Forlong - Rivers of Life

Serpent and Phallic Worship.
in any real mundane sense; so the Cock is continually identified with the Sun, and
also with cones, crests and such like. 1
In Matt. iv. 6, quoting Ps. xci 13, we see from the margin of the latter,
that when this psalm was written, a heresy had sprung up or was looked forward
to, for the writer hoped that the expected leader would “trample upon the Ser-
pent (not lion) and. the Asp.” The quotation in Matt. iv. 6 is not, however, a
happy one, for Christ there rejects the idea, and the Serpent we must re-
member, is also known as the “Fascinator” or “Persuader,” an office taken up
warmly by Christ and the Christian Church. The Greek verb pšiqw Peitho, Hebrew
htp, used in Matt. iv. 1, means to seduce, tempt. or persuade, and all who do not
listen to the voice of the Peithon or Python, were, no doubt, called in Greek as in
these days, 'Apeiqeˆj, or the unpersuaded, that is, “the disobedient.” Christ was pictured
as htp Pethah, that which draws aside, the veil, and is the door or key by which men
can gain happiness; he that declareth, looseneth. unbindeth, or openeth “the way of life”
and also that which comes forth as a sword. 2 The }tp Pethen is the disturbing serpent, and
the jtpm, the threshold of the door, or, I rather suspect, he who guards or stands at the
threshold, which we have seen is a special duty of the Serpent. He is also the guardian
of all highly valued treasures, of maidenly virtue, and “golden apples” in the
“gardens of love.” It was the Pet-on, 3 Pi-on, or Python on whom the Petra-essa
(Priestess) sat guard, and declared “the way of life” and the commands of Jove
in that Delphic chasm, as another Peter still does under his Baldakin and glorious
dome on Tiber’s banks. That papal Baldakin is an ophite offspring or out-
come of the ancient Serpent-hoods and canopies of eastern gods or deified
men. Boodha had such a canopy of Ahees or holy serpents, and Zoroaster of
Azoonees, from which our Zona or Zone, 4 the serpent-girdle of the Sun, who shines
on, and covers the heads of all gods with aureoles, if not canopies. Even here this Petra
or Peton, the representation of Christ still retains the meaning of the Persuader or
Seducer, which the Hebrew Zonoth (harlots) also means; such terms are applied
much too frequently by Protestants towards the Pope. The priests of the Egyptian
Venus, Neith, were called Pa-ta-neit and those who watched over the sacred treasures
(among which were Shields or Ancilia, such as Solomon probably had) on the Palatine
hill were called Pala-tinæ. The priests of Hercules were Po-ti-tii. In all these. matters
we come back to the Father and Mother idea, in the Pater, Patres, Dii Patrii, Patriot,
Patron, &c., so that the result arrived at is important to the last degree, wearisome
though I fear the reader has thought me. To get at a primitive Father, however, is
drawing nigh to the root of matters, and we are now simply driven to this extremity,
1 Cock is “the notch of an arrow; the upright
style or gnomon of a dial; the swinging indicator
of the Libra or Balance; a conical hay pile; that
which fires a gun; a spout; and in coqus, cocco, and
hence concha, a shell or small vessel” (a feminine
form), see Webster’s Dic.
321
2
The verb htp signifies “to ungird,” “unsheath,”
or “open of itself as a vinebud.”
3
Petra is used for the Sun in Iliad II, see “Clas.
Man.” p. 84.
4
Holwell’s “Myth. Dic.,” p. 64.