We would remind the reader in this connection, that Ravan, the

giant, who, in the _Ramayana_, wages such a war with Rama Chandra,

is shown as King of Lanka, which was the ancient name for Ceylon;

and that Ceylon, in those days, perhaps formed part of the main-land

of Southern India, and was peopled by the “Eastern Æthiopians.”

Conquered by Rama, the son of Dasarata, the Solar King of ancient

Oude, a colony of these emigrated to Northern Africa. If, as many

suspect, Homer’s _Iliad_ and much of his account of the Trojan war

is plagiarized from the _Ramayana_, then the traditions which served

as a basis for the latter must date from a tremendous antiquity.

Ample margin is thus left in pre-chronological history for a period,

during which the “Eastern Æthiopians” might have established the

hypothetical Mizraic colony, with their high Indian civilization and

arts.

Science is still in the dark about cuneiform inscriptions. Until

these are completely deciphered, especially those cut in rocks found

in such abundance within the boundaries of the old Iran, who can tell

the secrets they may yet reveal? There are no Sanscrit monumental

inscriptions older than Chandragupta (315 B.C.), and the Persepolitan

inscriptions are found 220 years older. There are even now some

manuscripts in characters utterly unknown to philologists and

palæographists, and one of them is, or was, some time since in the

library of Cambridge, England. Linguistic writers class the Semitic

with the Indo-European language, generally including the Æthiopian

and the ancient Egyptian in the classification. But if some of the

dialects of the modern Northern Africa, and even the modern Gheez or

Æthiopian, are now so degenerated and corrupted as to admit of false

conclusions as to the genetical relationship between them and the

other Semitic tongues, we are not at all sure that the latter have

any claim to such a classification, except in the case of the old

Coptic and the ancient Gheez.

That there is more consanguinity between the Æthiopians and the

Aryan, dark-skinned races, and between the latter and the Egyptians,

is something which yet may be proved. It has been lately found that

the ancient Egyptians were of the Caucasian type of mankind, and

the shape of their skulls is purely Asiatic.[846] If they were less

copper-colored than the Æthiopians of our modern day, the Æthiopians

themselves might have had a lighter complexion in days of old. The

fact that, with the Æthiopian kings, the order of succession gave the

crown to the nephew of the king, the _son of his sister_, and not

to his own son, is extremely suggestive. It is an old custom which

prevails until now in Southern India. The Rajah is not succeeded by

his own sons, but by _his sister’s sons_.[847]

Of all the dialects and tongues alleged to be Semitic, the Æthiopian

alone is written from left to right like the Sanscrit and the

Indo-Aryan people.[848]

Thus, against the origin of the Egyptians being attributed to an

ancient Indian colony, there is no graver impediment than Noah’s

disrespectful son--Ham--himself a myth. But the earliest form of

Egyptian religious worship and government, theocratic and sacerdotal,

and her habits and customs all bespeak an Indian origin.

The earliest legends of the history of India mention two dynasties

now lost in the night of time; the first was the dynasty of kings,

of “the race of the sun,” who reigned in Ayodhia (now Oude); the

second that of the “race of the moon,” who reigned in Pruyag

(Allahabad). Let him who desires information on the religious

worship of these early kings read the _Book of the Dead_, of the

Egyptians, and all the peculiarities attending this sun-worship and

the sun-gods. Neither Osiris nor Horus are ever mentioned without

being connected with the sun. They are the “Sons of the _Sun_;” “the

Lord and Adorer of the Sun” is his name. “The sun is the creator of

the body, the engenderer of the gods who are _the successors of the

Son_.” Pococke, in his most ingenious work, strongly advocates the

same idea, and endeavors to establish still more firmly the identity

of the Egyptian, Greek, and Indian mythology. He shows the head

of the Rajpoot Solar race--in fact the great Cuclo-pos (Cyclop or

builder)--called “The great sun,” in the earliest Hindu tradition.

This Gok-la Prince, the patriarch of the vast bands of Inachienses,

he says, “this _Great Sun_ was deified at his death, and according

to the Indian doctrine of the metempsychosis, his Soul was supposed

to have transmigrated into the bull ‘Apis,’ the Sera-pis of the

Greeks, and the SOORA-PAS, or ‘Sun-Chief’ of the Egyptians....

_Osiris_, properly Oosras, signifies both a ‘a bull,’ and ‘a ray of

light.’ _Soora-pas_ (Serapis) the sun chief,” for the Sun in Sanscrit

is Sûrya. Champollion’s _Manifestation to the Light_, reminds in

every chapter of the two Dynasties of the Kings of the Sun and the

Moon. Later, these kings became all deified and transformed after

death into solar and lunar deities. Their worship was the earliest

corruption of the great primitive faith which justly considered the

sun and its fiery life-giving rays as the most appropriate symbol to

remind us of the universal invisible presence of Him who is master of

Life and Death. And now it can be traced all around the globe. It was

the religion of the earliest Vedic Brahmans, who call, in the oldest

hymns of the _Rig-Veda_, Sûrya (the sun) and Agni (fire) “the ruler

of the universe,” “the lord of men,” and the “wise king.” It was the

worship of the Magians, the Zoroastrians, the Egyptians and Greeks,

whether they called him Mithra, or Ahura-Mazda, or Osiris, or Zeus,

keeping in honor of his next of kin, Vesta, the pure celestial fire.

And this religion is found again in the Peruvian solar-worship; in

the Sabianism and heliolatry of the Chaldees, in the Mosaic “burning

bush,” the hanging of the heads or chiefs of the people toward the

Lord, the “Sun,” and even in the Abrahamic building of fire-altars

and the sacrifices of the monotheistic Jews, to Astarté the Queen of

Heaven.

To the present moment, with all the controversies and researches,

History and Science remain as much as ever in the dark as to the

origin of the Jews. They may as well be the exiled Tchandalas, or

Pariahs, of old India, the “bricklayers” mentioned by Vina-Svati,

Veda-Vyasa and Manu, as the Phœnicians of Herodotus, or the Hyk-sos

of Josephus, or descendants of Pali shepherds, or a mixture of all

these. The _Bible_ names the Tyrians as a kindred people, and claims

dominion over them.[849]

There is more than one important character in the _Bible_, whose

biography proves him a mythical hero. Samuel is indicated as the

personage of the Hebrew Commonwealth. He is the _doppel_ of Samson,

of the _Book of Judges_, as will be seen--being the son of Anna and

EL-KAINA, as Samson was of Manua or Manoah. Both were fictitious

characters, as now represented in the revealed book; one was the

Hebrew Hercules, and the other Ganesa. Samuel is credited with

establishing the republic, as putting down the Canaanite worship

of Baal and Astarté, or Adonis and Venus, and setting up that of

Jehovah. Then the people demanded a king, and he anointed Saul, and

after him David of Bethlehem.

David is the Israelitish King Arthur. He did great achievements

and established a government in all Syria and Idumea. His dominion

extended from Armenia and Assyria on the north and northeast, the

Syrian Desert and Persian Gulf on the East, Arabia on the south, and

Egypt and the Levant on the west. Only Phœnicia was excepted.

His friendship with Hiram seems to indicate that he made his first

expedition from that country into Judea; and his long residence at

Hebron, the city of the Kabeiri (_Arba_ or four), would seem likewise

to imply that he established a new religion in the country.

After David came Solomon, powerful and luxurious, who sought to

consolidate the dominion which David had won. As David was a

Jehovah-worshipper, a temple of Jehovah (Tukt Suleima) was built in

Jerusalem, while shrines of Moloch-Hercules, Khemosh, and Astarté

were erected on Mount Olivet. These shrines remained till Josiah.

There were conspiracies formed. Revolts took place in Idumea and

Damascus; and Ahijah the prophet led the popular movement which

resulted in deposing the house of David and making Jeroboam king.

Ever after the prophets dominated in Israel, where the calf-worship

prevailed; the priests ruled over the weak dynasty of David, and the

lascivious local worship existed over the whole country. After the

destruction of the house of Ahab, and the failure of Jehu and his

descendants to unite the country under one head, the endeavor was

made in Judah. Isaiah had terminated the direct line in the person

of Ahaz (_Isaiah_ vii. 9), and placed on the throne a prince from

Bethlehem (_Micah_ v. 2, 5). This was Hezekiah. On ascending the

throne, he invited the chiefs of Israel to unite in alliance with him

against Assyria (_2 Chronicles_, xxx. 1, 21; xxxi. 1, 5; _2 Kings_,

xviii. 7). He seems to have established a sacred college (_Proverbs_

xxv. 1), and to have utterly changed the worship. Aye, even unto

breaking into pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made.

This makes the story of Samuel and David and Solomon mythical. Most

of the prophets who were literate seem to have begun about this time

to write.

The country was finally overthrown by the Assyrians, who found the

same people and institutions as in the Phœnician and other countries.

Hezekiah was not the lineal, but the titular son of Ahaz. Isaiah, the

prophet, belonged to the royal family, and Hezekiah was reputed his

son-in-law. Ahaz refused to ally himself with the prophet and his

party, saying: “I will not _tempt_ (depend on) the Lord” (_Isaiah_

vii. 12). The prophet had declared: “If you will not believe, surely

you shall not be established”--foreshadowing the deposition of

his direct language. “Ye weary my God,” replied the prophet, and

predicted the birth of a child by an _alma_, or temple-woman, and

that before it should attain full age (_Hebrews_ v. 14; _Isaiah_ vii.

16; viii. 4), the king of Assyria should overcome Syria and Israel.

This is the prophecy which Irenæus took such pains to connect with

Mary and Jesus, and made the reason why the mother of the Nazarene

prophet is represented as belonging to the temple, and consecrated to

God from her infancy.

In a second song, Isaiah celebrated the new chief, to sit on the

throne of David (ix. 6, 7; xi. 1), who should restore to their homes

the Jews whom the confederacy had led captive (_Isaiah_ viii. 2-12;

_Joel_ iii. 1-7; _Obadiah_ 7, 11, 14). Micah--his contemporary--also

announced the same event (iv. 7-13; v. 1-7). The Redeemer was to come

out of Bethlehem; in other words, was of the house of David; and

was to resist Assyria to whom Ahaz had sworn allegiance, and also

to reform religion (_2 Kings_, xviii. 4-8). This Hezekiah did. He

was grandson of Zechariah the seer (_2 Chronicles_, xxix. 1; xxvi.

5), the counsellor of Uzziah; and as soon as he ascended the throne

he restored the religion of David, and destroyed the last vestiges

of that of Moses, _i.e._, the _esoteric_ doctrine, declaring “our

fathers have trespassed” (_2 Chron._, xxix. 6-9). He next attempted

a reunion with the northern monarchy, there being an interregnum in

Israel (_2 Chron._, xxx. 1, 2, 6; xxxi. 1, 6, 7). It was successful,

but resulted in an invasion by the king of Assyria. But it was a new

_régime_; and all this shows the course of two parallel streams in

the religious worship of the Israelites; one belonging to the state

religion and adopted to fit political exigencies; the other pure

idolatry, resulting from ignorance of the true esoteric doctrine

preached by Moses. For the first time since Solomon built them “the

high places were taken away.”

It was Hezekiah who was the expected Messiah of the exoteric

state-religion. He was the scion from the stem of Jesse, who should

recall the Jews from a deplorable captivity, about which the Hebrew

historians seem to be very silent, carefully avoiding all mention of

this particular fact, but which the irascible prophets imprudently

disclose. If Hezekiah crushed the exoteric Baal-worship, he also

tore violently away the people of Israel from the religion of their

fathers, and the secret rites instituted by Moses.

It was Darius Hystaspes who was the first to establish a Persian

colony in Judea, Zoro-Babel was perhaps the leader. “The name

_Zoro-babel_ means ‘the seed or son of Babylon’--as Zoro-aster צרו־אשתר

is the seed, son, or prince of Ishtar.”[850] The new colonists were

doubtless _Judæi_. This is a designation from the East. Even Siam is

called Judia, and there was an Ayodia in India. The temples of _Solom_

or Peace were numerous. Throughout Persia and Afghanistan the names of

Saul and David are very common. The “Law” is ascribed in turn to

Hezekiah, Ezra, Simon the Just, and the Asmonean period. Nothing

definite; everywhere contradictions. When the Asmonean period began,

the chief supporters of the Law were called Asideans or Khasdim

(Chaldeans), and afterward Pharisees or Pharsi (Parsis). This

indicates that Persian colonies were established in Judea and ruled

the country; while all the people that are mentioned in the books of

_Genesis_ and _Joshua_ lived there as a commonalty (see _Ezra_ ix. 1).

There is no real history in the _Old Testament_, and the little

historical information one can glean is only found in the indiscreet

revelations of the prophets. The book, as a whole, must have been

written at various times, or rather invented as an authorization

of some subsequent worship, the origin of which may be very easily

traced partially to the Orphic Mysteries, and partially to the

ancient Egyptian rites in familiarity with which Moses was brought up

from his infancy.

Since the last century the Church has been gradually forced into

concessions of usurped biblical territory to those to whom it of

right belonged. Inch by inch has been yielded, and one personage

after another been proved mythical and Pagan. But now, after the

recent discovery of George Smith, the much-regretted Assyriologist,

one of the securest props of the _Bible_ has been pulled down. Sargon

and his tablets are about demonstrated to be older than Moses. Like

the account of _Exodus_, the birth and story of the lawgiver seem to

have been “borrowed” from the Assyrians, as the “jewels of gold and

jewels of silver” were said to be from the Egyptians.

On page 224 of _Assyrian Discoveries_, Mr. George Smith says: “In

the palace of Sennacherib at Kouyunjik, I found another fragment of

the curious history of Sargon, a translation of which I published in

the _Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archæology_, vol. i.,

part i., page 46. This text relates that Sargon, an early Babylonian

monarch, was born of royal parents, but concealed by his mother, who

placed him on the Euphrates in an ark of rushes, coated with bitumen,

like that in which the mother of Moses hid her child (see _Exodus_

ii.). Sargon was discovered by a man named Akki, a water-carrier, who

adopted him as his son; and he afterward became King of Babylonia.

The capital of Sargon was the great city of Agadi--called by the

Semites Akkad--mentioned in _Genesis_ as a capital of Nimrod

(_Genesis_ x. 10), and here he reigned _for forty five years_.[851]

Akkad lay near the city of _Sippara_,[852] on the Euphrates and north

of Babylon. “The date of Sargon, who may be termed the Babylonian

Moses, was in the sixteenth century and perhaps earlier.”

G. Smith adds in his _Chaldean Account_ that Sargon I. was a

Babylonian monarch who reigned in the city of Akkad about 1600 B.C.

The name of Sargon signifies the right, true, or legitimate king.

This curious story is found on fragments of tablets from Kouyunjik,

and reads as follows:

1. Sargona, the powerful king, the king of Akkad am I.

2. My mother was a princess, my father I did not know, a brother of

my father ruled over the country.

3. In the city of Azupirana, which is by the side of the river

Euphrates,

4. My mother, the princess, conceived me; in difficulty she brought

me forth.

5. She placed me in an ark of rushes, with bitumen my exit she sealed

up.

6. She launched me in the river which did not drown me.

7. The river carried me to Akki, the water-carrier it brought me.

8. Akki, the water-carrier, in tenderness of bowels, lifted me, etc.,

etc.

And now _Exodus_ (ii.): “And when she (Moses’ mother) could not

longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it

with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein, and she laid it

in the flags by the river’s brink.”

The story, says Mr. G. Smith, “is supposed to have happened about

1600 B.C., rather earlier than the supposed age of Moses[853] as we

know that the fame of Sargon reached Egypt, it is quite likely that

this account had a connection with the event related in _Exodus_ ii.,

for every action, when once performed, has a tendency to be repeated.”

The “ages” of the Hindus differ but little from those of the Greeks,

Romans, and even the Jews. We include the Mosaic computation

advisedly, and with intent to prove our position. The chronology

which separates Moses from the creation of the world by _only four

generations_ seems ridiculous, merely because the Christian clergy

would enforce it upon the world literally.[854] The kabalists know

that these generations stand for ages of the world. The allegories

which, in the Hindu calculations, embrace the whole stupendous sweep

of the four ages, are cunningly made in the Mosaic books, through the

obliging help of the _Masorah_, to cram into the small period of two

millenniums and a half (2513)!

The exoteric plan of the _Bible_ was made to answer also to four

ages. Thus, they reckon the Golden Age from Adam to Abraham; the

silver, from Abraham to David; copper, from David to the Captivity;

thenceforward, the iron. But the secret computation is quite

different, and does not vary at all from the zodiacal calculations of

the Brahmans. We are in the Iron Age, or Kali-Yug, but it began with

Noah, the mythical ancestor of our race.

Noah, or Nuah, like all the euhemerized manifestations of the

Unrevealed One--Swayambhuva (or Swayambhu), was androgyne. Thus,

in some instances, he belonged to the purely feminine triad of the

Chaldeans, known as “Nuah, the universal Mother.” We have shown, in

another chapter, that every male triad had its feminine counterpart,

one in three, like the former. It was the passive complement of the

active principle, its _reflection_. In India, the male trimurty is

reproduced in the Sakti-trimurti, the feminine; and in Chaldea, Ana,

Belita and Davkina answered to Anu, Bel, Nuah. The former three

resumed in one--Belita, were called:

“Sovereign goddess, lady of the nether abyss, mother of gods, queen

of the earth, queen of fecundity.”

As the primordial humidity, whence proceeded _all_, Belita is

Tamti, or the sea, the mother of _the city of Erech_ (the great

Chaldean necropolis), therefore, an infernal goddess. In the world

of stars and planets she is known as Istar or Astoreth. Hence, she

is identical with Venus, and every other queen of heaven, to whom

cakes and buns were offered in sacrifice,[855] and, as all the

archæologists know, with _Eve_, the mother of all that live, and with

Mary.

The Ark, in which are preserved the germs of all living things

necessary to repeople the earth, represents the survival of life,

and the supremacy of spirit over matter, through the conflict of

the opposing powers of nature. In the Astro-Theosophic chart of the

Western Rite, the Ark corresponds with the navel, and is placed at

the sinister side, the side of the woman (the moon), one of whose

symbols is the left pillar of Solomon’s temple--Boaz. The umbilicus

is connected with the receptacle in which are fructified the germs of

the race.[856] The Ark is the sacred _Argha_ of the Hindus, and thus,

the relation in which it stands to Noah’s ark may be easily inferred,

when we learn that the Argha was an oblong vessel, used by the high

priests as a sacrificial chalice in the worship of Isis, Astartè, and

Venus-Aphroditè, all of whom were goddesses of the generative powers

of nature, or of matter--hence, representing symbolically the Ark

containing the germs of all living things.

We admit that Pagans had and now have--as in India--strange symbols,

which, to the eyes of the hypocrite and Puritan, seem scandalously

immoral. But did not the ancient Jews copy most of these symbols? We

have described elsewhere the identity of the lingham with Jacob’s

pillar, and we could give a number of instances from the present

Christian rites, bearing the same origin, did but space permit, and

were not all these noticed fully by Inman and others (See Inman’s

_Ancient Faiths Embodied in Ancient Names_).

Describing the worship of the Egyptians, Mrs. Lydia Maria Child

says: “This reverence for the production of life, introduced into

the worship of Osiris, the sexual emblems so common in Hindustan.

A colossal image of this kind was presented to his temple in

Alexandria, by King Ptolemy Philadelphus.... Reverence for the

mystery of organized life led to the recognition of a masculine

and feminine principle in all things, spiritual or material....

The sexual emblems, everywhere conspicuous in the sculptures of

their temples, would seem impure in description, but _no clean and

thoughtful mind_ could so regard them while witnessing the obvious

simplicity and solemnity with which the subject is treated.”[857]

Thus speaks this respected lady and admirable writer, and no truly

pure man or woman would ever think of blaming her for it. But such a

perversion of the ancient thought is but natural in an age of cant

and prudery like our own.

The water of the flood when standing in the allegory for the symbolic

“sea,” Tamti, typifies the turbulent chaos, or matter, called “the

great dragon.” According to the Gnostic and Rosicrucian mediæval

doctrine, the creation of woman was not originally intended. She

is the offspring of man’s own impure fancy, and, as the Hermetists

say, “an obtrusion.” Created by an unclean thought she sprang into

existence at the _evil_ “seventh hour,” when the “supernatural” real

worlds had passed away and the “natural” or _delusive_ worlds began

evolving along the “descending Microcosmos,” or the arc of the great

cycle, in plainer phraseology. First “Virgo,” the Celestial Virgin of

the Zodiac, she became “Virgo-Scorpio.” But in evolving his second

companion, man had unwittingly endowed her with his own share of

Spirituality; and the new being whom his “imagination” had called

into life became his “Saviour” from the snares of Eve-Lilith, the

first Eve, who had a greater share of matter in her composition than

the primitive “spiritual” man.[858]

Thus woman stands in the cosmogony in relation to “matter” or the

_great deep_, as the “Virgin of the Sea,” who crushes the “Dragon”

under her foot. The “Flood” is also very often shown, in symbolical

phraseology, as the “great Dragon.” For one acquainted with these

tenets it becomes more than suggestive to learn that with the

Catholics the Virgin Mary is not only the accepted patroness of

Christian sailors, but also the “Virgin of the Sea.” So was Dido the

patroness of the Phœnician mariners;[859] and together with Venus

and other lunar goddesses--the moon having such a strong influence

over the tides--was the “Virgin of the Sea.” _Mar_, the Sea, is the

root of the name Mary. The blue color, which was with the ancients

symbolical of the “Great Deep” or the material world, hence--of evil,

is made sacred to our “Blessed Lady.” It is the color of “Notre Dame

de Paris.” On account of its relation to the symbolical serpent this

color is held in the deepest aversion by the ex-Nazarenes, disciples

of John the Baptist, now the Mendæans of Basra.

Among the beautiful plates of Maurice, there is one representing

Christna crushing the head of the Serpent. A three-peaked mitre is

on his head (typifying the trinity), and the body and tail of the

conquered serpent encircles the figure of the Hindu god. This plate

shows whence proceeded the inspiration for the “make up” of a later

story extracted from an alleged prophecy. “I will put enmity between

thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall

bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his _heel_.”

The Egyptian Orante is also shown with his arms extended as on a

crucifix, and treading upon the “Serpent;” and Horus (the Logos) is

represented piercing the head of the dragon, Typhon or Aphophis. All

this gives us a clew to the biblical allegory of Cain and Abel. Cain

was held as the ancestor of the Hivites, the Serpents, and the twins

of Adam are an evident copy from the fable of Osiris and Typhon.

Apart from the external form of the allegory, however, it embodied

the philosophical conception of the eternal struggle of good and evil.

But how strangely elastic, how adaptable to any and every thing this

mystical philosophy proved after the Christian era! When were ever

facts, irrefutable, irrefragable, and beyond denial, less potential

for the reëstablishment of truth than in our century of casuistry

and Christian cunning? Is Christna proved to have been known as the

“Good Shepherd” ages before the year A.D. 1, to have crushed the

Serpent Kalinaga, and to have been crucified--all this was but a

prophetic foreshadowing of the future! Are the Scandinavian Thor, who

bruised the head of the Serpent with his cruciform mace, and Apollo,

who killed Python, likewise shown to present the most striking

similarities with the heroes of the Christian fables; they become

but original conceptions of “heathen” minds, “working upon the old

Patriarchal prophecies respecting the Christ, as they were contained

in the one universal and primeval Revelation!”[860]

The flood, then, is the “Old Serpent” or the great deep of matter,

Isaiah’s “dragon in the sea” (xxvii. 1), over which the ark safely

crosses on its way to the mount of Salvation. But, if we have heard

of the ark and Noah, and the _Bible_ at all, it is because the

mythology of the Egyptians was ready at hand for Moses (if Moses ever

wrote any of the _Bible_), and that he was acquainted with the story

of Horus, standing on his boat of a serpentine form, and killing the

Serpent with his spear; and with the hidden meaning of these fables,

and their real origin. This is also why we find in _Leviticus_, and

other parts of his books, whole pages of laws identical with those of

_Manu_.

The animals shut up in the ark are the human passions. They typify

certain ordeals of initiation, and the mysteries which were

instituted among many nations in commemoration of this allegory.

Noah’s ark rested on the seventeenth of the _seventh_ month. Here we

have again the number; as also in the “clean beasts” that he took by

_sevens_ into the ark. Speaking of the water-mysteries of Byblos,

Lucian says: “On the top of one of the two pillars which Bacchus set

up, a man remains _seven_ days.”[861] He supposes this was done to

honor Deukalion. Elijah, when praying on the top of Mount Carmel,

sends his servant to look for a cloud toward the sea, and repeats,

“go again _seven_ times. And it came to pass at the _seventh_ time,

behold there arose a little cloud out of the sea like a man’s

hand.”[862]

“_Noah_ is a _revolutio_ of Adam, as Moses is a revolutio of Abel

and Seth,” says the _Kabala_; that is to say, a repetition or

another version of the same story. The greatest proof of it is

the distribution of the characters in the _Bible_. For instance,

beginning with Cain, the first murderer, every _fifth_ man in his

line of descent is a murderer. Thus there come Enoch, Irad, Mehujael,

Methuselah, and the _fifth_ is _Lamech_, the second murderer, and he

is Noah’s father. By drawing the five-pointed star of Lucifer (which

has its crown-point downward) and writing the name of Cain beneath

the lowest point, and those of his descendants successively at each

of the other points, it will be found that each fifth name--which

would be written beneath that of Cain--is that of a murderer. In the

_Talmud_ this genealogy is given complete, and thirteen murderers

range themselves in line below the name of Cain. This is _no_

coincidence. Siva is the Destroyer, but he is also the _Regenerator_.

Cain is a murderer, but he is also the creator of nations, and an

inventor. This star of Lucifer is the same one that John sees falling

down to earth in his _Apocalypse_.

In Thebes, or Theba, which means ark--TH-ABA being synonymous with

Kartha or Tyre, Astu or Athens and Urbs or Rome, and meaning also

the city--are found the same foliations as described on the pillars

of the temple of Solomon. The bi-colored leaf of the olive, the

three-lobed fig-leaf, and the lanceolate-shaped laurel-leaf, had all

esoteric as well as popular or vulgar meanings with the ancients.

The researches of Egyptologists present another corroboration of the

identity of the _Bible_-allegories with those of the lands of the

Pharaohs and Chaldeans. The dynastic chronology of the Egyptians,

recorded by Herodotus, Manetho, Eratosthenes, Diodorus Siculus, and

accepted by our antiquarians, divided the period of Egyptian history

under four general heads: the dominion of gods, demi-gods, heroes,

and mortal men. By combining the demi-gods and heroes into one class,

Bunsen reduces the periods to three: the ruling gods, the demi-gods

or heroes--sons of gods, but born of mortal mothers--and the Manes,

who were the ancestors of individual tribes. These subdivisions, as

any one may perceive, correspond perfectly with the biblical Elohim,

sons of God, giants, and mortal Noachian men.

Diodorus of Sicily and Berosus give us the names of the twelve great

gods who presided over the twelve months of the year and the twelve

signs of the zodiac. These names, which include Nuah,[863] are too

well known to require repetition. The double-faced Janus was also

at the head of twelve gods, and in his representations of him he is

made to hold the keys to the celestial domains. All these having

served as models for the biblical patriarchs, have done still further

service--especially Janus--by furnishing copy to St. Peter and his

twelve apostles, the former also double-faced in his denial, and

also represented as holding the keys of Paradise.

This statement that the story of Noah is but another version in its

hidden meaning of the story of Adam and his three sons, gathers

proof on every page of the book of _Genesis_. Adam is the prototype

of Noah. Adam _falls_ because he eats of the forbidden fruit of

_celestial_ knowledge; Noah, because he tastes of the _terrestrial_

fruit: the juice of the grape representing the abuse of knowledge in

an unbalanced mind. Adam gets stripped of his spiritual envelope;

Noah of his terrestrial clothing; and the _nakedness_ of both makes

them feel ashamed. The wickedness of Cain is repeated in Ham. But the

descendants of both are shown as the wisest of races on earth; and

they are called on this account “snakes,” and the “sons of snakes,”

meaning the _sons of wisdom_, and not of Satan, as some divines

would be pleased to have the world understand the term. Enmity has

been placed between the “snake” and the “woman” only in this mortal

phenomenal “world of man” as “born of woman.” Before the carnal fall,

the “snake” was _Ophis_, the divine wisdom, which needed no matter

to procreate men, humanity being utterly spiritual. Hence the war

between the snake and the woman, or between spirit and matter. If,

in its material aspect, the “old serpent” is matter, and represents

Ophiomorphos, in its spiritual meaning it becomes Ophis-Christos. In

the magic of the old Syro-Chaldeans both are conjoint in the zodiacal

sign of the androgyne of Virgo-Scorpio, and may be _divided_ or

separated whenever needed. Thus as the origin of “good and evil,” the

meaning of the S.S. and Z.Z. has always been interchangeable; and if

upon some occasions the S.S. on sigils and talismans are suggestive

of serpentine evil influence and denote a design of _black_ magic

upon others, the double S.S. are found on the sacramental cups of the

Church and mean the presence of the Holy Ghost, or pure wisdom.

The Midianites were known as the _wise_ men, or sons of snakes,

as well as Canaanites and Hamites; and such was the renown of the

Midianites, that we find Moses, _the prophet, led on, and inspired

by “the Lord,”_ humbling himself before Hobab, the son of Raguel,

the _Midianite_, and beseeching him to remain with the people of

Israel: “Leave us not, I pray thee; forasmuch _as thou knowest how

we are to encamp_ IN THE WILDERNESS, _thou mayest be to us instead

of eyes_.”[864] Further, when Moses sends spies to search out the

land of Canaan, they bring as a proof of the wisdom (kabalistically

speaking) and goodness of the land, a branch with _one_ cluster of

_grapes_, which they are compelled to bear between two men on a

staff. Moreover, they add: “we saw the children of ANAK there.”

They are the _giants_, the sons of Anak, “_which come of the

giants_,”[865] and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so

we were in their sight.”[866]

Anak is Enoch, the patriarch, who _dies not_, and who is the first

possessor of the “mirific name,” according to the _Kabala_, and the

ritual of Freemasonry.

Comparing the biblical patriarchs with the descendants of

Vaiswasvata, the Hindu Noah, and the old Sanscrit traditions about

the deluge in the Brahmanical _Mahâbhârata_, we find them mirrored in

the Vaidic patriarchs who are the primitive types upon which all the

others were modelled. But before comparison is possible, the Hindu

myths must be comprehended in their true significance. Each of these

mythical personages bears, besides an astronomical significance, a

spiritual or moral, and an anthropological or physical meaning. The

patriarchs are not only euhemerized gods--the prediluvian answering

to the _twelve_ great gods of Berosus, and to the _ten_ Pradjâpati,

and the postdiluvian to the seven gods of the famous tablet in the

Ninivian Library, but they stand also as the symbols of the Greek

Æons, the kabalistic Sephiroth, and the zodiacal signs, as types of

a series of human races.[867] This variation from _ten_ to _twelve_

will be accounted for presently, and proved on the very authority

of the _Bible_. Only, they are not the first gods described by

Cicero,[868] which belong to a hierarchy of higher powers, the

Elohim--but appertain rather to the second class of the “twelve

gods,” the _Dii minores_, and who are the terrestrial reflections

of the first, among whom Herodotus places Hercules.[869] Alone,

out of the group of twelve, Noah, by reason of his position at the

transitional point, belongs to the highest Babylonian triad, Noah,

the spirit of the waters. The rest are identical with the inferior

gods of Assyria and Babylonia, who represented the lower order of

emanations, introduced around Bel, the Demiurge, and help him in his

work, as the patriarchs are shown to assist Jehovah--the “Lord God.”

Besides these, many of which were _local_ gods, the protecting

deities of rivers and cities, there were the four classes of genius,

we see Ezekiel making them support the throne of Jehovah in his

vision. A fact which, if it identifies the Jewish “Lord God” with one

of the Babylonian trinity, connects, at the same time, the present

Christian God with the same triad, inasmuch as it is these four

cherubs, if the reader will remember, on which Irenæus makes Jesus

ride, and which are shown as the companions of the evangelists.

The Hindu kabalistic derivation of the books of _Ezekiel_ and

_Revelation_ are shown in nothing more plainly than in this

description of the four beasts, which typify the four elementary

kingdoms--earth, air, fire, and water. As is well known, they are the

Assyrian sphinxes, but these figures are also carved on the walls of

nearly every Hindu pagoda.

The author of the _Revelation_ copies faithfully in his text (see

chap. iv., verse 17) the Pythagorean pentacle, of which Levi’s

admirable sketch is reproduced on page 452.

The Hindu goddess Adanari (or as it might be more properly written,

Adonari, since the second a is pronounced almost like the English o)

is represented as surrounded by the same figures. It fits exactly

Ezekiel’s “wheel of the Adonai,” known as “the Cherub of Jeheskiel,”

and indicates, beyond question, the source from which the Hebrew seer

drew his allegories. For convenience of comparison we have placed the

figure in the pentacle. (See page 453.)

Above these beasts were the angels or spirits, divided in two groups:

the Igili, or celestial beings, and the Am-anaki, or terrestrial

spirits, the giants, children of Anak, of whom the spies complained

to Moses.

[Illustration: ADONAI]

The _Kabbala Denudata_ gives to the kabalists a very clear, to the

profane a very muddled account of permutations or substitutions

of one person for another. So, for instance, it says, that “the

scintilla” (spiritual spark or soul) of Abraham was taken from

Michael, the chief of the Æons, and highest emanation of the Deity;

so high indeed that in the eyes of the Gnostics, Michael was

identical with Christ. And yet Michael and Enoch are one and the same

person. Both occupy the junction-point of the cross of the Zodiac

as “man.” The scintilla of Isaac was that of Gabriel, the chief of

the angelic host, and the scintilla of Jacob was taken from Uriel,

named “the fire of God;” the sharpest sighted spirit in all Heaven.

Adam is not the Kadmon but Adam _Primus_, the _Microprosopus_. In one

of his aspects the latter is Enoch, the terrestrial patriarch and

father of Methuselah. He that “walked with God” and “did not die” is

the spiritual Enoch, who typified humanity, eternal in spirit and as

eternal in flesh, though the latter does _die_. Death is but a new

birth, and spirit is immortal; thus humanity can never die, for the

_Destroyer_ has become the _Creator_, Enoch is the type of the dual

man, spiritual and terrestrial. Hence his place in the centre of the

astronomical cross.

[Illustration: ADANARI]

But was this idea original with the Hebrews? We think not. Every

nation which had an astronomical system, and especially India, held

the cross in the highest reverence, for it was the geometrical basis

of the religious symbolism of their _avatars_; the manifestation of

the Deity, or of the Creator in his creature MAN; of God in humanity

and humanity in God, as spirits. The oldest monuments of Chaldea,

Persia, and India disclose the double or eight-pointed cross. This

symbol, which very naturally is found, like every other geometrical

figure in nature, in plants as well as in the snowflakes, has led

Dr. Lundy, in his super-Christian mysticism, to name such cruciform

flowers as form an eight-pointed star by the junction of the two

crosses--“the _Prophetic Star of the Incarnation_, which joined

heaven and earth, God and man together.”[870] The latter sentence

is perfectly expressed; only, the old kabalist axiom, “as above, so

below,” answers still better, as it discloses to us the same God for

all humanity, not alone for the handful of Christians. It is the

_Mundane_ cross of Heaven repeated on earth by plants and dual man:

the physical man superseding the “spiritual,” at the junction-point

of which stands the mythical Libra-Hermes-Enoch. The gesture of one

hand pointing to Heaven, is balanced by the other pointing down to

the earth; boundless generations below, boundless regenerations

above; the visible but the manifestation of the invisible; the man of

dust abandoned to dust, the man of spirit reborn in spirit; thus it

is finite humanity which is the Son of the Infinite God. Abba--the

Father; Amona--the Mother; the Son, the Universe. This primitive

triad is repeated in all the theogonies. Adam Kadmon, Hermes, Enoch,

Osiris, Christna, Ormazd, or Christos are all one. They stand as

_Metatrons_ between body and soul--eternal spirits which redeem flesh

by the regeneration of flesh _below_, and soul by the regeneration

_above_, where humanity walks once more with God.

We have shown elsewhere that the symbol of the cross or Egyptian

_Tau_, =T=, was by many ages earlier than the period assigned to

Abraham, the alleged forefather of the Israelites, for otherwise

Moses could not have learned it of the priests. And that the Tau was

held as sacred by the Jews as by other “Pagan” nations is proved

by a fact admitted now by Christian divines as well as by infidel

archæologists. Moses, in _Exodus_ xii. 22, orders his people to

mark their _door-posts and lintels_ with blood, lest the “Lord God”

should make a mistake and smite some of his chosen people, instead

of the doomed Egyptians.[871] And this mark is a tau! The identical

Egyptian handled _cross_, with the half of which talisman Horus

raised the dead, as is shown on a sculptured ruin at Philœ.[872] How

gratuitous is the idea that all such crosses and symbols were so many

unconscious prophecies of Christ, is fully exemplified in the case of

the Jews upon whose accusation Jesus was put to death. For instance,

the same learned author remarks in _Monumental Christianity_ that

“the Jews themselves acknowledged this sign of salvation until they

rejected Christ;” and in another place he asserts that the rod of

Moses, used in his miracles before Pharaoh, “was, no doubt, this

_crux ansata_, or something like it, _also used by the Egyptian

priests_.”[873] Thus the logical inference would be, that 1, if the

Jews worshipped the same symbols as the Pagans, then they were no

better than they; and 2, if, being so well versed as they were in the

hidden symbolism of the cross, in the face of their having waited

for centuries for the Messiah, they yet rejected both the Christian

Messiah and Christian Cross, then there must have been something

wrong about both.

Those who “rejected” Jesus as the “Son of God,” were neither the

people ignorant of religious symbols, nor the handful of atheistical

Sadducees who put him to death; but the very men who were instructed

in the secret wisdom, who knew the origin as well as the meaning of

the cruciform symbol, and who put aside both the Christian emblem and

the Saviour suspended from it, because they could not be parties to

such a blasphemous imposition upon the common people.

Nearly all the prophecies about Christ are credited to the patriarchs

and prophets. If a few of the latter may have existed as real

personages, every one of the former is a myth. We will endeavor

to prove it by the hidden interpretation of the Zodiac, and the

relations of its signs to these antediluvian men.

If the reader will keep in mind the Hindu ideas of cosmogony,

as given in chapter vi., he will better understand the relation

between the biblical antediluvian patriarchs, and that puzzle of

commentators--“Ezekiel’s wheel.” Thus, be it remembered 1, that

the universe is not a spontaneous creation, but an evolution from

pre-existent matter; 2, that it is only one of an endless series of

universes; 3, that eternity is pointed off into grand cycles, in

each of which twelve transformations of our world occur, following

its partial destruction by fire and water, alternately. So that

when a new minor period sets in, the earth is so changed, even

geologically, as to be practically a new world; 4, that of these

twelve transformations, the earth after each of the first six is

grosser, and everything on it--man included--more material, than

after the preceding one: while after each of the remaining six the

contrary is true, both earth and man growing more and more refined

and spiritual with each terrestrial change; 5, that when the apex

of the cycle is reached, a gradual dissolution takes place, and

every living and objective form is destroyed. But when that point is

reached, humanity has become fitted to live subjectively as well as

objectively. And not humanity alone, but also animals, plants, and

every atom. After a time of rest, say the Buddhists, when a new world

becomes self-formed, the astral souls of animals and of all beings,

except such as have reached the highest Nirvana, will return on earth

again to end their cycles of transformations, and become men in their

turn.

This stupendous conception, the ancients synthesized for the

instruction of the common people, into a single pictorial design--the

Zodiac, or celestial belt. Instead of the twelve signs now used,

there were originally but ten known to the general public, viz.:

Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo-Scorpio, Sagittarius,

Capricornus, Aquarius, and Pisces.[874] These were exoteric. But

in addition there were two mystical signs inserted, which none but

initiates comprehended, viz.: at the middle or junction-point where

now stands _Libra_, and at the sign now called Scorpio, which follows

Virgo. When it was found necessary to make them exoteric, these two

secret signs were added under their present appellations as blinds

to conceal the true names which gave the key to the whole secret of

creation, and divulged the origin of “good and evil.”

The true Sabean astrological doctrine secretly taught that within

this double sign was hidden the explanation of the gradual

transformation of the world, from its spiritual and subjective, into

the “two-sexed” sublunary state. The twelve signs were therefore

divided into two groups. The first six were called the ascending,

or the line of Macrocosm (the great spiritual world); the last

six, the descending line, or the Microcosm (the little secondary

world)--the mere reflection of the former, so to say. This division

was called Ezekiel’s wheel, and was completed in the following way:

First came the ascending five signs (euphemerized into patriarchs),

Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, and the group concluded with

Virgo-Scorpio. Then came the turning-point, _Libra_. After which, the

first half of the sign Virgo-Scorpio, was duplicated and transferred

to lead the lower, or descending group of Microcosm which ran

down to _Pisces_, or Noah (deluge). To make it clearer, the sign

Virgo-Scorpio, which appeared originally thus ♍︎, became simply

_Virgo_, and the duplication, ♏︎, or Scorpio, was placed between

Libra, the _seventh_ sign (which is Enoch, or the angel Metatron,

or _Mediator_ between spirit and matter, or God and man). It now

became Scorpio (or Cain), which sign or patriarch led _mankind to

destruction_, according to exoteric theology; but, according to the

true doctrine of the wisdom-religion, it indicated _the degradation

of the whole universe in its course of evolution downward from the

subjective to the objective_.

The sign of _Libra_ is credited as a later invention by the Greeks,

but it is not generally stated that those among them who were

initiated had only made a change of names conveying the same idea as

the secret name to those “who knew,” leaving the masses as unwise

as ever. Yet it was a beautiful idea of theirs, this Libra, or

the balance, expressing as much as could possibly be done without

unveiling the whole and ultimate truth. They intended it to imply

that when the course of evolution had taken the worlds to the

lowest point of grossness, where the earths and their products were

coarsest, and their inhabitants most brutish, the turning-point had

been reached--the forces were at an even balance. At the lowest

point, the still lingering divine spark of spirit within began

to convey the upward impulse. The scales typified that eternal

equilibrium which is the necessity of a universe of harmony, of

exact justice, of the balance of centripetal and centrifugal forces,

darkness and light, spirit and matter.

_These additional signs of the Zodiac warrant us in saying that the

Book of Genesis as we now find it, must be of later date than the

invention of Libra by the Greeks_; for we find the chapters of the

genealogies remodelled to fit the new Zodiac, instead of the latter

being made to correspond with the list of patriarchs. And it is this

addition and the necessity of concealing the true key, that led the

Rabbinical compilers to repeat the names of Enoch and Lamech twice,

as we see them now in the Kenite table. Alone, among all the books of

the _Bible_, _Genesis_ belongs to an immense antiquity. The others

are all later additions, the earliest of which appeared with Hilkiah,

who evidently concocted it with the help of Huldah, the prophetess.

As there is more than one meaning attached to the stories of the

creation and deluge, we say, therefore, that the biblical account

cannot be comprehended apart from the Babylonian story of the same;

while neither will be thoroughly clear without the Brahmanical

esoteric interpretation of the deluge, as found in the _Mahâbhârata_

and the _Satapatha-Brahmâna_. It is the Babylonians who were taught

the “mysteries,” the sacerdotal language, and their religion by

the problematical Akkadians who--according to Rawlinson came from

Armenia--not the former who emigrated to India. Here the evidence

becomes clear. The Babylonian Xisuthrus is shown by Movers to have

represented the “sun” in the Zodiac, in the sign of Aquarius, and

_Oannes_, the man-fish, the semi-demon, is Vishnu in his first

avatar; thus giving the key to the double source of the biblical

revelation.

Oannes is the emblem of priestly, esoteric wisdom; he comes out from

the sea, because the “great deep,” the water, typifies, as we have

shown, the secret doctrine. For this same reason Egyptians deified

the Nile, apart from its being regarded, in consequence of its

periodical overflows, as the “Saviour” of the country. They even held

the crocodiles as sacred, from having their abode in the “deep.” The

“Hamites,” so called, have always preferred to settle near rivers and

oceans. Water was the first-created element, according to some old

cosmogonies. This name of Oannes is held in the greatest reverence,

in the Chaldean records. The Chaldean priests wore a head-gear like

a fish’s head, and a shadbelly coat, representing the body of a

fish.[875]

“Thales,” says Cicero, “assures that _water_ is the principle of all

things; and that God is that Mind which shaped and created all things

from water.”[876]

“In the Beginning, SPIRIT within strengthens Heaven and Earth,

The watery fields, and the lucid globe of Luna, and then--

Titan stars; and mind infused through the limbs

Agitates the whole mass, and mixes itself with GREAT MATTER.”[877]

Thus water represents the duality of both the Macrocosmos and the

Microcosmos, in conjunction with the vivifying SPIRIT, and the

evolution of the little world from the universal cosmos. The deluge

then, in this sense, points to that final struggle between the

conflicting elements, which brought the first great cycle of our

planet to a close. These periods gradually merged into each other,

order being brought out of chaos, or disorder, and the successive

types of organism being evolved only as the physical conditions of

nature were prepared for their appearance; for our present race could

not have breathed on earth, during that intermediate period, not

having as yet the allegorical coats of skin.[878]

In chapters iv. and v. of _Genesis_, we find the so-called

generations of Cain and Seth. Let us glance at them in the order in

which they stand:

LINES OF GENERATIONS.

_Sethite._ _Kenite._

1. Adam. ⎫ ⎧ 1. Adam.

2. Seth. ⎪ ⎪ 2. Cain.

3. Enos. ⎪ ⎪ 3. Enoch.

4. Cainan. ⎪ ⎪ 4. Irad.

5. Mahalaleel. ⎬ Good Principle. Evil Principle. ⎨ 5. Mehujael.

6. Jared. ⎪ ⎪ 6. Methusael.

7. Enoch. ⎪ ⎪ 7. Lamech.

8. Methuselah. ⎪ ⎪ 8. Jubal. ⎫

9. Lamech. ⎪ ⎪ 9. Jabal. ⎬

10. Noah. ⎭ ⎩ 10. Tubal Cain. ⎭

The above are the ten biblical patriarchs, identical with Hindu

Pragâpatis (Pradjâpatis), and the Sephiroth of the _Kabala_. We say

_ten_ patriarchs, not _twenty_, for the Kenite line was devised

for no other purpose than, 1, to carry out the idea of dualism,

on which is founded the philosophy of every religion; for these

two genealogical tables represent simply the opposing powers or

principles of good and evil; and 2, as a blind for the uninitiated

masses. Suppose we restore them to their primitive form, by erasing

these premeditated blinds. These are so transparent as to require but

a small amount of perspicacity to select, even though one should use

only his unaided judgment, and were not, as we are, enabled to apply

the test of the secret doctrine.

By ridding ourselves, therefore, of the Kenite names that are mere

duplications of the Sethite, or of each other, we get rid of Adam;

of Enoch--who, in one genealogy, is shown the father of Irad, and in

the other, the son of Jared; of Lamech, son of Methusael, whereas

he, Lamech, is son of Methuselah in the Sethite line; of Irad

(Jared),[879] Jubal and Jabal, who, with Tubal-Cain, form a trinity

in one, and that one the double of Cain; of Mehujael (who is but

Mahalaleel differently spelled), and Methusael (Methuselah). This

leaves us in the Kenite genealogy of chapter iv., one only, Cain,

who--the first murderer and fratricide--is made to stand in his

line as father of Enoch, the most virtuous of men, who does not die,

but is translated alive. Turn we now to the Sethite table, and we

find that Enos, or Enoch, comes _second_ from Adam, and is father to

Cain (an). This is no accident. There was an evident reason for this

inversion of paternity; a palpable design--that of creating confusion

and baffling inquiry.

We say, then, that the patriarchs are simply the signs of the Zodiac,

emblems, in their manifold aspects, of the spiritual and physical

evolution of human races, of ages, and of divisions of time. In

astrology, the first four of the “Houses,” in the diagrams of the

“Twelve Houses of Heaven”--namely, the first, tenth, seventh, and

fourth, or the second inner square placed with its angles upward and

downward, are termed _angles_, as being of the greatest strength

and power. They answer to Adam, Noah, Cain-an, and Enoch, Alpha,

Omega, evil and good, leading the whole. Furthermore, when divided

(including the two secret names) into four _trigons_ or triads, viz.:

fiery, airy, earthy, and watery, we find the latter corresponding to

Noah.

Enoch and Lamech were doubled in the table of Cain, to fill out the

required number ten in both “generations” in the _Bible_, instead of

employing the “Secret Name;” and, in order that the patriarchs should

correspond with the ten kabalistic Sephiroth, and fit at the same

time the ten, and, subsequently, _twelve_ signs of the Zodiac, in a

manner comprehensible only to the kabalists.

And now, Abel having disappeared out of that line of descent, he

is replaced by Seth, who was clearly an afterthought suggested by

the necessity of not having the human race descend entirely from a

murderer. This dilemma being apparently first noticed when the Kenite

table had been completed, Adam is made (after all the generations

had appeared) to beget this son, Seth. It is a suggestive fact that,

whereas the double-sexed Adam of chapter v. is made in the likeness

of the Elohim (see _Genesis_ chapter i. 27 and v. 1 of the same),

Seth (v. 3) is begotten in Adam’s “own likeness,” thus signifying

that there were men of different races. Also, it is most noticeable

that neither the age nor a single other particular respecting the

patriarchs in the Kenite table is given, whereas the reverse is the

case with those in the Sethite line.

Most assuredly, no one could expect to find, in a work open to the

public, the final mysteries of that which was preserved for countless

ages as the grandest secret of the sanctuary. But, without divulging

the key to the profane, or being taxed with undue indiscretion,

we may be allowed to lift a corner of the veil which shrouds the

majestic doctrines of old. Let us then write down the patriarchs as

they ought to stand in their relation to the Zodiac, and see how they

correspond with the signs.

The following diagram represents Ezekiel’s Wheel, as given in many

works, among others, in Hargrave Jenning’s _Rosicrucians_:

[Illustration: EZEKIEL’S WHEEL (exoteric).

MACROCOSMOS

(ascending).

MICROCOSMOS

(descending).]

These signs are (follow numbers):

1, Aries; 2, Taurus; 3, Gemini; 4, Cancer; 5, Leo; 6,

Virgo, or the _ascending_ line of the grand cycle of

creation. After this comes 7, _Libra_--“man,” which, though

it is found right in the middle, or the intersection point,

leads down the numbers:

8, Scorpio; 9, Sagittarius; 10, Capricornus; 11, Aquarius;

and 12, Pisces.

While discussing the double sign of Virgo-Scorpio and Libra, Hargrave

Jennings observes (p. 65):

“All this is incomprehensible, except in the strange mysticism of

the Gnostics and the kabalists; and the whole theory requires a

key of explanation to render it intelligible; which key is only

darkly referred to as possible, but refused absolutely, by these

extraordinary men, as not permissible to be disclosed.”

The said key must be turned _seven_ times before the whole system

is divulged. We will give it but _one_ turn, and thereby allow the

profane one glimpse into the mystery. Happy he, who understands the

whole!

[Illustration: EZEKIEL’S WHEEL (esoteric).]

To explain the presence of Jodheva (or Yodheva), or what is generally

termed the tetragram יהוה, and of Adam and Eve, it will suffice to

remind the reader of the following verses in _Genesis_, with their

right meaning inserted in brackets.

1. “And God [Elohim] created man in his [their] own image

... male and female created he them [him]”--(ch. i. 27).

2. “Male and female created he them [him] ... and called

_their_ [his] name ADAM”--(v. 2).

When the ternary is taken in the beginning of the tetragram, it

expresses the divine creation _spiritually_, _i.e._, without any

carnal sin: taken at its opposite end it expresses the latter; it

is feminine. The name of Eve is composed of three letters, that of

the primitive or heavenly Adam, is written with one letter, Jod or

Yodh; therefore it must not be read Jehova but _Ieva_, or Eve. The

Adam of the first chapter is the spiritual, therefore pure androgyne,

Adam Kadmon. When woman issues from the left rib of the second

Adam (of dust), the pure _Virgo_ is separated, and falling “into

generation,” or the downward cycle, becomes _Scorpio_,[880] emblem

of sin and matter. While the ascending cycle points at the purely

spiritual races, or the ten prediluvian patriarchs (the Pradjâpatis,

and Sephiroth)[881] are led on by the creative Deity itself, who is

Adam Kadmon or Yodcheva, the lower one is that of the terrestrial

races, led on by Enoch or _Libra_, the _seventh_; who, because he

is half-divine, half-terrestrial, is said to have been taken by

God alive. Enoch, or Hermes, or Libra are one. All are the scales

of universal harmony; justice and equilibrium are placed at the

central point of the Zodiac. The grand circle of the heavens, so well

discoursed upon by Plato, in his _Timæus_, symbolizes the unknown

as a unity; and the smaller circles which form the cross, by their

division on the plane of the Zodiacal ring--typify, at the point of

their intersection, life. The centripetal and centrifugal forces,

as symbols of Good and Evil, Spirit and Matter, Life and Death, are

also those of the Creator and the Destroyer,--Adam and Eve, or God

and the Devil, as they say in common parlance. In the subjective,

as well as in the objective worlds, they are the two powers, which

through their eternal conflict keep the universe of spirit and

matter in harmony. They force the planets to pursue their paths, and

keep them in their elliptical orbits, thus tracing the astronomical

cross in their revolution through the Zodiac. In their conflict the

centripetal force, were it to prevail, would drive the planets and

living souls into the sun, type of the invisible Spiritual Sun, the

Paraâtma or great universal Soul, their parent; while the centrifugal

force would chase both planets and _souls_ into the dreary space, far

from the luminary of the objective universe, away from the spiritual

realm of salvation and eternal life, and into the chaos of final

cosmic destruction, and individual annihilation. But the _balance_

is there, ever sensitive at the intersection point. It regulates

the action of the two combatants, and the combined effort of both,

causes planets and “living souls” to pursue a double diagonal line

in their revolution through Zodiac and Life; and thus preserving

strict harmony, in visible and invisible heaven and earth, the forced

unity of the two reconciles spirit and matter, and Enoch is said to

stand a “Metatron” before God. Reckoning from him down to Noah and

his three sons, each of these represent a new “world,” _i.e._, our

earth, which is the seventh[882] after every period of geological

transformation, gives birth to another and distinct race of men and

beings.

Cain leads the ascending line, or Macrocosm, for he is the Son of the

“Lord,” not of Adam (_Genesis_ iv. 1). The “Lord” is Adam Kadmon,

Cain, the Son of sinful thought, not the progeny of flesh and blood,

Seth on the other hand is the leader of the races of earth, for he is

the Son of Adam, and begotten “in his own likeness, after his image”

(_Genesis_ v. 3). Cain is _Kenu_, Assyrian, and means eldest, while

the Hebrew word קין means a smith, an artificer.

Our science shows that the globe has passed through five distinct

geological phases, each characterized by a different stratum,

and these are in reverse order, beginning with the last: 1. The

Quaternary period, in which man appears as a certainty; 2. The

Tertiary period, in which he _may have_ appeared; 3. Secondary

period, that of gigantic saurians, the megalosaurus, icthyosaurus,

and plesiosaurus--_no vestige of man_; 4. The Palæozoic period, that

of gigantic crustacea; 5 (or first). The Azoic period, during which

science asserts organic life had not yet appeared.

And is there no possibility that there was a period, and

several periods, when man _existed_, and yet was not an organic

being--therefore could not have left any vestige of himself for exact

science? _Spirit_ leaves no skeletons or fossils behind, and yet few

are the men on earth who doubt that man can live both objectively

and subjectively. At all events, the theology of the Brahmans, hoary

with antiquity, and which divides the formative periods of the earth

into four ages, and places between each of these a lapse of 1,728,000

years, far more agrees with official science and modern discovery

than the absurd chronological notions promulgated by the Councils of

Nice and Trent.

The names of the patriarchs were not Hebrew, though they may have

been Hebraized later; they are evidently of Assyrian or Aryan origin.

Thus _Adam_, for instance, stands in the explained _Kabala_ as a

convertible term, and applies nearly to every other patriarch, as

every Sephiroth to each Sephira, and _vice versa_. Adam, Cain,

and Abel form the first _triad_ of the twelve. They correspond in

the Sephiral tree to the Crown, Wisdom, and Intelligence; and in

astrology to the three trigons--the fiery, the earthy, and the airy;

which fact, were we allowed to devote more space than we have to

its elucidation, would perhaps show that astrology deserves the

name of science as well as any other. Adam (Kadmon) or Aries (ram)

is identical with the Egyptian ram-headed god Amun, fabricating

man on the potter’s wheel. His duplication, therefore--or the Adam

of dust--is also Aries, Amon, when standing at the head of his

generations, for he fabricates mortals also in “his own likeness.”

In astrology the planet Jupiter is connected with the “first house”

(Aries). The color of Jupiter, as seen in the “stages of the seven

spheres,” on the tower of Borsippa, or Birs Nimrud, was _red_;[883]

and in Hebrew Adam means אדם “red” as well as “man.” The Hindu god

Agni, who presides at the sign of Pisces, next to that of Aries in

their relation to the twelve months (February and March),[884] is

painted of a deep red color, with _two_ faces (male and female),

_three_ legs, and _seven_ arms; the whole forming the number twelve.

So, also, Noah (Pisces), who appears in the generations as the twelfth

patriarch, counting Cain and Abel, is Adam again under another name,

for he is the forefather of a new race of mankind; and with his “three

sons,” one bad, one good, and one partaking of both qualities, is the

terrestrial reflection of the super-terrestrial Adam and his three

sons. Agni is represented mounted on a ram, with a tiara surmounted by

a cross.[885]

Kain, presiding over the Taurus (Bull) of the Zodiac, is also very

suggestive. Taurus belongs to the earthy trigon, and in connection

with this sign it will not be amiss to remind the student of an

allegory from the Persian _Avesta_. The story goes that Ormazd

produced a being--source and type of all the universal beings--called

LIFE, or Bull in the _Zend_. Ahriman (Cain) kills this being (Abel),

from the seed of which (Seth) new beings are produced. Abel, in

Assyrian, means _son_, but in Hebrew הבל it means something ephemeral,

not long-lived, _valueless_, and also a “Pagan idol,”[886] as Kain

means a _Hermaic statue_ (a pillar, the symbol of generation).

Likewise, Abel is the female counterpart of Cain (male), for they are

twins and probably androgynous; the latter answering to Wisdom, the

former to Intelligence.

So with all other patriarchs. Enos, אנוש, is _Homo_ again--a

man, or the same Adam, and Enoch in the bargain; and קיון _Kain-an_

is identical with Cain. Seth, שת, is Teth, or Thoth, or Hermes; and

this is the reason, no doubt, why Josephus, in his first book (ch. 3)

shows Seth so proficient in astrology, geometry, and other occult

sciences. Foreseeing the flood, he says, he engraved the fundamental

principles of his art on two pillars of brick and stone, the latter of

which “he saw himself [Josephus] _to remain in Syria in his own

time_.” Thus is it that Seth is identified also with Enoch, to whom

kabalists and Masons attribute the same feat; and, at the same time,

with Hermes, or Kadmus again, for Enoch is identical with the

former; הנוך, He-NOCH means a teacher, an initiator, or an initiate;

in Grecian mythology, Inachus. We have seen the part he is made to

play in the Zodiac.

Mahalaleel, if we divide the word and write מהלה, _m_a-_h_a-_l_a,

means tender, merciful; and therefore is he made to correspond with

the fourth Sephira, _Love_ or _Mercy_, emanated from the first

triad.[887] _Ir_a_d_, ירד, or _I_a_r_e_d_, is (minus the

vowels) precisely the same. If from the verb ירד, it means

_descent;_ if from ארד, _ar_a_d_, it means offspring, and

thus corresponds perfectly with the kabalistic emanations.

_L_a_m_e_ch_, למך, is not Hebrew, but Greek. Lam-ach means

Lam--the father, and Ou-Lom-Ach is the father of the age; or the

father of him (Noah) who inaugurates a new era or period of creation

after the _pralaya_ of the deluge; Noah being the symbol of a new

world, the Kingdom (Malchuth) of the Sephiroth; hence his father,

corresponding to the ninth Sephiroth, is the Foundation.[888]

Furthermore, both father and son answer to Aquarius and Pisces in the

Zodiac; and thus the former belonging to the airy and the latter to

the _watery_ trigons, they close the list of the biblical myths.

But if, as we see, every patriarch represents, in one sense, like

each of the Pradjâpatis, a new race of antediluvian human beings;

and if, as it may as easily be proved, they are the copies of the

Babylonian _Saros_, or ages, the latter themselves copies of the

Hindu ten dynasties of the “Lords of beings,”[889] yet, however we

may regard them, they are among the profoundest allegories ever

conceived by philosophical minds.

In the _Nuctemeron_,[890] the evolution of the universe and

its successive periods of formation, together with the gradual

development of the human races, are illustrated as fully as possible

in the twelve “hours” into which the allegory is divided. Each “hour”

typifies the evolution of a new man, and in its turn is divided

into four quarters or ages. This work shows how thoroughly was the

ancient philosophy imbued with the doctrines of the early Aryans,

who were the first to divide the life on our planet into four ages.

If one would trace this doctrine from its source in the night of

the traditional period down to the Seer of Patmos, he need not go

astray among the religious systems of all nations. The Babylonians he

would find teaching that in four different periods four Oannes (or

suns) appeared; the Hindus asserting their four Yuga; the Greeks,

Romans, and others firmly believing in the golden, silver, brazen,

and iron ages, each of the epochs being heralded by the appearance of

a saviour. The four Buddhas of the Hindus and the three prophets of

the Zoroastrians--Oshedar-Cami, Oshedar-mah, and Sosiosh--preceded by

Zarotushtra, are the types of these ages.

In the _Bible_, the very opening tells us that _before the sons of God

saw the daughters of men_, the latter lived from 365 to 969 years.

But when the “Lord God” saw the iniquities of mankind, He concluded

to allow them at most 120 years of life (_Genesis_ vi. 3). To

account for such a violent oscillation in the human mortality-table

is only possible by tracing this decision of the “Lord God” to its

origin. Such incongruities as we meet at every step in the _Bible_

can be only attributed to the facts that the book of _Genesis_ and

the other books of _Moses_ were tampered with and remodelled by

more than one author; and, that in their original state they were,

with the exception of the external form of the allegories, faithful

copies from the Hindu sacred books. In _Manu_, book i., we find the

following:

“In the first age, neither sickness nor suffering were known. Men

lived four centuries.”

This was in the Krita or Satya yug.

“The Krita-yug is the type of justice. The _bull_ which stands firm

on its four legs is its image; man adheres to truth, and evil does

not as yet direct his actions.”[891] But in each of the following

ages primitive human life loses one-fourth of its duration, that

is to say, in Treta-yug man lives 300, in Dwapara-yug 200, and in

Kali-yug, or our own age, but 100 years generally, at the most. Noah,

son of Lamech--Oulom-_Ach_, or father of the age--is the distorted

copy of Manu, son of Swayambhu, and the six Manus or Rishis issued

from the Hindu “first man” are the originals of Terah, Abraham,

Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses, the Hebrew sages, who beginning

with Terah were all alleged to have been astrologers, alchemists,

inspired prophets, and soothsayers; or in a more profane but plainer

language--magicians.

If we consult the Talmudistic _Mishna_ we find therein the first

emanated divine couple, the androgyne Demiurge Chochmah (or Hachma

Achamoth) and Binah building themselves a house with _seven_ pillars.

They are the architects of God--Wisdom and Intelligence--and His

“compass and square.” The seven columns are the future _seven_

worlds, or the typical _seven_ primordial “days” of creation.

“Chochmah immolates her victims.” These victims are the numberless

forces of nature which must “die” (expend themselves) _in order that

they should live_; when one force dies out, it is but to give birth

to another force, its progeny. It dies but lives in its children, and

resuscitates at every _seventh_ generation. The servants of Chochmah,

or wisdom, are the souls of H-Adam, for in him are all the souls of

Israel.

There are _twelve_ hours in the day, says the _Mishna_, and it is

during these hours that is accomplished the creation of man. Would

this be comprehensible, unless we had Manu to teach us that this

“day” embraces the four ages of the world and has a duration of

_twelve_ thousand divine years of the Devas?

“The Creators (Elohim) outline in the second” hour “the shape of a

more corporeal form of man. They separate it into two and prepare the

sexes to become distinct from each other. Such is the way the Elohim

proceeded in reference to every created thing.”[892] “Every fish,

fowl, plant, beast and man was androgyne at the first hour.”

Says the commentator, the great Rabbi Simeon:

“O, companions, companions, man as emanation was both man and woman;

as well on the side of the FATHER as on the side of the MOTHER. And

this is the sense of the words, and Elohim spoke, Let there be Light

and it was Light!... And this is the ‘two-fold man!’”[893]

A spiritual woman was necessary as a contrast for the spiritual

man. Harmony is the universal law. In Taylor’s translation, Plato’s

discourse upon creation is rendered so as to make him say of this

universe that “He caused it to move with circular motion.... When,

therefore, that God who is a perpetually reasoning Divinity,

cogitated about that God (man) _who was destined to subsist at some

certain period of time_, He produced his body smooth and even, and

every way even and whole from the centre, and made it perfect. This

perfect circle of the created God, _He decussated in the form of the

letter_ X.”

The italics of both these sentences from _Timæus_ belong to Dr.

Lundy, the author of that remarkable work mentioned once before,

_Monumental Christianity_; and attention is drawn to the words of

the Greek philosopher, with the evident purpose of giving them the

prophetic character which Justin Martyr applied to the same, when

accusing Plato of having borrowed his “physiological discussion

in the _Timæus_ ... concerning the Son of God placed crosswise in

the universe,” from Moses and his serpent of brass. The learned

author seems to fully accord an unpremeditated prophecy to these

words; although he does not tell us whether he believes that like

Plato’s created god, Jesus was originally a sphere “smooth and

even, and every way even and whole from the centre.” Even if Justin

Martyr were excusable for his perversion of Plato, Dr. Lundy ought

to know that the day for that sort of casuistry is long gone by.

What the philosopher meant was _man_, who before being encased in

matter had no use for limbs, but was a pure spiritual entity. Hence

if the Deity, and his universe, and the stellar bodies are to be

conceived as spheroidal, this shape would be archetypal man’s. As

his enveloping shell grew heavier, there came the necessity for

limbs, and the limbs sprouted. If we fancy a man with arms and legs

naturally extended at the same angle, by backing him against the

circle that symbolizes his prior shape as a spirit, we would have the

very figure described by Plato--the X cross within the circle.

All the legends of the creation, the fall of man, and the resultant

deluge, belong to universal history, and are no more the property

of the Israelites than that of any other nation. What specially

belongs to them (kabalists excepted) are the disfigured details

of every tradition. The _Genesis_ of Enoch is by far anterior to

the books of Moses,[894] and Guillaume Postel has presented it to

the world, explaining the allegories as far as he dared; but the

ground-work is still unexposed. For the Jews, the _Book of Enoch_

is as canonical as the Mosaic books; and if the Christians accepted

the latter as an authority, we do not see why they should reject the

former as an apocrypha. No more can the age of one than that of the

other be determined with anything like certainty. At the time of

the separation, the Samaritans recognized only the books of Moses

and that of Joshua, says Dr. Jost.[895] In 168 B.C., Jerusalem had

its temple plundered, and all the sacred books were destroyed;[896]

therefore, the few MSS. that remained were to be found only among the

“teachers of tradition.” The kabalistic Tanaïm, and their initiates

and prophets had always practised its teachings in common with

the Canaanites, the Hamites, Midianites, Chaldeans, and all other

nations. The story of Daniel is a proof of it.

There was a sort of Brotherhood, or Freemasonry among the kabalists

scattered all over the world, since the memory of man; and, like some

societies of the mediæval Masonry of Europe, they called themselves

_Companions_[897] and _Innocents_.[898] It is a belief (founded on

knowledge) among the kabalists, that no more than the Hermetic rolls

are the genuine sacred books of the seventy-two elders--books which

contained the “_Ancient Word_”--lost, but that they have all been

preserved from the remotest times among secret communities. Emanuel

Swedenborg says as much, and his words are based, he says, on the

information he had from certain _spirits_, who assured him that “they

performed their worship according to this Ancient Word.” “Seek for

it in China,” adds the great seer, “peradventure you may find it in

Great Tartary!” Other students of occult sciences have had more than

the word of “certain spirits” to rely upon in this special case--they

have seen the books.

We must choose therefore perforce between two methods--either to

accept the _Bible_ exoterically or esoterically. Against the former

we have the following facts: That, after the first copy of the _Book

of God_ has been edited and launched on the world by Hilkiah, this

copy disappears, and Ezra has to make a _new Bible_, which Judas

Maccabeus finishes; that when it was copied from the horned letters

into square letters, it was corrupted beyond recognition; that the

_Masorah_ completed the work of destruction; that, finally, we have a

text, not 900 years old, abounding with omissions, interpolations,

and premeditated perversions; and that, consequently, as this

Masoretic Hebrew text has fossilized its mistakes, and the key

to the “Word of God” is lost, no one has a right to enforce upon

so-called “Christians” the divagations of a series of hallucinated

and, perhaps, spurious prophets, under the unwarranted and untenable

assumption that the author of it was the “Holy Ghost” in _propria

personæ_.

Hence, we reject this pretended monotheistic Scripture, made up

just when the priests of Jerusalem found their political profit in

violently breaking off all connection with the Gentiles. It is at

this moment only that we find them persecuting kabalists, and banning

the “old wisdom” of both Pagans and Jews. _The real Hebrew Bible

was a secret volume, unknown to the masses_, and even the Samaritan

_Pentateuch_ is far more ancient than the _Septuagint_. As for the

former, the Fathers of the Church never even heard of it. We prefer

decidedly to take the word of Swedenborg that the “Ancient Word”

is _somewhere in China or the Great Tartary_. The more so, as the

Swedish seer is declared, at least by one clergymen, namely, the

Reverend Dr. R. L. Tafel, of London, to have been in a state of

“inspiration from God,” while writing his theological works. He is

given even the superiority over the penmen of the _Bible_, for, while

the latter had the words spoken to them in their ears, Swedenborg was

made to understand them rationally and was, therefore, _internally_

and not externally illuminated. “When,” says the reverend author, “a

conscientious member of the New Church hears any charges made against

the divinity and the infallibility of either the soul or the body of

the doctrines of the New Jerusalem, he must at once place himself on

the unequivocal declaration made in those doctrines, that the Lord

has effected His second coming in and by means of those writings

which were published by Emanuel Swedenborg, as His servant, and that,

therefore, those charges are not and cannot be true.” And if it is

“the Lord” that spoke through Swedenborg, then there is a hope for

us that at least one divine will corroborate our assertions, that

the ancient “word of God” is nowhere but in the heathen countries,

especially _Buddhistic Tartary, Thibet, and China_!

“The primitive history of Greece is the primitive history of India,”

exclaims Pococke in his _India in Greece_. In view of subsequent

fruits of critical research, we may paraphrase the sentence and say:

“The primitive history of Judea is a distortion of Indian fable

engrafted on that of Egypt. Many scientists, encountering stubborn

facts, and being reluctant to contrast the narratives of the “divine”

revelation with those of the Brahmanical books, merely present them

to the reading public. Meanwhile they limit their conclusions to

criticisms and contradictions of each other. So Max Müller opposes

the theories of Spiegel, and some one else; and Professor Whitney

those of the Oxford Orientalist; and Dr. Haug made onslaughts on

Spiegel, while Dr. Spiegel chose some other victim; and now even the

time-honored Akkadians and Turanians have had their day of glory.

The _Proto-Kasdeans_, _Kasdeo-Scyths_, _Sumirians_, and what not,

have to make room for some other fictions. Alas! for the Akkads,

Halevy, the Assyriologist attacks the Akkado-Sumirian language of old

Babylon, and Chabas, the Egyptologist, not content with dethroning

the Turanian speech, which has rendered such eminent services to

Orientalists when perplexed, calls the venerable parent of the

Akkadians--François Lenormant--himself, a charlatan. Profiting by the

learned turmoil, the Christian clergy take heart for their fantastic

theology on the ground that when the jury disagree there is a gain

of time at least for the indicted party. And thus is overlooked

the vital question whether Christendom would not be the better for

adopting Christism in place of Christianity, with its _Bible_, its

vicarious atonement and its Devil. But to so important a personage as

the latter, we could not do less than devote a special chapter.