Forlong - Rivers of Life

270
Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
”Omfaloj was Omph-El (Om-pi-El) the oracle of God, the seat of divine influence.” The
result then of the whole is, that we are told by the best modern as well as by nearly
every ancient writer, that the Egyptian, Kaldian, and
Greek “Omphe,” or Om-pe signified a Mahadeva
and Parvati, or the manifestation, seat, abode; and if
female, the ark of a God, and therefore, the feminine
organ or womb; if male, the oracle of the Euergetes,
as of Jupiter, the Creator; and behold what our British
Museum authorities define to us as the signification of
this picture which I take from a vase in the Greek collection;
“The Anointing of the Omphe!” This is the
oldest, and not yet by any means the dead “Messiah,”
or “Anointed One” of the nations. It is woman, not
man, who is here with lyre, vase, and patera—her proper
symbols, pouring on wine and perfumed oils, as
Fig 129.—GREEK OMPHE-WORSHIP
FROM VASE IN BRITISH MUSEUM.
did Mithradates on his lofty hill top, which was but this Omphe-idea exaggerated.
The statue of Memnon at Thebes, says Bryant, was called Patora—probably the
name of the place. The “priests of the Ompi of Amon were called Petipharæ in Egyptian,
but by Greeks Pateræ, from their carrying silver Pateræ 1 ” wherewith to anoint
the God; and this name was continued at Delphi: as in Egyptian, however, Pator or
Petor seems to have been the name either for “the place of the oracle,” or for the interpreter
of the words of the Deity, and to be so used in Gen. xli 8-13. It appears to me
that the derivation of this word is rather to be found in Pator, Padre and Father, in
accordance with that strong tendency man has ever shown to call his Priest—Father,
leader and guide. So the Patera or vase-idea seems to have been a mistake as to the
origin of the word, and a very natural one, when the Petipharæ came to be priestesses. This
does not militate against the idea of Peter being also a rock, for the Rock, according to
the Jewish writers, was claimed as theGod-Father of that people. The Rabbim called
Joseph Pator, because he interpreted omphi or oracular dreams; and to “go to you
father for counsel” used to be to “go to the Maha-Deva, Rock or Father-God.” So the
place of the famous oracle of Apollo in Lukia was called Patara, as that in Akaia was
Patra; and hence, adds Bryant justly, do we see in this the reason why Pethor or Petor
was the place where Bala-am, the son of Beor, resided (Num. xxii. 5). Petra of Arabia
was always a most celebrated place for the worship of Alilat (Ar-a-Rat), and is still known
as Rath-Al-dat; Rath, Rat, or Rad being God, 2 and Alilat the most popular of Arabian
deities, as Petra was of rocky hills, with Edomites, Moabites, Amonites, Ethiopians,
Jews, and Syrians, all of whom at one time or another fervently worshipped, on and
around this extraordinary mountain rock of the desert. Petra was the Mahā-Deva of
Arabia—Phallic at first, and then Solo-phallic. Bryant gives us at I. 312, a plate
1 Sansk.—Pat, to be powerful; Pati, a lord, a master, a husband; Patrin, a mountain, an arrow.
2 Sansk.—Rati, the Goddess of Love, Pudendum.