Babylon, and wrote in 
 a book all the evil that should come upon it. (Jer. 1., li.) 
 
 B.C. 53S the Medes and Persiansannihilated the Babylonian monarchy, 
 and Daniel recorded the event. 
 
 B.C. 430 Herodotus g-athered an account of it in the fallen city. 
 
 B.C. 350 or thereabouts, Xenophon wrote his narrative of the Medo- 
 Persian conquest, as he found it recorded in the Persian archives. 
 
BABYLON. THE FALL OF BABYLON. I05 
 
 that conquest, anticipated history in language so 
 express that not a word needs be altered to bring him 
 into exact agreement with Daniel, Herodotus, and 
 Xenophon, who wrote after the event ; the first as 
 actual witness of things in which he had taken part, 
 and of the others, the first repeats common report, and 
 the second gives the substance of authentic records 
 which he had carefully studied. 
 
io6 
 
 CYRUS. 
 
 THE NAME OF CYRUS. 
 Isaiah XLV. 28. 
 
 OT long after the fall of Babylon by the sword 
 of Cyrus the Great, came the restoration by a 
 decree of the same, as predicted by the prophet Isaiah, 
 who wrote as follows : " The Lord .... saith of 
 Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my 
 pleasure; even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be 
 built ; and to the temple. Thy foundation shall be 
 laid." (Is. xliv. 28.) So the prophet names a person 
 about eighty years, as we may say, before his birth; 
 and assigns to this person a work for which, at the 
 time of the prediction, no necessity could be antici- 
 pated, for the city and the temple were standing, and 
 although the future destruction of both was very pro- 
 bable, and the eventual restoration of both might be 
 hoped for, the naming a restorer is one of the most 
 remarkable instances on record of prophetic fore- 
 sight. 
 
 " In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, that the 
 word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be 
 fulfilled," for Jeremiah (Jer. xxv. 1-14) had foretold 
 that seventy years after the fall of Jerusalem the king 
 of Babylon would be punished, and the Hebrew cap- 
 tives liberated, "the Lord stirred up the spirit of 
 
CYRUS. — THE NAME OF CYRUS. I07 
 
 Cyrus, king of Persia, that he made a proclamation 
 throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, 
 saying. Thus saith Cyrus, king of Persia, The Lord 
 God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the 
 earth, and he hath charged me to build him an house 
 at Jerusalem, which is in Judah," etc. (Ezra i. 1-3.) 
 So he avowedly accepted the prophecy as a divine 
 commission. 
 
 The good work was happily accomplished. No 
 event in history is more notorious or undisputed, and 
 it would be almost waste of time to labour after 
 monumental confirmation, but I cannot refrain from 
 noting the occurrence of this singularly honoured 
 name in some inscriptions not yet destroyed. One is 
 on a brick to be seen among the Oriental antiquities 
 in the British Museum, and is thus translated : 
 " Ku-ra ' builder of 
 
 Bit-Saggal/^'' and Bit-Sidda 
 
 Son of Kambuziya ^ 
 
 The powerful kin^"^ am I." 
 After a reign of twenty-nine years, Cyrus died in a 
 good old age. His tomb yet remains ^ on the site of 
 ancient Pasargadae, the present Murgab, lying E.N.E. 
 of Shiraz, but was rifled many ages ago. On marble 
 pillars, some of which yet mark the boundary of the 
 area wherein the tomb stands, the words remain 
 inscribed in old Persian and Median: "I am Cyrus the 
 king, the Achaemenian." ^ 
 
 ^ Cyrus, the ra is restored by the translator, Mr. George Smith. 
 ' Ti the termination of the name restored. * Cambyses. 
 
 * King is restored also, where the brick is broken. 
 5 Sir Robert Ker Porter's Travels, 1., 498. 
 
 ^ Descendant of Achsemenes, from whom came the dynasty of which 
 Cyrus was a member. 
 
I08 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 The tomb has been seen and sketched by Sir 
 Robert Ker Porter and other travellers. It had been 
 described by Aristobulus, an attendant on Alexander 
 the Great, who also saw and examined it. This de- 
 scription, and the traveller's picture, unquestionably 
 represent the same object, on which we must dwell for 
 a moment. 
 
 Arrian preserves the narrative of Aristobulus, who 
 relates that when Alexander came to Pasargadse, and 
 found the tomb of Cyrus broken open and robbed, he 
 was extremely angry. It stood in the royal gardens, 
 surrounded by a grove planted with all kinds of trees ; 
 a Persian paradise, watered by a perennial stream, and 
 abounding with the choicest flowers. It was a square 
 pyramidal structure of beautiful white marble, sur- 
 mounted with a funeral chamber of massive walls, and 
 solid stone roof vaulted within. A small door opened 
 into the chamber, so small that a middle-sized man 
 could scarcely get into it. As originally described, a 
 gold chest containing the body of Cyrus was laid in 
 this chamber, and must have been placed there before 
 the door-way was completed. On a kind of couch, 
 having four feet of solid gold, the chest was placed, 
 covered with a Babylonian carpet, and laid on purple 
 rugs. Royal robes of Babylonian workmanship were 
 placed upon the couch. Median trousers, and stolae 
 of hyacinthine dye, some purple, some of various 
 colours, chains for the neck, bracelets, swords, ear- 
 rings, and other ornaments of gold and precious stones 
 covered a table. Within the same area as the sepul- 
 chral pyramid, and not far from it, a small house was 
 prepared for the Magi appointed by Cambyses, the 
 son of Cyrus, to guard the place ; their sacred office 
 
CYRUS. THE NAME OF CYRUS. IO9 
 
 was hereditary. They were to receive a daily ration 
 from the king, consisting of a sheep, with a certain 
 measure of wine and flour, and every month a horse 
 for sacrifice to Cyrus, some of the fat only being 
 actually offered, and the flesh eaten by those who 
 made the sacrifice. The epigraph was written in 
 Persian characters, and Arrian gives it in Greek," to 
 the following effect, " O man ! I am Cyrus the son of 
 Cambyses, who have established a kingdom for the 
 Persians, and have reigned king over Asia ; therefore 
 envy me not this monument." 
 
 But such was no longer the state of the tomb when 
 Alexander saw it. Nearly all was gone. Only the 
 coffin-chest and the couch were left. The chest was 
 broken and beaten together that it might be more 
 easily removed ; but probably the robbers were sur- 
 prised in the act, and had escaped, leaving the rem- 
 nant of their spoil behind. Alexander saw with 
 horror the scattered bones of the founder of the king- 
 dom he had conquered, and commanded Aristobulus 
 to have the chest repaired, the skeleton replaced and 
 covered with the lid which had been thrown aside, 
 and the doorway closed with stone and mortar, and 
 sealed with the royal seal. After examining the 
 Magian guards, but failing to get information of the 
 criminals, he released them and departed.' 
 
 The above inscription, as given by Arrian, differs 
 from the brief sentence on the pillars, and is in fact 
 the proper epigraph copied from the tomb,^ and con- 
 
 ' 'fl av6po)ne, eyii Kvpds etjui 6 Kafx/SvVov, 6 rijv apxr}v Ilepo-ais Karacmjo-a/w.ei'os, 
 Kol T^s A<ri'as /SaffiAeuaas, firi oZv <f)96y€c /noi tow /xMj/xaros. 
 
 • Arriani de Expedit. Alex. Magni Hist., Lib. vi., ad calcem. 
 
 ' EffeyrypaTTTO 5e 6 Ta<^os ncpcucoi? ypa/u.ft.ao'i. 
 
no ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 tains a few words which correspond with the narrative 
 in the book of Daniel, where the conquest of Babylon 
 by Cyrus is recorded, and the subsequent accession of 
 Cyrus to the throne is the crowning event of that por- 
 tion of Sacred History. 
 
Ill 
 
 CYRUS. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF CYRUS AND THE PERSIANS. 
 Ezra V. 13-15. 
 
 N the first year of Cyrus, the king of Babylon, 
 the same king Cyrus made a decree to build 
 this house of God. And the vessels also of gold and 
 silver of the house of God, which Nebuchadnezzar 
 took out of the temple that was in Jerusalem, and 
 brought them into the temple of Babylon, those did 
 Cyrus the king take out of the temple of Babylon, 
 and they were delivered unto one whose name was 
 Sheshbazzar, whom he had made governor, and 
 said unto him, Take these vessels, go, carry tJum into 
 the temple that is in Jerusalem, and let the house of 
 God be huilded in his place!' (Ezra v. 13-15.) 
 
 Cyrus both spoke and acted as a believer in the 
 true God. When, after his death, an attempt was 
 made to nullify his act, and prevent the restoration of 
 the city and the temple, Darius Hystaspes, his suc- 
 cessor, caused search to be made for the authorization 
 that was disputed ; " and there was found at Achmetha 
 (Ecbatana) in the palace that is in the province of the 
 Medes, a roll, and therein the record written, that in 
 the first year of Cyrus the king, the same Cyrus the 
 king made a decree cojicerning the house of God at 
 Jerusalem, Let the house be build ed, the place where 
 
112 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 they offered sacrifices, and let the foundation thereof 
 be strongly laid .... and let the expenses be given 
 out of the king's house ; and also let the golden and 
 silver vessels of the house of God, which Nebuchad- 
 nezzar took forth out of the temple which is at Jeru- 
 salem and brought unto Babylon, be restored; and 
 brought again unto the temple which is at Jerusalem, 
 every one to his place, and place them in the house of 
 God. Now, therefore, Tatnai .... let the work of 
 this house of God alone ; let the governor of the Jews, 
 and the elders of the Jews build this house of God in 
 his place .... that they may offer sacrifices of sweet 
 savours unto the God of heaven^ and pray for the life 
 of the king, and of his sons." In this manner he 
 speaks of the God of the Jews as of his own God, 
 treats the matter as his own, and requires all to be 
 done at his own cost, under heavy penalties in case of 
 neglect or disobedience, closing with " I Darius have 
 made a decree, let it be done with speed." (Ezra vi. 
 
 1-15.) 
 
 It cannot be reasonably objected that the mono- 
 theism of Cyrus was not pure, or that he would also 
 acknowledge the existence of some secondary gods ; 
 or, at least, of inferior and subordinate spirits, not to 
 be addressed as gods. This cannot be proved of 
 Cyrus, although it must be said of Darius, as appears 
 plainly in the Behistun inscription. 
 
 Cyrus was so far from worshipping any other than 
 the jealous God, who will not give His glory to 
 another, that the LORD called him His shepherd. His 
 anointed, His servant whose right hand He had 
 holden, and whom He had chosen to subdue nations. 
 (Is. xliv. 2Z\ xlv. I, 3, 4.) The Magism which came 
 
RELIGION OF CYRUS AND THE PERSIANS. II3 
 
 down with the Accads from the north had not yet 
 openly put forth the claims of a god of darkness 
 to rival the God of light ; and the demonology which 
 afterwards debased the intellect and morals of the 
 Persians, was but stealthily beginning to work its 
 mischief among the worshippers of Ahuramasda. But 
 when Medes and Persians were associated in affairs of 
 government, and the intercourse of daily life, two 
 very different systems began imperceptibly to inter- 
 mingle ; and no half-instructed loyalty to the good 
 and only God could withstand the subtle fascination 
 of Magian spirit-worship, or fortify mere monotheists 
 against the terror of a god of darkness. 
 
 In the mixed society of Babylon, Magians, trading 
 in incantations which were the more formidable for 
 their mysterious obscurity, acquired resistless in- 
 fluence ; and after the reign of Darius Hystaspis,' 
 who abominated the doctrine of devils, of which I have 
 given examples in my notes on spirit-worship, the 
 Accadian magic produced such an entire change that it 
 would be impossible to judge aright of the religion of 
 Cyrus, and his relation to the Jews, if it were imagined 
 to agree with that of his successors on the throne of 
 Persia. Isaiah did indeed utter a sentence against the 
 dualistic error; and Cyrus might be put on his guard by 
 the words of the inspired prophet, when he foretold the 
 commission which the God of the Hebrews would give 
 him, to open the two-leaved gates of Babylon and sub- 
 due kings, and the promise to raise him up in righteous- 
 ness to build His city and let go His captive people. 
 " I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known 
 me. I am the Lord, and there is none else ; there is 
 
 ' Otherwise written "son of Hystaspes." 
 H 9 
 
114 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 no God beside 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 beside 
 me. I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form 
 the light and create darkness ; I make peace and create 
 evil: I the LoRD do all these things." (Is. xlv. 5-7.) 
 
 Now this doctrine of divine revelation, is diametri- 
 cally opposite to all that the Magians had ever taught, 
 and would soon again propagate with augmented zeal 
 throughout the empire ; being only restrained from 
 so doing for a time by the known abhorrence of 
 Cyrus and of Darius also. The latter declared, in the 
 Behistun inscription, that a Magian pretender to the 
 crown of Persia, during a brief period of ascendancy, 
 had corrupted the state, and actively propagated im- 
 piety. Zoroaster made his first appearance, accord- 
 ing to the concurrent testimony of several eastern 
 writers,' in the reign of this same Darius, one of them 
 says, after he had reigned thirty years ; and by clever 
 perseverance induced the king to become his patron 
 as reformer of the Magian religion, and, under pre- 
 tence of reformation, fixed his own system in the 
 Zendavesta, wherein is inculcated the fear of the bad 
 spirit Angromanyus, usually called Ahriman, to- 
 gether with the worship of the good. The Zenda- 
 vesta, however, is a compilation of many writings, 
 with the additions of Zoroaster himself, and is chiefly 
 to be valued for some very ancient fragments of purer 
 doctrine. The Yasna, or book on sacrifice, is suffi- 
 ciently characteristic of the work in general. 
 
 " I pray and invoke the great Ormuzd, glorious 
 
 * Historia Religmiis Fetcrum Persarum, etc., Autor est Thomas Hyde, 
 S. T. D., Oxon. 1700, cap. xxiv. 
 
RELIGION OF CYRUS AND THE PERSIANS. II5 
 
 with dazzling light, most perfect, most excellent, most 
 pure, most mighty, most wise ; whose body is the purest 
 above all that is holy, who only thinks that which is 
 good, the source of all pleasure, who gives me that which 
 I possess, who is strong and powerful, who nourishes, 
 who, as the sovereign, is altogether excellent." So far 
 as this prayer goes, it is very good, but the framer of it 
 fails to catch a clear perception of absolute godhead. 
 
 The attributes of Ormuzd are not absolutely per- 
 fect. The terms of this laudatory description are but 
 comparative. This great god is not a pure spirit, and 
 has a body only comparatively pure, " excelling in its 
 purity all other bodies." 
 
 The second section of the first chapter of the Yasna 
 reveals the polytheism of the system : " I pray and 
 invoke Bahman, Ardibehesht, Shariver, Sapandomad, 
 Khordad, Amerdad, Goshorun, who has care of the 
 flocks, the fire of Ormuzd, the most active of the 
 Amshaspands." Polytheism, we may well say ; for 
 whatever these beings may be called, whether spirits, 
 angels, or genii, they are addressed as gods with in- 
 vocation and prayer ; and the long chapter from which 
 the above sentences are extracted, consists entirely of 
 the like. Element-worship, sun-worship, and spirit- 
 worship are mingled together, beginning with Mithra, 
 or the sun, who fructifies the barren fields, who 
 surveys all things with a thousand eyes, and hears 
 all creatures with a thousand ears. The worshipper 
 is instructed to invoke and celebrate the mountain 
 of life, created by Ormuzd, resplendent with light, 
 clothed with beauty, the abode of happiness.' Cyrus, 
 
 * Covimentaire sur le Ya^na, Vun des livres religieux des Parses, par 
 Eugene Burnouf, Chap. I., sections i, 2, 9, 10, 34. 
 
 n* 
 
Il6 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 we may be sure, knew nothing of these Accadlan 
 phantoms, adopted by Zoroaster. 
 
 Here, then, in the thirty-first year of Darius Hys- 
 taspis, under a pretence of reforming Magianism, a 
 new religion was introduced among the Persians ; and 
 the " sacred book " which Zoroaster pretended to have 
 written by inspiration, or to have received from 
 heaven, also contains such extracts from a very 
 ancient and venerable work as may help us to con- 
 ceive what was the faith of the most ancient Persians, 
 and how near it comes to that of the prophets of the 
 living God. I now borrow from a later version 
 passages which are believed to be of very remote 
 antiquity, and certainly present a doctrine very near 
 that of Moses and the prophets, if it be not the 
 same. Zoroaster adopts the language for his own, 
 and says : 
 
 " I believe thee to be the best being of all, the 
 source of light for the world. Everybody shall choose 
 (believe in) thee, as the source of light. Thee, holiest 
 spirit, Mazda.' Thou createst all true good things by 
 means of the power of thy good mind at any time, 
 and promisest us (who believe in thee) a long life. 
 
 " I will believe thee to be the powerful holy (god) 
 Mazda. For thou givest with thy hand, filled with 
 helps, good to the pious man, as well as to the im- 
 pious, by means of the warmth of the fire ' strengthen- 
 ing the good things. From this reason the vigour of 
 the good mind has fallen to my (Zoroaster's) lot. 
 
 "Thus I believed in thee as the holy god, thou 
 
 ' Mazda. The same as Ahuramazda = Ormazd. 
 
 ' Fire. Supposed in the Zendavesta and the Vedas to be the cause 
 of all life diffused throughout the universe. 
 
RELIGION OF CYRUS AND THE PERSIANS. II7 
 
 living, wise! Because I beheld thee to be the pri- 
 meval cause of life in the creation. For thou hast 
 made (instituted) holy customs and words ; thou hast 
 given a bad fortune (emptiness) to the base, and a 
 good to the good man. I will believe in thee, thou 
 glorious god ; in the last (future) period of creation," 
 
 Zoroaster acknowledges this god to be the source 
 of inspiration, and prays him that he may be taught. 
 He wants to know the origin of evil, and to know 
 about the spirits of evil ; and by so confessing that the 
 dualistic doctrine he delivers to his followers had not 
 been previously revealed, he confessed that it was 
 then published by himself for the first time ; therefore 
 it could not have been known by Cyrus. Again he 
 repeats the ancient truth, making it serve as a preface 
 to his innovations : 
 
 " By means of his power and rule the generation 
 gone by subsisted, and also those to come will subsist 
 in him. The sincere man's mind is aspiring to the 
 everlasting immortality, the destroyer of the wicked. 
 She (this immortality) is in the possession of the 
 living wise, the lord of the creatures. 
 
 " Him, whom I desire to worship, and celebrate 
 with my hymns, I beheld just now with mine eyes; 
 him who knows the living {Ahura) wise {Mazda) as 
 the source of the good mind, the good action, and the 
 good word. 
 
 " Him will I adore with the good mind, him who is 
 always propitious to us by day and by night .... 
 him will I adore with the prayers of pure devotion. 
 
 " He who created, by means of his wisdom, the 
 good and naughty mind in thinking, words, and deeds, 
 rewards his obedient followers with prosperity. Art 
 
Il8 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 not thou (Mazda) he in whom the last cause of both 
 intellects is hidden (both good and evil)?" ' 
 
 Now these sentences contain no recognition of an 
 evil god, rival and antagonist of the good one, but 
 rather a direct contradiction of the Accadian dualism 
 adopted and propagated by this very Zoroaster. Pro- 
 fessor Haug, therefore, having translated the Zenda- 
 vesta, and closely studied the doctrine it contains, 
 recognises in its descriptions of Ahuramazda a being 
 perfectly identical with the God revealed in the Old 
 Testament, the creator of the earthly and spiritual 
 life. Lord of the universe having all creatures in His 
 hand. He is light and the fountain of light, wisdom, 
 intellect. All good things proceed from Him, recti- 
 tude, immortality, health, truth, piety, and wealth. 
 All these He grants to righteous persons, who are 
 pure in thought, word, and deed. Ruler of the 
 universe. He at the same time rewards the good, and 
 punishes the wicked. "All that is created, good or 
 evil, fortune or misfortune, is his work." That a 
 separate evil spirit, of equal power with Ahuramazda, 
 is entirely strange to the earlier Persian theology, 
 though the existence of such an opinion among the 
 ancient Zoroastrians can be gathered from some later 
 books, such as the Vendidad." ^ 
 
 ' Essays oil the Sacred Language, PFritiiigs, and Religion of the Parsees, 
 by Martin Haug", Dr. Phil., Bombay, 1862, p. 146-159. 
 ^ So speaks Isa. xlv. 5-7. 
 3 Essays, etc., Haug, p. 257. 
 
119 
 
 ZERUBBABEL. 
 
 Haggai II. 20-23. 
 
 HEN Cyrus the Great permitted the Jews to 
 return to Jerusalem, he appointed Zerubbabel, 
 otherwise Sheshbazzar, if we call him by his Chaldee 
 name, to be their governor. Jerusalem and Judea 
 being a part of the Persian empire, Zerubbabel was 
 fitly chosen to that office, being a Jew and a descend- 
 ant of David. We find his name in the genealogy 
 of our Lord as given by St. Matthew and St. Luke.' 
 Zerubbabel, however, could not act independently of 
 the king of Persia, whose servant he was, neither 
 could he escape the interferences to which all public 
 officers are liable, nor avoid the delays and failures of 
 those among the people whose duty it chiefly was to 
 carry into effect the good intention of the king, and 
 his own sincere desire. 
 
 Since the arrival of Zerubbabel and his company 
 (B.C. 536) sixteen years had passed away, and the 
 work was not yet done. The foundation of the 
 temple was laid with great solemnity and gladness in 
 the second month of the second year of their return, 
 which was no doubt as early as practicable, but the 
 building was interrupted by the vexatious interference 
 of the people of the land, and was afterwards delayed 
 
 ' : "j^'ripXTp^n bnnn^, SoAafliijA Se eveViijo-e Tov ZopoBdpe\. Hag. i. I ; Matt. 
 i. 12; Lu. iii. 27. 
 
I20 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 by the indolence of the Jews themselves, and the 
 selfishness of some who spent their time and energies 
 on building costly dwellings for their own comfort. 
 But in the second year of Darius, the son of Hystaspes, 
 it pleased God to bestow the spirit of prophecy on 
 Haggai and Zechariah, and send them " to prophesy 
 to the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem, in the 
 name of the God of Israel." The zeal of the whole 
 community was quickened ; and at the same time, 
 after correspondence on the subject with the king at 
 Susa, and search among the records at Ecbatana, 
 Darius graciously renewed the authority given by 
 Cyrus for executing the sacred works, and furnishing 
 the needful grant from the tribute of the country. 
 " In the second year of Darius the king (B.C. 520), in 
 the sixth month, in the first day of the month, came 
 the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet unto 
 Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, 
 and to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, 
 saying : Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying. 
 This people say, The time is not come that the Lord's 
 house should be built." (Haggai i. i, 2.) For this 
 the prophet reproved them severely, but they were 
 made conscious of their unfaithfulness, and "obeyed 
 the voice of the Lord their God, and the words of 
 Haggai the prophet, as the Lord God had sent him, 
 and the people did fear before the Lord." (Haggai 
 v. 12.) 
 
 "And again the word of the Lord came unto 
 Haggai in the four and twentieth day of the month, 
 saying, Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, 
 saying, I will shake the heavens and the earth ; and I 
 will overthrow the throne of kingdoms, and I will 
 
ZERUBBABEL. 121 
 
 destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the heathen ; 
 and I will overthrow the chariots, and those that ride 
 in them ; and the horses and their riders shall come 
 down, every one by the sword of his brother. In that 
 day, saith the Lord of hosts, will I take thee, O Zerub- 
 babel my servant, the son of Shealtiel, saith the Lord, 
 and will make thee as a signet : for I have chosen 
 thee, saith the Lord of hosts." (Haggai ii. 20-23.) 
 
 Haggai predicts a great political convulsion that 
 would be felt through the world ; an overthrowing of 
 the throne of kingdoms, the downfall of a king of 
 kings ; the fall of an empire, with great destruction of 
 life in battles. At the same time he promises the 
 governor of Judah tranquil enjoyment of his own 
 position, as he shall live exempt from the general 
 disorder of society. While that great war is raging a 
 child will be born who shall spend some of the best 
 years of his life in collecting authentic records of its 
 history, and shall gather from the warriors, while yet 
 fresh in their memory, lively recollections of some of 
 the most stirring scenes that the pen of historian has 
 ever pictured. Herodotus is that witness. His work 
 serves us as a confirmatory monument, and enables 
 us to comprehend a prophetic passage which, without 
 such a key, would be hopelessly obscure. 
 
 From small beginnings a quarrel had arisen be- 
 tween Persia and Greece which led to petty warfare, 
 over an ever widening area, for more than a hundred 
 years. During forty years after the prophecy of 
 Haggai this quarrel was approaching to its crisis, and 
 uncounted thousands were perishing in battles. At 
 length, in the year B.C. 480, while Zerubbabel is be- 
 lieved to be still peacefully ruling at Jerusalem, 
 
122 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Xerxes, king of Persia, set out on his march for 
 Greece, accompanied by a mighty multitude. Of all 
 the armaments that Herodotus ever heard of, this 
 was incomparably the greatest.' " For was there a 
 nation in all Asia," so far as Asia was known, " which 
 Xerxes did not bring with him against Greece ? Or 
 was there a river, except those of unusual size, which 
 sufficed for his troops to drink ? One nation furnished 
 ships ; another was arrayed among the foot-soldiers ; 
 a third had to supply horses ; a fourth, transports for 
 the horse, and men also for the transport service ; a 
 fifth, ships of war towards the construction of bridges ; 
 a sixth, ships and provisions." To avoid a .second 
 wreck under Mount Athos, he caused a canal, twelve 
 furlongs in length, broad and deep, to be dug across 
 the neck of land which connects the mountain with 
 the continent, to provide passage for full-oared 
 triremes, two abreast, Avhere all his fleet might pass. 
 This work was done by detachments from the troops 
 of various nations, who worked under the lash of 
 task-masters. The same persons were employed in 
 building bridges over the river Strymon, which sepa- 
 rates Thrace from Macedonia. Along the line of 
 march he established depots of provisions, to diminish 
 the labour of transport. (20-25). 
 
 On reaching the capital of Lydia, he sent heralds 
 into Greece to demand earth and water in token of sur- 
 render of the territory, and to require preparations to 
 be made everywhere for feasting the king on his arrival. 
 He made no such demand of Athens nor of Sparta, 
 because Darius had already done so, but the Athenians 
 threw his heralds into the barathrtmt, or " pit of 
 
 ' Herod., Hist.y Lib. vii. 20. 
 
ZERUBBABEL. 1 23 
 
 punishment," to take earth for themselves, and the 
 Spartans threw them into a well for water. Xerxes 
 would go and take payment for the insult in those 
 cities. (32.) 
 
 At Abydos, where the Hellespont (Dardanelles) is 
 narrowest, measuring about a mile across, men to 
 whom the work was assigned constructed a double 
 bridge of ships : the Phoenicians one line, with cables 
 of white flax ; the Egyptians the other, with ropes of 
 papyrus. But it happened that a storm broke the 
 work into pieces, which so enraged Xerxes, that he 
 ordered three hundred lashes to be given to the 
 Hellespont, and a pair of fetters to be cast into it. 
 They who scourged the water were to say, as they 
 did it, " Thou bitter water, thy lord lays on thee this 
 punishment for that thou hast wronged him without 
 cause, having suffered no evil at his hands. Verily 
 king Xerxes will cross thee, whether thou wilt or no. 
 Well dost thou deserve that no man should honour 
 thee with sacrifice, for thou art indeed a treacherous 
 and unsavoury river." While this ceremony was going 
 on, he had the overseers of the lost work beheaded. 
 Other persons were employed to do the work better. 
 On the side towards the Euxine Sea, 360 triremes 
 and penteconters were moored and joined together to 
 carry the bridge, and 314, whereon to lay it, on the 
 other side. Three gaps were left to allow light craft 
 passage for entering or leaving the Euxine. The 
 cables were made taut from the opposite shores by 
 help of capstans. To each bridge were assigned six 
 cables, two of flax, and four of papyrus. Trunks of 
 trees were then sawn into planks cut to the width of 
 the bridge. These were laid, side by side, upon the 
 
124 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 tightened cables, and then fastened on the top. This 
 done, brushwood was brought, and arranged on the 
 planks, after which earth was heaped upon the brush- 
 wood, and the whole trodden down into a solid mass. 
 Lastly, a bulwark was set up on each side of the 
 causeway, of such a height as to prevent the horses 
 and the sumpter-beasts from seeing over it, and taking 
 fright at the water. (33-36.) 
 
 All these works being finished, on the first approach 
 of spring (B.C. 480), Xerxes led the whole host, fully 
 equipped, on march from Sardis towards Abydos. 
 They say that there was an eclipse of the sun as the 
 army began to march, but that is doubted. Some ill 
 omen caused alarm, and Pythius, an aged Lydian of 
 immense wealth, who had presented to Xerxes a gift 
 of money of fabulous amount, and joined the expedi- 
 tion at an earlier date, ventured to approach the king, 
 and ask a favour of slight amount, but immense im- 
 portance to himself. Xerxes engaged to grant him 
 whatever he wished, and bade him tell his wish freely. 
 He asked that the eldest of his five sons, all five being 
 called to join in the expedition, might remain at home 
 with him, to be his prop and stay, and the guardian 
 of his wealth. With inconceivable brutality the tyrant 
 gave him thanks for his money, but for his offence in 
 wishing to withhold one of his children gave him the 
 punishment of forfeiting the one he clung to most, 
 and commanded that eldest son to be sought and 
 brought, and cut asunder. It was done at the instant 
 in his father's presence. The two halves of the body 
 were laid on the great road, one on the right side and 
 the other on the left, and the army marched between 
 them, with Pythius and his other sons in the midst ; 
 
ZERUBBABEL. 1 25 
 
 the blood of the murdered man, the agony and tears 
 of the father and the brothers, and no doubt the im- 
 precations of thousands, crying to God for vengeance. 
 Xerxes, without shame or fear, went betwixt the two 
 grand divisions of the vast armament, separated from 
 each by an empty space before him and behind. He 
 rode in a chariot drawn by sacred Nissaean horses, 
 with a Persian charioteer standing by his side. A 
 thousand Persian horsemen, picked men, went before 
 him : a thousand chosen spearmen, also Persian ; ten 
 Nissaean horses, daintily caparisoned, and the sacred 
 chariot of Ormazd, drawn by eight milk-white steeds, 
 with a charioteer on foot behind them, holding the 
 reins, for no mortal was ever permitted to mount the 
 chariot. Next to this was the chariot of Xerxes. 
 Another splendid cavalcade came after (38-41). 
 When on the site of Troy, he offered a thousand 
 oxen to the Trojan Minerva, and the Magi poured 
 libations to the heroes who were slain there. The 
 night after this a panic fell on the camp. (43.) 
 
 Arrived at Abydos, where all things were made 
 ready for the strength of Asia to pass over into 
 Europe, Xerxes wished to take a view of all his 
 armament. By his command a marble throne was 
 set on the summit of a hill near the city, and there- 
 upon he sat, gazed upon the shore below, and saw at 
 one view all the land forces and the ships. "And 
 now, as he looked and saw the whole Hellespont 
 covered with the vessels of his fleet, and all the shore, 
 and every plain about Abydos, as full as possible of 
 men, Xerxes congratulated himself on his good 
 fortune. But after a little while he wept." Hero- 
 dotus relates a conversation which then passed 
 
126 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 between his uncle Artabanus and himself, which may 
 not have actually taken place : but there does appear 
 to be a substance of truth in it, and we may safely 
 conclude that Xerxes, Artabanus, and the Persians 
 were all in some degree impressed with the awful 
 magnitude and risk of the work before them, and 
 were in that hour possessed with sad forebodings 
 of reverse. (44-53.) 
 
 At break of day, on the morrow, all sorts of spices 
 were burnt on the bridges, and the way was strewed 
 with myrtle-boughs, all the multitude waiting the 
 while to get sight of the sun as he rose. When it 
 appeared, Xerxes poured a libation from a golden 
 goblet into the sea, praying to the sun that no mis- 
 fortune might befal him so as to hinder his conquest 
 of Europe until he had reached its utmost boundaries. 
 Then he cast a gold cup, a gold bowl, and a Persian 
 sword into the Hellespont, and the army began to 
 cross, and continued crossing seven days and seven 
 nights without a pause. The king crossed last. The 
 exact number of troops could not be told with cer- 
 tainty, but an attempt was then made to number 
 them, and it is said that the whole land-army 
 amounted to 1,700,000 men. (54, 55, 60.) 
 
 If careful classification and rigid discipline at the 
 outset, and free application of the lash to quicken 
 speed, enforce authority, and compel to fight could 
 have ensured victory, all Europe would have been 
 conquered ; but there were many incurable elements 
 of weakness. The Persian soldiers were decorated 
 with lavish magnificence ; each man glittered with 
 gold. They were followed by litters wherein rode 
 their concubines and servants ; handsomely dressed 
 
Sarcophagus of Queen Savon. 
 
ZERUBBABEL. 1 27 
 
 camels and sumpter-beasts carried their provisions. 
 The navy consisted of 1,207 triremes, manned by 
 Phoenicians, Syrians, Egyptians, and people from all 
 the coasts and islands subject to Persia, and each ship 
 had on board a band of soldiers, like Royal Marines 
 in a British fleet. As if to make variety complete, 
 a lady, Artemisia, queen of the Halicarnassians, 
 contributed five triremes to the imperial naval force, 
 commanded them in person with greater skill and 
 valour too than many a man, and gave Xerxes wiser 
 and more faithful counsel than he could get from any 
 other of his allies. (83-99.) Xerxes hastily reviewed 
 all these soldiers of all arms, and all the fleet, asking 
 questions of every nation and tribe, and getting such 
 answers as they could presume to give. But when he 
 had asked Demaratus, a plain-spoken Greek, what 
 reception he might expect from the Greeks, he re- 
 ceived information which should have cooled his con- 
 fidence, with cautions which he ought to have made 
 use of ; but he laughed at all he heard from Demara- 
 tus, and proceeded with his army to march through 
 Thrace upon Greece. 
 
 It is not my purpose to trace his progress, but only 
 to note the principal incidents in the narrative of 
 Herodotus. On approaching the river Strymon, 
 where bridges had been built for his passage, the 
 troops had first to cross a tributary stream ; and there 
 the Magi sacrificed white horses, and performed many 
 magical ceremonies to make the river favourable. 
 Crossing the Strymon at a place called the Nine 
 Ways, they took nine youths of the country, and as 
 many maidens, and buried them alive. (113, 114.) 
 Further on the way mischances began. At one 
 
128 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 resting-place in the wild country, lions left their lairs 
 at night, fell upon the camels, and ate many of 
 them. (125.) 
 
 Fighting began at Thermopylae, where Xerxes was 
 taken by surprise with the heroic valour of Leonidas 
 and his little band, and learned to respect the enemy 
 he had pretended to despise. (212.) The first warlike 
 operation of the fleet was of such a sort that any who 
 believed in a retributive Providence might have taken 
 to betoken the worst that could follow. " The 
 barbarian," fitly so called, "took a ship, drew the 
 handsomest of the men-at-arms to the prow of the 
 vessel, and there sacrificed him ; " for they thought the 
 man a good omen to their cause, seeing that he was 
 at once so beautiful, and likewise the first captive 
 they had made. (180.) At Sepias, in Magnesia, 
 Xerxes numbered his men again, and found, as 
 Herodotus sets it down, a grand total of 2,641,610 
 land and sea forces united. The number of attend- 
 ants that followed the camp, with the crews of 
 corn-barks and craft, was laid to be rather above 
 than below that of the fighting men. If counted as 
 equal only, that would give 5,283,220. But these 
 numbers are thought to be exaggerated, and other 
 calculations vary so much that nothing can be con- 
 cluded from them. They may, by an inscription at 
 Thermopylae, be reduced to 3,300,000 or a little more. 
 (184-187.) 
 
 The fleet, which had lain at Therma, sailed thence 
 to the Magnesian territory, and there occupied a strip 
 of coast between the city of Casthanaea and Cape 
 Sepias. The ships of the first row were moored to 
 the land, while the remainder swung at anchor further 
 
ZERUBBABEL. 1 29 
 
 off, row upon row, eight deep. One night, after the 
 crews were all asleep, a strong wind arose, blowing in 
 shore, with heavy sea. Some part of the ships 
 managed to escape the peril, but about 400 were 
 dashed to pieces, a multitude of men were drowned, 
 and much treasure was engulfed. Provision-craft, 
 and much other shipping perished, with all that was 
 on board. Of those that kept afloat fifteen were 
 taken by the Greeks. (188-193.) This disaster hap- 
 pened at the same time as the inglorious defeat at 
 Thermopylae, too well known to need repetition here. 
 (201-228.) The same tempest wrecked a squadron 
 of the fleet near Artemisium, and a small number of 
 Greek ships captured thirty more. (viii. 10-13.) 
 
 But Xerxes does his best on shore. The Thessa- 
 lians, his allies, help him to ravage the country ; 
 destroying towns, and burning down temples, he 
 advances towards Attica. At Delphi they were pro- 
 ceeding to plunder the temple, but a thunder-storm 
 terrified them ; they fled in dismay from the anger of 
 the gods, and were pursued by the Delphians and 
 smitten with considerable slaughter. (32-38.) He then 
 marched through Boeotia, burnt Thespiae and Plataea, 
 entered Attica, laid waste everything before his 
 army with fire and sword, made himself master of 
 Athens, which he found almost deserted by the in- 
 habitants ; and so general a desertion set in from 
 nearly all parts of Greece, that the land seemed to be 
 effectually conquered and made part of the Persian 
 dominions. Exulting in the conquest ere it was 
 complete, he sent a courier to Susa to give the joyful 
 tidings to Artabanus. Attica, in truth, was nearly 
 without inhabitant, Athens for the most part in ruins, 
 
 • H 10 
 
130 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 and the temple of Minerva, in the Acropoh's, burnt 
 down. (50-53.) After all his losses his camp is quite 
 as strong as it was before the fall of thousands at 
 Thermopylae. The Grecian fleet, however, remained, 
 and if that could be as effectually silenced as Attica 
 and Athens, the work would all be done. The king 
 therefore went to Phalerum, where the remnant of the 
 Persian fleet lay at anchor, to prepare for a decisive 
 effort. Seated in a chair of honour, and surrounded 
 by the sovereigns of the nations, and the captains of 
 the ships, he sent Mardonius round the assemblage to 
 question each whether a sea-fight should be risked or 
 not. Beginning with the king of Sidon, then going 
 to the king of Tyre, and afterwards to each in order, 
 he received the same affirmative reply from all but 
 one, advising to engage the Greeks. That one was 
 brave queen Artemisia. She would have dissuaded 
 him. She thought that, on shore, he was already 
 conqueror ; that the Grecian states being divided, he 
 had nothing more to do than receive the submission 
 of them all, and then recross the Hellespont, and 
 return to Persia with all Greece added to his empire. 
 On sea his fleet had suffered much : the Greek sailors 
 were as superior to his as men to women, and the 
 issue of an engagement with them would be very 
 doubtful. But, for his part, Xerxes thought the 
 naval defeats were owing only to his absence. He 
 would be present now, and with his presence victory 
 would be sure. This time he would be eye-witness of 
 the combat. 
 
 The king embarks, the ships put -out to sea, and 
 take their stations off the island of Salamis. The 
 Grecian captains make no delay, but sail down upon 
 
ZERUBBABEL. I3I 
 
 them, and join fight. Xerxes, seated on a hill, saw 
 the engagement, desperate on both sides. But while 
 the Greeks fought steadily, his captains were in dis- 
 order, gave way, and their ships were nearly all 
 destroyed or taken. A deadly fear came upon him. 
 He thought of the bridges on the Hellespont, where 
 lay his only way of retreat, and he apprehended that 
 the enemy would at once destroy it. Yet he had no 
 hope of safety but in flight. For the moment he 
 betook himself to Athens, and sent a swift messenger 
 to Susa with the intelligence of his misfortune. When 
 the messenger reached the city he found it full of 
 rejoicing over the victory announced by the one who 
 came before him, but his tidings plunged them into 
 grief and shame. (67-97.) 
 
 At Athens he takes counsel with Mardonius, whom 
 he leaves in occupation of as much as he may be able 
 to hold, with a force of 300,000 men, and instructions 
 to chastise the Spartans and take Sparta. Then he 
 takes the bulk of his army, and sets out to march 
 homeward by the way that he came, hoping to 
 re-cross the Hellespont at Abydos. But this time 
 there was no preparation for the sustenance of so 
 vast a multitude. " Along the line of march, in every 
 country where they chanced to be, his soldiers seized 
 and devoured whatever corn they could find belong- 
 ing to the inhabitants ; or, if no corn was to be found, 
 they gathered the grass, and stripped the trees of 
 leaves and bark, and so fed themselves. Dysentery 
 and plague attacked the troops while they were on 
 the march, and greatly thinned the ranks. Many 
 died, and their corpses lay unburied in the rear. The 
 sick were left to the pity of the inhabitants in the 
 
 10* 
 
132 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 cities that lay upon the route, in Thessaly, in Paeonia, 
 in Macedonia. Here Xerxes had left the sacred 
 chariot and horses of his god, but they were not to be 
 found again. After forty-five days' march the few 
 ■surviving Asiatics reached the passage, entered their 
 ships hastily, and were carried across the water to 
 Abydos. As for the bridges, they had been broken 
 in a storm, and had disappeared. In Abydos the 
 forlorn and half-dead wreck of that wretched expedi- 
 tion rested for a little. Many of them ate ravenously, 
 and died in consequence. A very few living men, 
 with Xerxes, made their way to Sardis. (i 13-1 17.) 
 
 Mardonius, in Athens, touched with the panic which 
 had paralysed his master, hearing that the Spartans 
 were on the march to give him battle, burnt and 
 demolished all that Xerxes had left standing, and 
 withdrew to Thebes ; while there he discovered that his 
 troops were haunted with forebodings, and that their 
 terror was not groundless. At Plataea the Greeks 
 came to them and offered battle. Mardonius had 
 260,000 on the plain, and could not escape. In spite 
 of themselves the men were daunted ; only 3,000 
 marched off the field, death swallowed up all the rest. 
 The remnant that were not encamped at Plataea were 
 overtaken and slaughtered at Mycale. Mardonius, 
 who had thirsted for the viceroyalty of Greece, per- 
 ished at Plat?ea. A very few men indeed made good 
 their flight, and appeared at Sardis to tell the king 
 the last Hnes of the ignominious tale. (ix. 6^, lOi, 107.) 
 With his extinction of a mad ambition closed the 
 year 479 before Christ ; and fifteen years later, after 
 a cruel and licentious life, Xerxes was murdered in 
 his bed. 
 
ZERUBBABEL. 1 33 
 
 With reference to the Scripture which the chapters 
 of Herodotus confirm, we have now to note that the 
 king of Persia was the only sovereign to be recognised 
 in the text of Haggai. He only could be there 
 described as "king of kings," and his throne as the 
 "throne of kingdoms." It is true that that throne was 
 not overthrown immediately on the flight of Xerxes 
 from Athens, nor did the empire cease with his death; 
 but his fatal expedition exhausted the resources of 
 the empire, greatly reduced its population, and 
 induced a decay which could never be arrested. It 
 also provoked the enmity of all the Greek-speaking 
 peoples, which no Persian craft or bribery could 
 divert, and nothing but one great deed of retaliation 
 could satisfy; such as the subsequent invasion of Asia 
 by Alexander and the Macedonians, which annihilated 
 for ever the Persian empire. (B.C. 330.) 
 
 Simultaneous with this succession of calamities was 
 a succession of prosperous events in Judah and Jeru- 
 salem. The promise to Zerubbabel extended only to 
 himself and to his work. How long he lived we can- 
 not tell. We only know that. his appointment to be 
 governor of Jerusalem took effect in the year 536 
 before Christ (Ezr. i. 11); and that Ezra, his suc- 
 cessor, entered on his office in 457, 79 years later, too 
 long a period unless he had lived a hundred years or 
 more ; yet it is not likely that Jerusalem was many 
 years without a governor ; and however we may 
 calculate, we are brought to the conclusion that his 
 government was prolonged, and he outlived the igno- 
 minious return of Xerxes. According to the Divine 
 promise, "The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the 
 foundation of this house ; his hands shall also finish 
 
134 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 it" (Zee. iv. 9; B.C. 519): he did so finish it. (B.C. 515.) 
 Fifty-eight years later Ezra received his appointment 
 from Artaxerxes to precisely the same office, but 
 with much larger powers. (Ezr. vii. 24-26; B.C. 457.) 
 Now far within the beginning and the end of this 
 term, that is to say, from 500 to 465, all the events 
 above related took place. But amidst the sweeping 
 conscription described fully by Herodotus (vii. 61-95), 
 there is no mention nor trace of Jews, although 
 Phoenicians and Syrians of Palestine are there. None 
 of the burden falls upon Jerusalem, neither did any 
 part of the immense armament pass that way, for it 
 lay distant from the line of march. Only the Sama- 
 ritans disturbed the restorers of the temple; only 
 some Persian local authorities in any way interfered 
 with them ; but all annoyance was set aside by mis- 
 sives from the seat of government in Persia. The stir 
 of preparation, the pressure of immense levies, the 
 alarms of war were felt in the remotest corners of the 
 empire, but nothing disturbed the tranquillity of Jeru- 
 salem. The heavens and the earth were shaken ; the 
 throne of kingdoms was moved from its place, soon 
 to be overthrown ; the strength of the kingdoms of 
 the heathen in Asia and eastern Europe was de- 
 stroyed ; the chariots and charioteers, the horses and 
 horsemen were overturned and cast down by the 
 swords of the heathen ; but i7i that day did the Lord 
 take Zerubbabel his servant, and make him a signet, 
 that by the accomplishment of his appointed work the 
 prophet might know that he himself was sent of God. 
 (Zee. iv. 9.) 
 
135 
 
 KINGS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH, 
 
 CANOPUS INSCRIPTION A.ND ROSETTA STONE. 
 Daniel XI. 3-14. 
 
 HE third and fourth verses of the eleventh 
 chapter of the book of Daniel obviously 
 refer to Alexander the Great, whose patrimonial 
 kingdom of Macedonia, and possessions by conquest 
 in Asia and Africa, were divided into four kingdoms 
 after his premature decease. 
 
 " A mighty king shall stand up, that shall rule with 
 great dominion, and do according to his will. And 
 when he shall stand up his kingdom shall be broken, 
 and shall be divided toward the four winds of heaven ; 
 and not to his posterity, nor according to his do- 
 minion which he ruled ; for his kingdom shall be 
 plucked up, even for others beside those." (Dan. xi. 
 
 3,4.) 
 
 In the north, Lesser Asia and Pontus fell to Anti- 
 gonus. In the south, Egypt, the name being taken 
 in its widest acceptation, was allotted to Ptolemy, son 
 of Lagus, whose descendants were the Lagidai. In 
 the east, Syria and Babylonia had for sovereign 
 Seleucus, whose descendants were the Seleucidae. In 
 the west, Aridaeus, a base-born brother of Alexander, 
 of mean capacity, took Macedonia, and therewith a 
 
136 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 new name, Philip, once belonging to his father, and 
 now enabling his successors to be called Philippians. 
 
 These divisions were situate toward the four winds 
 as they lay relatively, but the kingdoms of the 
 Seleucidse and the Lagidse, also taken relatively, lay 
 north and south. The kings of Syria and of Egypt, 
 therefore, are now intended by the prophet when he 
 speaks of the kings of north and south. As in these 
 two kingdoms the events occurred which are thence- 
 forth predicted by the prophet, their position only is 
 taken into account during the remainder of what is 
 called " The Scripture of Truth." In the former part 
 of the section before us, that is to say, on to the 
 seventeenth verse, and again at the twenty-fifth and 
 some following verses, the south is much spoken of, 
 and our attention is also invited to monuments of the 
 Ptolemies in Egypt. 
 
 After this Antiochus Epiphanes occupies the scene, 
 and Porphyry discerning the exact application of this 
 part of the prophecy to the events of his life, pro- 
 nounced the book of Daniel to have been written 
 after the death of Epiphanes. This is observed by 
 St. Jerome,' and is remarkable as an involuntary 
 testimony to the truth of this prophecy by an avowed 
 enemy of divine revelation. But Daniel was men- 
 tioned as a contemporary by Ezekiel, who wrote 
 during the Babylonish captivity, and the books of 
 Ezekiel and Daniel were translated into Greek in 
 Egypt in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, who 
 died 246 years before Christ, whereas Antiochus 
 
 ^ "Tanta dictorum fides fuit, ut propheta increduHs hominibus non 
 videatur futura dixisse, sed narrasse praeterita." Prooem. in Danielem. 
 
KINGS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 1 37 
 
 Epiphanes did not begin to reign until seventy-one 
 years after the death of Philadelphus. 
 
 The history foreshadowed by the spirit of prophecy 
 is fully written by Greek and Latin contemporaneous 
 authors, but we may reasonably expect original 
 monumental records of the Ptolemsean period. Two 
 such, at least, are already in our possession, one in an 
 authentically written copy from a monument which 
 probably still exists, and the other very recently 
 discovered, of which there is an admirably perfect 
 cast in the Egyptian Gallery of the British Museum. 
 
 The first passage which I find thus confirmed is 
 the following : 
 
 " But out of a branch of her roots shall one stand 
 up in his estate, which shall come with an army, and 
 shall enter into the fortress of the north, and shall 
 deal against them, and shall prevail, and shall also 
 carry captives into Egypt their gods, with their 
 princes, and with their precious vessels of silver and 
 of gold." (Dan. xi. 7, 8.) 
 
 St. Jerome explains as follows : 
 
 " Berenice being killed, Ptolemy Philadelphus having 
 died in Egypt, and Ptolemy III. himself, her brother, 
 surnamed Euergetes, having succeeded to the king- 
 dom, ' out of a branch of her roots,' because he was 
 her brother, came with a great army, and entered in 
 the province ' of the king of the north, that is to say, 
 Seleucus Callinicus, who reigned with his mother 
 Laodice in Syria, and dealt so ill with them, and so 
 made his way as to get possession of Syria and 
 Cilicia, and the upper country beyond the Euphrates, 
 
 ' So Jerome translates n2?Q. 
 
138 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 and almost all Asia. And when he heard that 
 sedition was breaking out in Egypt, he spoiled the 
 kingdom of Seleucus, took forty thousand talents of 
 silver, and precious vessels, and two thousand five 
 hundred images of gods, and among them those 
 which Cambyses had carried away to Persia after 
 taking Egypt. Then the Egyptians, being wholly 
 given to idolatry, called him Benefactor {Euei-- 
 getes), because he had brought back to them their 
 gods." 
 
 One of the monuments was known to Cosmas 
 (Indicopleustas), a monk in the sixth century, who 
 lived in the city of Adule, or Adulis, now called 
 Azoole. The ruins of that ancient city remain, and 
 the site is the same as that marked by Cosmas, two 
 miles from the Red Sea, at the head of Annesley 
 Bay, on the south side of a place called Zulla, and 
 about three days' journey from Axum, to which city, 
 metropolis of the Axumites, it served as port. He 
 very distinctly describes the monument. It consisted 
 of pure white marble, the blocks, or slabs being so 
 put together as to resemble a massive chair, or throne. 
 One who sat in it would look towards Axum along the 
 road leading thither, as the equestrian statue of the 
 late Prince Consort, in Holborn Circus, looks over 
 the Viaduct into the City of London. On one tall 
 slab, the back of the chair, was cut in Greek a very 
 long inscription. Elesbaan, king of the Axumites, 
 required the governor of Adule to preserve a copy 
 of the inscription at a time when war was imminent, 
 and there was danger to the marble throne. Cosmas 
 copied the inscription, taking care to keep a copy 
 for himself, which, twenty-five years later he inserted 
 
KINGS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 1 39 
 
 into his " Topography," where we now find it/ Mr. 
 Consul Salt, who visited Abyssinia in the years 1809 
 and 1 8 10, heard that the stone with its inscription 
 was still preserved, but so jealously guarded by the 
 people of ZuUa that one of his party who endea- 
 voured to make his way to Azoole was forcibly 
 prevented." 
 
 The following is my translation of the former part 
 of the inscription. 
 
 " The great king Ptolemy, son of king Ptolemy and 
 queen Arsinoe, divine children of king Ptolemy and 
 queen Berenice, descendant of the saviour gods, 
 (Soteres), etc. Having received from his father the 
 kingdoms of Egypt and Libya, and Syria, and 
 Phoenicia, and Cyprus, and Lycia, and Caria, and the 
 islands of the Cyclades, he invaded Asia with forces 
 of horse and foot, and naval expedition, and elephants 
 of the Troglodytes and Ethiopians, which his father 
 had himself taken out of those countries, brought 
 into Egypt, and trained for military service. And 
 having made himself master of all the country on 
 this side the Euphrates, and all Cilicia and Pamphylia, 
 and Ionia, with the Hellespont, and Thrace, and all 
 the forces in those countries, and the Indian elephants, 
 and having appointed all the subject monarchs in 
 those countries, he passed over the river Euphrates, 
 and Mesopotamia, and Babylonia, and Susiana, and 
 Persia, and Media, and all the rest as far as Bactriana, 
 subduing all before him. And having required back 
 again whatever sacred things had been carried away 
 
 * CoUectio Nova Patrum et Scriptorum Grcecorum ex MSS. Greeds 
 eruil, etc., D. Bernardus Montfaucon, Tom. II., p. 143, seq. 
 ^ Salt's Voyage to Abyssinia, London, 1S14, p. 453. 
 
140 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 by the Persians from Egypt, and recovered, with the 
 other treasure which was in those places for Egypt 
 again, he sent back his forces by the canals which 
 had been dug." ' 
 
 The second monument is the Canopus Decree on a 
 stele found in 1866 by the Doctors Lepsius and 
 Reinisch, in the ruins of San, the Zoan of the Old 
 Testament, and the Tanis of the Greeks. As mea- 
 sured by Dr. Lepsius, it is about seven feet high and 
 two feet and a half wide. There are 37 lines of 
 hieroglyphic and ']6 lines Greek, the demotic being 
 cut in a separate and smaller slab. Lepsius im- 
 mediately published magnificent facsimiles of diglot, 
 exhibiting the characters in equal size with the 
 original. Reinisch and his colleague Roesler, with 
 equal diligence, but without facsimile, copied and 
 translated the decree. Both translations are German.' 
 I make use of the Greek. The recovery of the 
 idols and other treasure is here stated rather more 
 fully than in the Adule inscription. The date of this 
 decree corresponds with March 7, B.C. 283. 
 
 The high priests, prophets, and they who enter into 
 the adyt to robe the gods, with the swift messengers, 
 sacred scribes, and other priests and companions of 
 the priests were assembled in session, in the temple 
 of the gods Benefactors in Canopus, a city about 
 
 * It will be sufficient to copy the concluding- lines of this extract. 
 
 Kal a.va.C,-tyri)<Taf; oaa vtto rSiV Ilepcrcui' iepa e^ At-yuTrrov k^r\x6r], kol a.vaKOfii(ya<;, fxera 
 T^S aXXrjs ya^-q^, t^s o.iro twj' joTCinv ci? Xlyvmov dvixxfjieis ane<neL\e, Slol rijjv 
 opvxOevTu:!/ irorafxCiV. 
 
 ^ Das bilingue Dekret von Kannpus in der original grosse, mit Uehrsel- 
 zung unci Erkl'dtung heider Texte. Herausgegeben von R. Lepsius, Berlin, 
 1S66. Die Zweisprachige Inschrift von Tanis zum erste.n Male herausgegeben 
 und Uebersetzty von S. Leo Reinisch und E. Robert Roesler. Wien, iS66. 
 
KINGS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 141 
 
 twelve miles N.E. of Alexandria on the shore of the 
 Mediterranean sea, said : 
 
 (7) " Forasmuch as king Ptolemy, son of 
 
 Ptolemy and Arsinoe, brother-and-sister gods {Oecov 
 aSeXcpcjv), (8) and queen Berenice, his sister and wife, 
 the gods Euergetse (benefactors) confer many and 
 great benefits on the temples of the land, and 
 (9) more and more augment the honours of the gods, 
 of Apis, of Mnevis, and of the other sacred animals 
 which are in the land, (lo) taking the care of them 
 altogether with great cost and state ; and the sacred 
 images that were carried out of the country by (i i) the 
 Persians, the king, having led out a martial expedi- 
 tion, saved again for Egypt, and restored to the 
 temples whence each was first carried away, and the 
 (12) country has been preserved in peace by his 
 fighting for it against many nations and their rulers, 
 and to all in the country (13) with other under their 
 royal dominion, has brought prosperity." 
 
 After recounting some of their good deeds, which 
 were certainly worthy of gratitude, the priests 
 proceed to offer them the incense of divine wor- 
 ship. 
 
 (20) " Good fortune ! Let there be rendered 
 
 by the priests of the land, all honours (21) hitherto 
 accustomed to king Ptolemy and queen Berenice, 
 £-ods and benefactors, and let them magnify their 
 parents, the brother-and-sister gods, and their grand- 
 parents (22) the saviour-gods. Also let the priests in 
 each of the temples of the country be pre-named 
 priests of the gods Benefactors, and so inscribed 
 (23) in all decrees ; and also let the rings they are to 
 wear be first engraved with priesthood of the gods 
 
142 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 EttergetcB, Moreover, let them take precedence (24) of 
 the four tribes which are now chief of the multitude 
 of priests in every temple, to be pre-named (25) Fifth 
 tribe of the gods Euergetce, inasmuch as he (Ptolemy 
 Euergetes) also happened to be born with the good 
 fortune, and in the lineage of king Ptolemy, son of 
 the Philadelphi gods, (26) on the fifth day of Dis, 
 which is with all men an occasion of much good : and 
 into this tribe shall be elected (27) those that were 
 made priests in the first year, and to the month 
 Mesore of the ninth year, and their children for 
 ever." 
 
 This fifth tribe of the Euergetse priests is to be 
 enriched with many other privileges. King Ptolemy 
 Euergetes, and his sister-queen Berenice, are to be 
 honoured with a yearly feast to be kept by all the 
 people, when for five days together all may make 
 merry with sacrifices and oblations. From this time 
 forth the calendar is to be rectified by the supplement 
 of five days, and a day additional of the fourth year : 
 and this ordinance is made by command of the gods 
 Euergetse, Ptolemy and Berenice. 
 
 (46) "And then the daughter of king 
 
 Ptolemy (47) and queen Berenice, the gods PZuergetae, 
 born and called Berenice, and also immediately 
 acknowledged queen ; it happened that this virgin 
 
 (48) immediately passed away to the everlasting 
 world, the priests of the country remaining with the 
 king, to present themselves to him year by year ; 
 
 (49) who had great grief on account of what had 
 happened, and determined to honour the king and 
 the queen by establishing the goddess with Osiris 
 in the (50) temple at Canopus, which is not only one 
 
KINGS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 1 43 
 
 of the first temples, but is also under the king, and 
 of all the temples in the land is among the most 
 greatly honoured." 
 
 A multitude of ceremonies are ordained in honour 
 of this infant goddess, who is to be invocated as 
 Queen of the Virgins, being deified, as by right of a 
 divine birth ; and a golden symbolic image, together 
 with jewels and shields of gold, is to be made to her 
 honour, under special magical directions, and placed 
 in all the temples of Egypt. 
 
 (73) "And he who is appointed president 
 
 and chief priest of each temple, with the scribes 
 (74) of the temple shall write this decree on a stele 
 of stone or brass in the sacred characters, the Egyp- 
 tian and the Greek, and shall place (75) it in the most 
 conspicuous part of each temple of the first, second, 
 and third class, that the priests of the country may 
 be sure to honour the gods Euergetae, and their 
 children, (j6) as is just." 
 
 So proud a title was this Eiiergetes, inscribed on 
 signets, written in decrees, and borne by gods ! In it 
 we may discern the significance of one of our 
 Saviour's sentences : " The kings of the Gentiles ex- 
 ercise lordship over them, and they that exercise 
 authority over them are called benefactors (the very 
 same word being used in the Gospel as on the Ptole- 
 msean monuments, evep^erai). But ye shall not be so." 
 (Lu. xxii. 25, 26.) 
 
 The single incident of a Ptolemy bringing back 
 the idols and the golden toys looted by Cambyses 
 and his Persians, cannot be all that was intimated in 
 the sacred text of Daniel. That incident was typical 
 of all that the priests put upon record in their 
 
144 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 assemblage in the temple of Canopus. The pro- 
 phecy briefly told how this king of all the Ptolemies, 
 would most signalise himself by restoration of the 
 decaying national idolatry ; how he assumed the 
 peculiar fictions and forms of the Egyptian supersti- 
 tion. There appears the same identification of king 
 and god ; the same pretended divine lineage ; the 
 same apotheosis of the dead. And here is the same 
 monstrous policy, the interchange of royal and sacer- 
 dotal favours ; the priest conferring godhead on the 
 king, and the king heaping wealth, power, and titles, 
 upon the priest ; the nation being cruelly impoverished 
 and debased between them : all this followed from 
 the fatal benefaction of Euergetes. To facilitate all 
 this the mythologies of Egypt and Greece were art- 
 fully intermingled, and a third system resulted from 
 the union, as when the trial is made to improve the 
 feeble cavalry of an army by crossing it with a foreign 
 breed. But the experiment was worthless. The 
 religions of the Pharaohs, the Athenians, and the 
 Ptolemies have been extinct for ages. In Egypt, 
 Christianity first, and then the fierce invasion of 
 Islamism, destroys the last vestige of them all. 
 
 Much more monumental evidence will probably 
 be found to complete the confirmation of this portion 
 of the book of the prophet Daniel. The Rosetta 
 stone, read in connection with other inscriptions or 
 writings of the Ptolemean period, may be found 
 useful. It contains a decree of priests assembled at 
 Memphis to welcome king Ptolemy Epiphanes with 
 his queen, and acknowledge his goodness to them- 
 selves and his munificence in maintaining the gran- 
 deur of their temples. They pronounce the king and 
 
KINGS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 1 45 
 
 queen to be gods, and they ordain the worship that 
 shall be paid to them. 
 
 The text of Daniel says : 
 
 "And in those times there shall many stand up 
 against the king of the South : also the robbers of 
 thy people shall exalt themselves to establish the 
 vision ; but they shall fall." (Dan. xi. 14.) 
 
 The standing up of many against the king of the 
 South is all that concerns us here : the latter part 
 relates to the Jews who at this time migrated into 
 Egypt, not as invaders, but as allies.^ This invasion 
 of Egypt is very fully referred to in this decree. It 
 says that Ptolemy Epiphanes ordained that : 
 
 (19) "those returned from wars, and others 
 
 who had been (20) engaged in foreign matters(.?), in 
 times of tumult to remain on their own estates. He 
 also made provision for forces of horse and foot, and 
 ships, to be sent out against invaders of (21) Egypt 
 by sea and land ; having borne great costs in money 
 and provisions that the temples and all the inhabit- 
 ants might be in safety, and having (22) arrived at 
 Lycopolis in the nome Busirites, which had been 
 seized and fortified to stand a siege, with an abundant 
 supply of arms, and with all else that was requisite, as 
 if for a long (23) time by a strong foreign force, the 
 wicked ones being gathered together against it ; they 
 had done much mischief to the temples and to the 
 inhabitants, and (24) having sat down before it with 
 banks, trenches, and walls, all worthy to be remem- 
 bered, surrounded it ; and the Nile, having made a 
 great rise in the eighth year, as is usual, overflowed 
 
 * Historical Exposition of the Book of Daniel^ by W. H. Rule, D.D. 
 1S63. Seeleys. 
 
 H 11 
 
146 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 the plains: (25) he restramed the flood, by stopping 
 the mouths of the rivers in many places, supplying 
 for this purpose no small amount of money, and 
 appointing horsemen and foot-soldiers for protection 
 of {26) these works : in a short time he took the city 
 by force, and destroyed all the wicked that were in it. 
 Like Hermes {Thoth), and Horus, son of Isis and 
 Osiris, they made an end of those that in those places 
 
 (27) had revolted first ; and them who had led away 
 the deserters from his own father, and had thrown 
 the country into confusion, and desecrated the tem- 
 ples, when he came to Memphis, avenging his father 
 
 (28) and his own kingdom, he punished them, as it 
 was fitting that he should, at the time when he had to 
 execute all that the laws required of him on his 
 accession to the kingdom." ' 
 
 So copiously does the Egyptian monument expound 
 the fulfilment of the Hebrew prophecy. However, 
 according to the next verse of the prophecy, the king 
 of the north comes again ; this time prevails ; the 
 general of Epiphanes is beaten, and, no doubt, the 
 Jewish allies fall victims, as was predicted. 
 
 ^ For the Greek text of the Rosetta Stone, see Fragmenta Historicorum 
 Grcecorum, Car. et. Theod. Mullen, Parisiis, i84i,Tom. I., with Description 
 Grecque de Rosette, par M. Latronne. An English translation is given in 
 Records of the Past, Vol. IV. 
 
147 
 
 DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLE 
 AND CITY OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 Daniel IX. 26, 27. 
 
 HERE is a prediction in the book of Daniel, 
 that from the going forth of the command- 
 ment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the 
 Messiah the Prince should be 69 weeks (of days, or 
 483 years), when the Messiah was cut off (or solemnly 
 separated^ as a victim devoted to sacrifice), but not 
 for himself, and one week (or 7 years,' making in all 
 70 weeks, or 490 years). I venture to count this 
 period from 4257 to 4746, inclusive, of the Julian 
 calculation, from the decree of Artaxerxes to rebuild 
 Jerusalem to the ascension of our Lord.^ 
 
 " And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah 
 be cut off {set apart) ^ but not for himself: and the 
 people of the prince that shall come {the army of 
 Tittis, in spite of all his efforts to prevent it) shall 
 destroy the city and the sanctuary, and the end thereof 
 shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war 
 desolations are determined. And he {Messiah the 
 Prince) shall confirm the covenant with many {the 
 
 ^ n73^. * From the Baptism to the Ascension. 
 
 3 I have treated the subject also at length in my Historical Exposition. 
 As already quoted. 
 
 11* 
 
148 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Gentiles) for one week {the seven years as above de- 
 fined) ; and in the midst of the week he shall cause 
 the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the 
 overspreading of abominations he shall make it deso- 
 late, even until the consummation, and that determined 
 shall be poured upon the desolate." (Dan. ix. 26, 27.) 
 
 The consummation, the thing determined, the out- 
 pouring of vengeance on the desolate was again fore- 
 told by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, with express 
 reference to these very words in the book of Daniel : 
 " When therefore ye shall see the abomination of de- 
 solation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in 
 the holy place, (whoso readeth let him understand,) 
 then let them which are in Judaea flee to the moun- 
 tains." (Mat. xxiv. 15, 16.) 
 
 Flavins Josephus, an eye-witness, relates the siege, 
 the destruction, and the triumph of the Roman con- 
 queror so fully, and so well, and an English translation 
 of his books on the Jewish war is so accessible, that I 
 shall not be expected to make a literal quotation." 
 Josephus describes how one Jesus, or Joshua, a priest, 
 purchased his life of Titus by bringing him, out of the 
 Temple, many precious things belonging to the sacred 
 worship of the Jews, and how Phinehas, the treasurer 
 of the Temple, brought forth much more for the same 
 reason.' 
 
 When describing the triumph given to Titus in 
 Rome, the same historian distinctly relates that of all 
 the objects taken in the Temple at Jerusalem, those 
 that made the greatest figure were the golden table, of 
 the weight of many talents, the golden candlestick, 
 
 • The Jeivish War, VI., 4-10; VII., i, 2. » Hid., VI., 8. 
 
DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM AND THE TEMPLE. 1 49 
 
 constructed as it is now usually represented, and " the 
 Law of the Jews.'" 
 
 There yet remains in Rome a famous monument of 
 this event, the triumphal arch erected in honour of 
 Titus Vespasian by the Roman Senate and people: — 
 
 SENATVS • POPVLVSQVE ' ROMANVS 
 
 DIVO • TITO • DIVI • VESPASIANI ' F. 
 
 VESPASIANO • AVGVSTO 
 
 "The Roman Senate and People to Divine Titus 
 Vespasian Augustus, Son of Divine Vespasian;" 
 " Divine " being the title usually given to an emperor 
 deceased. It is the most ancient arch of the kind 
 now standing in Rome, is said to be the finest as a 
 work of art, and has been minutely described by many 
 artists. I avail myself of the drawings and descrip- 
 tions of Giampietro Bellori, Roman antiquarian, who 
 published the fruit of his studies nearly two centuries 
 ago. Within the arch there are two grand panels. 
 In the first, Titus is represented in his chariot with 
 Victory holding a laurel-wreath over his head, while 
 the Republic leads his horses. The procession is 
 continued in the second panel. Here they carry aloft 
 the golden table for the shew-bread, with a cup for 
 drink-offerings, trumpets for the solemn feasts, and the 
 seven-branched golden lamp. A knight mounted on 
 horseback, the horse having its usual trappings, has 
 his robe fastened on his breast with golden clasps. 
 Citizens {Quirites) clad in snowy white, crowned with 
 laurel, and carrying laurel in their hands, walk before 
 the imperial chariot in long procession. 
 
 • The Jewish IVar, VII., 5. 
 
150 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 " Prsecedentia longe 
 Agminis officia, et niveos ad fraena quirites." 
 
 The pomp is continued in the frieze around the arch 
 above. There you might have discovered, until lately, 
 a river-god resting on his bier, carried by two men, to 
 represent the Jordan now brought, reluctant, within 
 the borders of the Roman Empire. Next follow 
 Roman priests leading their victims to be sacrificed, 
 the priests being distinguished by their attire. 
 
 This recalls the statement of an historian that, on 
 the occasion here commemorated, the Emperors Ves- 
 pasian and Titus earned a splendid triumph, when a 
 fair city, Jerusalem, hitherto unknown to all mortals, 
 entered into the empire ; and that the spectacle in- 
 sculped on the arch was the three hundred and 
 twentieth triumph counted from the founding of 
 Rome to that time. 
 
 Here is a bull crowned with garlands, ready to be 
 sacrificed to Jupiter, and covered with cloths painted 
 for triumph. Soldiers crowned with laurel too, wear- 
 ing short tunics, and carrying round shields. Soldiers, 
 again, carry banners, inscribed with names of con- 
 quered people, and of their chiefs. Kpopa, or servant 
 who assists at sacrifices, leads oxen, and has an axe to 
 kill them. He is naked down to the middle, and his 
 legs are bare from knee to toe. Another Z^?/^ carries 
 a pitcher in his hand, and a dish full of fragrant spices 
 to be burnt with the victims. Such dishes, they tell 
 us, may be seen on the coins of Domitian.' So mag- 
 nificently did the Romans welcome into their gates 
 
 * Veteres Arcus Augustorum Triumphis insignes, ex Reliquis quae 
 Romae adhuc supersunt cum Imaginibus triumphalibus restituti, antiquis 
 nummis notisque. lo. Petri Bellorii illustrati nunc primum per lo. 
 Jacobum de Rubeis seneis typis vulgati. Romse, MDCXC. 
 
DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM AND THE TEMPLE. 151 
 
 the conquerors of Palestine ; so faithfully has the ful- 
 filment of the Saviour's last sorrowful denunciation 
 been told by the mute marble. The time-worn marble 
 now imperfectly exhibits the pageant, but the artistic 
 restoration of the monument, and classic description 
 of the scene, as given by the antiquarian Bellori almost 
 compensates the defect. Faithful reproductions by 
 photography of the only existing original picture of 
 the inevitable decay of earthly power and pride may 
 minister instruction; while the consummation of a 
 work promised from the foundation of the world, and 
 the founding of a kingdom that shall have no end, 
 date nearly alike from the event commemorated on 
 this perishing monument of Roman triumph. Then 
 it was that God made the first covenant old, and the 
 Apostle made an abiding record of the inevitable sen- 
 tence, " Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is 
 ready to vanish away." (Heb. viii. 13.) 
 
152 
 
 TOMBS OF THE KINGS. 
 
 Jeremiah VIII. 1-3. 
 
 HE prophet Jeremiah, predicting the desolation 
 of the land, proceeds thus : " At that time, 
 saith the Lord, they shall bring out the bones of the 
 kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the 
 bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, 
 and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of 
 their graves : and they shall spread them before the 
 sun, and the moon, and all the host of heaven, whom 
 they have loved, and whom they have served, and 
 after whom they have walked, and whom they have 
 sought, and whom they have worshipped : they shall 
 not be gathered, nor be buried ; they shall be for 
 dung upon the face of the earth. And death shall be 
 chosen rather than life by all the residue of them that 
 remain of this evil family, which remain in all the 
 places whither I have driven them, saith the LORD of 
 hosts." (Jer. viii. 1-3.) 
 
 The prediction is literal, and has been actually ful- 
 filled. Jerome, who spent a great part of his life in 
 Syria and Palestine, and resided in Bethlehem, or its 
 neighbourhood, for some years, testifies most ex- 
 pressly the fulfilment in his commentary on the place. 
 "We see all that the prophetic discourse predicted 
 actually come to pass in our own time," the fourth 
 
TOMBS OF THE KINGS. 1 53 
 
 century of the Christian era, " not only at Jerusalem, 
 where they have suffered it from the Chaldees and 
 from the Romans, but the whole world over, so that 
 after the tears of those who were once living are 
 dried away, all that the prophets foretold is fulfilled 
 with the bones of the dead. And as they were accus- 
 tomed, according to an ancient usage, to bury gold, 
 and certain ornaments of both men and women in 
 the sepulchres together with the dead, avarice has 
 broken open the sepulchres, and dug out the dead, 
 exposing them to the light of day. First, the bones 
 of the kings of Jiidah, and then those of their princes ; 
 of the priests, too, and of the prophets, and of all the 
 people who had inhabited Jerusalem, were brought 
 out of the tombs, and laid open to view, so to speak, 
 of sun, moon, and stars, that they whom they served 
 after they had forsaken God might look upon them, 
 and see them consumed like ashes in a dunghill. So 
 great is the misery, that if any one of the multitude 
 had escaped, and could come to one of these places, 
 he would prefer death to life, and think the destruc- 
 tion (of his body) to be the remedy of a soul insuffer- 
 ably wretched." 
 
 M. Caignart de Saulcy,' commissioned some years 
 ago by the French Government, excavated the sub- 
 terranean place, traditionally known as the Tombs of 
 the Kings, between Jerusalem and Bethlehem ; and his 
 minute, full, and formally authenticated narrative not 
 only conveys an affecting illustration of the words of 
 Jeremiah and the note of Jerome, but leaves no reason 
 for doubt that the place once known by name to 
 the Jews, and now distinguished as such by the 
 
 ' Voyage en Terre Samte, Paris, 1865, Tome ler. 
 
154 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Arabs, is the very catacomb where once the bodies 
 of David and Solomon were laid. 
 
 Josephus mentions these tombs, and although his 
 text does not afford any distinct information as to 
 the site, his descriptions were so circumstantially 
 correspondent with what was found there as to be 
 found of great use for guidance to the explorer. He 
 says that John Hyrcanus, high priest and king, broke 
 into the tombs, and robbed them of about three 
 thousand talents of money, buried with the kings. 
 He also relates that one of the Herods attempted to 
 take the treasure which Hyrcanus was supposed to 
 have left ; he opened the sepulchre at night, went 
 into it, and found a treasure of golden vessels and 
 jewels, all which he took away. But he had a strong 
 desire to go further in, eveti to the vaults wJure the 
 bodies of David and Sobnion lay, and make a more 
 thorough search. But it was reported that two of his 
 guards were killed by a flame which burst on them 
 as they were attempting to go in, and that he ran 
 out horribly frightened, and afterwards built a pro- 
 pitiatory monument of costly white stone over the 
 mouth of the tomb, to show his reverence.' It is not 
 impossible that the lamps carried by the guards 
 before Herod may have caused a gaseous explosion, 
 if the story of the fire be not a mere adorning of the 
 tale; but the propitiatory monument'' of white marble, 
 built, too, so short a time before Josephus, could not 
 have been a mere invention of this historian, nor of 
 Nicolaus, another historian, who was contemporary 
 with Herod, and agrees with Josephus. 
 
 The sepulchre, then, with the white marble monu- 
 
 * Antiq. J ml., XVI., vli. I. ' 'lAaonjpioi' /x»^Ma. 
 
TOMBS OF THE KINGS. 1 55 
 
 ment, was known by Josephus and his contempo- 
 raries ; and, about sixty years before Josephus, the 
 Apostle Peter told the Jews in Jerusalem that they 
 had the sepulchre of David with them at that day. 
 (Acts ii. 29.) The objects were familiar to them all, 
 and these incidents, whether of history or fiction, were 
 associated with the objects. 
 
 Not only kings, but members of royal families, 
 "princes," as Jeremiah said, would be buried there, 
 and the burial of Sarah and Leah in the cave with 
 Abraham and Jacob were precedents to be followed 
 in the interment of royal ladies. 
 
 M. de Saulcy began his excavations by clearing 
 away the earth which covered the entrance to the 
 tombs, and laid open to view steps of solid rock. 
 Then he went down the steps to the entrance of the 
 "house of burial,"' and penetrated into the first grand 
 chamber, clearing his way through the accumulated 
 rubbish of at least two thousand years. With charac- 
 teristic perseverance he uncovered platform after plat- 
 form in the heart of the rock, connected by galleries 
 with gently inclined levels, and found each chamber 
 surrounded with loculi, or beds for the dead, ex- 
 structed at right angles with the chamber, each bed 
 to be closed at the foot with a stone, as was the 
 " grave " of Lazarus. In these mortuary cells corpses 
 had, no doubt, been laid in aromatic spices, and 
 covered with costly robes. 
 
 Before reaching the inmost burial-places, he found 
 the remains of Romans with incineration, after costly 
 ceremonies ; heaps of bones, unburnt, seeming to 
 
 » 01'a*^p lAAli Acts Ii. 29. Syr. Vers. 
 
15^ ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 show how Roman foot-soldfers, most probably during 
 the siege of Jerusalem, had fallen between Jerusalem 
 and Bethlehem. The jars, containing human dust, 
 were undoubtedly Roman. 
 
 ^^ggi^g deeper again, he came upon coins of older 
 times ; one, for example, of the age of Jaddua the 
 high priest, he that is said to have met Alexander 
 the Great on his approach to Jerusalem. Another 
 that had been stamped soon after the Maccabees. 
 There were also lachrymatories and precious jewels, 
 some of western fashion ; others, lying deeper, of 
 Asiatic. Then he found fragments of demolished 
 cornices and pilasters, broken sarcophagi, and, as he 
 believed, remains of the Herodian monument of pure 
 white marble. 
 
 But he had not yet discovered the cells which 
 Herod sought, but could not find, being driven back 
 by terror. At length, when almost baffled by seem- 
 ingly impenetrable rock, one of his associates in 
 search detected a joint in the stonework of yet 
 another inner chamber. This discovery reminded 
 him of a passage in his Greek Josephus which tells 
 of the narrow entrance^ of a tomb. He therefore set 
 at work to remove the masonry, succeeded perfectly, 
 and made his way into the inmost and deepest 
 chamber of the whole cemetery, which became the 
 scene of his chief discovery. There lay a rich carved 
 chest of calcareous stone, too small to receive a 
 human body, and apparently a treasure-chest. It 
 was broken ; evidently broken by violence for the 
 sake of the contents. Shattered remains of sarco- 
 phagi were on the floor. One of them, however, was 
 
TOMBS OF THE KINGS. 157 
 
 entire, lid and all, and did not seem to have been 
 violated. The lid was not flat, but a slab of marble 
 cut in the shape of a low-pitched roof, which is said 
 by the Arabs to distinguish sarcophagi for females. 
 De Saulcy saw the lid lifted, and laid gently on the 
 floor. 
 
 Then he looked down into the coffin, and saw the 
 skeleton of a female, seemingly perfect, for the ex- 
 ternal air had not reached it until that moment. It 
 was perfect in form, except that the facial bones had 
 sunk into the bowl of the skull. A gentle endeavour 
 to take up what remained of the head, caused the 
 whole cranium to subside into the finest dust. So 
 did all the skeleton. Dust covered the bed of the 
 coffin, but the embroidered borders of the grave- 
 clothes might almost be traced as they originally lay 
 upon the corpse, by thousands of finely twisted 
 threads of gold which remained after the warp and 
 woof of raiment was utterly dissolved by time. 
 
 Before opening the sarcophagus, M. de Saulcy had 
 the wisdom to summon witnesses who might see what 
 should be found. They saw all this, and signed a 
 document in presence of himself and the French 
 consul, who signed it also. A copy of this remarkable 
 certificate is given in the appendix to the two volumes 
 of his Voyage. Now came the question whose corpse 
 this might have been } There is an inscription out- 
 side the coffin, and it had to be deciphered. The 
 copy given by the discoverer appears to be an exact 
 facsimile. It is obviously bilingual, and not all written 
 by the same hand. The upper line is Aramaic, and 
 the lower Hebrew. Both lines are strictly equivalent, 
 and mean Sadoji, or Saron, Queen; the v {ts) being 
 
158 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 sounded soft.' The present writer decides for Saron, 
 from the form of the character, and also because he 
 observes that the same name occurs in a sepulchral 
 inscription in Carthage.' The language of the epi- 
 graph in Carthage is Latin, but the name is certainly 
 Phoenician : 
 
 S ARON 
 
 VA 
 
 LX V. 
 
 That is to say, SaroUy vixit amios LXV. 
 
 It may have been a Tyrian wife of Solomon whose 
 remains were seen by the learned French commis- 
 sioner. Leaving many valuable observations and 
 conjectures of the discoverer, we are content to note 
 that the sepulchre he examined at or near Bethlehem, 
 the city of David, although no more than one of the 
 sleeping tenants can be now traced, affords an un- 
 deniable confirmation of St. Peter's words, " Men and 
 brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch 
 David, that he is both dead and buried, a7id his sepul- 
 chre is with us ttnto this day." For although the 
 remains of David were not in the sarcophagus now 
 described, it is marked with the name of a royal 
 person, and was but one of the many whose bodies 
 were deposited in these tombs of the kings of the 
 house of Judah, near or in Bethlehem, the city of 
 David. 
 
 * Voyage en Terre Sainte. 
 
 ' Davis, Ruined cities in Africa, London, 1862, p. 369. 
 
159 
 
 THE *' HOUSE OF PRAYER FOR 
 ALL PEOPLE." 
 
 Isaiah LVI. 7. 
 
 UCH was not the Temple of Solomon. It had 
 no more than two courts, and however devout 
 Gentiles might be allowed to worship in one of those, 
 as some suppose, there was no court of the Gentiles, 
 as afterwards in Herod's Temple. But the prophet 
 Isaiah, long before Herod, predicted the change in a 
 prophecy concerning the conversion of the heathen. 
 "Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves 
 to the Lord, to serve him, and to love the name ot 
 the Lord, to be his servants, every one that keepeth 
 the sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of my 
 covenant ; even them will I bring to my holy moun- 
 tain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer : 
 their burnt offerings and their burnt sacrifices shall 
 be accepted upon mine altar ; for 7nme house shall be 
 called an house of prayer for all peopled (Isa. Ivi. 7.) 
 
 On a memorable occasion our Lord went into the 
 court of the Gentiles provided by Herod, drove out 
 the Jews who were profaning the place by selling 
 cattle and exchanging money, and justified His action 
 by referring to the scripture now quoted. " He 
 taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house 
 
l6o ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 sJiall be called an house of prayer for all nations f but 
 ye have made it a den of thieves." (Mar. xi. 17.) 
 Gentiles, however, or as Isaiah says, strangers^ were 
 not permitted to enter the inner courts, and, at that 
 very time, our Lord saw the prohibition written at 
 the entrances by gates in the wall which enclosed 
 those courts. That prohibition would shortly be can- 
 celled by His own death, making atonement for the 
 sins of the whole world ; meanwhile the separation 
 between the Israelite and the stranger w^as more 
 strongly marked than ever by the wall which shut 
 out the Gentiles from assemblage with the Jews ; but 
 when that greatest of all events had taken place, St. 
 Paul wrote, " Now, in Christ Jesus, ye who sometime 
 were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 
 For he is our peace who hath broken down the 
 middle wall of partition." (Eph. ii. 13, 14.) And the 
 abolition of the enmity by the Gospel of peace was 
 symbolised by the demolition of the material wall 
 and the removal of the written prohibition. 
 
 In compliance with a suggestion of St. James, and 
 the elders of the church at Jerusalem, St. Paul was 
 induced to associate with himself four men who had a 
 vow on them, to purify himself with them, and go 
 together with them into the Temple "to signify the 
 accomplishment of the days of purifying, until that 
 an offering should be made for every one of them." 
 (Acts xxi. 26.) The motive of the elders in advising 
 the Apostle to take this course was to show that he 
 walked orderly, and kept the law. Compliance with 
 this advice does appear somewhat at variance with 
 St. Paul's own teaching, and may be regarded as an 
 instance of well meant, but unsuccessful, compromise 
 
THE "house of prayer FOR ALL PEOPLE." l6l 
 
 in a little matter. On the other hand, it must be 
 remembered that while, as yet, the temple was 
 standing, entire separation from its services was not 
 accomplished. 
 
 " The Jews which were in Asia, when they saw him 
 in the sacred court (eV rw tepoS), stirred up all the peo- 
 ple, and laid hands on him, crying out. Men of Israel, 
 help : this is the man that teacheth all men every- 
 where against the people, and the law, and this place; 
 and further, brought Greeks also into the sacred court 
 {eh TO lepov), ahd hath polluted this holy place (rov 
 ar/tov TOTTov tovtov). For they had seen before with 
 him in the city Trophimus, an Ephesian, whom they 
 supposed that Paul had brought into the temple." 
 (Acts xxi. 27-29.) Every one knows that the intro- 
 duction of a heathen foreigner into the sacred court 
 would have been a daring desecration, and of such 
 a desecration St. Paul could not be guilty. Now the 
 whole matter can best be understood by help of an 
 inscription a few years ago discovered in Jerusalem. 
 
 M. Ganneau, long known as a learned Oriental 
 archaeologist, and especially noted as one of the first 
 who saw, and the first who translated, the inscription 
 on the Moabite stone, relates that on the 26th May, 
 1 87 1, being in a part of Jerusalem less frequently 
 visited by Europeans, he felt inclined to explore the 
 premises of a deserted old Mohammedan college, 
 which he had often heard of, but never seen. Passing 
 through a ruinous doorway, without the thought of 
 finding anything of importance there, his antiquarian 
 eye caught sight of a fine sharp-cut block of very hard 
 stone, built into the wall with other blocks of inferior 
 quality. It lay low in the building, and appeared yet 
 H 12 
 
l62 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 lower than when at first placed there, inasmuch as 
 the ground had risen in course of time, as it always 
 does rise in such situations. On one part of the face 
 of the stone he observed what seemed to be incised 
 writing, and on looking in closely, he found, just 
 peeping above ground, two Greek letters, IJO. Closer 
 still, after scraping away a little of the soft earth at 
 the surface, he discovered a third letter, making ^ITO, 
 and certainly indicating a Greek word. This impelled 
 him to dig, and very soon, exposing more of the stone, 
 he laid open the ends of at least thrdb lines of a well 
 preserved inscription. At last, with the help of one 
 or two poor Arabs living in the ruins, he laid bare the 
 entire block, nowhere broken, measuring nearly three 
 English feet in length, two feet in breadth, and fifteen 
 and a half inches in thickness. 
 
 It was at once evident that the stone had formed 
 part of a building older than the Moslem college, that 
 it lay horizontally in the original building, but had 
 been set up on end to form part of the corner of the 
 gateway. The stone is so hard that a hammer strikes 
 fire on it. The inscription tells where it was originally 
 placed. As soon as the Pasha of Jerusalem heard of 
 it, he caused it to be taken out of the wall, and 
 brought to himself; but before the removal M. Gan- 
 neau had managed to obtain a photographic copy of 
 the inscription, which we borrow. In type it may be 
 exhibited as follows, the divisions of words being 
 marked for the convenience of the reader : 
 
 MHeENA\AAAOrENH\EI^nO 
 
 PETE^GAI\ENTO^\TOT\nE 
 
 PI\TO\IEPON\TPT^AKTOT\KAI\ 
 
THE "house of prayer FOR ALL PEOPLE." 1 63 
 
 nEPIBOAOT\OI!\J\AN\AH 
 ^eH\EATTni\AITIO^\E^ 
 TAI\AIA\TO\EBAKOAOT 
 eEIN\9ANAT0N\ 
 
 " No stranger born may enter within the circuit of 
 the barrier {rpvcfxiKrov) and enclosure {Trepi/SoXov) 
 that is around the sacred court (to lepov). And who- 
 ever shall be caught there, upon himself be the blame 
 of the death that will consequently follow." Flavius 
 Josephus, describing the enclosures, or courts, of the 
 temple, tells us that in the midst of the outer court, 
 which he describes as very spacious, and surrounded 
 by vast cloisters of an amazing grandeur, and not far 
 within, as you pass from the cloister at the entrance, 
 was the second court, to be reached by a few steps. 
 This was enclosed by a stone wall, for the sake of 
 separation, where there was an inscription forbidding 
 entrance there to foreigners, on pain of death.' 
 
 Within this court for women there was another, f/ie 
 sacred court, not accessible by the women ( . . . iacoripco 
 Be Kol eKelvov yuvat^lv a/Sarov rjv to lepov). Still more 
 inward was a third enclosure, where only priests 
 might enter, and yet further within was the temple 
 itself (6 vah), never called the hieron (to lepov), which 
 is the sacred court of the Israelites, already specified. 
 Josephus has yet another' description of the courts of 
 the temple built by Herod, from which temple was 
 taken the stel^ found by M. Ganneau. "When you 
 went through this first enclosure to the second sacred 
 court (iirl to SevTepov lepov), there was a partition, or 
 balustrade (Bpv(paKTo<;), made of stone, all round ; " and 
 
 ' Joseph., J7itiq., XV., xi. 5. » Joseph., Bell. y>/d., V., v. 2. 
 
 12* 
 
1 64 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 here the same word is used as was given by the Greek 
 Church to an enclosed raised floor, or chancel.' The 
 height of the balustrade in the temple was three 
 cubits, and its construction was very elegant. On it 
 stood pillars {aTrjkat) raised at equal distances, with 
 inscriptions declaring the law of purity, some in 
 Greek letters, and some in Roman, that no foreig7ter 
 might go within the holy place ; for the second sacred 
 place was called holy (to jap Sevrepov lepov ajiov 
 eKaXeuTo). 
 
 Now the agreement between St. Luke, Josephus, 
 and every word of the inscription on the stele at 
 Jerusalem is most exact. St. Paul, as we read in the 
 Acts of the Apostles, entered with the Nazarites itito 
 the sacred court (et? to lepov) ; certainly not into the 
 temple ivaov). The Jews saw him in the sacred place, 
 the hieron. They cried out that he had brought 
 Greeks into the hieron, and polluted the hagion, or 
 holy place ; both adjectives, sacred and holy, being 
 used for the same court, according to Josephus. They 
 supposed only, for they did not see, that he had 
 brought Trophimus, the Ephesian, into the hieron. 
 Thence they dragged him outside the hieron (efw roO 
 lepov), for he, being an Israelite, was in it rightfully ; 
 and then, having hold on him in the first enclosure, 
 just within the cloisters, where Gentiles might law- 
 fully be, forthwith the gates were shut, so that they 
 held him in custody, intending to kill him ; according 
 to the letter of the law, that " whosoever should be 
 caught, would be to himself cause of the death that 
 would consequently follow." At that critical moment, 
 the chief captain and the soldiers ran down from the 
 
 ^ Suicer., Thcsaur. Eccles. s. v.' 
 
THE "house of prayer FOR ALL PEOPLE." 165 
 
 castle which overlooked the courts, and rescued him 
 from their fury. Just there, within the closed gates 
 of the temple-buildings, as St. Paul afterwards de- 
 clared to king Agrippa, the Jews caught him ; an 
 expression which recalls the Greek of the inscription, 
 and set about killifig him out of hand {iTrecpMVTo Siaxei- 
 pLo-aaOac).'^ (Acts xxvi. 21.) 
 
 Thanks to M. Ganneau, as a servant of Providence, 
 we have now a complete enarration of the text. 
 Truly, indeed, did our Lord say to His disciples, 
 " Stone shall not be left upon stone that shall not be 
 demolished" {KaraXvOrjaeTat). (Mat. xxiv. 2.) But 
 there in the Moslem college, and not here on the site 
 of the holy house, is one of the dismounted stones ; 
 nay, there, in the Pasha's palace, bearing witness to 
 the true word of Christ, with confirmation of the 
 faithful record of his servant. 
 
 * Revue Archiologique, Avril et Mai, 1872. 
 
i66 
 
 THE MAGI WHO CAME TO 
 WORSHIP JESUS. 
 
 Matthew II. i, 2. 
 
 HEN Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, 
 in the days of Herod the king, behold, there 
 came wise men from the East to Jerusalem, saying, 
 Where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we 
 have seen his star in the East, and are come to wor- 
 ship him." Let us answer the following questions : 
 
 Whence came these wise men ? 
 
 What were they ? 
 
 When and why did they come ? 
 
 I. St. Matthew tells us that they came to Jeru- 
 salem /ro7n the stm-rising {anro avaroXcav). There can 
 be no doubt that they were Parthians, representing 
 the people of whom Justin says, "Parthians, with 
 whom, as they divide the world with the Romans, is 
 now the empire of the East"' Jerome, too, com- 
 menting on the words of Isaiah (Isa. xli. 2), "Who 
 raised up the righteous man from the East } " quotes 
 the opinion of some that the righteous man referred 
 to by the prophet was Cyrus the Persian, who came 
 from the East to Babylon, and so Persians or Par- 
 thians are commonly spoken of as coming from the 
 
 ' Just.Hjsf.,XLI. I. 
 
THE MAGI WHO CAME TO WORSHIP JESUS. 1 67 
 
 East. One glance at a map showing the boundary 
 of the Parthian empire in the reign of Augustus, coin- 
 cident with the course of the Euphrates from the 
 mountains of Armenia to the Persian Gulf, and the 
 eastern shore of that gulf from north to south, shows 
 that the Parthian empire covered all the East, and 
 whoever came from the East must have necessarily 
 come from Parthian territory. 
 
 2. The second question is answered in a word by 
 the Greek original. They were Magi {fjud'yoi), and a 
 general understanding of the name as commonly 
 explained would be sufficient, if it were not for rea- 
 sons that will appear in answering the next question. 
 
 2i' At what time, and for what purpose did they 
 comef They came after the birth of our Lord, and 
 before the death of Herod ; which brings the date of 
 their mission within a narrow space of time. The 
 birth of Christ took place, as the margin of our Eng- 
 lish Bible has it, "in the fourth year before the 
 common account called Anno Domini," making the 
 crucifixion, and close of the evangelic history, four 
 years later than people are generally mindful to con- 
 sider as the time of the Saviour's birth; thirty- 
 seven years instead of thirty-three. Within the fourth 
 year B.C., or 4707 of the Julian period, we find a 
 remarkable state of things in Rome, in Parthia, and in 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 As to Parthia, Professor Rawlinson ' has thoroughly 
 investigated the state of affairs, and collects exact and 
 most important information. The relations of the two 
 empires were very critical. Romans and Parthians 
 
 ^ Sixth Great Oriental Monarchy. 
 
1 68 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 were mutually jealous. Augustus, too old and too 
 prudent to throw himself into the heat of war, yet too 
 sincerely Roman to make any concession beneath the 
 dignity and honour of the empire, sends his grandson, 
 Caius, a young man full of energy, to watch the state 
 of affairs in the East, to compel Armenia, now subject 
 to Parthia, to submit to the authority of Rome, and 
 to prevent Parthia from taking any part with Armenia 
 against Rome. Parthia, if well governed, would pro- 
 bably be able to repel a Roman army if marched 
 across the Euphrates ; but at this time there is not a 
 king capable of marshalling the national forces, or in 
 any way maintaining his dominions in rightful in- 
 dependence. Phraates, now on the throne, but every 
 moment in danger of losing it, murdered his father, 
 and has now sent away his own four sons to Rome to 
 be educated ; but the Romans contend that they are 
 hostages, and hold them fast in safe keeping, regard- 
 less of their father's wish that one of them, at least, 
 shall return to the Parthian court, and there await the 
 moment of his death, then to be proclaimed king. 
 But Augustus detains the youths, as if they were 
 hostages from an unfriendly state. 
 
 The aged king, Phraates, disgraced himself by 
 taking to his bed an Italian slave, sent him as a gift 
 by Augustus. She now boasts herself queen, and 
 longs to see a son of her own, Phraataces, on the 
 throne. To attain this object Phraataces poisons his 
 aged father, even as Phraates poisoned his own 
 father, Orodes, and slaughtered all his brothers. 
 Such is the savage brutality of Parthian sovereigns, 
 but such, also, is the retributive vengeance with which 
 justice overtakes criminals not fit to live. The son of 
 
THE MAGI WHO CAME TO WORSHIP JESUS. ' 1 69 
 
 a parricide becomes a parricide in his turn, proving 
 himself the fittest instrument of retribution. 
 
 The Parthian people are consequently overwhelmed 
 with discontent, shame of their kings, and terrific 
 dread of Rome. In Jerusalem and Judea, king 
 Herod, as he is called, madly savage, approaches the 
 end of his life, and he too, by excessive cruelties 
 and mad injustice is filling his subjects with terror 
 and hatred of himself Judea lies between the 
 threatening empires of East and West, and fears 
 being made the prey of both, as aforetime often. 
 The young Parthian king lives incestuously with his 
 wretched mother, and to the disgust of his subjects, 
 has her head stamped upon his coins. The great 
 enemy of Parthia in the West longs to attack the 
 Parthians in a ruinous war, and in their helplessness, 
 attach them to his vast empire. Meanwhile, Judea rolls 
 down the hill of ruin under the tyranny of Herod. 
 
 Some one true king is now desired with power 
 and will to turn the balance in favour of peace and 
 general security. The populations of all the East, 
 all Parthia, Armenia, Judea, and far more distant 
 regions, are expecting that such a king will arise in 
 Palestine, and these Magi are come to see. 
 
 Then with what further intentioii did tJiey come ? 
 They came to seek for him that should be born king 
 of the Jews. They were not mere philosophers, or 
 literary men, or magicians divining from the stars. 
 They were part of the great council of the nation. 
 Sometimes, in questions of difficulty, they were 
 arbiters or judges. More fitly than the Athenian 
 Areopagites, for Parthia was never a republic, they 
 had the prerogative of deposing a king by their own 
 
170 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 collective authority, if that became necessary, and 
 could elect and crown another. This is affirmed by 
 Strabo. 
 
 When our Lord Jesus Christ was a youth in the 
 house of Joseph the carpenter in Nazareth, Strabo 
 the Greek was writing his Geographica ; but he had 
 probably finished his travels in the East before the 
 commencement of the Christian era. If so, the visit 
 of the Magi to Judea took place between the travels 
 of Strabo and the composition of his work. The testi- 
 mony of this writer, therefore, is contemporaneous 
 with that event, and the following extracts convey 
 his views of the Magi after personal observation, with 
 intelligence collected in Syria, Palestine, and Egypt. 
 
 Speaking of diviners, he says that " they were held 
 in such high esteem as to be accounted worthy even 
 to be made kings, (^are kol l3a(nXeia<; a^LovaOai, inso- 
 much as they explained divine precepts and admoni- 
 tions, sometimes by their living discourses, and some- 
 times in writings which spoke for them after their 
 death, as was said of Tiresias : 
 
 Tm kol redvMTL voov Trope Uepae^oveia 
 ^Oicp TrerrvvaOaL' toI he aiaaX alao-ovac. 
 
 'To whom even after death Proserpine gave intel- 
 lect, that he only might have understanding, while 
 others passed away like shadows.' Such were Am- 
 phiareos, and Trophonius, and Orpheus, and Musaeus, 
 and once a god among the Getae ; in olden time 
 Zamolxis, a Pythagorean ; in our own time Decae- 
 neus, who prophesied at Byrebista, and Archaicarus 
 among the Bosporani(?), the Gymnosophists with the 
 Indians, t/ie Magi with the Persiafts, and they who 
 
THE MAGI WHO CAME TO WORSHIP JESUS. 171 
 
 are called necyomants, lecanomants, and hydromants ; 
 Chaldeans with the Assyrians, and with the Romans 
 Etruscan haruspices. Such also were Moses and his 
 successors, who began well, but afterwards de- 
 generated." ' 
 
 This association of the Magi with the ministers of 
 religion and of superstition, and with popular in- 
 structors and leaders, and their most distinguished 
 disciples, indicates what they were, almost as distinctly 
 as any formal description. But for illustration of 
 St. Matthew's record of the visit from the East, other 
 passages of Strabo are useful. Persia, he says, is in- 
 habited by the Patischores, the Achaemenides, and the 
 Magi, of whom the last mentioned devote themselves 
 earnestly to a certain art of living honestly, ovtoi [lev 
 ovv Geybvov tivo^ elao jSiov ^rfkcorab 
 
 In an account of some matters relating to India, 
 Strabo mentions the Gymnosophists, and observes 
 that some say they associate with Indian kings in the 
 same way as the Magi associate with the kings of 
 Persia, co? tov<; /jbdjov; Tot<^ Tlepaat^.^ 
 
 But what bears most directly on our present sub- 
 ject, is a statement he quotes from Posidonius that 
 "the Parthians had a twofold council, one part con- 
 sisting of relatives of the king, and the other of wise 
 men a7id Magi ; and the kings were chosen out of 
 both : OTL tS)v UapOvaioav avveSpcov (j^Tjacv elvai Tloaeiha)- 
 VLO^ BtTTOVj TO fiev avyyevoiv^ to Se aocpcov koL fjidycoPj e'f 
 MV dfKpoLv Tov<; jBaaCkel^ KadlaTaaOat.* 
 
 Such were the men who came to pay homage to 
 the infant king, and acknowledge him to be the 
 
 * Geographica, XVI., ii. 39. ' Rid., XV., iii. i. 
 
 3 Ibid., XV., i. 68. ♦ Ibid., XL, ix. 3. 
 
172 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 future sovereign of Parthia. They brought him gold, . 
 frankincense, and myrrh, as most precious products 
 of their country. The mystic reason suggested by 
 Jerome and Juvencus, and caught up by preachers 
 in the middle ages, that the gold was brought as 
 tribute to the king, the frankincense for worship to 
 the God, and the myrrh for His burial when crucified, 
 is too far-fetched. His divine nature. His royalty 
 over a heavenly kingdom, and His atonement for the 
 sins of men, were truths unknown to the Magi, and 
 were only known in those days to those who learned 
 them from the Bible. 
 
 The Parthian Magi came to Judea when their 
 affairs were in the calamitous condition above de- 
 scribed, and they came sharing in the general ex- 
 pectation that a temporal deliverer would come about 
 that time to save the world from its miseries and 
 confusion. The Jews, most of all, expected that such 
 would be the Messiah predicted by the prophets. 
 The Magi sought him that should be born king of 
 the Jews,' intending to worship him, pay him the 
 homage due from Parthia, desiring to have him as 
 their sovereign, and give him the earnest of future 
 tribute. They hoped to receive, in his person, a king 
 of royal blood, not the child of a slave, as Phraataces 
 was, and parricide. It was not until our Lord himself 
 instructed his disciples better, and undeceived the 
 Jews, that they clearly understood that His kingdom 
 was not of this world, and that His servants would 
 not fight for it. And the Magi were not the only 
 persons who desired, and vainly attempted, to make 
 him king. 
 
173 
 
 THE FAME OF JESUS IN SYRIA. 
 
 Matthew IV. 23, 24. 
 „^Ji!ND Tesu 
 
 jND Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in 
 their synagogues, and preaching the gospel 
 of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness, 
 and all manner of disease among the people. And 
 his fame went throughout all Syria ; and they brought 
 unto him all sick people that were taken with divers 
 diseases and torments, and those that were possessed 
 with devils, and those that were lunatic, and those 
 that had the palsy; and he healed them." 
 
 The statement that our Lord's fame went from 
 Galilee throughout all Syria, and that they brought 
 unto Him sick persons, apparently from beyond 
 Galilee, invites attention ; and it is remarkable that a 
 full narrative of communication with Syria, contained 
 in the ecclesiastical history of Eusebius,' completely 
 tallies with the words of St. Matthew. Eusebius 
 relates that when the Divinity of our Saviour was 
 proclaimed among all men, by reason of the astonish- 
 ing miracles He wrought, and myriads came to Him 
 from all countries to be healed, a Syrian king, Abgar 
 of Edessa, on the Euphrates, the modern Orfa, re- 
 nowned among the nations for his valour, found his 
 body wasting away with a grievous and incurable 
 
 ' Hist. Ec, I. 13. 
 
174 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 disease, and sent Him by a courier a letter of request 
 to come and heal him. Eusebius had a copy of the 
 letter taken for him from the records which were then 
 kept at Edessa, the capital of his dominions, and his 
 translation into Greek was, until very lately, the only 
 original of many versions. But the late Dr. Cureton 
 found the Syriac original as it had lain in the archives 
 of Edessa, which were transferred thence to Ecbatana 
 in Armenia, and from that place to the Natron 
 monastery in Egypt, but now rests in the British 
 Museum. It reads thus : 
 
 "Abgar the Black, sovereign of the country, to 
 Jesus, the good Saviour, who has appeared in the 
 country of Jerusalem : Peace. I have heard about 
 Thee, and about the healing which is wrought by 
 Thy hands, without drugs and roots. For, as it is 
 reported. Thou makest the blind to see, and the lame 
 to walk ; and Thou cleansest the lepers, and Thou 
 castest out unclean spirits and demons, and Thou 
 healest those who are tormented with lingering 
 diseases, and Thou raisest the dead. And when I 
 heard all these things about Thee, I settled in my 
 mind one of two things : either that Thou art God, 
 who hast come down from heaven, and doest these 
 things ; or that Thou art the Son of God, and doest 
 these things. On this account, therefore, I have 
 written to beg of Thee that Thou wouldest weary 
 Thyself to come to me, and heal this disease which 
 I have. (And not only so), for I have also heard that 
 the Jews murmur against Thee, and wish to do Thee 
 harm. But I have a city, small and beautiful, which 
 is sufficient for two." 
 
 There can be no reasonable doubt about the 
 
<fc»a ^«<if>£47 ^^<^'< 
 
 
 
 
 L?ike xi. 24-26. 
 Curetonian Syriac Gospels. Add. 14,451. 
 
THE FAME OF JESUS IN SYRIA. T75 
 
 authenticity of this letter. Eusebius had a copy brought 
 to him as it was taken from the original copy soon 
 after the year 300, authenticated as part of the public 
 records. Moses of Osrohene, historian ,of Armenia, 
 found the same document in the " house of records " 
 in the century following ; and his translation into 
 Armenian, like that of Eusebius into Greek, doubles 
 the assurance that it is not fictitious. There is a 
 report, gathered hastily from Eusebius, that our Lord 
 sent an answer to Abgarus, promising that after His 
 departure He will send him a disciple, with power to 
 heal him ; but the Greek barely supports the idea, 
 and the Armenian contradicts it by the title prefixed 
 to his version. Answer to Abgars letter, which the 
 Apostle Thomas wrote to this prince by command of the 
 Savioitr. The same collection of manuscripts con- 
 tains interesting accounts of events consequent on a 
 visit to the king at Edessa by Thaddaeus, one of the 
 Seventy,' which there can be no good reason to doubt. 
 The ecclesiastical historians agree in believing Chris- 
 tianity to have been introduced into Edessa about 
 this time. The Curetonian manuscripts contain a 
 statement that Abgar had the Pentateuch and the 
 Gospels read in public by a person appointed to the 
 office of reader ; and Gregory Bar Hebraeus, writing 
 in the 13th century, says, on the credit of authors of 
 like antiquity, that messengers were sent from Edessa 
 to Palestine to translate the sacred books, and, yet 
 more particularly, affirms that "the New Testament 
 
 * The words of the Syriac document, as translated in the Anle-Nicene 
 Library, are : Thomas the Apostle, one of the twelve, as by an impulse 
 from God, sent Thaddaeus, who was himself numbered among- the Seventy 
 disciples of Christ. This Thaddaeus is therefore considered to be a 
 different person from the Thaddaeus of Mark iii. iS. 
 
176 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 was translated in the time of Thaddseus, and Abgar, 
 king of Edessa." ' 
 
 The whole subject is discussed at length, and a large 
 body of evidence adduced by the Rev. B. P. Pratten, 
 in the twentieth volume of Clarke's Ante-Nicene 
 Christian Library; which, together with further study 
 in other sources, makes it plainly apparent that Chris- 
 tianity was introduced into that part of Syria, and 
 thence into the parts of Armenia conterminous, imme- 
 diately after our Lord's ascension ; the Syriac lan- 
 guage in a very pure dialect being then spoken in 
 Edessa. These facts being now established, it follows 
 irresistibly that the few words now quoted from the 
 Gospel according to St. Matthew are the commence- 
 ment of a most important section of ecclesiastical 
 history ; and perhaps assist us to understand how the 
 way was opened at Damascus,, by the early establish- 
 ment of a Christian community, for the extraordinary 
 mission of St. Paul, the extensive acceptance of the 
 Gospel intimated in the Acts of the Apostles, and 
 the honourable part taken by the disciples at Antioch 
 of Syria, where they first took the name of Christians, 
 and led the way in missionary enterprise. 
 
 ' Westcott on the Canon of the New Testament, p. 207. 
 
177 
 
 POLYGLOT INSCRIPTIONS. 
 
 PILATE'S WRITING ON THE CROSS. 
 
 HILE the Canopus Decree and the inscriptions 
 on the Rosetta Stone supply confirmatory illus- 
 tration of a passage in "the Scripture of Truth," they 
 suggest a reference far beyond. It must be remem- 
 bered that polyglot writings of the kind become 
 necessary when they are to record matters of more 
 than provincial importance, and will be put forth 
 by imperial authority. They concern "nations, and 
 peoples, and tongues." 
 
 Such a writing is the famous Rock Inscription of 
 Behistun, on the western frontier of ancient Media, on 
 the road from Babylon to the southern Ecbatana, a 
 highway lying between the eastern and western pro- 
 vinces of ancient Persia. Three languages, the ancient 
 Persian, the Babylonian, and the Scythic, relate for 
 Darius Hystaspis the story of his reign. Its truly 
 imperial character, thus intimated, is declared early 
 in the first column : 
 
 " I am Darius the great king, the king of kings, the 
 king of Persia, the king of the dependent provinces, 
 the son of Hystaspes, the grandson of Arsames, the 
 Achaemenian." (Par. i.) After naming twenty- three 
 kingdoms, of which Persia is the first, but as a mem- 
 ber of the empire, ranks only as a province like the 
 H 13 
 
178 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 rest, " says Darius the king : These are the provinces 
 which have come to me ; by the grace of Ormuzd 
 they have become subject to me ; they have brought 
 tribute to me. That which has been said to them by 
 me, both by night and by day, it has been done by 
 them." (Par. 7.)^ 
 
 On an alabaster vase found by Mr. Newton, keeper 
 of the Greek and Roman antiquities in the British 
 Museum, in the ancient mausoleum at Halicarnassus, 
 there are three lines of Cuneiform characters, and a 
 cartouche of Egyptian, all interpreted in the same 
 sentence, " Xerxes the great king," transliterated 
 thus : 
 
 1. Persian : l^H-SH^YAR-SHA NaQa WaZaRKa. 
 
 2. Median : IKSIRSA (K^) IRSARRA. 
 
 3. Assyrian : KHISIARSA SAR RABU. 
 
 4. Egyptian : KH^SH^I^ARSHA P^RAPA^.' 
 
 A predecessor of Mausolus on the throne of Halicar- 
 nassus had probably received the vase as a gift from 
 Xerxes ; and when the widow of Mausolus had taken 
 his ashes from the cinerary urn, and, as is related of 
 her, put it into water, and consumed it by successive 
 draughts, she erected the cenotaph to be, as it were, a 
 magnificent temple in his memory, and there deposited 
 the most precious objects he had left in her posses- 
 sion ; this vase remained, too simple in appearance to 
 attract the cupidity of the barbarians who rifled the 
 mausoleum of the rest. The lines of Cuneiform are, 
 
 * Rawlinson's Herodotus, Vol. II., p. 490. 
 
 * A History of Discoveries at Halicarnassus, Cnidus, and Brancliidae, by 
 C. T. Newton, M.A., keeper of the Greek and Roman Antiquities, British 
 Museum, assisted by R. P. Pullan, F.R.I.B.A., 1863, Vol. II., p. 667. 
 
POLYGLOT INSCRIPTIONS. 1 79 
 
 severally, Persian, Median, and Assyrian. The car- 
 touche tells that Egypt was, nominally at least, a 
 province of his empire. 
 
 So, as we have seen, the Egyptian priests at Mem- 
 phis, wrote the praises of their benefactor, Ptolemy, in 
 sacred, enchorial, and Greek characters, with corre- 
 sponding diversity of language ; and so the priests 
 assembled at Canopus recorded the praises of Ptolemy 
 Epiphanes with the sacred language used by them- 
 selves, the language of the people, and also the 
 language of their conquerors. 
 
 Not to multiply examples of the kind, it may be 
 sufficient to observe in these the same intention to 
 recognise the widely extended sovereignty of the 
 monarchs in whose memory they are engraven. Now 
 considering how the Persian Magi had openly 
 acknowledged the title to sovereignty in the infant 
 Jesus ; how the Armenian king Abgarus afterwards 
 did the same ; how the people rapturously acknow- 
 ledged his royalty, and (with a reason the Egyptians 
 had not for their Euergetes and Epiphanes) his God- 
 head also ; and how the Pharisees, offended at their 
 acclamation, made use of it to aggravate their accusa- 
 tion of sedition, — they not only betrayed their envy, 
 but gave wider publication to the fact. Pilate knew 
 it all. He had received with apparent assent our 
 Lord's own declaration that he was indeed a king, 
 and would come again in the clouds of heaven, seated 
 at the right hand of power. Accordingly he wrote 
 the title that he would have affixed to the cross, 
 "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews." The Phari- 
 sees presumed to demand of the Roman governor the 
 substitution of another inscription which should merely 
 
 13* 
 
l8o ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 intimate that the saying that he was king of the Jews 
 was the offence of a sedition attempted against Caesar ; 
 the offence for which he died a shameful death. But 
 Pilate, otherwise vacillating though he was, stood on 
 this point firm. He simply replied that what he had 
 written he had written ; he caused this implied con- 
 fession that he was, at least, as great a king as a 
 Darius, or a Xerxes, or a Ptolemy, that he had 
 sovereignty over the East and the West, and that 
 a representative of the Roman conquerors of East 
 and West acknowledged him for such ; — this con- 
 fession he caused to be written in Hebrew, and Greek, 
 and Latin, just as at Memphis they wrote in the 
 hieratic, the demotic, and the Greek languages, and as 
 it was afterwards written with higher authority by 
 St. John, that He was indeed the great king. King 
 of kings and Lord of lords. 
 
 Not content with this, and perhaps again writing 
 under a superior impulse, he did not register the 
 crucifixion of the Nazarene as if he were but one of 
 three common malefactors, but so reported it to the 
 emperor that this clear confession of our Lord's vast 
 sovereignty should be placed among the archives of 
 the Roman empire. We have not, as yet, any literal 
 vestige of this act of Pilate's among the ruins on the 
 Palatine or the Quirinal mount, but we have some- 
 thing which approaches to a certificate that such a 
 record did exist, in the uncontradicted statements of 
 two eminent apologists. 
 
 Justin, philosopher and martyr, wrote a long and 
 eloquent apology about the year 1 39, addressed to the 
 emperor Antoninus Pius, and the senate and people of 
 Rome, in which he says, That all these things took 
 
POLYGLOT INSCRIPTIONS. l8l 
 
 place, you may learji from the acts that zvere recorded hi 
 the time of Pontiles Pilate: koX ravra on <yeyov€, hvvaaOe 
 fjuadelv eK tcov eVt TIovtlov TliXdrov yevofjiivcov arcroyv.^ 
 And further on in the same apology, after reciting a 
 prediction of Isaiah in relation to our Saviour's 
 miracles, he again refers Antoninus to the evidence 
 of the Roman governor, or more correctly speaking, 
 of those public acts which the governor could not 
 have suppressed, even if he would : A7id that he did 
 these things yon may learn from the acts which were 
 recorded in the time of Pontins Pilate : oti re ravra 
 iiroLricrev, eK rcov eVt Tlovrlov UiKarov yevofievcov aicrcov 
 jxadelv ^vvaaOe.^ 
 
 About the year 200, Tertullian, being a presbyter 
 of the church at Carthage, and son of a Roman cen- 
 turion who served under the Roman proconsul in that 
 city, addressed an apologetic discourse to the chiefs 
 of the Roman empire. Writing in his own style of 
 bold and rough sincerity, the African presbyter follows 
 the Evangelists. He recounts the substance of their 
 narratives of our Lord's suffering, death, and resurrec- 
 tion, and His commanding the disciples to preach the 
 Gospel to the world, and adds : Pilate, he himself 
 being in his conscience a Christian, then reported to 
 Tiberius CcBsar all these things concerniiig Christ. But 
 eve7i the Ccesars would have believed i7i Christ, eitJier if 
 the Ccesars were not wedded to the world, or if, being 
 Christians, they could be also Ccesars. Ea omnia super 
 Christo Pilatus, et ipse jam pro sua conscientia Chris- 
 tianus, Ca^sari tum Tiberio nunciavit. Sed et Caesares 
 credidissent super Christo, si aut Caesares non essent 
 
 ^ Ju&t. Mart. ApoL, 1., 35. « Ut supra, 48. 
 
1 82 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 sseculo necessarii, aut si et Christiani potuissent esse 
 Caesares.' 
 
 And now I cannot refrain from giving utterance to 
 the thought that when the repentant malefactor at the 
 crucifixion saw that imperial superscription, and was 
 constrained to contrast with their own guilt the inno- 
 cence of Him whom his companion, with the rulers 
 and the soldiers, was reviling, he may at the same 
 time have believed in His universal royalty as therein 
 set forth, and so hailed Him as the long expected 
 king whose dominion was to be established from the 
 rising to the setting of the sun, and confidently cried, 
 "Jesus, Lord! Remember me when thou comest 
 into thy KINGDOM." At the same time the thief saw, 
 as Pilate could not see, in what sense his Lord's 
 kingdom was not of this world. 
 
 ' Tertulliani Apolo^et. adv^ Geiites, Cap. xxi. 
 
i83 
 
 CARMEN CHRISTO QUASI DEO. 
 
 LTHOUGH the date of the fourth Gospel be 
 not certainly known, it is generally agreed that 
 it could not have been written until very near the end 
 of the first century. One could not afiirm that it was 
 written so late as the year lOO, after St. John had 
 returned from Patmos and taken up his abode, for the 
 last time, in Ephesus. Yet this is not improbable. 
 It is, however, certain that the distinctive mission of 
 " the disciple whom Jesus loved " was to proclaim 
 His Godhead, by presenting such a narrative of His 
 life, ministry, and ascension, and by so discoursing on 
 the evidences of His divine nature, as to declare 
 beyond all his fellows "the testimony of Jesus 
 Christ." (Rev. i. 2.) 
 
 Now it is observable that the last years of this 
 Apostle's life fell in the reign of Trajan, that he is 
 said to have borne his last and greatest testimony at 
 this time, in the Gospel which bears his name, and 
 was written in Ephesus or the neighbourhood ; and 
 that a Roman proconsul, resident in Bithynia, a 
 neighbouring province, bore witness, a very few years 
 later (A.D. 107), to the prominence then given by the 
 Bithynian Christians to the same great doctrine. It 
 would thus appear from the Gospel, and from the 
 testimony of Pliny, as Avell as from the Apocalypse, 
 that the last decade, counting back from 107, was 
 
184 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 distinguished in that part of the Christian church by 
 a great exaltation of Christ in the faith and worship 
 of His people. The letter from Pliny the younger, 
 written to the Emperor Trajan, has so purely 
 monumental a character, in relation to the primitive 
 Christian faith, that it must necessarily be noted 
 here. 
 
 In the exercise of his functions as proconsul, Pliny 
 took part in a ruthless persecution of the Christians. 
 Like others, he treated their faith as a state offence, 
 and considered them as a people existing quite be- 
 yond the range of mercy, or even of common justice. 
 Yet there were many reasons why he should observe 
 certain judicial forms. Perhaps weary of going 
 through those forms incessantly, and overwhelmed 
 with the multitude of cases poured into his hands by 
 the informers, he wrote to Trajan for instructions how 
 to proceed. This memorable epistle contains some 
 important passages. It had been his practice to 
 pU7iish every one reported to him as a Christian, and 
 proved to be such, and to kill every one who, being 
 convicted, refused to offer sacrifices, with wine and 
 frankincense, to the images of the gods, and to the 
 image of Trajan, which was also set before him. The 
 Christians were all required to call upon the gods, 
 make supplication before the emperor's image, and 
 revile Christ. 
 
 When questioned as to their religion and practices, 
 the confessors all answered to the same effect, that 
 the whole sum of their fault or error had been no 
 more than that they were accustomed to hold their 
 meetings before sun-rise on a stated day, and recite 
 together^ responsively, a hym7i to Christ, as God (car- 
 
CARMEN CHRISTO QUASI DEO. 1 85 
 
 menque Christo, quasi Deo, dicere secum invicem), 
 binding themselves by a solemn oath not to commit 
 any crime, such as theft, robbery, adultery, promise- 
 breaking, or refusal to return a pledge. Pliny, not 
 yet satisfied, or not choosing to appear so, caused two 
 young women, called ministrce, or deaconesses, to be 
 put to the torture, but no torment could force them to 
 any denial or equivocation. Again they were urged 
 to worship Trajan and the gods, but nothing moved 
 them. So the Roman governor of Pontus and 
 Bithynia registered the fact that the Christians per- 
 sisted in honouring the Son, even as they honoured 
 the Father, and chanted their antiphone to Christ as 
 unto God. We also learn from him how, in obedience 
 to a divine command, they taught and admonished 
 one another, and made melody in their hearts unto 
 the Lord, "in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual 
 songs." (Eph. V. 19 ; Col. iii. i6.) This instruc- 
 tion was accompanied with an injunction to " give 
 thanks unto God and the Father in the name of the 
 Lord Jesus Christ." 
 
 It is the opinion of many that a passage from one 
 of the earliest compositions of the kind is quoted by 
 St. Paul in his Epistle to the Ephesians. (Eph. v. 14.) 
 They translate Zio \eyei by " wherefore // saith," 
 meaning the hymn ; and write it thus : 
 
 'Eyelpe 6 KaOevhwv, 
 
 K dvdara eic twv veKpcjv, 
 
 K iiTL^avaet aoL 6 p^pio-ro?. 
 
 Awake thou that sleepest, 
 
 a?td arise from the dead^ 
 
 and Christ shall give thee light. 
 
l86 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 The most ancient Christian hymns extant prove 
 that this was done, for beHef in the divinity of Christ 
 was essential to their faith. The hymns to which I 
 now refer are to be found at the close of the Pcedago- 
 gus of Clement of Alexandria, who flourished under 
 the Emperors Severus, Antoninus, and Caracalla, from 
 the year 196 to 220, bringing down this testimony to 
 the faith of Christians, and to their manner of con- 
 fessing that faith, at least a century later than 
 Pliny, and perhaps 120 years after St. John. The 
 following is evidence in confirmation of Pliny,' from 
 Clement.'' 
 
 With a dedicatory hymn Clement presents his work 
 to the PcBdagogus, to God manifest in His incarnate 
 Son, the Conductor and Teacher of mankind, the 
 all-wise Word from God proceeding consentient, and 
 with Him present. Creator and Ruler of the world. 
 The hymn preceding it is rather longer, and abounds 
 in imagery illustrative of the mediatorial government. 
 The following verses are expressly addressed to Christ 
 as God : 
 
 BaatXev dylcov, O king of saints, 
 
 \6ye TravBa/jLaTcop thou all-subduing Word 
 
 irarpo^; vylrlaTov, of the most high Father, 
 
 <ro(f)La^ TrpvravLf thou Lord of wisdom, 
 
 arrjpLyfjia ttovcov thou support in toils 
 
 alwvoxape^^ ever gracious, 
 
 l3poT6a<; j6vea<;, of the race of men, 
 
 (TCJTep *Ir)(Tov. Jesus the Saviour. 
 
 * C. Plinii, Caecil. Epistolarum, X., 97. 
 Clem. Alex., Peed., Lib. III., cap. xii., 101. 
 
CARMEN CHRISTO QUASI DEO. 
 
 187 
 
 oBo'i ovpavia, 
 X0709 a6vao<;, 
 
 ik6ov<; TTTjyr], 
 f)€KTr]p apeTi/9, 
 o-6/jLvr] ^Lorrj 
 
 Heavenly way, 
 ever-during Word, 
 light eternal, 
 fountain of mercy, 
 in virtue strong, 
 life revered 
 
 deov vfMvovvTcoVj Xpt(TT6 of them who hymn thee 
 'Irjaov, God, Christ Jesus. 
 
 aiyov<; a^eXet?, 
 vfJLVOv^ aTp6/ceL<;, 
 ^aaCkel Xptarco, 
 fjLLa6ov(i 6cr[ov<; 
 fa)^9 BcBa'xfj^, 
 fjbi\7rcofjb6V ofiov, 
 fiekircofiev a'iTk(p<;, 
 
 iralBa KparepoV 
 XOpo^ elprjVT]^, 
 01 ypidTor^ovoi^ 
 \ao<^ (Tco(l)pcov, 
 yjraXXcofJLev ofiov deov 
 elpTjvrj^;. 
 
 Simple praises, 
 
 sincere hymns, 
 
 to Christ the King, 
 
 offerings pure 
 
 of lively doctrine 
 
 let us chant together, 
 
 with simplicity let us 
 
 praise 
 the mighty child ; 
 the band of peace, 
 we sons of Christ, 
 people of sober mind, 
 let us together praise the 
 God of peace. 
 
 Flowing spontaneously, as it were, from the lips of 
 Christian worshippers, rather than proceeding from 
 the pen of any author who could now be named, and 
 very early in Christian antiquity, came the first sen- 
 tence of an imperishable doxology: Glory be to the 
 Father y and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost ; ascrib- 
 ing to the Son equal Godhead with the other persons 
 
1 88 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 of the ever-blessed Trinity. Then an emphatical 
 response was added: for ever and ever; and this 
 whole congregations made their own, with a sublime 
 Amen. The poverty of sacred literature in the earlier 
 centuries, beyond what was called forth in the form 
 of apologetic defences of Christianity and epistolary 
 communications between individuals and churches, 
 makes it difficult to collect examples of hymnody 
 that would more directly answer to the account of 
 Pliny ; but such remains as are extant most abun- 
 dantly prove that our Lord Jesus Christ was wor- 
 shipped as God : and after the great councils of 
 Nicaea and Constantinople, the Christian poets gave 
 most free utterance to fervent adoration. A large 
 volume might be compiled from writers of the fourth 
 and fifth centuries, to show how Christians might 
 seem to emulate the angels of God (Heb. i. 6) in 
 honouring the Son, even as they honoured the Father. 
 Their utterances enriched the early liturgies. Perhaps 
 Gregory Nazianzen stands first. I cannot hope to do 
 him justice by any effort at poetical translation, and 
 it would not be easy to select any one that might be 
 pronounced the best, but my eye falls on a few lines 
 which I would fain describe. 
 
 He writes a Hymn to Christ, "Glorious word of 
 the eternal Father, uttering His vast mind, more 
 excellent than any speech ; Light of unmingled light; 
 One-Begotten ; Image of the Immortal Father ; most 
 certain Seal ; shining as bright as that great Spirit ; 
 filling eternity ; whose praise all celebrate ; Giver of 
 all wealth ; enthroned high in heaven ; almighty 
 Source of mind ; Bringer of life; Ruler of all that are, 
 and all that shall be, for by Him all subsist ; by Him 
 
CARMEN CHRISTO QUASI DEO. 1 89 
 
 were laid the foundations of the world, and all things 
 are committed to His care." ' Here we may pause, 
 bearing in mind that the first candid report of 
 Christianity given by a heathen presents the one 
 cardinal truth of our holy religion, that God was in 
 Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself 
 
 Greg-. Naz., Carmina Faria., Carm. LV., Edit. Colon, mdclxxxx. 
 
1 90 
 
 PRIMEVAL FAITH 
 
 Revelation. 
 
 NWRITTEN revelation is as old as the world. 
 No sooner were our first parents created, than 
 they were instructed in their duty to God and to each 
 other. They could understand the instruction they 
 received, and by direct communion with their Creator, 
 gained certain knowledge of His existence and His 
 attributes, and were capable of rendering perfect 
 obedience. A written revelation was not necessary 
 in that state of innocence ; and even after the Fall, it 
 pleased God to communicate His will to some chosen 
 patriarchs, but such communications were infrequent 
 and incomplete. Between the Fall and the Deluge, 
 men did not willingly remember precepts they had 
 no inclination to fulfil ; much was inevitably forgotten, 
 and much was wilfully put out of mind. It is not 
 known that even the most highly favoured of the 
 antediluvian patriarchs left any written memorial of 
 his knowledge or belief, and the few stray writings 
 purporting to be such are too ridiculously absurd to 
 be mentioned. 
 
 Noah and his household could scarcely have pro- 
 duced any considerable fragment of historical writings, 
 except, perhaps, a few notes of the names and ages of 
 Noah's ancestors ; but other memorials, if any had 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. I9I 
 
 existed, but of which there is no authentic trace be- 
 yond what is preserved in a few verses of the book of 
 Genesis, were blotted out. The primeval faith of 
 Adam and his earlier descendants, refreshed some- 
 times by repeated revelation, and preserved by Noah, 
 does not seem to have been preserved by Noah's 
 children ; and the ark, while it became the cradle of 
 a second world, did not produce much, that we can 
 find, besides the corrupt traditions of their latest 
 ancestors. Noah was a righteous man, but not a 
 prophet, and certainly not infallible. He w^orshipped 
 the one true and only God, but left nothing to in- 
 dicate that he was inspired, nothing that could be 
 taken into the canon of Holy Scripture. As for oral 
 tradition of the truth, his family could not be trusted, 
 nor does it appear to have been the w411 of God that 
 His truth should ever be entrusted to the unfaithful 
 memory of men. It is now matter of indisputable 
 fact that the most ancient Chaldean writings, pro- 
 ceeding from the family of Shem, and . probably 
 written within his life-time, contain nothing more in 
 the way of religion than the mythology of their fore- 
 fathers, and represent the very sin for which the 
 world was drowned. Written revelation there was 
 none, and it is well that there was no pretence of any, 
 there not being any person of the eight saved who 
 could produce credentials of a mission to instruct 
 mankind. Prophets when sent from God in after 
 ages brought their credentials with them. There 
 were a few historic memories ; but no code of law, nor 
 any authentic summary of faith. 
 
 After perusing the oldest remains, we think that we 
 can almost see the men that were scattered abroad 
 
192 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 from the City of Confusion, as they migrated into the 
 lands of their dispersion. They write down their 
 current fables, but therewith mingle records of the 
 cities that were built, and whose foundations are laid 
 open by the spade of the excavator ; and they make 
 notes of institutions that afterwards become historic, 
 and these are the broken channels through which we 
 have to pass when searching for vestiges of the 
 primeval faith. The wonder is not that we find so 
 little that can be recognised as such, but that we 
 ascertain so much. Moreover, this kind of evidence, 
 being given unawares, is all the more valuable on that 
 account. It consists of what these men said of them- 
 selves, telling in their own way just what the historian 
 of the Pentateuch prepared the world to hear, yet it 
 never could have expected to hear in such a way. It 
 would have been perplexing to read of children of 
 Babel-builders, more enlightened than their fathers 
 had either time or means to be, more God-fearing 
 than the men whose speech the Lord confounded. 
 
 Hence, too, it comes to pass that a chief god of 
 Babylonians, Egyptians, or Indians is immeasurably 
 inferior in dignity, and unapproachably different in 
 nature, from the one God whose adorable Name has 
 been cherished by some, along the whole track of 
 time, through the imperishable lineage of Seth, and is 
 held most sacred by a branch of it to this very hour. 
 Nay, vestiges of primeval faith have been almost 
 everywhere preserved, however much distorted by the 
 lapses and perversions of human tradition. In ancient 
 Egypt there survived an erratic semblance of im- 
 mortality; in Assyria the confused imagery of a 
 heaven and a hell ; everywhere the confession of a 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. 1 93 
 
 Godhead, with some kind of priesthood and of sacri- 
 fice. On every shore were cast the fragments of a 
 universal wreck, and they are such fragments as 
 powerfully suggest how precious must have been the 
 mass that perished. Even the mockery of those mis- 
 shapen images which are dimly seen amidst the gloom 
 of ancient heathenism, shows a persuasion everywhere 
 lingering that there must exist somewhere the sub- 
 stance of a worthier object of holy fear and filial 
 reliance. All this answers to the statement of an 
 inspired writer, that God made man upright, but he 
 sought out many inventions ; and of another, that 
 they changed the truth of God into a lie, and served 
 the creature more than the Creator. 
 
 Hence we learn the direction that our studies ought 
 to take : they must not begin among the archaic 
 tablets, but must finish there. We must find our way 
 upwards towards times when the primeval faith was 
 not quite forgotten, and when the dim perceptions of 
 men that lived twenty-five centuries ago were less 
 dark than they afterwards became, and the false 
 systems which they framed were less extravagant. 
 There is, indeed, a certain simplicity of statement, 
 sometimes approaching towards the majesty of truth, 
 which entices one-sided readers of antiquity to fancy 
 that they can detect the beginnings of the religion of 
 the Old Testament. But if they expect to find that 
 Moses and the prophets did no more than elaborate a 
 better ordered system out of the traditions they re- 
 ceived, it will be well for them to prepare for failure 
 in the search. Such pains cannot but be vain ; and 
 any theory constructed thereupon with great labour, 
 in the present generation, will require no efibrt for 
 H 14 
 
194 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 its demolition in the next. Nothing less than a 
 revelation from heaven could have given the first 
 elements of divine truth, or imparted a code of law 
 and scheme of doctrine sufficient for the guidance, the 
 happiness, and the moral elevation of mankind. The 
 records we have collected serve to confirm the state- 
 ments of Holy Scripture, but the papers now to follow 
 might show to any one who fancies otherwise that 
 they contain nothing out of which another Bible could 
 be compiled. 
 
195 
 
 THE 
 SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 
 
 LTHOUGH the Egyptian mythology became 
 a maze of intolerable confusion, there does 
 appear in the Hieratic writings a frequent recognition 
 of the sublimest truths : chiefly, the existence of one 
 God supreme, if not absolutely single. On close 
 examination this truth is traced most clearly in the 
 more ancient documents ; but I notice one of the 
 latest first It was propounded very emphatically by 
 Jamblicus, of Chalcis, in his treatise concerning 
 mysteries. Jamblicus was contemporaneous with 
 Constantine the Great, and endeavoured to explain 
 the Egyptian mysteries in the language of Greek 
 philosophers. After acknowledging the multitude 
 and the inconsistency of opinions which had been 
 maintained in Egypt from remotest antiquity down 
 to his own time, he wrote as follows : 
 
 " Before all things that now exist ; before the be- 
 ginning of all, and before the first god and the first 
 king, there is one God, immutable, abiding in his own 
 singleness and unity, and there is nothing, whether 
 intellectual or not, to be confounded with Him. And 
 this God abides the exemplar of the self-begetting, 
 self-begotten, only Father and really good. He is 
 that which is first and greatest. Fountain of all 
 
 14* 
 
196 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 things, and foundation of the first intelh'gible ideas 
 that ever were. Also from that One, the self-sufficient 
 God made Himself shine forth ; wherefore He is 
 father of Himself, and of Himself sufficient, for He is 
 the beginning, and God of gods. Unity from Him 
 that is one, pro-essential, and beginning of being, for 
 from Him proceeds possibility of being (ov(ti,6t7}<;), and 
 beginning of being {koI apxv '''V^ ovcrla<;). Wherefore 
 He is proclaimed t/ie source of mind (vorjTapxv^)- 
 Therefore these are the most ancient beginnings of 
 all, which Hermes (Thoth, god of wisdom) places 
 over the ethereal, empyreal, and heavenly gods." ' To 
 our conceptions the one God, the One before the first 
 god and king, could be none other than the God of 
 divine revelation. The other first god and king, and 
 the multitude of gods and demi-gods that follow, 
 were inventions which made up that maze. Perhaps 
 Jamblicus would not have interpreted his own religion 
 so confidently, if he had not learned how to read the 
 Hermetic writings under the light of the Hebrew and 
 Christian Scriptures, then so well known in Egypt ; 
 but lest this consideration should detract too much 
 from the credit of his testimony, we will refer to a 
 few lines from the 17th chapter of the Egyptian 
 Book of the Dead, as it is repeated on three sarco- 
 phagi of the eleventh dynasty (B.C. 2240-2220), and 
 published and annotated by Professor Lepsius of 
 Berlin. 
 
 "(i) I am Tum, a being that am as one. (2) I am 
 Ra in this first dominion. (3) I am the great god 
 existing of himself, the maker of his name, the lord 
 
 ' Jamblici Chalcidensis, De Mijsteriis Liber, Oxon., 167S, Sect. VIII., 
 Cap. 2. 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 197 
 
 of the whole circle of gods, whom none of the gods 
 resist. (4) I was yesterday, I know the morning. 
 (5) There was prepared a battle-field of the gods, as 
 I said. (6) I know the name of every great god, 
 who the same is. (7) I am that great Bennu of 
 Heliopolis. (8) I am Chem in his manifestation, on 
 whose head are set both feathers. (9) I am come to 
 my home." 
 
 1. A papyrus in the Museum at Turin contains the 
 Book of the Dead, much enlarged, and now accepted 
 as the standard text after very great enlargement 
 during many ages, and explanatory of the oldest text 
 now quoted. The Jirst line is enlarged thus, '*I am 
 Tum, as a being that am one (ei7ies, ev), as the primal 
 water." Dr. Lepsius, whom I now quote, recognises 
 an allusion to the deep, abyss, Dinn of Genesis, ob- 
 serving, however, that the allusion is not found in the 
 oldest text, but crept into the later text. There is 
 another remarkable reading in a papyrus now in 
 Paris, which, instead of the words, " I am as one," 
 gives "who has made the heaven, the creator of 
 things, as God ruling chaos {imii)',' where the mani- 
 fest allusion to the history of the creation in Genesis 
 is extremely significant. 
 
 2. The " first dominion of Ra," which is the name 
 assumed by Ra, whose visible image is the sun, is the 
 dominion he gains after subduing the rebellious 
 powers of confusion, or chaos, mentioned in the note 
 above. The Turin text on this line is extremely 
 mystic, but is explained to show that it consists of an 
 interpolated story of such a battle with eight rebel- 
 lious demons at Hermopolis ; a recent adaptation, it 
 might be, of the tradition of the fallen angels. 
 
IQo ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 3. The Turin paraphrase is, " I am the great god 
 existing of himself, that is to say, the water, the 
 primal water, the father of the gods." The same 
 expositor substitutes for the nmne of Ra his members, 
 the gods, that is to say, to whom he communicates 
 his name; and his unconquerable majesty is repre- 
 sented by the glorious disk of the sun, whose glory no 
 power can subdue. 
 
 4. " I was yesterday, and I know the morning," 
 however mystically explained by later expositors, can 
 only mean, says Lepsius, " I was ever {von je) in the 
 past, and I know for ever the future." ' 
 
 5. What is meant by the battle-field will be ex- 
 plained presently, as will the lines that follow. 
 
 That the reader may understand some further 
 quotations from the same source, it is necessary to 
 give some account of the transformations of the god 
 Ra. In the teaching of the old Egyptian priests the 
 pure and upright man was of a superior nature, at 
 once a person having an existence of his own, and the 
 most high god himself, who, for his part, voluntarily 
 assumed the existence and form of individual man by 
 the transubstantiation of one single god into the 
 several persons of an unlimited number of such men, 
 Tum complete in each, with whose death he returns 
 again into his own existence. All righteous men, as 
 they all in general descend from God, so are they also 
 his members ; or, rather, they are his several names ; or, 
 in other words, they are his several aspects, or forms 
 of his appearance, now seen in this world as separate 
 existences ; but in the world to come, without giving 
 
 ' Aelteste Texle des Tudtenbuclis nach Sarkophagen des altagyptische)! 
 Reichs im berlmer Museum, herausgegeben von R. Lepsius, Berlin, 1867. 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 1 99 
 
 Up their individuality, will then, equally be god him- 
 self again. The most high god in this world of bodies 
 is Ra, originally Tum, visibly the sun, in the world of 
 spirits Osiris. But as after every earthly manifesta- 
 tion a spiritual one is borrowed, so is also Ra, while 
 the sun shines, a visible or earthly manifestation of 
 Osiris. Osiris is the soul of Ra ; he wanders through 
 this world as Ra, now daily changing his name and 
 form of existence, until, every evening, he reaches his 
 own home on yonder side, where he bears rule as 
 Osiris, changing again his name and form. There he 
 bears rule all night as Osiris, as here all day he bore 
 rule as Ra. Next morning he begets himself again, 
 the Ra while the morning-star is paling, and by 
 sunrise, in his rejuvenated form, a youth, he steps 
 into the solar disk as Horus, or Horus-Ra, mounts to 
 the zenith hailed with the salutations of mankind, 
 as he pursues the bright career, droops towards the 
 west, touches the horizon, enters the gate of death, 
 encounters the fiendish demons, conquers them, takes 
 the name of Osiris, reigns in the nether world until 
 the dawn of day, when Horus is again begotten. 
 Horus-Ra resumes his dazzling course, Ra is rowed 
 over the azure sea of space by rejoicing gods: his 
 members too, the pure and upright men who, since 
 his departure yesternight, heaved their last breath, 
 are there waiting to enter Kar-neter with him, do 
 battle with demons, conquer through the power of 
 Osiris, whose name they borrow, and pursue their 
 way by methods appointed, until they reach lofty 
 stations in the land of the blessed. 
 
 Much more might be said about this paTttheus Tum, 
 for that seems to be the original and abiding name, 
 
200 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 yet seldom used, but rather whispered in privacy, and 
 his praises are to be found in hymns,' but most that 
 is in them is new, and would be extraneous to our 
 present subject. 
 
 There is, however, one hymn of extraordinary in- 
 terest, containing much that is directly relevant. It 
 is extant in two select papyri published by the 
 Trustees of the British Museum, and extensively 
 translated, the version before me being that of the 
 Rev. Canon Cook." The author is said to be an 
 Egyptian named Enna, who wrote other works in the 
 reign of Rameses IL, and therefore was contem- 
 poraneous with Moses, and his views of Godhead 
 could not be strange to the Egyptians of his time. 
 The hymn is addressed to the Nile, or rather to the 
 Nile-god, who is called Num, but, according to cus- 
 tom, takes also the names of Ammon and Ptah. But 
 the river-god is adored under his own title, and what 
 is most remarkable, is in part of the hymn addressed 
 in a peculiar style, until the poet relapses into the 
 manner of a mere Egyptian. It seems as if the Nile- 
 god were invested with attributes not shared by any 
 other, and the portion now to be quoted reads as if it 
 contained an article of the primeval faith. Of the 
 fourteen stanzas, there are at least four which appear 
 to present a shadow of the worship offered to the true 
 God before the Egyptian mythology was framed : 
 
 IV. " Bringer of food ! Great Lord of provisions ! 
 Creator of all good things ! 
 Lord of terrors and of choicest joys ! 
 
 * Records of the Past, Vol. II., p. 127, first edition, has a hymn to Amen-Ra. 
 
 * Hid., Vol. v., p. 105. 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 20I 
 
 All are combined in him. 
 He produceth grass for the oxen ; 
 Providing victims for every god. 
 The choice incense is that which he supplies. 
 Lord in both regions, 
 
 He fiUeth the granaries, enricheth the store- 
 houses, 
 He careth for the state of the poor. 
 V. He causeth growth to fulfil all desires, 
 He never wearies of it. 
 He maketh his might a buckler. 
 He is not graven in marble, 
 As an image bearing the double erozvn. 
 He is not beheld: 
 
 He hath neither ministrants nor offerings : 
 He is not adored in sanctuaries : 
 His abode is not hiown : 
 No shrine is found with painted figures. 
 VI. There is no building that can contain him ! 
 There is no cotmsellor in thy heart ! 
 Thy youth delight in thee, thy children 
 Thou directest them as king. 
 Thy law is established in the whole land, 
 In the presence of thy servants in the north : 
 Every eye is satisfied with him : 
 He careth for the abundance of his blessings. 
 VII. The inundation comes, (then) cometh rejoicing ; 
 Every heart exulteth : 
 
 The tooth of the crocodiles, the children of Neith, 
 (Even) the circle of the gods who are counted 
 
 with thee. 
 Doth not its outburst water the fields, 
 Overcoming mortals with joy : 
 
202 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Watering one to produce another(?) 
 There is none who zuorketh with him ; 
 He produces food wit ho? it the aid of Neith. 
 Mortals he causes to rejoice." 
 
 Now if this hymn was written in the time of 
 Rameses II., it is not unlikely that the Egyptian 
 magicians were singing it when, under the reign of 
 Menephtah, Moses and Aaron came back to Egypt. 
 They were messengers of the LoRD, God of the 
 Hebrews, and their commission ran thus : " Thou 
 shalt say unto him : The LORD, God of the Hebrews, 
 hath sent me unto thee, saying. Let my people go, 
 that they may serve me in the wilderness : and 
 behold, hitherto thou wouldest not hear. Thus saith 
 the Lord, In this thou shalt know that I am the 
 Lord : Behold, I will smite with the rod that is in 
 mine hand upon the waters that are in the river, and 
 they shall be turned to blood. And the fish that is 
 in the river shall die, and the river shall stink ; and 
 the Egyptians shall lothe to drink of the water of the 
 river." (Ex. vii. 16-18.) And this was done. The 
 fish were all dead, and the river stank. The praises 
 due to the God of the Hebrews had been given to the 
 god of the river, but this plague came in spite of 
 them ; and perhaps, while the Egyptians were digging 
 in vain for water, and sickening of that which they 
 were forced to drink, they might bethink themselves 
 of two or three lines of another stanza (IX.) : 
 
 "When hewilleth,hegoethforth from his mystic fane. 
 Thy wrath is destruction of fishes. 
 Then men implore thee for the waters of the 
 season," 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 203 
 
 and hear with dismay that their adoration had been 
 misplaced, and their praises ought to have been ren- 
 dered to the Lord. But now began the manifesta- 
 tions of the true and only God which could not be 
 possibly forgotten, nor fail to introduce the knowledge 
 afterwards professed by Jamblicus. 
 
 Although the unity of the Godhead was taught 
 esoterically, and the doctrine was produced by such 
 men as Jamblicus in defence of their religion, after 
 the Old and New Testament Scriptures were known 
 in the world by millions who were neither Jews nor 
 Christians, and the existence of one God, Father of 
 gods and men, had been for many ages familiar to 
 both Greeks and Latins, and was taught more dis- 
 tinctly by the Stoics, — polytheism, and nothing better, 
 was known to the Egyptians in general, whether in 
 earlier or later times : and even Tum, the very first 
 divine name in the oldest documents, was not con- 
 fined to the being self-begotten and supreme in his 
 original existence, but exchanged for another and 
 more usual name, Ra ; and Ra, maker of this name, 
 communicated it to others, while those other gods yet 
 bear their own names, and these names again are 
 mysteriously exchanged and endlessly multiplied. 
 
 But it did not please the Lord to give Moses any 
 name to be published as his own in Egypt. " God 
 said unto Moses, / am that I am. And he said. Thus 
 shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, / am, hath 
 sent me unto you," Perhaps this does bear some 
 resemblance to a form of speech which I remember 
 to have met with somewhere in these translations, 
 but cannot quote it now. Even so, it is not a name, 
 but an affirmation only, which neither names nor 
 
204 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 describes. "And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus 
 shalt thou say unto the children of Israel : The Lord 
 God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God 
 of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto 
 you : this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial 
 unto all generations." (Ex. iii. 14, 15.) To all genera- 
 tions it is indeed a memorial of the faithfulness of the 
 God of Abraham, but it was not known in Egypt, it 
 was not one of the innumerable names of Egypt. It 
 was not framed after their manner. It had no mean- 
 ing in their language. It was a memorial belonging 
 to a distant history, and Pharaoh said accordingly, 
 *' I know not the Lord." In truth, there was no 
 name in Egypt, nor could any name be spoken there 
 that would to the perverted mind of the people have 
 conveyed any other idea than that of one god out of 
 a multitude. The primeval truth was lost. It was 
 restored, however, to the Hebrews, when Moses re- 
 ceived the revelation on Mount Sinai, and pro- 
 claimed, " Hear, O Israel ! the LORD our God is one 
 Lord." 
 
 Diligent search has been made in the most ancient 
 writings known in the heathen world as sacred, for 
 traces of pure monotheism, as distinguishable from 
 philosophic pantheism, but without any reliable suc- 
 cess. Hymns in the Vedas of India, and sentences 
 of the oldest Chinese kings, contain sayings which, 
 when extracted and read separately, certainly appear 
 to assert the existence of a supreme, self-existent, and 
 only God. But the context, it is said on the best 
 authorities, generally qualifies the texts quoted, or 
 other texts of equal authenticity contradict them. 
 The student remains unsatisfied. He has now to 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 205 
 
 determine whether those rare and imperfect glimpses 
 of the truth were caught from primeval revelation, 
 and indicate a half-recovered memory, fading and 
 soon to die away; or whether they were philosophical 
 conclusions of polytheists dissatisfied with their own 
 mythology, and seeking to exalt one of their great 
 gods high enough to maintain subordination and 
 good fellowship among the inferior spirits/ 
 
 As yet we cannot hear of any Assyrian monument 
 of equal age and equally certain origin with the 
 so-called history of Izdubar, that affords further in- 
 formation on the Subject. As yet we do not know of 
 any material relic of the time before the Deluge, or 
 having obvious relation to that time, that evidences 
 belief in the existence of the one true God, Creator of 
 heaven and earth, the God who revealed Himself to 
 man while yet in paradise, and thenceforth made 
 Himself known to his descendants from age to age. 
 It is a fact which cannot be controverted that in all 
 the Assyrian inscriptions which have come to light, 
 there is no trace whatever of true monotheism. The 
 idea of one only God was lost Is it not, then, a 
 reasonable conclusion that polytheism was the root 
 and substance of the manifold sins which brought 
 down the Deluge on the world ; and that the sur- 
 vivors of the Deluge, guilty of the same offence, could 
 only, in their ignorance, describe that visitation of 
 God's displeasure as the united work of the many 
 gods whom their imagination had created ? They 
 conceived a god, Hea, for example, being at the head 
 of the pantheon at one time, and Vul, or some one 
 
 ' Hardwick, in his Christ and other Masters (Cambridge, 1858), II., 93; 
 III., 46, evidently arrives at a similar conclusion. 
 
2o6 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 else, at another, in turn exerting some sort of 
 supremacy, like the temporary president of a republic ; 
 but beyond that concession to the necessity of order 
 the men of Nineveh could never go. 
 
 Yet when Noah came out of the ark, and with his 
 family offered sacrifice to God, and received the sign 
 of a perpetual covenant, much primeval truth must 
 have been remembered, and he, at least, must have 
 had a knowledge of the Divine unity. It could not 
 then have been forgotten that God was the Creator, 
 and however much obscured during the time that 
 elapsed between the Deluge and the dispersion from 
 Babel, some would continue in His worship. The 
 Chaldeans might utterly forget, but universal forget- 
 fulness would be impossible. 
 
 Therefore, turning away from the polytheism of 
 Chaldea, Babylonia, and Assyria, we search again for 
 some vestiges of belief in one God, Creator of the 
 world, in the earlier mythology of Egypt; and have 
 already quoted a passage of the Book of the Dead, 
 where the almost forgotten god Tum is made to 
 speak of himself as the self-existent God, as it is 
 written on the sarcophagus of Men-tu-hotep, a king 
 of the eleventh dynasty, in the twenty-third century 
 before Christ. This is enlarged in the Turin manu- 
 script of Professor Lepsius, where it is written and 
 explained as follows : ''I am the great god, self- 
 existing, that is to say, the water, the divine primeval 
 water, the father of the gods." This is undoubtedly 
 an addition to the earlier text, but it does not follow 
 that the tradition of primal waters, Urgewdsser, as 
 Lepsius renders it, did not exist when the earlier text 
 was written: for that it did exist long before the Turin 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 207 
 
 papyrus was written in the twenty-sixth dynasty, about 
 the time of the Babyloniah captivity, is indeed sug- 
 gested by the expression the water, or the primaL 
 water, as referring to something famiharly known. It 
 is certainly possible, but not in the least degree pro- 
 bable, that the Mosaic history, which contains a men- 
 tion of the same thing, might have been known to 
 some persons in Egypt at that time ; and that the 
 writings of Moses were not known in Egypt three 
 or four hundred years later than the Egyptian manu- 
 script now quoted, must be inferred from the fact that 
 Ptolemy Philadelphus could not find them there. Nor 
 can it be conceived possible that the Egyptian priests, 
 even if they could have read the book of Genesis in 
 Hebrew, would date back their great god Ra, and his 
 father Tum, to the same original. The enlarged sen- 
 tence in the Book of the Dead at once recalls the 
 words of Moses : " The Spirit of God moved upon the 
 face of the waters " (Gen. i. 2), where, also, the waters 
 apparently indicates a familiar belief, as well as the 
 deep, the Hebrew word Dinn being almost, or quite, 
 the same as Tum, the mysterious father of all the 
 gods, who calls himself the zuaters, source of all things. 
 But while the Egyptian notion is that self-existent 
 water gave being to all the gods and to the universe, 
 the statement in Genesis is that darkness was on the 
 deep, and that the Spirit of God moved upon the 
 waters ; the one conception being absurd, while it is 
 consistent with reason to believe that the Spirit of 
 God is the Author of creation. But this notwithstand- 
 ing, we find a similarity of language arising, as all 
 language must arise, from the thing spoken of: and 
 here the thing spoken of varies only as it is viewed 
 
2o8 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 under the light of revelation, or concealed under 
 pagan misapprehension of a tradition common to 
 children of the same father. 
 
 It is well known that Greece had a similar tradition, 
 and the words of Hesiod have been quoted a thousand 
 times, until perhaps, they cease to be remembered, and 
 may be once more repeated : 
 
 H TOL fxev TrpcoTcara %<xo<? yever, avrafj eirena 
 r" evpva7epvo<;, irdvTwv eho<^ datpaXh alel 
 AdavcLTWv. 
 
 Btit chaos was first of all, tJien after chaos, the zuide- 
 spread land, firm dwelling for all the immortal gods J- 
 But older than Hesiod, Orpheus, if Orpheus ever was, 
 or if not, the mythology embodied in one of the 
 hymns that bear the name of Orphic. It was pre- 
 served by Eusebius Pamphilus, who introduces it to 
 his readers as a compendium of the theology of the 
 followers of Orpheus. It shows how the effort to 
 construct a system of divine government under one 
 chief, without the knowledge of God, which can only 
 be attained by means of revelation, leads to pantheism 
 at best. 
 
 Ziev<^ 7rpcoTO<; jivero, feu? vaTaTO<; dpyiicepavvo^^ 
 Zev^i Ke<paX7), ^ev<; fiecraa, Sto9 S' e/c Trdvrd rervKTat, 
 Zev^ dpcrrjv yevero, ^6V<; d(f)6i,To<; iirXero vvfi(f)r). 
 Z6V<^ 7rv6/jir)v yalrj<; re koX ovpavov darepoevTO^. 
 Zev^ irvoirj iravTcav feu? d/cafidrov irvpo<; opfjurj. 
 Zev<^ TTovTov pi^a' feu? ^Xto? ^Se aekyvrj. 
 Zeifg /8a<rtX6U9, feu? avTo<; dirdvrwv dpy^iyeveOXo'^. 
 'Ev Kpdro^, eh Saificov jevero^ fieya^; dpyp^^ diravrcov. 
 *Ev he he/jLa<; ^aatkeoov, ev to5 rdhe Trdvra KVKXetrac, 
 
 ^ Hesiodi T/ieogonia, 116-118. 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 209 
 
 nop Kal vScop, Kol yala^ kol aWr)p, vv^ he koX yfiap, 
 Kal firjrk irpcoro^ yevercop, kol €p(o^ TTokUTepirrjf;. 
 UdvTa yap iv fxeyaXo) ^r]po<; rdSe crco/uLart Kelrai. 
 Tov Btjtol K6(j)aX7)v /jL6V ISelv, Kal Ka\a TrpoacoTra, 
 Ovpavo^ aly\r)6L^, 6v ')(pv(TeaL dficj^U Weipai, 
 Aarpcov /jbapfiapicov TrepiKaXkee^ rjepedovraL. 
 Tavpea S' dfJbcporepwOe Svo ')(^pvaeia Kepara. 
 AvTo\l7]T€ Bvac^i re, ^ecoz^ oSol ovpavLoovwv. 
 Ofifjuara 8' r]€Xi6<^ re, /cat dvTi6(oaa creXijvr}, 
 Nov<i he ye d'\jrevBr]<;, l3acri\r)Lo<;, a(j)6Lro<i aWrjp 
 fli Br), irdvra KVKkei Kal cppd^erac, ovBe Tt<; avSr}, 
 OvT ivoTTT), ovre /ctutto?, ovhe fiev oaaa, 
 H \r]6eL hib^ via virep fxeveo^i Kpovl(ovo<i, 
 fliSe fiev ddavdrrjv Ke^aXrjv 6%6z/, 7]he vorjfia. 
 ^(o/JLa he ol 7repc(j)eyye<;, direipLrov^ dcrTvc^eXiKTOv^ 
 Ol3pi/jLov, o^pLfidr/voov, virep /jueve^, Q)he rervKTO 
 flfiot fjbev KOL (TTepva, kol evpea vcora Oeolo. 
 Arjp evpvl3L7)(;, 7rT€pvye<i he ol e^ecfyvovro. 
 Tfj a eiro irdvra irordrai' leprj he ol eirXero vrjhv^, 
 Tald re ira/jL/jLrjretpa, opecovr aiireiva Kaprjva. 
 Meaar) he ^oovrj /Sapvrj'^eo'; olh/jua 6a\daar)<^, 
 Kal fTOVTOv^ TTVixdrr] he ^dai^ % ^01/09 evhodv pi^ai 
 TapTapd T evpdoevra, Kal ea^ara Trelpara yaL7]<i. 
 Tlavra 8' d7roKpv'\jra<; avOi^; ^do<^ e? 7ro\vyr)6e<i, 
 MeWev diro Kpahlr]^ 7rpo(f)epeLv iroXvOeaKeXa pe^cov. 
 Zev<; ovv 6 ttol^ Koafjuo^^ ^cooy Ik ^(s)(ov^ Kal deo^ eK Oewv^ 
 
 " Zeus was born first, Zeus last, glorious thunderer. 
 Zeus the beginning, Zeus the middle, and of Zeus 
 
 all things are. 
 Zeus was born male, Zeus became pure virgin 
 spouse. 
 
 * Euseb., Prce<^. Evang., III., 9. 
 M 15 
 
2IO ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Zeus is foundation both of earth and starry 
 heaven. 
 
 Zeus breath of all, Zeus force of unwearying fire. 
 
 Zeus root of sea, Zeus both sun and moon. 
 
 Zeus king, Zeus himself chief parent of all 
 things. 
 
 One power, one daemon born, great prince of all. 
 
 And one royal frame, whereby all things are en- 
 compassed. 
 
 Fire and water, and earth and aether; night also, 
 and day. 
 
 Both parent first in counsel, and much delighting 
 love. 
 
 For in the vast body of Zeus do all things lie. 
 
 Then by seeing his head, and lovely features 
 
 Brilliant heaven, around whom golden hairs 
 
 Of shining stars arise most lovely. 
 
 And on both sides two bulls' horns of gold 
 
 Both east and west, ways of the celestial gods. 
 
 And for eyes the sun, and the moon opposite 
 thereto. 
 
 And for mind, unerring, royal, untainted aether. 
 
 Around him all things move, and he deliberates, 
 but there is no sound. 
 
 No clamour, and no uproar, not a single voice. 
 
 The son of Zeus is not ignorant of the anger of 
 Chronion, 
 
 Even he who had his immortal beginning, and his 
 mind ; 
 
 And his body dazzling bright, not to be pierced 
 through, nor injured. 
 
 Robust, powerful, resistless, whomsoever he en- 
 counters. 
 
THE SUPREMACY AND UNITY OF GOD. 211 
 
 Shoulders and breast, and back broad, as becomes 
 
 a god. 
 Air wide prevailing, and far reaching wings. 
 With which he broods over all ; and he has a 
 
 sacred bosom. 
 And earth, mother of all, with lofty mountain 
 
 heights, 
 And for mid-zone the swelling ot deep sounding 
 
 sea. 
 And remote ocean bed, and the profound founda- 
 tions of the land. 
 And the broad plains of Tartarus, and utmost 
 
 ways of earth. 
 And having hidden all things, out into glad light 
 
 again. 
 Is about to offer from the heart most sacred 
 
 gifts. 
 Zeus, then, is all the world, life of the living, and 
 
 god of gods." 
 
 Mere monotheism, a doctrine of one god, without 
 the light of revelation, such as the ancient Persians 
 appear to have had, has proved equally futile. Hero- 
 dotus relates what he heard of their religion, which 
 was probably less pure than that held in the time of 
 Cyrus by that people, who did not receive the in- 
 struction which he could not but receive from Daniel. 
 " The customs which I know the Persians to observe," 
 says the historian, " are the following. They have no 
 images of the gods, no temples nor altars, and con- 
 sider the use of them as a sign of folly .... Their 
 wont, however, is to ascend the summits of the loftiest 
 mountains, and there to offer sacrifice to Jupiter, 
 
 15* 
 
212 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 which is the name they give to the whole circle of 
 the firmament. They likewise offer to the sun and 
 moon, to the earth, to fire, to water, and to the 
 winds." ' Afterwards they borrowed from the Ara- 
 bians and the Assyrians, but chiefly adopted the 
 dualism of Zoroaster. Further we might go ; but with 
 regard to the knowledge of God, our conclusion still 
 would be that this was lost to the heathen world, even 
 while some important truths were in some degree 
 retained; the first element of true theology could be 
 faintly traced as a truth practically forgotten, and 
 the Hebrews did not recover it for themselves, but 
 were indebted for their knowledge to the teaching of 
 the Holy Spirit, through Abraham, Moses, and the 
 prophets. 
 
 ^ Herod. Hist., I., 131. Rawlinson's translation. 
 
213 
 
 PRIMEVAL FAITH. 
 
 THE FUTURE STATE.— EGYPT. 
 
 HE Egyptians," says Diodorus, "call the habi- 
 tations of the living inns, because they only 
 dwell in them for a short time. The tombs of the 
 deceased, however, they call eternal habitations, where 
 they in the sepulchres shall live through unbounded 
 eternity." Indeed their sepulchres, excavated in the 
 solid rock, were more durable than their palaces, and 
 have actually outlasted them. Herodotus is a yet 
 more valuable witness. He had visited both Memphis 
 and Thebes, the metropoles of Lower and Upper 
 Egypt, and also the famous priest-city of Heliopolis, 
 the On of Genesis. (Gen. xli. 50.) Everywhere he 
 had conversed with the priests, and was initiated into 
 their mysteries. He had acquainted himself, by per- 
 sonal observation and study, with the customs and 
 traditions of the country ; and the fruits of his 
 research appear in the second and third books of his 
 history. It was he who noticed the singular custom 
 of a servant, at the close of a banquet, carrying round 
 the wooden image of a corpse, or mummy, in a coffin, 
 carved and painted in imitation of the real object, 
 presenting it to each guest, and saying, " Gaze here, 
 and drink and be merry, for when you die, such will 
 you be." Nor was this festive rejoicing over death so 
 
214 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 unreasonable as it might seem to be ; for those 
 Egyptians had no truer conception of death than 
 their priests gave them, when they taught the rich, 
 whose tables they surrounded, that they would be 
 honourably "justified" at the hour of death, and 
 received into the company of the gods, in a world of 
 pleasure, to feast in a celestial paradise. Of such a 
 judgment after death as the Christian revelation 
 teaches, they had no conception, and therefore no 
 dread, and would gaily say, " Let us eat and drink, 
 for to-morrow we die." 
 
 This view of the matter is entirely confirmed by 
 one of those very songs. It is called " The song of the 
 house of king Antuf, deceased," having been sung 
 during his life, and no doubt expresses the sentiment 
 prevailing at an Egyptian banquet. 
 
 "All hail to the good prince, the worthy good 
 man. The body is fated to pass away, the atoms (or 
 perhaps the little ones, the children) remain, ever 
 since the time of the ancestors. The gods who were 
 beforetime rest in their tombs ; the mummies of the 
 saints likewise are enwrapped in their tombs. They 
 who build houses, and they who have no houses, see 
 what becomes of them ! I have heard the v/ords of 
 Imhotep (a god) and Hartatef (a sage). It is said in 
 their sayings, After all, what is prosperity.'* Their 
 fenced walls are dilapidated. Their houses are as 
 that which has never existed. No man comes from 
 thence who tells of their sayings, who tells of their 
 affairs, who encourages our hearts. Ye go to the 
 place whence they return not. Strengthen thy heart 
 to forget how thou hast enjoyed thyself, fulfil thy 
 desire whilst thou livest. Put oils upon thy head, 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. FUTURE STATE. EGYPT. 215 
 
 clothe thyself with fine linen adorned with precious 
 metals, with the gifts of God. Multiply thy good 
 things. Yield to thy desire. Fulfil thy desire with 
 thy good things, whilst thou art upon earth, according 
 to the dictation of thy heart. The day will come to 
 thee when one hears not the voice, when the one who 
 is not at rest hears not their voices. Lamentations 
 
 deliver not him who is in the tomb Feast 
 
 in tranquillity, seeing that there is no one who carries 
 away his goods with him. Yea, behold, none who 
 goes thither comes back again." ' 
 
 This might seem to contradict their faith in immor- 
 tality, but it only goes to prove that their faith was 
 barren of comfort. They could talk of resting in 
 their mummies until the time came to get their bodies 
 back again, but their only practical conclusion was, 
 " Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." 
 
 Mariette-Bey, in his notice of the principal monu- 
 ments in the Museum of Boulac, mentions the 
 mummy-case of a queen, whose husband reigned over 
 all Egypt, from Nubia to the Mediterranean, whereon 
 were painted these words in one conspicuous line : 
 " The royal principal wife, who received the favour 
 of the white crown, Aah-hotep, living for eternity." "- 
 She was of the eleventh dynasty, and therefore must 
 have been laid in that coffin some time between 2020 
 and 2240 years before Christ. 
 
 The mystic sentences, cut into the marble sarco- 
 phagi, written on papyrus, and otherwise preserved 
 from very remote antiquity, contain the doctrine of 
 
 ^ Translated by C. W. Goodwin, M.A., Records of the Past, Vol. IV., 
 p. 115. 
 
 ' Brugsch-Bey, Hisloire d'Egypte, 1875, I., 166. 
 
2l6 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Egypt concerning the state of the departed, and the 
 entire collection is called The Book of the Dead. As 
 it stood in the twenty-sixth dynasty, from B.C. 664 to 
 525, or thereabouts, is what is now taken as the 
 standard text. The chapters were considered to be 
 inspired, and were the rule of faith, and the directory 
 for practice.' 
 
 This book taught that the soul, when born into the 
 world, was imprisoned in a human form, to endure a 
 living death. For the sake of the soul, thus impri- 
 soned, they paid an excessive honour to the human 
 person, which, according to their philosophy, con- 
 sisted of five parts, or principles, namely, Ba, the soul, 
 represented in hieroglyphic by the figure of a hawk 
 with human head and arms ; Akh or Khn, intelli- 
 gence ; Ka, existence, or breath of life ; Khaba, 
 shade ; Kha, body ; and besides this, Sah, or 
 mummy, which remains after the dissolution of the 
 living frame. The soul is not described as created, 
 and if not created it must be divine. The Ka, or 
 existence, was held to be the special gift of Tum, the 
 sun after sunset.' 
 
 According to this book, the soul, immediately after 
 her separation from the body, addresses the gods of 
 the lower world. In that address the defunct recounts 
 his titles to the favour of Osiris, and demands admis- 
 sion into his empire. The choir of happy souls sup- 
 port his plea. The priest on earth implores the 
 clemency of the gods. Osiris hears the prayers, and 
 bids the deceased enter freely into Amenti, the 
 Egyptian paradise. Many chapters follow, relating 
 
 ' Translated by Dr. Samuel Birch, London, 1S67. 
 * P. Pierret, Diet, d' Archcologie, Egypt. Atoum. 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. FUTURE STATE. EGYPT. 217 
 
 to the funeral ceremonies. When at last the deceased 
 is admitted into paradise, he is amazed at the glory 
 of the sun-god, whom he sees for the first time. He 
 chants a hymn of praise, and makes many invocations. 
 The great evil serpent threatens to swallow him up, 
 but he defies it and escapes. Now he passes through 
 the gate of the West, as the god Osiris, he has the 
 paths of heaven and earth laid open before him. Gods 
 and goddesses make way for him to pass. 
 
 Now comes a multitude of wild im.aginations. The 
 deceased has to be reconstructed. A mouth and 
 speech are given him for use in paradise. Charms are 
 given him to produce new ideas, and he has a new 
 name, and a new heart besides. He rejoices in the 
 amplitude and perfection of his powers, and delights 
 himself in raptures of self-congratulation. He opens 
 heaven and exults. 
 
 The chapters of this book served as charms. Men 
 learned them while imprisoned in their bodies in this 
 world, that they might remember to recite them in 
 the next. Sixteen of them have the virtue, if recited, 
 of preserving the bodies of the dead in the tombs, and 
 keeping them safe from "the gnawing worm, the 
 snake, the tortoise, the malignant fiends, and the 
 noisome vermin that infest the chambers of death. 
 Nine chapters are for the living to recite for the 
 benefit of the dead, to save them from an eternal 
 overthrow. Twelve relate to their diet in Amenti. 
 Other twelve are supposed to describe the manifesta- 
 tion to light of the uncorrupted human body, invested 
 with undying powers, and surrounded with manifold 
 defences against mortality. They are now to come 
 forth as the day, break through the barriers of 
 
2l8 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 sepulchral night, mount up into meridian glory, and 
 ascend towards heaven. 
 
 With all this diligence there seems little hope of 
 rest, and ways without end are devised to save the 
 mummy from being injured, and the soul from dis- 
 appointment and mischance. Millions of years may 
 pass before the vast cycle of existence shall revolve ; 
 many transmigrations, for better or worse, may come 
 to pass ; and provision must be made for all. 
 
 But the section of '' the hall of the two truths, or 
 scales of justice," is of the highest interest. Until the 
 reader comes to this part of the book, he may suppose 
 that the Egyptians relied on nothing for happiness 
 beyond the grave except charms, or protestations of 
 his own, or of his priest, until here, at length, he finds 
 mention of a judgment after death. Here the 125th 
 chapter tells of "going to the hall of the two truths, and 
 separating a person from his sins, zuhen he has been 
 made to see the faces of the gods!' The person to be 
 judged, and weighed in the balance by Anup, judge 
 of the dead, appeals to the supreme judge, and to his 
 assessors, forty-two in number ! 
 
 " O ye lords of the truth ! Let me know you. I 
 have brought you truth ! Rule ye away my faults. I 
 have not privily done evil against mankind. I have 
 not afflicted persons or men. I have not told false- 
 hood in the tribunal of truth. I have had no acquaint- 
 ance with evil. I have not done any wicked thing. 
 I have not made the labouring man to do more than 
 his task daily. I have not exceeded what is ordered. 
 I have not been idle. I have not failed. I have not 
 ceased. I have not been weak. I have not done 
 what is hateful to the gods. I have not calumniated 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. — FUTURE STATE. —EGYPT. 219 
 
 the slave to his master. I have not made to weep. I 
 have not murdered. I have not given orders to smite 
 a person privily. I have not committed fraud to men. 
 I have not injured the images of the gods. I have 
 not taken scraps of the bandages of the dead. I have 
 not committed adultery. I have not spat against the 
 priest of the god of my country. I have not falsified 
 measures, nor thrown the weight out of the scale, nor 
 cheated in the weight of the balance. I have not 
 withheld milk from the mouths of sucklings." And a 
 great many other things that have not been done are 
 also enumerated. 
 
 The remarkable code, of which no more than this 
 brief and partial sketch can now be given, contains 
 evidence that amidst a vast accumulation of super- 
 stitions, the mere sport of an unrestrained imagination, 
 there lay a confession of responsibility to a superior 
 power, with the expectation of a final judgment, and 
 a measure of reward or punishment in an eternal 
 state. Lepsius ' has demonstrated, by comparison of 
 documents, that the chapters of this death-book were 
 far more simple in the earlier ages of Egyptian his- 
 tory ; and his statements at the same time prove that 
 the vestiges of a primeval faith were more distinct. 
 And here let me observe that this persuasion of im- 
 mortality and judgment after death was always a 
 leading characteristic of the religion ; and this being 
 the case, and the Hebrews, moreover, having become 
 Egyptian in all their habits, if not in all their prin- 
 ciples, that vast multitude whom Moses led out of 
 Egypt, and to whom he gave the law, could not have 
 
 ' Aelteste Texte des Todienbuchs, von R. Lepsius, Berlin, 1867. 
 
220 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 been insensible to the fact that whatever they did in 
 this world they would have to answer for in the world 
 to come. But there is another aspect of the case in 
 which the Hebrews were actually concerned, and 
 which, therefore, we must not overlook. 
 
 Amongst the Egyptian remains, there is the sarco- 
 phagus of Seti I., father of Rameses II., in whose 
 reign it is believed that Moses was born. On this 
 receptacle of the royal mummy is inscribed a picture 
 of the last judgment, with a lengthened representation 
 of the scene, as it appeared to the mind of an Egyp- 
 tian. A lengthened explanation of the picture is also 
 cut into the stone. 
 
 The great god Ra is the central figure. He is in 
 the form of a man with a ram's head, standing erect 
 in the solar boat, which a vast serpent encircles with 
 its folds. Two demi-gods, named San and Haken, 
 are on board, one at the prow, and the other at the 
 poop. Four infernal beings drag the boat with a 
 thick towing-cable, and many other beings, whether 
 of hell or heaven none can tell, attend in strong pro- 
 cession. At the right hand of Ra stands Horus, 
 leaning on a tall staff, hawk-headed, in sign of wis- 
 dom, quick sight, and swiftness to take the prey. 
 Four quaternions represent the four races, as they 
 will be at the last judgment, namely. Men, Asiatics, 
 Negroes, Libyans. The first are Men, Egyptians pre- 
 eminently so considered. The second are Asiatics, 
 less than men, as slaves might seem to be, and the 
 Hebrews were in reality Asiatic slaves. The third, 
 Negroes, and the fourth, Libyans, ranked yet lower in 
 the scale of being, yet, as they were capable of adoring 
 Ra, they were charitably counted worthy to come 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. FUTURE STATE. — EGYPT. 221 
 
 before the judges, and might even be allowed some 
 humble place in paradise.' 
 
 In this picture of the last judgment it is easy to 
 discern some shadow of the scriptural teaching on the 
 subject ; such as the assemblage of all mankind, a 
 separation of the righteous and the wicked, and the 
 reward or punishment to follow. Apart from these 
 circumstantial resemblances, the Egyptian scheme is 
 but remotely descended from the primeval revelation ; 
 and the Biblical teaching is not directly traditional, 
 but brought to the world by inspired prophets, and 
 most distinctly by the Saviour. But the divergence 
 is too wide to allow conciliation, and the opposition 
 so absolute that there can be no comparison. What 
 we chiefly gather from the sepulchral documents of 
 Egypt is a direct evidence of irrecoverable degeneracy, 
 together with proof, not to say demonstration, that 
 before the making of those records in Egypt, and the 
 call of Moses at the burning bush, the early genera- 
 tions of mankind had been duly taught concerning 
 death and resurrection, judgment and immortality. 
 
 But before closing this section, it may be well to 
 note a writing of later date, " probably from the epoch 
 of the Ptolemies." It is called *' the Book of Respira- 
 tions," or Book of the Breaths of Life, and consists of 
 salutations to a deceased person. One of these salu- 
 tations will show how confidently the Egyptians were 
 instructed in this belief. 
 
 " Hail to the Osiris N ! 
 Thine individuality is permanent. 
 
 * Les Quatre Races au Jiigement Dernier, read April 6, 1S75, Trans. 
 Soc. Bib. Arch., Vol. IV., p. 44. 
 
2 22 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Thy body is durable. 
 
 Thy mummy doth germinate. 
 
 Thou art not repulsed from heaven (neither from) 
 
 earth. 
 Thy face is illuminated near the sun. 
 Thy soul liveth near to Ammon. 
 Thy body is rejuvenated near to Osiris. 
 Thou dost breathe for ever and ever. 
 Thy soul maketh thee offerings, each day, of 
 
 bread, of drinks, of oxen, of geese, of fresh water, 
 
 of condiments. 
 Thou comest to justify it. 
 
 Thy flesh is on thy bones, like to thy form on earth. 
 Thou dost imbibe into thy body. 
 Thou eatest with thy mouth. 
 Thou receivest bread with the souls of the gods. 
 Anubis doth guard thee. 
 He is thy protection. 
 Thou art not repulsed from the gates of the lower 
 
 heaven. 
 Thoth, the doubly great, the lord of Sesennu, 
 
 Cometh to thee. 
 He writeth for thee the book of respirations with 
 
 his own fingers. 
 Thy soul doth breathe for ever and ever. 
 Thou dost renew thy form on earth, among the 
 
 living. 
 Thou art divinized with the souls of the gods. 
 Thy heart is the heart of Ra. 
 Thy members are the members of the great god 
 
 (Osiris). 
 Thou livest for ever and ever."' 
 
 ' Translated by P. J. De Horrack, Records of the Past, Vol. IV., p. 119. 
 
223 
 
 PRIMEVAL FAITH 
 
 THE FUTURE STATE.— ASSYRIA. 
 
 HILE one class of writers takes it for granted 
 that Moses knew nothing of the immortaHty of 
 the soul and a future state, and therefore could only 
 offer to obedient Israelites temporal rewards, others 
 have proved the contrary by resistless arguments. It 
 is not my business to go over this ground again, but 
 to confine my attention to such recently discovered 
 monuments as contribute evidence in favour of the 
 belief that from times far anterior to the most ancient 
 book of Holy Scripture, these fundamental truths of 
 revealed religion were given to the world. 
 
 Mr. Fox Talbot was among the first to discover 
 the confession of a future state, and of the immortality 
 of the soul, strangely mingled with worship of the 
 Assyrian gods. It occurs in a prayer for one of 
 the kings, translated from a tablet in the British 
 Museum, and reads thus : " Length of days, long 
 lasting years, a strong sword, a long life, extended 
 years of glory, pre-eminence among kings, grant to 
 my lord the king, who has given such gifts to his 
 gods. The vast and wide bounds of his empire and 
 of his rule may he enlarge, and may he complete. 
 Holding supremacy, and royalty, and empire over all 
 kings, may he attain to grey hairs and old age." 
 
224 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Thus far goes the yearning after the things of this 
 world, which are sought first. Then the author of the 
 prayer rises higher in acknowledgment of the truth 
 not yet utterly obscured, yet spoiled with polytheism. 
 "And after the gift of these present days, in the feasts 
 of the land of the silver sky, the refulgent courts, the 
 abode of blessedness : and in the light of the happy 
 fields, may he dwell in a life eternal, holy, in the pre- 
 sence of the gods who inhabit Assyria." * Here is 
 a confession of life and immortality, yet it is debased 
 with a large alloy of error. The prayer to the gods 
 of Assyria contains a confession of glorious truths, 
 but it is made in darkness. It was but half cherished 
 in the world, and half lost, yet it gains full acceptance 
 when men receive the revelation of the Gospel, shed- 
 ding light on life and incorruption, (^corlaavro^ ^corjv kol 
 a<f>dapo-Lav. 
 
 The confidence of Job that after the destruction of 
 his body he should see God (Job xix. 25-27), and the 
 signal faith of Abraham, who proceeded to make 
 Isaac a burnt sacrifice to the Lord, " accounting that 
 God was able to raise him up, even from the dead " 
 (Heb. xi. 17-19), sufficiently prove that the doctrine 
 of a future life was known in the world before Moses. 
 The traces of such a truth, however perverted, are 
 very clear. The legend of the descent of Ishtar has 
 attracted great attention. It has been studied very 
 carefully by several Assyriologists, but especially by 
 Mr. Talbot and the late Mr. Smith. Mr. Talbot 
 gives the following improved translation, with the 
 approval of his colleague in the work : 
 
 ' Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, Vol. I., p. 107. 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. — FUTURE STATE. ASSYRIA. 225 
 
 " Column I. (i) To the land of No-return ' (Hades), 
 the land of her desire, (2) Ishtar daughter of the 
 moon-god San turned her mind, (3) and the daughter 
 of San fixed her mind (to go there) : (4) to the house 
 where all meet : the dwelling of the god Irkalla : 
 (5) the house which those who enter it, never come 
 out : (6) the road which those who travel it, never 
 return : (7) the house which those who enter it, are 
 deprived of light : (8) where earth is their food ; their 
 nourishment clay: (9) light is not seen; in darkness 
 they dwell : (10) ghosts, like birds, flutter their wings 
 there : (11) upon the gate and the gate-bars the dust 
 lies undisturbed. 
 
 " (12) When Ishtar arrived at the gate of No-return 
 (Hades), (13) to the keeper of the gate a word she 
 spoke: (14) O keeper of the entrance! open thy 
 gate! (15) Open thy gate, I say again, that I may 
 enter ! (16) If thou openest not thy gate, and. I enter 
 not, (17) I will assault the door: I will break down 
 the gate : (18) I will attack the entrance : I will split 
 open the portals : (19) I will raise the dead, to be the 
 devourers of the living ! (20) Upon the living the 
 dead shall prey! (21) Then the porter opened his 
 mouth and spoke, (22) and said to the great Ishtar, 
 (23) Stay, lady ! do not shake the door ! (24) I will 
 go, and tell this to the queen Ninkigal. (25) The 
 porter entered, and said to Ninkigal, (26) These 
 curses thy sister Ishtar (utters), (2^) blaspheming thee 
 
 ' Land of No-relurn. The translation which I have the advantage of 
 copying, instead of any that preceded, has the Greek word Hades, but 
 Mr. Talbot, in an Appendix to his Notes, approves of " Land of No-return" 
 as the exact rendering of the original ; and certainly it is far superior to a 
 foreign word, which needs translation for general readers, and sounds very 
 harsh amidst the admirable simplicity of the version. 
 
 H .16 
 
226 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 with great 'curses (....). (28) When Ninkigal 
 heard this (....) (29) she grew pale, Hke a flower 
 that is cut off: (30) she trembled like the stem of a 
 rood : (31) I will cure her rage, she said, I will cure 
 her fury, (32) these curses I will repay to her! 
 (33) Light up consuming flames ! Light up blazing 
 straw ! (34) Let her doom be with the husbands who 
 deserted their wives ! (35) Let her doom be with 
 their wives who from their husband's side departed ! 
 (36) Let her doom be with the youths who led dis- 
 honoured lives ! (37) Go, porter, open the gate for 
 her, (38) but strip off her jewels, like those of former 
 people. (39) The porter went and opened the gate. 
 
 (40) Enter, lady of Tiggaba city ! It is permitted ! 
 
 (41) The sovereign of No-return will come to meet 
 thee! 
 
 "(42) The first gate admitted her, and stopped her : 
 there was taken off the great crown from her head. 
 (43) Keeper! do not take off from me the great 
 crown from my head ! (44) Enter, lady ! for the 
 queen of the land demands her treasures ! 
 
 "(45) The ^second gate admitted her, and stopped 
 her : there were taken off the earrings of her ears. 
 (46) Keeper ! do not take off from me, the earrings of 
 my ears ! (47) Enter, lady! for the queen of the land 
 demands her treasures ! 
 
 "(48) The third gate admitted her, and stopped 
 her : there were taken off the precious stones from 
 her head. {49) Keeper! do not take off from me, the 
 precious stones from my head ! (50) Enter, lady I 
 for the queen of the land demands her treasures ! 
 
 "(51) The fourth gate admitted her, and stopped 
 her : there were taken off the small lovely gems from 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. FUTURE STATE. ASSYRIA. 227 
 
 her forehead. (52) Keeper, do not take off from me, 
 the small lovely gems from my forehead ! (53) Enter, 
 lady ! for the queen of the land demands her trea- 
 sures ! 
 
 " (54) The fifth gate admitted her, and stopped 
 her: there was taken off the central girdle of her 
 waist. (55) Keeper! do not take off from me, the 
 central girdle of my waist ! (56) Enter, lady ! for the 
 queen of the land demands her treasures ! 
 
 "(57) The sixth gate admitted her, and stopped 
 her : there were taken off the golden rings of her 
 hands and feet. (58) Keeper! do not take off from 
 me, the golden rings of my hands and feet ! 
 (59) Enter, lady ! for the queen of the land demands 
 her treasures I 
 
 (60) The seventh gate admitted her, and stopped 
 her : there was taken off the last garment from her 
 body. (61) Keeper, do not take off from me, the last 
 garment from my body! (62) Enter, lady! for the 
 queen of the land demands her treasures ! 
 
 (63) After that mother Ishtar had descended into 
 the land of No-return, (64) Ninkigal saw her, and de- 
 rided her to her face. (65) Ishtar lost her reason, and 
 heaped curses upon her. {66} Ninkigal opened her 
 mouth and spoke ; {6y) to Namtar her messenger a 
 
 command she gave : {62) Go, Namtar {some 
 
 words lost). (69) Bring her out for punishment .... 
 {words lost). 
 
 "Column II. (i) The divine messenger of the 
 gods lacerated his face before them.' (2) He tore 
 his vest Rapid words he spoke. (3) The Sun 
 
 * A sign of violent grief and evil news. Forbidden in Deut. xiv. i ; 
 Lev. xix. 28. 
 
 4 16* 
 
228 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 approached. He joined the Moon his father. 
 
 (4) Weeping they spoke thus unto Hea the king : 
 
 (5) Ishtar descended into the earth : and she did not 
 rise again, (6) and since the time that mother Ishtar 
 descended into the land of No-return, (7) the bull has 
 not sought the cow, nor the male of any animal the 
 
 female. (8) The slave and her master {some 
 
 words lost). (9) The master has ceased from com- 
 manding ; (10) the slave has ceased from obeying. 
 (11) Then the god Hea in the depth of his mind laid 
 a plan : (12) he formed, for her escape, the figure of a 
 man of clay. (13) Go to, save her, phantom ; present 
 thyself at the portal of No-return ; (14) the seven 
 gates of No-return will open before thee, (15) Nin- 
 kigal will see thee, and will come to meet thee. 
 (16) When her mind shall be grown calm, and her 
 anger shall be worn off, (17) awe her with the names 
 of the great gods! (18) Prepare thy frauds! On 
 deceitful tricks fix thy mind ! (19) The chiefest 
 deceitful trick ! Bring forth fishes of the waters, out 
 of an empty vessel ! (20) This thing will astonish 
 Ninkigal : (21) then to Ishtar she will restore her 
 clothing. (22) A great reward for these things shall 
 not fail. (23) Go, save her, phantom, and the great 
 assembly of the people shall crown thee ! (24) Meats, 
 the first of the city, shall be thy food ! (25) Wine, 
 the most delicious in the city, shall be thy drink I 
 (26) A royal palace shall be thy dwelling ! (27) A 
 throne of state shall be thy seat ! (28) Magicians 
 and conjurers shall kiss the hem of thy garment ! 
 
 "(29) Ninkigal opened her mouth and spoke; 
 
 (30) to Namtar her messenger a command she gave ; 
 
 (31) Go, Namtar, clothe the temple of justice! 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. FUTURE STATE. — ASSYRIA. 229 
 
 (32) Adorn the seats and the (33) Bring out 
 
 Anunak ! Seat him on a golden throne ! (34) Pour 
 out for Ishtar the waters of life, and let her depart 
 from my dominions ! (35) Namtar went, and clothed 
 the temple of justice, (36) he adorned the seats and 
 
 the (37) he brought out Anunak ; on a 
 
 golden throne he seated him ; (38) he poured out for 
 Ishtar the waters of life, and let her go. (39) Then 
 the first gate he let her forth, and restored to her, the 
 first garment of her body. (40) The second gate he 
 let her forth, and restored to her, the ornaments of 
 her hands and feet (41) The third gate let her forth, 
 and restored to her, the central girdle of her waist. 
 (42) The fourth gate let her forth, and restored to 
 her, the small lovely gems of her forehead. (43) The 
 fifth gate let her forth, and restored to her, the pre- 
 cious stones of her head. (44) The sixth gate let her 
 forth, and restored to her, the earrings of her ears. 
 (45) The seventh gate let her forth, and restored to 
 her, the great crown on her head." ' 
 
 Let this be what it may : a mythic legend, or a 
 poem, or what, if written in the middle ages, would 
 be called a mystery, or miracle-play ; whatever it is, 
 or by whomsoever composed, the author must have 
 had a conception of the region of the departed not 
 unlike that of the prophets Isaiah (Isa. xiv.) and 
 Ezekiel (Eze. xxxii.). He had heard of a fiery doom 
 for the wicked after this life, and an eternal prison. 
 He had learned to give up all hope of taking any- 
 thing out of this world with him to be enjoyed in the 
 next. He had learned to conceive of the possibility 
 of release from the house where all must meet, and of 
 
 * Trans. Soc. Bib. Arch., Vol. III., p. ii8. 
 
230 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 a return, having help from heaven, even by the way 
 on which none can return without it. Whatever his 
 faith or his unbeHef might be, he ventured to speak 
 as one who thought it not incredible that a God of 
 gods should raise the dead. Here again, then, is 
 evidence that a thought of immortality had been 
 breathed into the minds of men, some faint hope 
 at least that the gates of the realm of death and 
 darkness might, by a sovereign power, be broken 
 open after all. 
 
 Yet more important are some fragments which tell 
 of an established and unquestionable belief, as 
 Mr. Talbot observes, of a future state, as expressed in 
 the daily life of the Assyrians. For example : a man 
 is expected to die, and they offer up this prayer for 
 his soul : " Like a bird may it fly to a lofty place ! 
 To the holy hands of its god may it return ! " Or 
 this : " The departed man, may he be in glory ! May 
 his soul shine radiant as brass ! To that man may 
 the Sun give life ! And Marduk (Merodach), eldest 
 son of heaven, grant him an abode of happiness ! " 
 The death of a righteous man is eloquently described 
 on a tablet, imperfect like most of the tablets from 
 Nineveh, but of which the following lines are pre- 
 served : ' 
 
 ' Trans. Soc. Bib. Arch., Vol. II., p. 29. With much regret I note an 
 assertion of Mr. Talbot in a paper read to the Society of Biblical 
 Archaeology on 1st April 1873, that "when the Jews returned from the 
 Babylonian captivity, they brought with them a multitude of new opinions 
 and superstitions which had not been known in former times; 'and also 
 some much purer doctrines, among which was pre-eminent a belief in the 
 immortality of the soul, which, after the captivity was universally received, 
 except by the sect of the Sadducees, who rejected it." (Trans. II. 50.) 
 If it were so, we should not find any statement of the doctrine, nor any 
 allusion to it, in the Old Testament Scriptures before the captivity, and 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. FUTURE STATE. ASSYRIA. 23 1 
 
 " (i) Tempest in heaven, lightning on earth, are 
 raging. (2) Of the brave man who was so strong, his 
 strength has departed. (3) Of the righteous servant, 
 the force does not return. (4) In his bodily frame he 
 lies dangerously ill. (5) But Ishtar smiles upon him 
 with a placid smile, (6) and comes down from her 
 
 there was little inspired Hebrew Scripture after it : but it has been abun- 
 dantly proved that such is not the case. Passing by many passages which 
 indicate belief in the doctrine of immortality, or without a recognition of 
 the doctrine would not be intelligible, I content myself with marking some 
 where it is distinctly stated : " Enoch walked with God, and was not, for 
 God took him" (Gen. v. 24.) The Psalmist said, " God will redeem my 
 soul from the power of the grave, for he shall receive me." (Psa, xlix. 15.) 
 The writer of Ecclesiastes argues that while both men and beasts go unto 
 one place, and that one place is the dust to which their bodies are turned, 
 "the spirit of man goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast goeth down- 
 ward to the earth." (Ecc. iii. 20, 21.) And again: "The dust shall 
 return to the earth as it was; and the spirit unto God who gave it." (Ecc. 
 xii. 7.) God said to Moses, " I am the God of thy father, the God of 
 Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob" (Ex. iii. 6, etc.) ; and 
 our Lord insists thereupon, "As touching the resurrection of the dead, 
 have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am 
 the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob ? God 
 is not the God of the dead, but of the living." This not only astonished 
 the multitude, but ^11 1 the Sadducees to silence. (Mat. xxii. 31-34.) The 
 patriarch Jacob telling Pharaoh his age, calls his life a. ■pilgrimage. (Gen. 
 xlvii. 9,) David in prayer said: "We are strangers before thee, and 
 sojourners, as were all our fathers: our days on the earth are as a shadow, 
 and there is none abiding." (i Chr. xxix. 15.) St. Paul, speaking of the 
 faith of those who so confessed, reasons, " For they that say such things 
 declare plainly that they seek a country, .... a better country, that is an 
 heavenly." (Heb. xi. 13-16.) No language could be more explicit than 
 that of David, " I have set the Lord always before me : because he is at 
 my right hand, 1 shall not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad, and my 
 glory rejoiceth; my flesh also shall rest in hope.- For thou wilt not leave 
 my soul in the grave, "''i*^^?, neither wilt thou suffer thy Holy One to see 
 corruption. Thou wilt shew me the path of life : in Thy presence is fulness 
 of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore." (Psa. xvi. 
 8-1 1.) All this, and much more, was familiar to the Israelites long before 
 the two captivities of Nineveh and Babylon ; and after Babylon, was 
 received by all the Jews, until a few turned infidel after the sect of Sadok 
 was set up. 
 
232 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 mountain unvisited of men. (7) At the door of the 
 sick man she speaks. (8) The sick man turns his 
 head: (9) Who is there.? Who comes.? (10) It is 
 Ishtar, daughter of the moon-god Sin : (11) It is the 
 
 god son of Bel : (12) It is Marduk, son of the 
 
 god (13) They approach the body of the 
 
 sick man. {The next line, 14, is nearly destroyed) 
 (15) They bring a khisibta (jewel.?) from their heavenly 
 treasury: (16) They bring a sisbuQ) from their lofty 
 storehouse: (17) To the precious khisibta they pour 
 forth a hymn. (18) That righteous man, let him now 
 depart. (19) May he rise as bright as that khisibta! 
 (20) May he soar as high as that sisbii ! (21) Like 
 pure silver may his figure shine ! (22) Like brass 
 may it be radiant ! (23) To the Sun, greatest of the 
 gods, may it return ! (24) And may the Sun, greatest 
 of the gods, receive the saved soul into his holy 
 hands ! " 
 
 Here we return to Egypt for a moment, to place 
 in contrast with a distinction marked between the 
 righteous and the wicked by the Assyrians before death, 
 so far as the examples hitherto collected enable us 
 to judge, the exorbitant self-admiration of the Egyp- 
 tians, who seem to have placed great reliance on a 
 communion of divinity between themselves and their 
 gods. They ascribed great efficacy to a proclamation 
 of their virtues on entering the nether world, and an 
 assumption of the name of a god, especially Osiris. 
 There was no satisfactory doctrine as to judgment after 
 death. The deceased had to do battle with malignant 
 fiends, and by his own prowess win his way to the 
 bright plains of heaven. He was to plead his merits be- 
 fore the judges in the hall of judgment. The survivors 
 
PRIMEVAL FAITH. — FUTURE STATE. ASSYRIA. 233 
 
 were always to believe that his own post mortem efforts 
 were to be successful. Somewhere we are always sure 
 to find the rudiments of the purely heathen doctrine 
 of purgatory for the dead, and a correspondent pre- 
 sumption in the living. This delusion pervades the 
 Book of the Dead. It altogether fills the Book of 
 Migrations, whence we take two sections, by way of 
 specimen. 
 
 " Hail ! Osiris {here the earthly name is to follozv), 
 thou comest to the house of glory in great purity; 
 the goddesses of truth made thee exceedingly pure at 
 the great tribunal. Thou hast a grand cleansing at 
 the tribunal. The god Seb purified thy members at 
 the tribunal. Thou art fair by looking on Ra, and 
 the conjunction of the god Atune at the place of 
 darkness {that is to say, the sim at his settiiig). 
 Ammon is with thee, giving thee breath, and the god 
 Ptah, bending thy limbs. Thou comest to the 
 horizon with Ra ; thy soul is received into the barge 
 with Osiris ; thy soul is divine in the house of Seb, 
 and thou art justified for ever. 
 
 " Hail ! Osiris .... Thy name remaineth ; thy 
 mummy is fresh ; thou art not excluded from heaven 
 nor from earth. Thy soul shineth with Ra ; thy soul 
 liveth with Ammon ; thy body is renewed with Osiris ; 
 thou goest on migration for ever." ' 
 
 It is written on their monuments, as witnesses an 
 epitaph at Beni-Hassan : 
 
 " I have not troubled the son of the poor man ; I 
 have not oppressed any poor widow ; I have not dis- 
 turbed any fisherman ; I have not driven away any 
 shepherd ; there was no householder whose servant I 
 
 ' Sdi an Sinsin, Edidit Hen. Brugsch, BeroHnij 1S51. 
 
234 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 took for labour. No prisoner languished in my days; 
 no one died of hunger in my time. When there were 
 years of hunger, I had all the fields of my Nomos 
 ploughed, into the northern and the southern boun- 
 daries. I gave nourishment to the inhabitants, and 
 fed them. There was no hungry person in it. I gave 
 the widow equal measure with the married woman. I 
 did not prefer the rich to the poor." ' 
 
 A very perfect example of the same kind was pro- 
 duced in a paper by M. Chabas, read to the Society 
 of Biblical Archaeology while this last sheet was in 
 the press (May i, 1877). The person departed was 
 lord of the public granaries, and a great favourite 
 with the Pharaoh. His name was Beka, which is said 
 to mean slave, and it is suggested that, like Joseph, 
 he was a foreigner. The style of the inscription, 
 however, is entirely Egyptian, and when printed, it 
 will be seen that while there is sufficient mention of 
 the general excellence of this Beka, he insists (if he 
 prepared it before his death, which is probable) that 
 his great virtue was veracity. He boasts all through 
 of an unfailing love of truth, in which respect he is 
 represented as immaculate through all his life, and in 
 all his relations. So in every similar writing. Every 
 soldier is victorious ; every tyrant is humane and 
 generous ; every libertine is devoted to the gods. 
 Whoever dies is described as the justified, just as in a 
 Greek menology he is 6 fiaKdpio<iy the blessed ! 
 
 ' Die agyPtische Grabericelt, von Heinrich Brug-sch, Leipzig-, iS6S. 
 
235 
 
 SACRIFICE, 
 
 OTH sacrifice and oblation were presented to 
 God by members of the first human family, 
 and the sacrifice was offered in faith. But faith could 
 not exist without the declaration of some truth pre- 
 ceding, or the promise of some blessing that should 
 thereafter be received. That blessing might be the 
 bruising of the serpent's head, the triumphant issue 
 of a prolonged conflict predicted in Eden after the 
 Fall. (Gen. iii. 15.) 
 
 The next recorded sacrifice was offered by Noah, 
 after the subsidence of the Deluge ; and after this, the 
 mention of sacrifice is frequent in the Old Testament, 
 and sacrificial rites, of some kind or other, became 
 prevalent throughout the Gentile world. Whether or 
 not this manner of worship was directly ordained of 
 God at the beginning, it received the Divine sanction ; 
 both these sacrifices were signally accepted; and 
 under the Mosaic law the victims became typical of 
 the body of Christ, who suffered to make atonement 
 for the sins of all mankind. Then were these words 
 written : " There remaineth no more sacrifice for sins " 
 (Heb. X. 26) ; that is to say, for those who refuse the 
 benefit of that atonement. 
 
 " The Babylonian legend of the Creation," as the 
 late Mr. George Smith called it in the fifth chapter of 
 
236 ORIENTAL RFXORDS. 
 
 his Chaldean Accormt of Genesis, was inscribed in 
 tablets of which there are but a few fragments as yet 
 translated ; but in the fragmentary translations we find 
 some very important sentences in relation to this 
 subject, and may hope that other students will, from 
 time to time, recover much of what is wanting to 
 complete the Chaldean tradition of the Creation, the 
 Fall, and the events which followed. 
 
 Tablet K 3364, in the British Museum, contains on 
 the obverse an address to the newly created man, 
 called Adam, as in the Bible,' instructing him in his 
 duties. Among the broken lines are these, almost 
 perfect : 
 
 " (8) Every day thy god shalt thou approach (or 
 invoke). (9) Sacrifice, prayer of the mouth, and in- 
 struments (10) to thy god in reverence thou 
 
 shalt carry (ii) whatsoever shall be suitable for 
 divinity, (12) supplication, humility, and bowing of 
 the face, (13) fire(.?) thou shalt give to him, and thou 
 shalt bring tribute, (14) and in the fear also of god 
 
 thou shalt be holy (17) Sacrifice saving 
 
 (18) and worship (19) the fear of god 
 
 thou shalt not leave (20) the fear of angels 
 
 thou shalt live in " 
 
 It is remarkable that no mention is found here of 
 any other than one god, who is called god, or thy god, 
 although there are gods many and goddesses, whose 
 names crowd the tablets. But the name of Adam's 
 god, who is elsewhere said to have created him, is Hea, 
 one of the chief divinities, and very prominent indeed 
 in the Chaldean and Assyrian mythology, and appears 
 to agree very closely with the verb rrri to be, and to 
 
 ' The Chaldea?! /Iccnnnl of Genesis, 1S76, p. 304. 
 
SACRIFICE. 237 
 
 express the radical idea of the name of God, the n^ni^ 
 n>ni< i^i^ declared to Moses. (Ex. iii. 14.) And the 
 style of this inscription is certainly peculiar. Sacri- 
 fice, daily prayer, prayer of the mouth, supplications, 
 humility, and bowing of the face, almost entirely con- 
 stitute the ritual of this primeval worship. Fire, if 
 this be the true rendering of an indistinct word on the 
 broken clay, may be intended to consume the burnt 
 offering, such as Abel gladly brought, firstlings of the 
 flock, and fat, to be laid with faith upon the altar. 
 Tribute, such, perhaps, as the fruit of the ground 
 which Cain brought ; but with Cain it was a servile 
 offering rather than an oblation made in thankful 
 faith ; and this may serve to illustrate the sad scene 
 described in Gen. iv. 3-8. Stipplicatioii, too, conveys 
 an acknowledgment of sin, for which sacrifice is 
 needed, and of which this Chaldean legend makes 
 distinct mention.' Then, again, reverence ; the fear 
 of God ; living in the fear of angels, or such fear as 
 angels have ; holiness : these are words to indicate 
 the spirit of this primeval worship, and I observe that 
 Mr. Smith himself so regarded it. And thus the 
 earliest of the Cuneiform documents, for this Assyrian 
 is also a translation from the Chaldean archaic, like 
 the oldest sentences in the Egyptian Book of the 
 Dead, is also the most simple. Both the one and the 
 other come nearest to the simplicity of the first five 
 chapters of the book of Genesis, which the document 
 now quoted so admirably confirms. 
 
 / See "Antediluvians," p. lo of the preceding volume. 
 
238 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 NOTES ON THE FRAGMENT OF A SYRIAC 
 MANUSCRIPT, AT PAGE 175. 
 
 AVING presented to my readers the tracing of 
 three verses of the most ancient known version 
 of the Gospels, — obtained by permission from a leaf 
 of one of the Curetonian Syriac manuscripts in the 
 British Museum, and considering it to be, as nearly 
 as possible, a visible memorial of the Gospel on the 
 eastern side of the Euphrates immediately after our 
 Lord's ascension, I append a few notes by way of 
 elucidation. 
 
 Students of the history of early Christianity well 
 know that one of the first things done in every 
 country where the Gospel was first proclaimed, was to 
 supply those who received it with copies of portions 
 of Holy Scripture; not excepting the Books of the 
 Old Testament, already extant in Greek as well as 
 Hebrew, as the Pentateuch had been for ages in 
 Chaldee, the word of God being always written in 
 the language of the people. It was undoubtedly in 
 view of providing authentic information and in- 
 struction by this method, that the four Evangelists 
 wrote their biographies of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 which were published without delay, and read 
 
APPENDIX. 239 
 
 by friends and foes, by a Justin and a Porphyry, and 
 were soon translated into vulgar languages : the 
 dialects of Egypt for example. So it was not left for 
 fame only to inform all Syria of the person and the 
 ministrations of Jesus ; and when Thaddaeus went to 
 Edessa, as related above, he might carry with him, or 
 would very soon receive the first Gospel written in 
 Hebrew, as the Aramaic, or Syriac, spoken at that 
 time in Palestine, is called in the New Testament* 
 That the first Gospel was originally so written by 
 St. Matthew was attested without contradiction by the 
 earliest and most considerable Christian authorities,- 
 and is now generally acknowledged. 
 
 We learn from Hegesippus that there was a Gospel 
 according to the Hebrews, Ka& 'E^paLov<;, that is to say, 
 as the Hebrews, or Jews read it, before their dis- 
 persion from the Holy Land after the year 70, and a 
 Gospel translated into Syriac from the Hebrew dialect, 
 CK TTjfi 'E(3paLBo<; BiaXeKTov, both which books he saw 
 about the middle of the second century.^ These two, 
 the Palestine Syriac and the Edessene Syriac, were to 
 each other what the original Hebrew of the Law of 
 Moses, and the Chaldee Targum were, after the 
 Babylonian captivity. The Hebrew and Greek 
 editions of the Gospel, with the Edessene Syriac, may 
 have been issued simultaneously, or as soon afterwards 
 as possible, Thaddaeus the translator of the last being 
 too far off to work in actual concert with St. Matthew. 
 
 The custom of publishing in diglot was not unusual. 
 
 * Acts xxi. 40; xxii. I. 
 
 ' Papias, Irenaeus, Pantaenus, Origen, Eusebius, Cyril of Jerusalem, 
 Athanasius, Epiphanius, Jerome. 
 3 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. IV. 22. 
 
240 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Josephus, for example, published his history of Jewish 
 Antiquities in Greek for the Gentiles, and in Hebrew 
 for the Jews. Public records in Egypt were written at 
 once in hieratic for the priests, and in demotic for the 
 people: in China there are still two dialects in use, the 
 mandarin and the common. So, in short, wherever 
 the subject of writing is meant to be understood, it is 
 published without reservation or delay, in the lan- 
 guage or languages of the people for whose benefit or 
 direction it is intended. 
 
 We have now before us, in the size of the original, 
 a fragment of the most ancient " Curetonian 
 Syriac." The manuscript itself may not be older 
 than the fifth century, but the version it contains is 
 most probably the same as that written by Thaddaeus, 
 or under his direction, which served himself and his 
 disciples during the greater part of the twelve or 
 thirteen years of the reign of Abgar as a Christian 
 king, from A.D. 33 or 34 to 45 (when he died), and by 
 their successors in generations following, until a 
 revised version took its place. In short, as Dr. Cureton 
 says : " If we are to place any faith in the tradition 
 constantly maintained in the Syrian churches, the 
 books of the New Testament originally in Greek, 
 which have been admitted into the (Syrian) canon, 
 were translated into Syriac before the end of the first 
 century.' There is also a record preserved of the date 
 of a copy of the Gospels in Syriac transcribed at 
 
 " Dr. Cureton says, " In the days of Abgar, the first Christian king- of 
 Exiessa, under the superintendence of Adai." But this must be an over- 
 sight. I find by the dates given in Asseman, Bib. Or. I. 420, that Abgar 
 began to reign a.d. 8, and died a.d. 45. In the remaining years of the 
 century, certainly there was time enough for all the New Testament to be 
 translated. 
 
APPENDIX. 241 
 
 Edessa by Achaeus, the friend of one of Adai's 
 (Thaddaeus') own disciples as early as A.D. JJ or 'jZ, 
 And if this is to be relied upon, it is no unreasonable 
 inference to draw, that the Gospels of St. Mark and 
 St. Luke were translated into Syriac even before the 
 present canonical Greek version of St. Matthew ex- 
 isted.'" The writer describes "a certain Gospel of 
 Edessa extremely ancient, indeed, but bright and 
 clear, from which not a stroke had faded ; but it was 
 easier to read than books lately written, and only one 
 sheet was missing from the manuscript, which had 
 fallen off through age. At the end was written : 'This 
 holy book was completed on the fifth day of the week, 
 the eighteenth of the first Canum (December) of the 
 year 389 of the Greeks (A.D. yZ) by the very hand of 
 Achai the Apostle, companion of my Lord Maari, 
 disciple of my Lord Adai the Apostle. May his 
 prayer be with us: Amen.'"' The description of this 
 manuscript might very well apply to the one whose 
 fragments are translated by Dr. Cureton, before it was 
 abandoned and shattered in a dark cell of the Egyptian 
 monastery; and the Gospel of Edessa ought now to 
 be forthcoming in the Vatican Library, where it was 
 deposited in the year 1721 or thereabout. And an in- 
 ternal mark of primitive antiquity is archaic simplicity 
 of style, a frequent rudeness and incompleteness of 
 rendering, which passes away as the version is corrected 
 from time to time in later copies, until at last the Peshito 
 
 ' Remains of a very ancient Version of the four Gospels in Syriac, 
 hitherto unknown in Europe; discovered, edited, and translated by 
 William Cureton, D.D., F.R.S., etc. London, 1858. Preface lxxvii., 
 Lxxvin. 
 
 ' Index Codicum MSS., Asseman, BiH. Oriental, II., 468. 
 H ]7 
 
242 ORIENTAL RECORDS. 
 
 Syriac, as it is called, bears the evidence of careful 
 revision. The Curetonian fragments, however, most 
 frequently agree in leading characteristics with the 
 three most ancient Greek manuscripts, the Sinaitic, 
 the Vatican and the Alexandrian. 
 
 At the close of this little volume after a less difficult 
 but not less interesting task, I cannot refrain from 
 adopting entirely for my own the closing sentences 
 of Dr. Cureton when putting forth his edition of the 
 Nitrian fragments : " I have honestly and fearlessly 
 sought for the truth in my labours ; and during their 
 progress I have had the vast satisfaction of continually 
 obtaining additional conviction of the genuineness and 
 authenticity of these documents of our faith, of the 
 impossibility of their being other than what they are 
 represented to be, and of the wonderful fidelity of the 
 transmission of the text in all essential matters 
 whatever; in the midst of some variations which 
 nothing but a constant miracle could prevent, by 
 several processes of philological argument and reason- 
 ing, which rest solely upon the free critical examination 
 of numerous questions into which the task has led 
 me." 
 
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