Forlong - Rivers of Life

334
Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
hem. The Chrisome cloth, or handkerchief, was then presented to the priest, or afterwards
given to him by the mother, at her churching. Even in the case of a deth, the child
had to be brought to the priest in a Chrisome, when it was buried, and called “a chrisome
child.” This wrapper was evidently a sort of Pallium, with an important and sacred
meaning. From a considerable time back up to the last century, people from Thanet
and Essex to the Orkneys 1 used to retain all original Chrisomes as family heirlooms,
substitutes, “not under the value of 4d. each” being given to the priests. In Devonshire
the Chrisome was called a Christening Pane, possibly from the Latin Pannus, a
cloth, or garment. The word Chrisome, like Christ, “the anointed,” comes from the
Greek crisma, Krisma, and Krio, criw, “to anoint.” Thus we have Krio, a horn, or the
Hebrew }rq, Kern, used in anointing kings and gods, 2 and Chrismatory, a vessel
very like the Monstrance (page 196 ante) of Christian churches.
Christians now justly object to the term Christian, as meaning “anointed ones,”
which was first applied to them “in reproach or contempt” by “the scurrilous jesters of
Antioch;” see the orthodox Parkhurst 3 on this word, Christianos, and Messiaj. He adds
that the disciples could not have given themselves such a name, “much less imposed it
by divine authority.” All were clearly ashamed of it at first. Parkhurst considers that in
Acts xi. 26, xxvi. 28, and 1 Peter iv., 14.-16—the only places where the term occurs
in the Bible we find “Believers suffering under this appellation,” and further quotes
“the ever-truthful Tacitus,” as writing that only “the vulgar called them Christians.” 4
He says that Christus, “The Anointed” and “Messias,” Hebrew jycm Messiah, have the
same signification, but if Christians were better informed they would not say they
spring from the same root-idea; nay, not even on the great authority of the unknown
writer of John i. 41, and iv. 25. According to Fürst, M s h signifies “to anoint,
appoint, and to expand,” and M s i h “the Anointes,” is the “Expanded,” “the consecrated,”
“the Progenitor.” And so M-s-i-h seems connected with, Mesites, Misithj,
“a Mediator,” also a term applied to Christ, and connected, Parkhurst thinks, with
wnynb B-n-i-noo “between us,” which Fürst associates with Posterity. Parkhurst says
that Mesites, Mediator, signifies in Greek, not only “umpire,” but “a witness,” Eduth
or Testimony, as when Lucian writes of Pylades and Orestes, that they took their god
for a witness (Mesites) of their mutual affection. 5 Mesites comes from Mesos middle,
which this Lexicographer connects with oxm or jxh giving us the: signification of “The
Divider in the middle,” “the Presser,” that which cuts into an incision or cleft
(Fürst). In a footnote, I give the actual meaning from Greek and Hebrew Lexi-
cons, 6 and beg close attention to this very important subject, for the old and ever
anointed one is Maha-Deva.
1 Morant on Dunton Ch., Essex; Lewis’ His. of
Thanet; Brand’s Pop. Ants.; Brewer’s Phrase and
Fable, etc.
2 1 Sam. xvi. 13; 1 Kings i. 39.
3 Greek Lexicon.
4 Tac., Anal., xv. 44.
5 Parkhurst Greek Lex. 427.
6 Mesites, Greek, from Mesos, the Middle (Parkhurst,
p. 427). A Mediator, Umpire, a God
the Witness—the Mesistes, and in the sense of
Exodus xvi. 34, the Eduth or “Testimony.”
Mesos “from hxj” H-j-h, to divide, to divide in
midst—Meros.—See Greek and Hebrew Dic.
Messias. The Messiah hycm M-s-ei-h from M-s-h