Introduction to the History of Religions Part 74

[1978] In the political and social disorders in Judea in the seventh and sixth centuries B.C. the priesthood was, probably, influential in maintaining and transmitting the purer worship of Yahweh, and thus establishing a starting-point for the later development.

[1979] Cf. Breasted, _Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt_, lecture x.

[1980] So Ezekiel's altar (probably a copy of that in the Jerusalem temple-court), over 16 feet high, with a base 27 feet square (Ezek. xliii, 13 ff.). The Olympian altar was 22 feet high and 125 feet in circ.u.mference. Cf. W. R. Smith, _Religion of the Semites_, 3d ed., pp. 202, 341, 377 ff. On the general subject see article "Altar" in Hastings, _Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics_.

[1981] So in Australia (Spencer and Gillen, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_, Index, and _Native Tribes of Northern Australia_, Index), Samoa (Turner), Canaan (Genesis, Judges, pa.s.sim), Greece (Gardner and Jevons, _Greek Antiquities_, p.

173), etc.

[1982] Gardner and Jevons, op. cit., Index, s.v. tee???, _Temple_; Wellhausen, _Reste arabischen Heidentumes_, Index; W. R. Smith, op. cit., Index, s.v. _Temples_. There is perhaps a hint of such a place in Ex. iii, 5.

[1983] K. F. Hermann, _Gottesdienstliche Alterthumer der Griechen_, -- 18; Jevons, _Introduction to the History of Religion_, 1st ed., p. 137.

[1984] Cf. article "Architecture" in Hastings, _Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics_.

[1985] Ps. xiii, 3 [2]; lx.x.xiv, 3 [2].

[1986] So in Egypt, Palestine, Greece, and probably in Babylonia and a.s.syria.

[1987] In Herod's temple: the Court of the Gentiles, the Court of Women, the Court of Israel (Nowack, _Lehrbuch der hebraischen Archaologie_, ii, 76 ff.).

[1988] Pauly-Wissowa, _Real-Encyclopadie der cla.s.sischen Altertumswissenschaft_; article "Asylum" in _Jewish Encyclopedia_. The right of asylum goes back to very early forms of society in all parts of the world; many examples are cited by Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, Index, s.v. _Asylums_.

[1989] Cf. above, -- 121.

[1990] Jastrow, _Religion of Babylonia and a.s.syria_, chap.

xxvi.

[1991] On the supposed difference of symbolism between Greek and Gothic temples (churches) see Ruskin, _Seven Lamps of Architecture_.

[1992] ---- 15, 120, note 3.

[1993] For details see Erman, _Handbook of Egyptian Religion_, p. 45 f.; Jastrow, op. cit., p. 658 ff.; articles "Ritual" and "Sacrifice" in _Encyclopaedia Biblica_; Bloomfield, _Religion of the Veda_, p. 213 f.; Hopkins, _Religions of India_, p. 124; _L'Annee sociologique_, ii.

[1994] -- 1199.

[1995] Some hymns to Tammuz are lamentations for dying vegetation and pet.i.tions for its resuscitation.

[1996] 1 Chron. xvi; commentaries on the Psalms; works on Hebrew archaeology (Nowack, Benzinger); articles in Biblical dictionaries and encyclopedias.

[1997] _Revue des etudes grecques_, 1894. On savage songs and music see above, -- 106.

[1998] Pauly-Wissowa, _Real-Encyclopadie der cla.s.sischen Altertumswissenschaft_; Fowler, _Roman Festivals_.

[1999] Pa.s.sover with the departure from Egypt; Sukkot (Tabernacles) with the march through the wilderness; later, Weeks (Pentecost) with the revelation of the law at Sinai.

[2000] Book of Esther.

[2001] 1 Macc. v, 47 ff.

[2002] 1 Macc. vii, 49.

[2003] H. H. Wilson, _Religious Sects of the Hindus_; Monier-Williams, _Hinduism_, Index.

[2004] Gardner and Jevons, _Greek Antiquities_, p. 289.

[2005] They sometimes degenerate into coa.r.s.eness or immorality.

[2006] Christmas, New Year's Day, May Day, Midsummer, All Souls, and others.

[2007] The protest in Prov. xxvi, 2, against this whole conception shows that it existed among the Jews down to a late time.

[2008] Totemic poles, with carved figures of animals, are found in Northwest America (Boas, _The Kwakiutl_; Swanton, in _Journal of American Folklore_, xviii, 108 ff.) and in South Nigeria (Partridge, _Cross River Natives_, p. 219); but these figures are rather tribal or clan symbols than idols.

[2009] The situation in Egypt was exceptional; after the idolatrous stage had been reached the old worship of the living animal survived.

[2010] Aniconic representations of deities in civilized communities (like the stone representing the Ephesian great G.o.ddess) are survivals from the old cult of natural objects.

[2011] Teraphim, 1 Sam. xix, 13 al.

[2012] In the literature they are guardians of sacred places (Gen. iii, 24) and throne-bearers of the deity (Ezek. i, 26; Ps. xviii, 11 [10]).

[2013] The numerous images mentioned in the Old Testament as worshiped by the Israelites appear to have been borrowed from neighboring peoples. The origin of the bull figures worshiped at Bethel and Dan is obscure, but they appear to represent the amalgamation of an old bull-cult with the cult of Yahweh.

[2014] Possibly the civilization of China was in earliest times identical with or similar to that Central Asiatic civilization out of which Mazdaism seems to have sprung. Cf.

R. Pumpelly, in _Explorations in Turkestan_ (expedition of 1904), i, pp. xxiv, 7, chap. iv f.

[2015] The same feeling appears in the treatment of images of saints by some European peasants.

[2016] For Egyptian forms see Rawlinson, _History of Ancient Egypt_, vol. i; Maspero, _Dawn of Civilization_; for Semitic, Ohnefalsch-Richter, _Kypros, the Bible, and Homer_; for Indian, Lefmann, "Geschichte des alten Indiens" in Oncken's _Allgemeine Geschichte_.

[2017] Even the Hindu women's linga-cult is said to be sometimes morally innocent.

[2018] A church is here taken to be a voluntary religious body that holds out to its members the hope of redemption and salvation through a.s.sociation with a divine person or a cosmic power.

[2019] -- 530 f.

[2020] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, vol. i, chap. ix.

[2021] H. Webster, _Primitive Secret Societies_, chap. vii.

[2022] For a large definition of the term see S. Reinach, _Orpheus_ (Eng. tr.), p.v.

[2023] For a possible influence see below, -- 1101.

[2024] See the histories of philosophy of Ueberweg, Windelband, Meyer, Zeller.

[2025] See the reference in the _Republic_ (ii, 364 f.) to the mendicant prophets with their formulas for expiation of sin and salvation from future punishment, and Demosthenes's derisive description of aeschines as mystagogue (_De Corona_, 313).

[2026] It is not clear that the peculiar cults described in Isa. lxv, 3-5; lxvi, 3 f., are of Semitic origin. Their history, however, is obscure--they are not referred to elsewhere in Jewish literature. In part they are, like the cults mentioned in Ezek. viii, 10, the adoption of the sacred animals of neighboring peoples; Isa. lxv, 5 seems to point to a close voluntary a.s.sociation with a ceremony of initiation, but nothing proves that the a.s.sociation was of Semitic origin. For a different view see W. R. Smith, _Religion of the Semites_, 2d ed., p. 357 ff.