Forlong - Rivers of Life

Serpent and Phallic Worship.
result of very extensive learning, that we may lay it down as a rule, the Serpent
always has a Phallic signification—a remark very gratifying to me, as it exactly
accords with my own experience founded simply upon close observation in Eastern
lands, and conclusions drawn by myself, unaided by books or teachers, from thousands
of stories and conversations with Eastern priests and peoples. Jacob, or IAKAB, is a
very important word, regarding which I beg the reader will consult Dr. Inman’s
learned work (Ancient Faiths), especially about page 602 of his first volume.
The quarrel between the mythic brothers—so important here to those who build
on this feeble foundation the genealogy of their Christ—seems to have been merely
what we in India so well understand, a quarrel between the Lingaites and Yonites,
“the right and left hands”—the gods and Titans or Devas and Dāsyas. Iakab
bquy, Yakab, or Jacob, was, we know, a persistent worshipper of pillars, erect
stiles, hbxm or sun-stones, which Rebekah was also; and no more devoted followers of
Lingam-worship exist in India than women. Jacob 1 is a female name, and hence the
chnngc to Israel—a male name, that the people migbt be shewn not to be descended
from a woman.
Of course all my readers-except Revelationists who have not been accustomed
to exercise independent thought and investigation on writings they hold to be
“revealed”—are aware, that the Hebrew tales of Yakob and Esau are myths, although
we may freely acknowledge them to be most valuablc myths, which teem with history
of a kind, if we can only divide the wheat from the chaff. So also in the story of
the creation in Genesis we have a very valuable myth, though a purely Phallic tale,
such as my Indian brethren, and perhaps they only, can thoroughly comprehend.
And here I would pause for a moment to state distinctly, that I am not one who
would in any way seek to detract from the great value of myth.; for besides their
own intrinsic worth, these stories also exhibit to us many phases of ancient life and
thought. I would never venture, therefore, to contemn them, far less to eall them.
forgeries and false. Myths I consider but history which we have not yet been able
to read; and especially would I beg my readers never to understand me when I
discard as untrue or unhistorical any tale, biblical or other, as implying that it is false
and unworthy of consideration; on the contrary, I hoId that we cannot too earnestly
and patiently ponder over every ancient tale., legend, or myth, which all have some
foundation and instructive lesson.
Mr Pococke states truIy, that “the great mythi of antiquity are not feelings
embodied to relieve the mind; still less are they concrete images, fictioms and in~
ventions. Whenever an important mythos has existed, an important fact has been its
basis. Great principles do not arise from identities; a national myth cannot be generated
without a national cause, and a national cause implies agency not invention;
1
See Origin of Legends about Abram, Isaac, and Jacob; by A. Bernstein, an important paper of
Mr. Thomas Scott’s Series.
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