Forlong - Rivers of Life

206
Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
in Barma for many years, I can testify to the fact of our Boodhist officials thoroughly
understanding it, having observed many a smile and jocose remark passing as the
young office-hands daily stamped the various documents with “the charm” before passing
them out in the evening.
Siva is in India called the holder or owner of the Bhāga, which is one of the names of
the Yoni or Bag; hence he is Bhagha-van, or Bhagha-vari, and his consort is Bhaga-vani
or shortly, Bhavani. In the Mahomedan “Dahistan,” a Persian work of the 17th century, 1
a man, who understood well the lore of those very practical
Phallic-worshippers—the Saktis, says that the high
altars of the Mosks, are Bhagas or Yonis (he might have
said the same of Christian altars) and the minarets
Lingas—here too, he might have added, corresponding to
our altar candles. This observant Sakti here accounts for
what has often puzzled me in Synagogues, Mosks, and
Masjeeds (places of prayer), viz., the ovicular bulge, always
given to the back wall, just opposite the raised pulpit.
Nor is Boodhism free from phallic forms and ideas. In
this figure 85, which Dr. Inman gives us 2 from the Jour.
R. As. Socy., xviii, 394, taken from the monastery of Gopach
in Nepal, we see a Boodhiswata in the same charmed
Fig 86—A BOODHIST SEER IN
SHOE OF ASS
symbol, the mare’s shoe, or it may be a cow’s or donkey’s,
all or any being sufficient to ward off the evil eye, as well
in the further Himalayas as in our own “Green Isle.”
This figure 87, also from Layard and Inman, is a com-
panion one to Layard’s gem from Nineveh, my No. 84, in which
we see the Linga and Yoni on the same altar with the reduplication
of a Yoni and palm-tree, and the Sun and Moon above. The
barred Sistrum explains to us the origin and
meaning of “the ladder to heaven” which
so long puzzled us all, and which is made
doubly clear in this figure 86, from the same
author, to whom we are all so much indebted.
Over this “ladder” is a seven-rayed star,
emblem of virile power, and a very peculiar
hand at the junction of the two.
Fig 86—WORSHIP OF VIRGO
INTACTA AND SUN.
Any generating part of either sex is often, as I have before
urged, used to signify all the parts and even both sexes; and so
any characteristic part, especially of a symbolic animal, often
stands for the whole Arbil; and I think Dr. Inman may be right in what he states at page
1 Translated by D. Shea for Or. Trans. Fund, 3 vols, Allan & Co., London.
Fig 87—WORSHIP OF
LINGAM AND YONI.
2 Symbolism, p. 78. [ed. 1874]