Forlong - Rivers of Life

Fire Worship.
second or Zerubbabel’s temple of the 5th C. B.C., or for the second Herod’s, of 21 B.C.
No doubt, if they had, it would have been the receptacle of the Lingam, or been placed
over it like Soma, the moon, upon the upright Siva in Som-nat. As few Eastern conquerors
take away a mere tribal Lingam—national ones were conatantly removed—we
may believe tat Yokob’s Matsebah would remain, and descend to the next conquerors
of this unfortunate city, of which there were several before the Mahomedans. These
are indeed said to be the culprits, for though Islāmis, they had long lost their own
“black-stone,” and could only show fragments of it or of another, for the adoration of
the faithful; we find exactly such a stone as the Jewish one is described to be, viz.,
18 × 3 × 3 inches actually built into one corner of the Al-Kaba, as is detailed in my
chapter on Arabian faiths. The writer in Kitto’s Bible here adds: '”The Mahomedans
are persuaded. that their famous temple at Meka is built over the same stone.”
Public sacrificial, eucharistic, and memorial repasts existed long before the days
of either Rome or Greece. We are told by Aristotle, 1 that the very old Italian races
—Enotrians, Oskans, or rather Op-iki (serpent-worshippers), who were driven out by
Sabines and Ausonians—had, like the Greeks, religious feasts in presence of sacred fire,
which began with prayers, libations, and hymns to the gods. The Spartan religious
repast took place twice a month, as in the case of some of its after-types of the present
day, but a eucharist or thanks-giving feast, was also adopted on great occasions, as
when Orestes returned to Athens; 2 to these festivals every good citizen was expected to go.
The Odyssey describes such a “Sacrament,” as we call it, at Pylas, when five hundred
citizens sat down at nine long tables, 3 which however is nothing to the Christian Sacramental
festival of the Vernal Equinox. Truly, history repeats itself, and in these festivals
it does so in very many particulars. Thus the Catholic Churches very soon ceased
to ask the laity to partake of their “sacrament,” and so the Athenian Prutanes had
acted some thousand years before; for, in the time of Demosthenes, we are told that
these Prutanes ate the repasts before the gods and sacred fire, instead of the Parasiti,
or chosen representatives of the people; although these last had for a long time back
been expressly chosen by lot to partake of the repast in lieu of the people; 4 the object of
drawing lots for the Parasites was to know the voice of the gods, who only spoke
through such a medium. At first, the very highest importance was attacbed to what,
in the days of the philosophers, no wise men troubled their heads about, and this too
was the fate of Christian polemics, as in the occult matters of Homo-ousia and Homoiousia,
&c. It becomes us as thoughtful men to consider whether we are not now also
fighting about Bible Inspiration and the godhood of men, or godly men, in a manner
which after-ages will smile at.
All who attended the Greek “reIigious repasts” were invariably dressed with
care and adorned with flowers, the Prutans and all the priests being robed in white,
1
Pol. iv. 9. 3, quoted by Barker in Aryan Civil.,
98.
2
Athen. x. 49; Barker, 97.
399
3
Athen. iii. 5-9; 43-50; 339-341.
4
Plutarch and other writers quoted in Aryan
Civil.