“The Babylonians were from the first a nation of star gazers.... The
cuneiform character which denotes a god is the picture of a star” (Sayce
_op. cit._). “The Babylonian and Assyrian-name for Ursa Minor was Kakkabu;
the Hebrew, Kokhâbh; and the Euphratean, Kochab, which means, ‘_the_ star
_present_,’ a title which reminds us of its former supreme importance as
the pole-star.... In various Babylonian tablets we meet a star-god called
Imina-bi=the seven-fold one.”(91) Although Mr. Brown has reached no
definite conclusion as to the identity of this star-god, I venture to
maintain that the original “seven-fold one” could have been no other than
Ursa Major and that this and “the ever-present star” are identical with
what the Chinese termed “the Imperial Ruler of Heaven” and the “Seven
Regulators.” The following passages furnish ample evidence of the
suggestive influence that “the seven-fold one” exerted upon the minds of
the ancient Babylonian star-gazers.
“The institution of the sabbath went back to the Sumerian days of
Chaldea—the name itself is Babylonian” (Sayce, _op. cit._). “The seventh
month (=Sept.-Oct.) in Akkadian is named Tul-ku=the holy altar.... The
seventh month of Tasritutisri was also connected with the building of the
tower of Babel, said to have been the special work of the ‘King of the
Holy Mound,’ Sar-tuli-elli, and its erection placed in the seventh month
at the autumnal equinox. It was a zikkurâtú with seven steps, a
circumstance connected with planetary [? stellar] symbolism. This style of
building is reduplicated in the oldest Egyptian pyramids, _e. g._ the
pyramid of Sakkârah, which had seven steps like the Babylonian towers.
This circumstance, one amongst many such, supplies a most interesting
illustration of the fact that the Egyptian civilization was mainly
Euphratean in origin” (Robert Brown, _op. cit._).
The following facts contained in Prof. Morris Jastrow’s admirable hand
book on the “Religion of Babylonia and Assyria,” further establish the
pervading influence of the number seven. “The two most famous zikkurats of
seven stages were those in Babylon and Borsippa, opposite Babylon. The
latter bears the significant name E-ur-imin-an-ki, _i. e._, ‘the house of
seven divisions of heaven and earth.’ Two much older towers than those of
Babylon and Borsippa bear names in which ‘seven’ is introduced. One of
these is the zikkurat to Nin-girsu at Lagash, which Gudea describes as
‘the house of seven divisions of the world,’ the other the tower at Uruk,
which bore the name ‘house of seven zones.’ The reference in both cases
is, as Jensen has shown, to the seven concentric zones into which the
earth was divided by the Babylonians.”
In a standard German book of reference (Spamer’s Illustrierte
Weltgeschichte I Theil, Alterthum, I Theil, s. 371), I find the statement
that the zikkurat of the temple I-zidda at Borsippa, was called “the
temple of the seven lights of heaven and earth,” which seem to have been
symbolized also by the seven-branched candlestick of the Hebrews.
Considering that other sacred symbols which were employed in Solomon’s
temple are believed by Professor Jastrow to be “imitations of Babylonian
models,” it seems justifiable to endeavor to trace to the same source the
origin of the Hebrew “seven-branched candlestick,” to which I shall revert
later on. Prof. Morris Jastrow offers the suggestion that the name “seven
directions of heaven and earth” may point to a conception of seven zones
dividing the heavens as well as the earth, and states that the “seven
divisions” and “seven zones” are merely terms equivalent to universe. He
explains that the seven directions were interpreted by the Babylonian
theologians as a reference to the seven great celestial bodies, the sun
and moon, Ishtar, Marduk, Ninib, Nergal and Nabu. To each of these one
story was supposed to be dedicated and the tower thus became a
cosmological symbol. Moreover, from Herodotus’ description of the seven
concentric walls of Ecbatana, in which each wall was distinguished by a
certain color, the conclusion has been drawn that the same colors—white,
black, scarlet, blue, orange, silver and gold—were employed by the
Babylonians for the stages of their towers.
Professor Jastrow draws attention to the fact that the division of the
earth into seven zones is a “conception that we encounter in India and
Persia, and that survives in the seven ‘climates’ into which the world was
divided by Greek and Arabic geographers. It seems clear that this
interpretation of the number seven is older than the one that identified
each story with one of the planets. Both interpretations have a scholastic
aspect, however, and the very fact that there are two interpretations
justifies the suspicion that neither furnishes the _real_ explanation why
the number seven was chosen ... it is because seven was popularly sacred
that the world was divided into seven zones and that the planets were
fixed at seven, not _vice versa_” (p. 620).
The preceding statements lead to the conclusion that, among Assyriologists
there is no current, generally-accepted view as to the origin of the
“sacred seven” of the Babylonians. The following details concerning the
zikkurat and the sanctuaries of Babylon will be found to furnish evidence
that their builders were imbued with the identical primitive set of ideas
or seven-fold division of the cosmos that is now so familiar to the reader
and is traceable to the observation of Polaris and Septentriones.
The astronomical association and cosmological symbolism of the zikkurat
become more and more evident when all evidence concerning it is carefully
sifted. According to the cosmogony of the Babylonians the earth was
pictured as a huge mountain. Khar-sag-gal-kurkura=the mountain of all
lands, is a designation for the earth. E-kur=mountain house, another name
for the earth, became one of the names for temple and, by extension, for
the sacred precinct which enclosed the zikkurat and sacred edifices.(92)
A plural formed of the word E-kur,=Ekurrati, was used for divinities, and
this association of the word mountain with the name for a god is
particularly interesting when it is also remembered that the cuneiform
character for god is a star and that therefore either a mountain, or a
star, signified a god in Babylonian and Assyrian inscriptions. Bel, the
supreme star god of the Babylonians, whose name literally signifies merely
“lord or king,” and under the form Ah-baal became current throughout Asia
Minor, was, as Professor Jastrow states (_op. cit._ p. 435), actually
identified with the polar star, and sometimes addressed as the “great
mountain.”(93)
The famous temple, the E-kur of Babylonian history, is described by
Herodotus, Strabo and other pagan authorities, as consisting of seven
stories and being surmounted by a sanctuary which was under the charge of
a virgin priestess and contained a couch (resting-place) for the god.(94)
It is amply demonstrated, moreover, that the central zikkurat was regarded
as the permanent resting and dwelling place of _the_ lord or god, par
excellence, and in this connection it is significant that among the names
of sanctuaries enumerated by Professor Jastrow there occur such as “the
true or fixed house,” the house of the established seat, the sacred
dwelling, the permanent dwelling, etc.
The Babylonian ideas connected with the supreme god and his temple are,
moreover, sufficiently apparent in the prayers to Marduk, from which I
extract the following detached passages: “Marduk, king of heaven and
earth.... Look favorably upon the city, _O lord of rest_!... May the gods
of heaven and earth speak to thee _O lord of rest_!... A resting-place for
the lord of E-sagila is thy house, E-sagila, the house of thy sovereignty,
is thy house....”
The sanctuary surmounting the zikkurat, is also termed “the high place par
excellence, or the lofty house, the high edifice, the tower of the great
dwelling, the great palace, the house of the glorious mountain [or god]
the house of him who gives the sceptre of the world; also the house of
light, the house of great splendor, the house without rival, the gate of
widespread splendor, the light of Shamash, the heart of Shamash, the life
of the world.”
The idea that the “mountain house” or “high place” was the consecrated
centre where the union of heaven and earth took place, is apparent from
the following names: “the house of heavenly construction, the heavenly
house, the house reaching to heaven, the point of heaven and earth, the
link of heaven and earth, the foundation stone of heaven and earth.”
“Complementing,” as Professor Jastrow says, “the cosmological associations
that have been noted in connection with the zikkurat,” we find the inner
room or sanctuary of the Babylonian and Assyrian temple named Papakhu,
from the verb pakhu=to close. It was also known as the parakhu, from
parâku=to shut off, to lock. “Gudea describes the papakhu as ‘the dark
chamber.’ Professor Jastrow states that it was regarded as an imitation of
a cosmical ‘sacred chamber,’ and from his book we learn that it was
employed as an assembly room, or council chamber by the priesthood. It was
indeed termed ‘the assembly room’ the ‘place of fates,’ ‘the court of the
world,’ ‘the house of oracle,’ also as the ‘sacred room where the gods
assembled in solemn council’ and ‘the chamber of fates’ where the chief
god sits on New Year’s day and decides the fate of mankind for the ensuing
year” (Jastrow, _op. cit._ p. 423).
The Babylonian and Assyrian kings were the living representatives of the
chief god and Professor Jastrow states that “it was into the papakhu that
the priests retired when they desired to obtain an oracle direct from the
god.... It is particularly interesting to collate the statements ‘that the
New Year’s day was the occasion of a symbolical marriage between a god and
goddess,’ and that ‘the New Year’s festival came to be the season most
appropriate for approaching the oracular chamber.’ ” It thus appears that
the papakhu was the sacred and secret chamber where the ancient kings and
their councillors united to confer upon the government of the nation and
decreed the irrevocable laws which decided the fate of individuals.
“The ‘decision of fates’ is, in Babylonian theology, one of the chief
functions of the gods. It constitutes the mainspring of their power. To
decide fates is to control the arrangement of the universe—to establish
order.” The “tablets of fate” are repeatedly mentioned in the Assyrian
epics where it is described how one god addressing another, “gives him the
tablets of fate, hangs them on his breast and dismisses him,” with the
words: “thy command be invincible, thy order authoritative” (Jastrow, pp.
420 and 424). It is evident that these words were supposed to convey the
power to establish order and issue irrevocable laws.
The temple of Shamash (who, like Marduk, was evidently identical with
Bel), situated in Babylon, was termed “the house of the universal judge,”
and it is extremely interesting to find this “god”(95) represented on a
stone tablet found at Sippar, as seated on a low throne in the sanctuary
or papakkhu, of the temple El-bab-bara, while in front of him on an altar
rests what Professor Jastrow describes as “a wheel with radiant spokes.”
A fine illustration of this tablet which bears an inscription by the king
Nabupaliddin (879-855 B.C.) being published in Spamer’s standard work
already cited, I have been able to note the interesting fact that the
“wheel with radiant spokes” exhibits four pointed rays, directed outwards
and forming a cruciform figure, which, by the way, it is interesting to
compare with the Mexican Calendar stone and its four rays. Each of the
spaces between these pointed rays is filled by a group of wavy lines which
appears to simulate some fluid flowing from the centre, which is formed by
a series of concentric circles. The quadruplicate peculiar partition of
the disk assumes special importance when it is realized that, in the niche
above the head of Shamash, a miniature production of the _disk recurs
between the familiar conventional images of the moon and a disk containing
eight rays or spokes_. According to Dr. Felix von Luschan (Mitth. aus der
vorderasiat. Abth. der Kgl. Museen, Heft XI, p. 24), the inscription opens
with the invocation to “ilu Sin, ilu Shamash u ilu Ishtar,” a fact of
double interest, because Ishtar is termed the “twin-sister of Shamash” in
an Assyrian hymn, and because the inscription obviously identifies the
moon as the symbol of Sin, the four-spoked wheel as that of Shamash and
the eight-spoked wheel as that of Ishtar. As the king, in his inscriptions
expressly states that he has restored on the tablet the image of Shamash
according to an ancient model, for the guidance of future artists, it is
evident that departures from the original cult of Shamash had taken place
in his time and that he was making an attempt to reëstablish it. The
extreme antiquity of the cult of Shamash may, indeed, be inferred from the
fact that about B.C. 1850, the king, Shamsi-ramann, bore the god’s name as
a divine title. About B.C. 1350, moreover, a temple was built to Shamash
in Ashur.
I shall treat, further on, of the evidences showing that the cult of
Polaris gradually became a secret one known to the initiated only, while
popular worship was directed to the sun, moon, and morning and evening
stars, etc. Meanwhile the following passages from Professor Jastrow’s
hand-book will elucidate the Babylonian Assyrian cult of the Four
Quarters.
“The zikkurat was quadrangular in shape. The orientation of the four
corners towards the four cardinal points was approximate. Inasmuch as the
rulers of Babylon from a very early period call themselves ‘king of the
four regions,’ it has been supposed that the quadrangular shape was chosen
designedly.”... “The title ‘king of the four regions’ was an old one that
pertained to the kings of Agade.... The city of Arbela, at one time the
seat of the cult of Ishtar, was named ‘the four-god city.’ ” This name is
particularly interesting when it is remembered that the Babylonian and
Assyrian word for god and mountain was identical and that this identity
may account for the Chinese employment of the term “four mountains,” to
express also the four provinces and their chiefs. Professor Jastrow
informs us, in a note, that the name Arbela is, more precisely, Arba-ilu,
signifying “city of the four-fold divinity” or “four-god” city and invites
comparison to the Palestinian form Kiryath-arba, “four-city.” He suggests
that this name may perhaps likewise signify a city of four gods, but adds
that it has commonly been explained as meaning four roads or four quarters
(_op. cit._ 203).
The ancient pagan authorities inform us that the ancient city of Babylon
was laid out in the form of a perfect square, the sides of which were
oriented to the cardinal points. A massive wall enclosed the entire city
and the river Euphrates divided it into halves, united by a bridge, each
half being again subdivided by the main street leading to the bridge. A
series of streets ran parallel to the river through the city and were
crossed at right angles by others, the result being that 625 blocks or
squares of building were thus formed.
There is positive evidence that the capital city of Lagash or Shir-pur-la
was divided into four sections, the separate names of which were Girsu,
Uru-alaga, Ninâ and Gish-Galla or Erim, the reading of the latter name
being doubtful. The circumstance that each of these quarters had its
“divinity” and was ruled by its earthly representative, explains the term
“four-god city” or “four city” found associated with other capitals of
Babylonia.
The existence of a central ruler who exercised supreme authority over the
four quarters of the capital, and by extension over the “four provinces”
is amply proven by the title of the Babylonian kings, _i. e._, the “king
of the four regions.” An interesting oracle, addressed to king Esar-Haddon
is found to contain the statement that “Ashur has given him the four ends
of the earth” (Jastrow, _op. cit._ 345).
Evidence that while the capital and entire state consisted of four
quarters, the whole was also divided theoretically and practically into
halves, is furnished by the significant fact that, from remote antiquity,
the rulers of Babylonia also bore the title of “lord of Akkad and
Sumer”=North and South, this term being, like that of “Four Regions,” a
general designation for the whole of Babylonia and the first being
obviously analogous to the Egyptian royal title: “King of upper and lower
Egypt.”
I can but briefly indicate here some facts which prove that this ancient
Babylonian centre of civilization underwent precisely the same evolution
as that I have traced in America and India.
Assyriologists agree in stating that, at the beginning of Babylonian
history, about 4,000 B.C., Akkad and Sumer, or North and South Babylonia,
already existed and were inhabited by two distinct races of people: the
non-Semitic Sumerians and the Semitic Akkadians or later Babylonians. In
later times we find the region embraced by the Euphrates and Tigris
inhabited by descendants of both races and forming the Babylonian empire
in the south, the Assyrian empire to the northeast, while in the
northwestern part of Mesopotamia, was the seat of various empires that
were alternately the rivals and subjects of either Babylonia or Assyria
(Jastrow, _op. cit._ 26).
Three distinct and rival cults are indeed found associated with these
three centres of government, and when examined by the light of our
knowledge of a parallel process of evolution elsewhere, their origin can
be traced back to elementary pole-star heaven and earth worship, and what
is termed the establishment of the districts of Anu, Bel and Ea. That at
one period these separate cults peacefully existed alongside of each other
is indicated by the joint worship of pairs and triads of divinities who
were personifications of central powers, of the upper and of the lower
regions. In order to demonstrate this statement I shall briefly cite some
references to such divinities from Professor Jastrow’s hand-book, taking
them in the order in which they are enumerated in the famous Babylonian
version of the creation of the world, contained in the fragment known as
the “Creation epic” which begins thus:
“There was a time where Above, the heaven, was not named. Below, the
earth, bore no name. Apsu was there from the first, the source of both
(_i. e._, heaven and earth). And raging Tiamat, the mother of both (_i.
e._, heaven and earth).” Apsu and Tiamat are synonymous and are
personifications of the watery deep or abyss. “Apsu represents the male
and Tiamat the female principle of the primæval universe ... the embrace
of Apsu and Tiamat became a symbol of ‘sexual’ union.”
Tiamat was popularly pictured as a huge serpent-like monster, a fact of
utmost interest when connected with the name Nakkash, _i. e._, crooked
serpent, bestowed upon the constellation Draconis which contained the
pole-star of 2170 B.C. Abstaining from comment I merely establish here the
interesting point that in ancient Babylonia the serpent is found
distinctly associated with Polaris as well as with the dual creative
principle. The divine pairs Lakhmu and Lakhamu and Anshar and Kishar were
then created. By an arbitrary division of his name into An and shar, the
deity becomes the “one that embraces all that is above.” The element An is
the same that we have in Anu and is the ideographic form for “high” and
“heaven.” Ki is the ideographic form for earth and the natural consort to
an all-embracing upper power is a power that “embraces all that is below.”
It is interesting thus to ascertain that on another tablet by the side of
these personifications of heaven and earth are enumerated a series of
names which certainly appear to be merely variations on the names or
titles of the divine pairs. Lakhumu and Lakhamu occur on the list, and
Anshar and Kishar recur as Anshar-gal, “great totality of what is on
high,” and Kishar-gal, “great totality of what is below.” Then there are
En-shar and Nin-shar, “lord and mistress” and a “Father-Mother of Anu,”
titles which furnish an interesting comparison with the list printed on
page 42 of this investigation.
Pagan authorities, cited by Professor Jastrow, relate that the first
result of the union of Apsu and Tiamat was the production of “strange
monsters, human beings with wings, beings with two heads, male and female,
hybrid formations, half man, half animal, with horns of rams and horses’
hoofs, bulls with human faces, dogs with four-fold bodies ending in fish
tails.” Seen in the light of the present investigation these accounts and
the sculptured images of such monstrosities, many of which have been
preserved to the present day, may be accounted for in a very simple and
natural manner. It is obvious that, once the Babylonian theologians had
definitely adopted the theory and creed that the universe had been created
by the union of the Above and Below, Male and Female principle, Heaven and
Earth, or Upper and Lower Firmament, the production of allegorical images
personifying or symbolizing this union would inevitably follow in course
of time. The somewhat naïve but expressive combination of the form of a
quadruped or serpent with that of a bird, and the adoption of winged
bulls, lions and serpents, would have seemed a most appropriate rendering
of the current idea of the dual, creative power, which might also be
conveyed by two heads, or two horns. From Professor Jastrow’s description
of the case of a single monster, with four bodies and with attributes of
the elements earth and water, we learn that not only the union of heaven
and earth but also of earth and water was at times the task imposed upon
the native artists by the fancy and imagination of minds dwelling upon the
subject of the creative first cause. Postponing further discussion of the
Babylonian and Assyrian symbolism of the Middle, Above and Below and Four
Quarters or the “seven directions of Heaven and Earth,” I shall now direct
attention to the most famous triad of Babylonian cosmology which figures
at the end of the Creation epic. It consisted of Anu, Ea and Bel(96) and
obviously personified the Above and Below and the link or central meeting
place of these, the earth named Esharra, “the house of fertility” or E-kur
“the mountain house.” We learn from Professor Jastrow’s handbook that
whereas Bel=the polar star (the secret god) and Nibir=the planet Jupiter
(the later popular personification of Bel) were associated with the North,
Ea was identified with the South (p. 435). Elsewhere we are told that Anu
was identified with the North, Bel with the equator and Ea with the South
(p. 460), a fact to which I shall again recur in treating of the
territorial divisions of the state, which corresponded to the three
divisions of the universe, the Above, Middle and Below.
The following detached statements concerning Babylonian divinities drawn
from Professor Jastrow’s handbook, show with what activity the fundamental
set of ideas was developed by the native theologians and philosophers.
Bel-arduk became the chief god of Babylon, the title “Belu-rabu” _i. e._,
“great lord,” becoming identified with Marduk. As such he is termed “the
king of heaven and earth” and the “lord of the four regions.” His dwelling
was on the sacred “mountain-house,” the zikkurat, and is represented “with
a crown with high horns, a symbol of dual rulership. As the supreme ruler,
life and death are in his hands and he guides the decrees of the deities
of the Above and Below.” “The first part of the name Marduk is also used
to designate the ‘young bullock,’ and it is possible that the god was
pictured in this way.” It should be remembered here, however, that on page
89 Professor Jastrow tells us how Nannar=the one who furnishes light=the
moon, was invoked as “the powerful bull of Anu,” _i. e._, heaven. In this
connection it is interesting to learn that in Canaan, Astarte, the goddess
of night, was also worshipped under the form of a cow, and that in
Phœnicia she was sometimes figured with horns, symbolizing the moon. In
Assyria, four horns, denoting four-fold rulership, usually encircle the
high conical cap of sovereignty, which also crowns the human heads of the
winged bulls. It may be permissible to point out here what an appropriate
and expressive embodiment of symbolism the winged bull appears to be; the
form of the quadruped, combined with wings, clearly symbolizes a union of
the Above and Below; the control over both being expressed by the human
head which completes the allegorical figure. The high cap, with which the
head was crowned, exhibits the form of a mound, and combined or partly
encircled by two or sometimes four horns, obviously symbolizes dual or
quadruple rulership. It thus appears evident that the winged bull of
Assyria expressed, almost as clearly as the seven-staged towers of
Babylon, the “seven directions of heaven and earth,” and was as
appropriate an allegorical image of Assur the god, as of Assur the state,
and of the royal power which conferred upon the supreme lords of Babylonia
and Assyria the titles: “lord of the holy mound,” “lord of Akkad and
Sumer,” and “lord of the four regions.”
The idea that some of the Assyrian kings actually embodied seven-fold
power, or ruled the “seven divisions,” is further conveyed by curious
groups of seven symbols, accompanied by the numeral seven, expressed by
seven dots, which occur above their portraits on tablets which will be
described further on. Whilst analyzing the royal titles and insignia
represented on the stelæ of Assyrian kings, I shall likewise show how
these complete the foregoing evidence and indicate that in Babylonia and
Assyria, the seven-fold division was applied not only to the Cosmos, but
to the territory of the State, to its social organization, to its
calendar; and that the seven-storied zikkurat, the winged bulls, etc., and
indeed, the seven-branched candlestick, were apparently designed as
expressive of the general seven-fold scheme of organization.
Let us now examine some data which shed light upon the various and curious
phases of evolution undergone by the growing and diverging cults of Heaven
and Earth in Babylonia and Assyria. Going back to the dawn of astronomy in
Babylonia let us note some facts which show that, as elsewhere, in
remotest antiquity the periodical disappearance and reappearance of the
Pleiades produced a deep impression upon the primitive star-gazers. These
phenomena marked natural divisions of the year and the constellation
appeared to belong alternately to the visible or upper world and to the
invisible or lower region. A recognition that the Pleaid was _the_
constellation at that remote period when Taurus led the year, may be
established by the common Euphratean name by which it is said to have been
designated: Kakkab-mul=_the_ constellation or star. The Akkadian and
Assyrian names which had probably also originally designated Polaris
signified that it and the Hyades were the foundation stars or
constellations. In the Ptolemy star charts, the Pleiades are designated by
the name Ki mah (see Robert Brown, _op. cit._ p. 57). While it appears
that whereas the Pleiades long exerted its influence and, with Polaris and
the circumpolar constellations, regulated and marked the primitive year,
its cult was gradually superseded by that of morning and evening stars and
of the sun and moon which became the emblems of the rapidly developing
divergent cults of the diurnal and nocturnal heavens, of light and
darkness, of the Above and Below.(97)
In connection with the cult of the Pleiades I draw attention to R. G.
Haliburton’s interesting investigations on this particular subject, and to
his publication in the Proceedings of the A. A. A. S. 1895, on “Dwarf
survivals and traditions as to pigmy races,” which contains the following
statements: “We find that the Atlas dwarfs and the Nanos predict the
future by watching the reflection of the ‘Seven Stars’ in a bowl. The
famous cup of Nestor, supposed to have been a divining cup, had two groups
of Pleiades on its handle....” On examining the archaic designs engraved
in the centre of the fine collection of Phœnician and Assyrian bronze
bowls, which were found in the S. E. Palace, Nimroud, and are exhibited at
the British Museum, I recently ascertained that they appear to be mostly
variations on the theme of the centre and four or seven-fold division,
some exhibiting a marked quadruplicate division, others a seven-pointed
star surrounded by seven smaller stars. In one case a face is repeated
four times, in opposite positions, on the central design which is
surrounded by four large and four lesser conventionally drawn mountains.
The head-dress with lappets which encloses each face recalls the familiar
Egyptian form, and on two bowls images of scarabs are engraved. On one of
these the beetle is drawn in such a way that its four legs, two of which
turn upwards and two downwards, suggest the form of a swastika.
The peculiarities of these designs and the knowledge that star-worship
prevailed in Assyria and Phœnicia suggest the inference that the Nimroud
Palace bowls were employed for the observation of the positions of certain
stars which marked the seasons and regulated the calendar, by means of
which the priest-kings controlled the working of the system of state.
Doubtlessly the constellations originally and principally observed besides
Polaris were the three great “seven-fold ones,” _i. e._ the Ursa Major
which marked the Four Quarters; the Pleiades which pertained to the Above
and Below and marked the division of the year into halves, and Orion which
also may well have appeared to be a composite image of the sacred, equal
Four, and the central triad composed of the Above, Middle and Below.
It is interesting to note that in the Euphratean and other myths the
antagonism between sun and moon, etc., coincides with traditions of actual
warfare between their earthly representatives and that it is the record of
a combat between the followers of light and of darkness that seems to have
been thus preserved. The Babylonian Creation epic teaches us that, in
remotest antiquity, the association of light and life with the male, and
darkness and death with the female principle had become current. A mighty
war takes place between the female serpent Tiamat, associated with evil,
and the male god Marduk, the champion of the gods of the upper realm,
which ends in her overthrow. It was then that Marduk “established the
districts or cities of Anu, Bel and Ea,” identified with the North, Middle
and South. It is remarkable that this mythical establishment of three
cities exactly coincides with the conclusions reached by recent
investigators as to the existence during centuries, of three rival states,
_i. e._ Babylonia in the south and Assyria in the northeast, who, during
centuries, were in continual warfare with each other and with a third
disintegrated power inhabiting the northwest which was alternately rival
or vassal. This condition of affairs, and the facts enumerated in
Professor Jastrow’s handbook, chapter II, are precisely what would
naturally develop from the formation and adoption of three distinct cults
and their ultimate separate establishment in as many centres of
government. The following data will suffice to reveal some of the curious
results obtained by the logical working out of certain associations of
ideas and these results are the more interesting and intelligible because
they are analogous to those I have traced elsewhere.
One point deserves special note: directly opposite views, not only as to
the relative supremacy of the Middle, Above and Below, but also as to the
relation of the sexes to the upper and lower worlds, seem to have been
held at different times and in different places; and this particular
division of opinion appears to have given rise to endless dissension,
strife and warfare, to the separation of sectarians from the main state
and the foundation of numberless minor centres of government on the old
plan, but with fresh forms of cult embodying a new artificial combination
of ideas.
The shifting of supremacy from one “god” to another explains moreover the
transference of the title “Bel”=Lord, or Chief of Gods, from the
personification of one region to another. “In remotest antiquity we find
En-lil designated as the ‘lord of the lower world’ and bearing the title
Bel. En-lil represents the unification of the various forces whose seat or
sphere of action is among the inhabited parts of the globe, both on the
surface and beneath, for the term ‘lower world’ is here used in contrast
to the upper or heavenly world.... As ‘lord of the lower world,’ En-lil is
contrasted to a god, Anu, who presides over heavenly bodies. The age of
Sargon (3800 B.C.), in whose inscriptions En-lil already occurs, is one of
considerable culture and there can, therefore, be no objection against the
assumption that at this early period a theological system should have been
evolved which gave rise to beliefs in great powers whose dominion embraces
the ‘upper’ and ‘lower’ worlds” (Jastrow, _op. cit._ pp. 52-55).
A consort, Nin-lil, a “mistress of the lower world,” was assigned to
En-lil and was known also as Belit, the feminine form of Bel, _i. e._ the
lady _par excellence_. She too had her temple at Nippur, the age of which
goes back, at least, to the first dynasty of Ur. She was also known as
Nin-khar-sag, the “lady of the high or great mountain,” as the “mother of
the gods.” The assignment by Sargon, of the northern gates of his palace
to Bel, who lays foundations, and Belit, who brings fertility, affords
evidence that the goddess was the feminine form of Polaris. In Assyria,
Belit appears, either as the wife of Bel, as the consort of Ashur, as the
consort of Ea, or simply as a designation for Ishtar, _i. e._ “the
goddess,” the “mistress of countries, or of mountains,” in which
connection it is interesting to note that the ideographs for country and
mountain are identical in Assyrian.
If the attributes of the goddesses of the Babylonian and Assyrian pantheon
be carefully examined, they will be found to associate the female
principle with fertility, abundance and with water, the source of plant
life. Two divergent views appear to have influenced the artificial
formation of personifications of the female principle in nature. According
to one the goddess is termed the “lady of the deep, the mistress of the
place where the fish dwell” (Sarpanitam-erua) and in other cases is linked
to the lower firmament to subterraneous regions, to darkness, death,
destructiveness and hence to evil, thus representing the complement to the
male personification of the upper realm of daylight and the preservative
and beneficent life-giving principles. The other tendency, which almost
appears as a reaction or protest against the previous view, led to the
ultimate adoption of an ideal goddess of the nocturnal heaven, who was
“bountiful, offspring-producing, silvery bright” and was in one instance
addressed as “the lady of shining waters,” of “purification” and of
“incantations.” In the period of Hammurabi, devotion went so far as to
cause the goddess Gula, termed the “bride of the earth,” to be invoked as
the “creator of mankind,” the “great physician” and “life-giver” and “the
one who leads the dead to a new life” (Jastrow, _op. cit._ p. 175).
As an interesting outcome of an adjustment of both trains of thought
stands Ishtar-Belit=the lady _par excellence_ and consequently, the
feminine personification of Polaris, the supreme goddess whom
Tiglath-pileser termed “the first among the gods.” She is the mild and
gracious mother of creation, “loves the king and his priesthood,” but is
also the mighty commanding goddess of war who clothes herself in fiery
flame, appears as a violent destroyer and sends down streams of fire upon
her enemies. “The distinguishing position of both the Babylonian and
Assyrian Ishtar is her independent position. Though at times brought into
close contact with Ashur she is not regarded as the mere consort to any
god—no mere reflection of a male deity, but ruling in her own right on a
perfect par with the great gods of the pantheon. She is coequal in rank
and splendor with Ashur. Her name becomes synonymous for goddess as Marduk
becomes the synonym for god. The female deities, both foreign and native,
came to be regarded as so many forms of Ishtar.”
A curious fact connected with Ishtar, which proves that she had developed
from an original divinity, conceived as dual or bi-sexual, is that among
Semites Ishtar appears both as a male and female deity. This seems to show
that at a certain stage of thought Ishtar was also a centralization of
attributes, a fact which undoubtedly explains the supreme position
accorded to this divinity at one time as the feminine form of Polaris. The
most striking illustration of this supremacy is furnished by the famous
bas-relief figured by Layard (“Ninive and its remains” I, 238), which
represents Ishtar, the mother-goddess, the female form of Assur, as seated
on a throne which is borne on the back of a lion in the procession formed
by the seven chief divinities of the Assyrian pantheon, six of whom are
figured as bearded men standing on different animals. On the fine stela of
Esarhaddon, discovered by Dr. von Luschan at Sendschirli, the goddess,
accompanied in this case by three standing gods, is likewise represented
as seated on a throne holding a large ring or circle in her left hand.
The fact that the “All-mother, the female creator of mankind,” is
represented as the only occupant of the throne, reveals a distinct phase
in the evolution of the Babylonian state religion, which curiously concurs
with the supremacy of female sovereignty at Babylon, at the period of its
greatest power under Semiramis. It may be safely assumed that it was at
this time, when the queen represented the goddess, that the cult of the
female principle of nature reached its highest development.
At Nippur the clay images chiefly represent Bel and Belit either
separately or in combination, but figurines of Ishtar have also been
found, in some cases representing her as nursing a child (Jastrow, _op.
cit._ p. 674). It is probable that the symbols of duality connected with
Ishtar had some reference to the mystic unity and duality of the mother
and unborn child, and suggested the installation of the goddess as the
most appropriate personification of creative and life-giving central
power.(98)
It is as interesting to follow the complex train of thought which created
an Ishtar as it is to realize that curious fact that, contrary to views
held elsewhere, it was the male principle that was at one time most
distinctly associated with earth in Babylonia-Assyria, while femininity
was linked to the nocturnal heaven. It is probable that priesthood
encouraged the popular adoption of Bel, the masculine Polaris, as an
earth, sun and morning-star god, while his consort Belit became a heaven,
moon and evening-star goddess. Doubtlessly at an early period the cult of
Polaris and the registration of circumpolar rotation was guarded in
secrecy by the astronomer-priests. Tempting as it is to linger among the
gods and goddesses of the Babylonian-Assyrian pantheon and to follow the
spread of their influence, I shall limit myself to pointing out the change
of government that accompanied the development and establishment of
various divergent cults.
Indications that, as in China at the present day, a combined heaven and
earth cult was practised in Babylonia-Assyria by male and female
representatives of heaven and earth, are furnished by various detached
pieces of information gleaned from Professor Jastrow’s work. The
priest-king was the “child” of Bel, and his living representative. As such
he bore the divine titles of supreme lord, ruled the four regions of the
earth, and became the representative of earth. Pagan authorities state
that a virgin priestess officiated at times in the sanctuary of Bel and
that there were three classes of priestesses devoted to the cult of
Ishtar. They were called “the sacred ones” and carried out a mysterious
ritual which had, however, originated “from naïve conceptions connected
with the worship of the goddess of fertility.”
The use of sacred water and of fermented intoxicating wine entered into
the cult of the life-giving principle and Babylonia ultimately becomes
associated with “Mystery” and “the golden cup full of abominations”
(Revelations XVII). Large terra cotta vases or jars have been found at
Nippur and elsewhere, standing in front of the altar, and “the depth at
which they were found is an indication of the antiquity and stability of
the forms of worship in Babylonian temples. It may be proper to recall
that, in the Solomonic temple likewise, there were a series of jars that
stood near the great altar in the court” (Jastrow, p. 653). One of the
oldest sacred basins found in the ruins of a Babylonian temple “has a
frieze of female figures in it, holding in their outstretched hands
flagons from which they pour water,” a fact which establishes the
ritualistic association of female priestesses with water.
The later association of Ishtar with the moon and with the evening star,
“the leader of the heavenly procession of stars,” naturally exerted an
influence over the ceremonial rites performed by the high priestess or
queen, the living image of the goddess. “Mythological associations appear
to have played a part in identifying the planet Venus with the goddess....
A widely spread nature myth, symbolizing the change of seasons, represents
Ishtar the personification of fertility, the great mother of all that
manifests life, as proceeding to the region of darkness and remaining
there for some time. The disappearance of the planet Venus at certain
seasons ... [and re-appearance] ... suggested the identification of this
planet with Ishtar.” The foregoing affords an explanation why Ishtar
should have become identified with the west and also naturally suggests
the probability that the cult of Ishtar gradually imposed upon its
priestesses and its votaries of the female sex, the ceremonial observance
of periods of retirement and seclusion, coinciding with the disappearance
of the moon and evening star.
A critical examination of the accounts preserved of the Phœnician or
Canaanite religion reveals that it consisted of an idealistic development
of the Ishtar cult of Assyria. The fact that, ultimately, in Phœnicia, the
cult of the female Astarte almost superseded that of the male Baal and
that their joint cult, introduced into Palestine, seriously rivalled the
monotheism of the Israelites, furnishes another indication that we have to
deal here with the same marked divergence of cults which we have seen to
result from a common basis in ancient America. In studying the Phœnician
conception of Astarte as recorded by various authors, one is struck by its
comparative refinement and ideality although, as in ancient America, the
cult of the female principle of nature was also accompanied by secret
licentious ceremonials.
In the Astarte cult of Phœnicia we have precisely what might be expected
to have been evolved by the descendants of an ancient race of
star-watchers who, powerfully impressed by the antithesis of light and
darkness and having become a nation of traders and seafarers, naturally
adopted the nocturnal heaven and guiding stars as their chief object of
worship. It does not seem improbable that it was to the less degrading
association of the female principle with the nocturnal heaven(99) that
woman owed, in lapse of time, the higher position she was accorded in the
countries directly influenced by the Phœnician civilization, and notably
in Greece and Rome.
In Phœnicia, Astarte-Ishtar became the goddess of love and marriage. In
Babylonia-Assyria the high-priestess, the living representative of the
goddess, who, like the planet-goddess, periodically retired into darkness
and seclusion and led a shadowy existence, appears to have originally
shared equal honors with the “lord of earth” and to have delivered
oracular utterances in subterraneous chambers. Throughout Babylonia, New
Year’s Day, which coincided with the beginning of the rainy season, was
the occasion of “the marriage of the god and the goddess” _par
excellence_, a rite which symbolized the “meeting of Heaven and Earth.”
Circumstantial evidence seems to prove, moreover, that, as in Peru, the
annual consecrated union of the male and female personification of heaven
and earth was followed by the marriage of young persons throughout the
land, a custom which furnishes another indication of the original
existence of an annual mating season for the human race. As it was at this
period also that the priesthood approached the papakhu, the inner
sanctuary, also termed the “assembly-room,” “chamber of the oracle” and
“of fates,” and transmitted to the people the irrevocable decrees of
Marduk, it seems as though these ancient rulers practised a similar
“abundance of lying and deceit for the advantage of the governed” as that
advocated by Plato in his Republic;(100) exerted a stern control over the
alliances formed and the number of marriages celebrated and endeavored to
make these, as far as possible, sacred. The mere record that the Assyrian
king Ashurbanipal claims to be the offspring of a pair of divinities
personifying heaven and earth, appears to show that he was the offspring
of the sacred divine union of the high priest and priestess, _i. e._ of
divine birth. It is interesting to collate a few disconnected facts which
appear to illustrate the natural and inevitable result of the institution
of two cults ruled by separate representatives.
Sin-Gashid, of the dynasty of Uruk, mentions a temple built for the god
and his consort, as “the seat of their joy.” At Babylon, the “mother of
great gods” dwelt within the precincts of the temple on the east side of
the Euphrates known as Esagila, “the lofty house.” When the city of
Babylon extended as far as to include Borsippa, the temple known as Ezida,
“the true house,” was built for Marduk=Bel. At Lagash the temple of the
“good lady” and mother stood in one quarter known as the “brilliant town”
while the temple of her consort stood in the other of the two most ancient
quarters of the town. The above facts acquire double significance when
collated with the well-known fact that the palace of Semiramis, the great
queen of Babylon, was built on the west bank of the Euphrates, opposite to
the ancient palace of the king. A bridge united these royal residences
which were otherwise separated by the river.
Under Semiramis, Babylonia was a nation under a single female ruler and
this usurpation of power by a woman, accompanied as it was by the
predominance of the originally naïve cult which had unconsciously fostered
and ministered to perversion and depravity, preceded the decadence,
disintegration and ultimate downfall of the empire. Many centuries
previous, the instalment of a female sovereign preceded the ruin of
another empire in what we may assume to have been precisely the same way.
Professor Sayce informs us that, “about 3800 B.C., in northern Babylonia
and in the city of Agadê or Akkad, arose the empire of
Sargani-sarali=Sargon, and that Sargon’s son, Naram-Sin, succeeded him in
3750 B.C. and continued the conquests of his grandfather.... Naram-Sin’s
son was Bingam-sar-ali. A queen, Ellat-gula, seems to have sat upon the
throne not much later, and with her the dynasty may have come to an end.
At any rate the empire of Akkad is heard of no more. But it left behind it
a profound impression in western Asia, whose art and culture became
Babylonian” (_op. cit._).
The process of disintegration, which caused the Babylonian empire to
crumble away, was doubtlessly hastened by its division into four regions,
each of which in latter times possessed its capital and became the centre
of various independent forms of rival cults. During many centuries
Babylonia was closely associated with the cult of Marduk-Bel, the “lord of
rest;” while Shamash, another form of the central supreme lord, was the
deity of Larsa and Sippar.
At one time Ur became the headquarters for the cult of the moon-god Sin or
Nannar. As, according to Babylonian notions, the sun does not properly
belong to the heavens and plays an insignificant part in the calendrical
system in comparison with the moon, sun-worship proper does not seem to
have existed in Babylonia. At the same time it would seem as though when
the “primitive sun”=Polaris became the hidden, secret god of the
priest-astronomers, who determined the seasons by Ursa Major, the populace
was taught to regard Bel as the personification of the diurnal sun and of
the herald of day, the morning star.
When it is borne in mind how, as the empire spread, new cities were
founded on the plan of the metropolis, that each of these must therefore
have been, in turn, governed by a pair of minor rulers, and had its own
minor zikkurat, we can understand the various indications that exist
showing how the ancient sacred capital of the state became the place of
reunion for the minor “gods,” who assembled there annually in the main
sanctuary, and the fact that each minor chief necessarily required his
dwelling place and tribal council-chamber, would account for the
“references to zikkurats ... or special sanctuaries of some kind, which
were erected within the sacred precinct of the main capital ...” (Jastrow,
p. 637).
When it is realized that each zikkurat was an artificial “mountain” the
description of Babylon in Revelations XVIII becomes clearly intelligible
and is seen to apply to the seven-fold organization of the ancient empire
which had become the centre of the debasing earth-worship ultimately
identified with a female goddess. “And the woman which thou sawest is that
great city which reigneth over the kings of the earth.... I saw a woman
sit upon a scarlet colored beast ... having seven heads.... The seven
heads are seven _mountains_, on which the woman sitteth ... and there are
seven kings”....
Future investigation will doubtlessly furnish us with exact knowledge
concerning the original relation of the governors of the “four regions” to
the central ruler and of the “seven divisions” of the state to each other.
It would be desirable to establish whether each territorial division and
tribe bore the name of its tribal ancestor and whether these names agree
with those of the seven chief “gods” of the pantheon, each of whom is
associated with a celestial body, a day of the seven-day period and, as
shown in the bas-relief already cited, with a different animal. I am
strongly tempted to see in the latter traces of tribal totems and to
connect the days of the week with the seven divisions of the population
and some established form of rotation, employed for the government of the
state, analogous to that I have found out in Ancient Mexico. With regard
to the regulation of the calendar by certain officials, the following
facts are important: Professor Sayce tells us that, “in Assyria, the
high-priest was the equal of the king and the king himself was a priest
and the adopted child of Bel.” Under him were a number of grades of
officials and officers. The land was divided into provinces whose
“governors were selected from the highest aristocracy and who alone had
the privilege of sharing with the king the office of limmu or eponymous
archon after whom the year was named.” This office, which finds its
analogy in China and Central America, is more clearly explained in the
following passage: “The Assyrians were endowed with a keen sense of
history and had invented a system of reckoning time by means of certain
officers called limmi, who gave their names to the year” (Sayce, _op.
cit._ p. 255).
Venturing to make a general statement, as a suggestion for future
investigation, I should say that the ultimate result of the institution of
two cults which were bound to grow in opposite directions, was the fall of
the Babylonian empire under the degrading growth of perversion and
depravity, linked to the cult of earth and night and bi-sexuality, and the
rise of the Assyrian empire with a cult in which the ideas of light and
darkness, night and day preponderated over those of sex. It may possibly
have been as a reaction and protest against the prevailing rites of
Babylonia that influenced the Assyrians in their adoption of two male
rulers, the high-priest and the king. On the other hand, there are
indications showing that possibly, in order to evade the ceremonial
obligations of their position as the representative of the principle of
fertility, several “goddesses” or female rulers of Babylonia transferred
their seat of government, or placed the reins of government into the hands
of a king. Thus Hammurabi tells us that he has restored the temple of the
“lady” or “great lady” of Hallabi, a town near Sippar and that she had
conferred upon him supreme authority over the Babylonian states, then
engaged in fighting with each other. It is obvious that, as soon as
concealment and mystery increasingly surrounded the cult of the female
principle, and warfare became habitual, the power and rôle of the female
ruler must have become more and more “shadowy” and finally dwindled to the
utterance of sacred oracles in dark concealed places of retirement and
safety. Ultimately the cult of Ishtar appears to have become absolutely
secret and hidden and shrouded in mystery and darkness. Its priestesses
became the most famous oracle-givers of Assyria who imparted “divine
knowledge concealed from men.” In the eighth century B.C., Arbela became
the centre of the cult of Ishtar and “developed a special school of
theology marked by the attempt to accord a superior position to the
goddess. In a series of eight oracles addressed to Esarhaddon six are
given forth by women” (Jastrow, p. 342).
Inevitable as was the disintegration of the original state and religion,
continual efforts appear to have been made even in Babylonia itself, to
check the growth of a debasing ritual and the constant increase of the
gods and goddesses which were installed as the rulers of each new town
that was founded on the plan of the metropolis. Professor Jastrow tells us
that “whenever the kings in their inscriptions mention the regular
sacrifices, it is in almost all cases with reference to their
re-institution of an old custom that had been allowed to fall into neglect
(owing to the political disturbances which always affected the temples)
and not as an innovation” ... (_op. cit._ p. 667). The tablet of Sippara,
on which the image of Shamash is restored by the king on an ancient model,
has already been described and on it appears the four-spoked wheel, the
expressive symbol of a “primitive Sun.” The primeval conception of a
single, stable, changeless and central celestial power was evidently
adhered to in ancient Babylonia by a small but faithful minority, and the
constant growth of debasing practices and the manufacture of symbolical
images to which reverence was paid and which were ultimately worshipped,
awakened its constant disapproval and abhorrence. At a remote period we
find the adherents to a stern monotheism establishing the Babylonian
province of