Forlong - Rivers of Life
Forlong - Rivers of Life Forlong - Rivers of Life
94 Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands. Egypt, nay Mexico in the Far West, vied with China. and Japan in the Far East, and from unknown ages, to do him honour. They called him the Spirit of the Sun—the holy Osiris—OB or AB, the FATHER OF ALL, and surrounded him with winged glories, and to Fig. 32—SUN OF THEBES him, say the Chinese to the present hour, do their mighty dead go. 1 He was as sacred as fue and water, in almost every nation, when we first hear of it; save with Zoroastrians, the teachers of the Jewish cosmogony, and they called him in their early writings the first creation of their Satan, Ahriman, but this was, I suspect, a heresy from an older faith which loved him. The wildest as well as most civilised nations alike revere this svmbolic reptile: the Dahomeys of this day have a grand palace for their holy serpent, as Egypt had for Apis, which is a later god than Op-is, the serpent deity; he who kills a snake in Dahomey can only be purified through fire and water. The universality of Serpent Worship has long been acknowledged by the learned, though rarely of late in Europe has the real cause or symbolism been understood. It is called Ophiolatry, or Ophiolatreia, and thereupon put aside as quite understood, but “a mere superstition,” not even so good as Mary-olatry, and nothing to compare to Bibli-olatry, or Christ-olatry, &c. I suspect we migbt count upon our fingers the number even of learned men who in Europe see through the real meaning of the Serpent. Even the Bible story so familiar to all Europe regarding woman bruising its bead, and it her “heel,” or rather Akab bqu, which Dr Donaldson tells us “is the pudenda muliebria,” is a matter which is quite da.rk to Europe though when repeated to an intelligent Sivaite makes him merely smile. It is fraught with meaning and truth, and, properly viewed, is history. It is not all Asiatics who comprehend the Serpent; the far back writer of mythic Sankoniathon failed to do so, or else he satirized mankind, for he makes Sankoninthon speak as if both he and the Egyptian Obelisk- God-King, Toth or Tauthus, did not see the significance of their faith. In Cory’s Ancient Fragments, it is said that Sankoniathon attributed to Toth the first adoration of the Serpent, and taught this to the Egyptians, “because the Serpent is the most inspirited of all reptiles, and of a fiery nature, swift, moving without hand, assumes a variety of forms, and darts with swiftness, is long-lived, renews its youth, and enlarges its size and strength.” Yet the writer knew, and so do we know, that mankind do not woxahip strange creatures, per se, but only as bringing before them godlike attributes or features, mysterious and divine. It is not as the insignificant though death-dealing little reptile, that man has worshipped him, as we shall see before I have rehearsed even the little I know of his ways and of this faith; this would never have crowned him the Basileus of so many great nations and made so many monarchs, 1 The official edict of this year, announcing the death of their late young king, says “he has gone to the great Dragon.”
Serpent and Phallic Worship. noblest and priests proud to wear his up-reared form on their brows or frontlets. Let us glance somewhat generally at him. Archeological research, until within the last two generations, showed him as a sort of sporadic superstition, though often divine, yet ever closely associated with trees and fetishes, and only revered and occasionolly worshipped in the lowest strata of civilization; for it overlooked that “as our civilization so shall our gods be;” and that sensual and warring people, love “a god of battles,” him who accepts their barbarous sacrifices and neglects not their passions. The Serpent was Siva in an his creature energies and being so, loved human and bloody sacrifices, though he can dwell with races who have passed into a higher stage than this. In Greece as well as in India, he survived human sacrifices, though it is probable he would demand and have these again in the East, were the British power withdrawn from India. In Egypt, we see the Serpent under a multitude of symbols and connected with nearly all the animal kingdom, and often disguised as an animal or bird, as the hawk for vivacity and wisdom, the bull for power, &c. In Asyria he is often Nishrok, the “eagle-headed-one,” as in India he is sometimes Vishnoo, the “eagleborne one.” We meet him, says Fergusson, everywhere “in the wilderness of Sinai, the groves of Epidaurus, and in Samothracian huts.” Yet it is incorrectly held that he sprang from the land of the lower Euphrates and is peculiar to the Turanian rather than to the Aryan or Shemitic races. My own investigations oblige me to confess that he is a bold man who can fix the place of his birth and death. Lucan in Phars. lib. ix. 727, says :—“Vos quoque qui cunctis innoxia numina terris Serpitis aurato nitidi fulgore Dracones.” 1 Rome says she got him from the outlying parts of ltaly, and Fergusson, following Herodotus and others, shows us his habitation nearly everywhere. We know that he was accepted into the bosom of the Christian Chureh amongst comparatively learned Nicolaitans and Gnostics, and even when not worshipped, was held by all Chistians as of vast importance in Gentile faiths. Christ confessed his “wisdom,” which he muat have learned from the traditional story connected with the Eden myth, for of the reptile’s actual wisdom we know nothing; yet many of Christ’s followers treasured Serpents, and called themselves Ophites, and the reptile, their Saviour’s representation if not more. Was not the Serpent “the healer of the nations” of Israel from the days of Moses to Hezekiah; occupying the most prominent spot in their holy places far 700 years and probably much longer. Wandering Arabs or Edumean outcasts from Egypt were, however, but an insignificant part of the mighty crowds which followed Python, or Ops, and called him incarnate power and wisdom; he was the power of the Lawgiver’s Rod, Banner, or Caduceus, for this is a true Phallic emblem, and one which in the case of Israel “the Jhavh” became incarnate in, by turning it into that “holy thing,” which Moses was desired in his troubles to hold up in his hand, and to rear up on a pole for the salvation of the 1 Trans.—You also Serpents which creep gleaming in golden splendour, hamless deities in all lands. 95
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Serpent and Phallic Worship.<br />
noblest and priests proud to wear his up-reared form on their brows or frontlets. Let<br />
us glance somewhat generally at him.<br />
Archeological research, until within the last two generations, showed him<br />
as a sort <strong>of</strong> sporadic superstition, though <strong>of</strong>ten divine, yet ever closely associated<br />
with trees and fetishes, and only revered and occasionolly worshipped in the<br />
lowest strata <strong>of</strong> civilization; for it overlooked that “as our civilization so<br />
shall our gods be;” and that sensual and warring people, love “a god <strong>of</strong> battles,”<br />
him who accepts their barbarous sacrifices and neglects not their passions. The<br />
Serpent was Siva in an his creature energies and being so, loved human and bloody<br />
sacrifices, though he can dwell with races who have passed into a higher stage than<br />
this. In Greece as well as in India, he survived human sacrifices, though it is probable<br />
he would demand and have these again in the East, were the British power<br />
withdrawn from India. In Egypt, we see the Serpent under a multitude <strong>of</strong> symbols and<br />
connected with nearly all the animal kingdom, and <strong>of</strong>ten disguised as an animal or<br />
bird, as the hawk for vivacity and wisdom, the bull for power, &c. In Asyria he is<br />
<strong>of</strong>ten Nishrok, the “eagle-headed-one,” as in India he is sometimes Vishnoo, the “eagleborne<br />
one.” We meet him, says Fergusson, everywhere “in the wilderness <strong>of</strong> Sinai,<br />
the groves <strong>of</strong> Epidaurus, and in Samothracian huts.” Yet it is incorrectly held that<br />
he sprang from the land <strong>of</strong> the lower Euphrates and is peculiar to the Turanian rather<br />
than to the Aryan or Shemitic races. My own investigations oblige me to confess<br />
that he is a bold man who can fix the place <strong>of</strong> his birth and death. Lucan in Phars.<br />
lib. ix. 727, says :—“Vos quoque qui cunctis innoxia numina terris Serpitis aurato<br />
nitidi fulgore Dracones.” 1 Rome says she got him from the outlying parts <strong>of</strong> ltaly,<br />
and Fergusson, following Herodotus and others, shows us his habitation nearly everywhere.<br />
We know that he was accepted into the bosom <strong>of</strong> the Christian Chureh<br />
amongst comparatively learned Nicolaitans and Gnostics, and even when not<br />
worshipped, was held by all Chistians as <strong>of</strong> vast importance in Gentile faiths. Christ<br />
confessed his “wisdom,” which he muat have learned from the traditional story connected<br />
with the Eden myth, for <strong>of</strong> the reptile’s actual wisdom we know nothing; yet many <strong>of</strong><br />
Christ’s followers treasured Serpents, and called themselves Ophites, and the reptile, their<br />
Saviour’s representation if not more. Was not the Serpent “the healer <strong>of</strong> the nations”<br />
<strong>of</strong> Israel from the days <strong>of</strong> Moses to Hezekiah; occupying the most prominent spot in<br />
their holy places far 700 years and probably much longer. Wandering Arabs or<br />
Edumean outcasts from Egypt were, however, but an insignificant part <strong>of</strong> the<br />
mighty crowds which followed Python, or Ops, and called him incarnate power and<br />
wisdom; he was the power <strong>of</strong> the Lawgiver’s Rod, Banner, or Caduceus, for this is a<br />
true Phallic emblem, and one which in the case <strong>of</strong> Israel “the Jhavh” became<br />
incarnate in, by turning it into that “holy thing,” which Moses was desired in his<br />
troubles to hold up in his hand, and to rear up on a pole for the salvation <strong>of</strong> the<br />
1 Trans.—You also Serpents which creep gleaming in golden splendour, hamless deities in all lands.<br />
95