Chapter XIV: Front Matter (14)

In modern Buddhism the identical fundamental ideas continue to exist in a slightly different form; the six directions in space are known and elaborately worshipped. The embodiment of central power is Buddha, seated cross-legged on a lotus flower. According to Birdwood, cited by Mr. Goodyear, “In the Hindu cosmogony the world is likened to a lotus flower, floating in the centre of a shallow circular vessel, which has for its stalk an elephant and for its pedestal a tortoise. The seven petals of the lotus flower represent the seven divisions of the world as known to the ancient Hindus and the tabular torus (_Nelumbium speciosum_) which rises from their centre represents Mount Meru, the Hindu Olympus.”

In the statues of Buddha, thus associated with the centre of the world, we have what may be termed the highest development of the idea of stability, quietude and absolute repose which impressed itself upon the human mind by the observation of Polaris. The abstract conception of Nirvana, “the state in which all individuality and consciousness are lost, and life and death, good and evil, and every other possible antithesis disappear in absolute unity,” appears to me to be the natural ultimate outgrowth of the primitive appreciation of stability and repose as the most desirable of conditions.

An ancient American priest-astronomer, imbued with the native ideas, would doubtlessly see in the modern figures of Buddha a more perfect artistic rendition of the same conception which was expressed in the Copan swastika. He might remark that, in the statues of Buddha, the human form is intended to convey the idea of quadruple organization and that in certain images the primitive symbols of the centre, “the belly and navel,” are obviously emphasized. In the fakirs, who cultivate immobility, he might see people who are under the absolute dominion of the ideal of stability and detect the origin of this suggestion from the fact that the swastika position of either arms or legs is a favorite one among Hindoo fanatics, just as, out of devotion, many persons have swastikas painted or tattooed upon their limbs.

It is interesting to note the peculiar result attained by the Buddhists in their development of the twin idea of permanence, _i. e._ immutability or immortality, as shown in the following quotation: “There is a remarkable distinction between the Buddhism of China and of Tibet. In regard to philosophy there is little or no difference, but in Tibet there is a hierarchy which exercises political power. In China this could not be. The Grand Lama and many other lamas in Mongolia and Tibet assume the title of ‘Living Buddha.’ In him, most of all, Buddha is incarnate, as the people are taught to think. He never dies. When the body, in which Buddha is for the time incarnate, ceases to perform its functions, some infant is chosen by the priests, who are intrusted with the duty of selecting, to become the residence of Buddha until, in turn, it grows up to manhood and dies. No Buddhist priest in China pretends to be a ‘living Buddha’ or to have a right to the exercise of political power. In Tibet, on the other hand, the Grand Lama, as chief of the ‘living Buddhas,’ not only holds the place of the historical Buddha long since dead, acting as a sort of high-priest, but he also exercises sovereignty over the country of Tibet ruling the laity as well as the clergy and being only subordinate to the lord paramount, the Emperor of China” (Edkins, Religion in China, p. 8).

“The form of the Buddhist temples exemplifies in a striking manner the relative positions of Buddha and the gods. Four kings of the gods are represented in the vestibule. Their office is to guard the door by which entrance is obtained to the presence of Buddha.... The central position is that of Buddha, who is seated on the lotus flower in the attitude of a teacher....” (Edkins). In this attitude an ancient American high-priest would see the graphic representation of one of the titles of the star-god Polaris, “the teacher of the world.”

The association of Buddha with the north and with the number seven is curiously shown in the mythical account that “when Buddha was born a lotus blossomed where he touched the ground; he stepped seven steps northward and a lotus marked each footfall.”

Distinct evidence of the ancient cult of Polaris is yielded by the Hindu marriage custom, which I have found described thus in Meyer’s conversations Lexikon: “In the evening the bride and bridegroom seat themselves on the hide of a red ox, after making the usual offerings.... Then the bridegroom points out the pole-star to the bride and says: ‘the heaven is firm, also the earth; the universe is stedfast, so mayest thou be stedfast in our family’....” The symbolism of the act of sharing the ox-hide as a seat becomes apparent when it is realized that the name for cow or ox=go, also signifies possessions and riches, a conception which is traceable to a period when cattle constituted the chief and most valued possession of pastoral tribes. The veneration accorded in India to the cow is well known and travellers have frequently described the sacred statue of a cow, which is seven feet in height and stands next to the sacred well of the temple at Benares.

In connection with the reference to the pole-star made by the Hindu bridegroom, it is noteworthy that the Sanscrit for star is stri, tara, for stara; Hindu sitara, tara and Bengal stara and that variants of the same word constitute the name for star in Latin, Greek, Gothic, Old and Anglo Saxon, Welsh, Icelandic, Swedish, Danish and Basque, in which language it appears as izarra, recalling the Hindu sitara and, if I may venture to say so, the Nahuatl word for star, citlallin.

The supreme veneration and importance accorded in India to the North, from time immemorial, are shown by passages of the book of Manu, which prescribe the severe penances which were to be performed by the Brahmans who attained advanced age. He “is to inflict all sorts of tortures upon himself and when he falls ill in consequence, he is to set out to walk to the northwest, towards the holy mountain Meru, until his mortal frame breaks down and he unites himself with Brahma.” It is likewise stated that when a Brahman king grew old and ill he was obliged to abdicate in favor of his son and voluntarily seek death in battle or by starvation, whilst wandering towards the holy mountain Meru, in the northwest. I point out the curious parallelism of this custom, which was carried out during countless centuries and determined a periodical migration towards the northwest of venerable sages, presumably accompanied by faithful followers, and the search for the stable centre of the world which caused the wanderings of American tribes under their chiefs.

According to various encyclopædias and general works of reference, Brahma is said to have made the world in two parts, _i. e._, heaven and earth; placed air between both and made the eight regions, fire and the eternal waters. The mythical mountain Meru, on the summit of which the supreme power is said to be enthroned in eternal majesty, is the traditional paradise and is supposed to lie somewhere in the northwest of the Himalayas. It is situated in the centre of the seven zones in which the earth is divided, thence its name Meru=the Middle. The association of the central mountain with divinity and eternal stability is further shown by the statement that the sun, moon and stars circled about it and that it supported the heaven.

As the natural complement to the above, I can cite the following evidences of an all-pervading quadruplicate division and organization, as set forth in an ancient manuscript which was brought from India by Count Angelo de Gubernatis and exhibited in Florence in 1898, by Mr. Pullé, in an extremely instructive series of native maps of India: 1. In the oldest maps, the empire of India was represented as a disk, divided into a number of concentric zones, in the centre of which arose the sacred mountain. 2. These representations were, in several cases, accompanied by representations of the swastika obviously representing quadruplicate territorial division.

On Mount Meru itself there were four lakes respectively filled with milk, butter, coagulated milk and sugar. Four great rivers flowed from the mountain towards the cardinal points, namely, the Ganges, issuing from the mouth of a cow, the Sita from the head of the elephant; the Bhadra from a tiger or lion and the Chaksu from a horse. According to Buddhistic mythology, the sacred mountain Meru, which constitutes the centre of the world, is guarded by four hero “kings of demons.” Their names are as follows: 1. Kubera or Vaisrānana, the god of wealth, who lives in the north, whose attributes are the lance and banner, the rat which throws forth jewels from its mouth. 2. Virūdhaka, who rules the south, and whose attributes are the helmet in the form of an elephant’s head, and a long sword. 3. Virūpāksha, the guardian of the west: attributes, the jewel and the serpent. 4 Dhrtarāshtra, the ruler of the east: attribute, the mandoline.

An interesting parallelism is brought out by a comparison between the ancient Mexican mode of producing the sacred fire by means of a reed and a piece of wood and its symbolism of the mystic union of the two principles of nature, to the origin of fire as told in the Veda and the ceremonial mode employed in India to produce the sacred fire by means of the mystic arani and the pramantha. The difference between the ancient American and Indian apparatus should be noticed. The two arani, made of the wood of _Ficus religiosa_, were placed crosswise. “At their junction was a fossette or cup-like hole and there they placed a piece of wood upright, in the form of a lance (the pramantha), violent rotation of which by means of whipping, produced fire, as did Prometheus, the bearer of fire in Greece” (Bournouf, Des Sciences et Religions and Prof. Thomas Wilson, The Swastika, p. 777). A remarkable relation unquestionably exists between the two mystic arani, which, crossed, form a four-branched cross from the centre of which fire is produced by rotation and the almost universal identification of Polaris and Ursa Major, as the central source of life, power extending to four directions, rotation and duality underlying quadruplicity. In my opinion no more graphic presentation of the rotation of Ursa Major around Polaris, the central ruler of heaven, could have been devised than the cross figure from the centre of which fire was perpetually obtained.

It is all the more significant, therefore, to find it stated that the ancient Aryan light-god, Mithra, was worshipped under the form of fire. I point out that, in a representation published by Layard in his Culte de Mithra and reproduced here (fig. 72, 1) from Mr. Goodyear’s work, a man and a woman are represented as worshipping a star, the scene so strongly recalling the portion of the Hindu marriage ceremony where the pole-star is pointed out, that an identity of scene suggests itself. Returning to the swastika: its meaning in India appears to be forgotten; but, according to Professor Thomas Wilson, a follower of the Jain religion expressed the opinion that “the original idea was very high, but later on some persons thought the swastika represented only the combination of the male and female principles” (Thomas Wilson, On the Swastika, p. 803).

To the Hindu, holding this view and also accustomed to associate the pole-star with the marriage rite, there must exist a curious band of union and identity between Polaris and the swastika, both connected with the combination of the male and female principles.

To treat of the Hindu calendar and division of time would be to transgress beyond the limits of the present investigation which has already assumed unforeseen dimensions. As I shall discuss it in detail in my monograph on the ancient Mexican Calendar system, it will suffice to recall here that Humboldt pointed out the resemblance between the latter and the Hindu system, and that this has been further dwelt upon for instance in the article on the subject in the Encyclopædia Britannica. In the same work of reference it is also stated that, “according to the conclusions of Delambre, the Hindoo knowledge of astronomy was greatly inferior to that of the Greeks, and it has been argued by Laplace, in opposition to the previous opinions of Bailly, that the Indian astronomy is not of the highest antiquity, but must have been imperfectly borrowed from the Greeks.” I may as well state here, however, that, in India as in Mexico, the divisions of time were in accordance with the general scheme, and enabled human activity and labor to be controlled and carried out by means of rotation, and with strict impartial law, order and harmony.

Pausing here and with a clear realization of probable omissions and deficiencies of material, I venture to believe that the foregoing data suffice to establish beyond a doubt the point which is the main object of the present essay, namely, that in India the swastika is found accompanied by the primordial set of ideas which also form the basis of the Chinese and ancient American civilizations. The Middle is, moreover, associated in India with the idea of immovability, repose and centrifugal power and rule, incorporated in the supreme divinity whose symbol is the wheel and who is represented as dual and quadruple in nature, _i. e._ with four hands (as two persons), and with four heads (four persons), the six persons thus symbolized being united in the person of the seventh, the synopsis of them all. The seven-day period; the seven zones of the earth; the seven divine footsteps towards the north; the seven councillors of the Brahmin king, etc., all prove that, whereas six directions in space were worshipped in India, they were inseparable from the sacred seventh which united all of them. The mythical sacred mountain Meru, the throne of the supreme eternal power, constituted the fixed centre of the world and strikingly exemplified quadruplicate division and organization, being associated with four lakes and four rivers; four mythical animals and four guardians. In consonance with this plan Brahma was endowed with four heads and four hands; the empire was divided into four quarters and seven zones, and the population into four castes identified with four colors, and governed by a king and seven councillors. The wheel, associated in the case of Mithra with the serpent, constituted the emblem of supreme dominion and rule which was connected with the idea of an extension to the four quarters. The swastika was but another expression of the same idea and represented also an image of the universal scheme. This sign and the pole-star were both associated, in the native mind, with the life-producing union of the male and female principles of nature and the sacred element fire, under which form the supreme god was anciently worshipped. The lotus flower symbolized the universe, its unity and complexity; the number of petals represented usually agreeing with the number of the cosmical divisions. Two points should further be briefly referred to: The division of time into seven-day periods coincides with the septenary scheme of organization resting upon the seven directions in space. The sacred soma tree, the hom, was an object of cult in India. The custom of planting a Bodhi tree wherever Buddhist missionaries established their doctrine indicates its association with the idea of an established centre. The employment of wooden sticks for the production of the sacred fire under which form the supreme central god was anciently worshipped, also connected wood and the tree with the sacred Centre. Deferring a discussion of the different and yet analogous way in which the fundamental set of ideas was worked out in America and India, I shall but mention here how clearly, in each case, the ultimate results can be traced back to a common primitive and natural origin.

MESOPOTAMIA.

Let us now carry our research into that region whence civilization spread through western Asia, and is said to have been carried to Egypt, Greece and Rome. It may be a surprise to many to learn that, at the present day, on the banks of the Euphrates, in Mesopotamia, pole-star worship, pure and simple, is openly professed by the Mandaïtes who are reputed to be the descendants of the famous Magi of ancient Chaldea, and are termed Sabba or Sabans by the Moslems. It will be seen that these star-watchers have preserved intact an extremely ancient form of the archaic cult which contains the living germ of all primitive religions and represents an evolutionary stage which they must all have undergone.

It is to the kindness of a friend that I owe the knowledge of an article on a Mandaïte New Year festival which appeared in the “Standard” some years ago and which I reproduce in full as Appendix II. As might be expected, the Euphratean star-gazers, like the Chinese, determined midnight by the position of the Great Bear. It is interesting to find, moreover, that the spiritual head of the sect is entitled Gan-zivro, and is closely escorted by four young deacons, named sh-kan-dos, as well as by four priests=tarmidos, and four sub-deacons. The circumstance that the consecrated group of officiants consists of 12+1=13 individuals is particularly suggestive. Not less so are the employment of the tau-shaped cross and the sacrifice of a quadruped to the lord of the underworld and his companion (the lord of the upper world?). The ceremonial immersion in the starlit river is a curious parallel to the midnight bathing in the sacred pool attached to the ancient Mexican temple.

The formulas employed in addressing the pole-star deserve special consideration. In the designation of the stable centre of heaven as “the abode of the pious hereafter and the paradise of the elect,” the natural longings of the human race for stability, _i. e._ safety and repose, find an expression and in this we can detect the germ of thought whose extreme development, in India, produced the comparatively philosophical doctrine of Nirvana. The title of “Primitive Sun” enlightens us as to the original use of the word sun and the supreme importance accorded by the ancient star-gazers to the “Imperial ruler of heaven,” as the Chinese term the pole-star. This application of the word sun will be found particularly interesting to those who, having found the swastika termed a “sun-symbol,” have naturally been led to associate it with the diurnal sun, although they found it difficult to understand its connection with the rotatory motion so clearly discernible in the form of the primitive symbol.

Having ascertained that the Mandaïte pole-star worship of the present day embodies the cult of the sacred centre and of dual principles (one of which is designated as the lord of the underworld) and is associated with quadruple organization and a form of cross, let us now make a great stride backwards and note some details concerning ancient Sabæan star-worship.

ARABIA.

In remote antiquity, star-worship prevailed throughout Arabia and one of its great centres was the flourishing land of Saba or Sheba, whose queen visited Solomon at Jerusalem. The star-cult of the Sabæans is acknowledged to have resembled that of the ancient inhabitants of Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia and India. We are told that a certain sect amongst them “believed in a great cycle of time in which certain epochs of the world’s history recurred”—an idea akin to ancient Mexican speculative philosophy. It is also stated that one of the chief centres of Sabæism was the town of Harran in Mesopotamia and that, although surrounded by Christianity, this ancient form of star-worship maintained itself here until the Middle Ages. The possibility that the Mandaïtes of to-day may be the descendants of the ancient inhabitants of Harran is naturally suggested by this historical fact. A curious detail concerning monarchical succession in Sheba has been preserved to us. The king was kept in an enforced seclusion in his palace and incurred the penalty of death if he left it. His office was not hereditary but fell to the first son who was born amongst the nobility, after a king’s accession to the throne. In this custom, a curious parallel of which is furnished by the Thibetan mode of electing the “living Buddha,” some readers may be inclined to find an explanation for the massacre of the babes ordered by Herod when he learned that the wise men of the East, guided by a star, had designated “a young child” as the future “King of the Jews.” It is an interesting reflection that, to many of his contemporaries, the establishment of the “Kingdom of Heaven,” announced by the Messiah, may have appeared as a movement to revive the most ancient form of government and to reinstate Jerusalem as the central metropolis of an empire, the organization of which would have resembled the Chinese and ancient American forms of “Middle Kingdoms,” or “Celestial Empires.”

The ideal of many of these descendants of ancient pole-star worshippers may well have been the reversion to the primitive, pure type of single central, celestial and terrestrial rule which had been superseded in western Asia by the pernicious growth of the utterly abasing and demoralizing separate cults of the dual principles of nature.

A curious remnant of the worship of the Earth-mother and of the stable centre of the world, recalling ancient American symbolism, exists in Arabia and merits a passing notice. “The great holy place of Jiddah, the principal landing place of the pilgrims to Mecca, on the eastern coast of the Red sea, is the singular tomb of ‘our mother Eve’ surrounded by the principal cemetery. The tomb is a walled enclosure said to represent the dimensions of the body about 200 paces long and 15 feet wide. At the head is a small erection where gifts are deposited and rather more than half way down a whitewashed dome encloses a small, dark chapel, within which is the black stone known as el-surrah=the navel. The grave of Eve is mentioned by Edrisi but, except the black stone, nothing bears any aspect of antiquity” (Encycl. Brit., article Jiddah).

The fact that the Arabian appellation for Mecca is om-el-kora=“the mother of cities” deserves special attention. Exactly in the centre of the city is the mosque enclosing the kaaba, a structure the only door of which opens to the north. It contains the celebrated black sacred stone and a trough, reputed to be of pure gold, which conducts freshly fallen rain water to the interior of the building and pours it upon its floor of dark earth. The following details are given in a recently published account by an anonymous visitor:

“The Moslems believe that the original Kaaba was built in heaven two thousand years before the creation of the world and that, at the command of the Almighty, angels walked around it in adoration. Furthermore, they said that Adam built the first Kaaba on earth on its present site, directly under the one in heaven.... Long before the time of Mahomet, the Kaaba was a place of worship for the idolatrous Arabs and in it they had no less than 360 idols, one for each day of the Arabian year. These were destroyed by Mahomet....” Beside the pilgrimages to the Kaaba pious Mussulmans also visit the sacred granite mountains the “Arafat where Adam is supposed to have met Eve after a long separation.”

Summarized, the preceding facts clearly show that, from a remote antiquity, the Arabians have preserved the conception of (1) a divine, celestial, stable sanctuary around which “angels” walked in a circle. (2) A terrestrial sanctuary built by man directly beneath the heavenly one and associated with the period of a year, _i. e._ 360 days. (3) In the sacred terrestrial kaaba the mystic union of rain and earth is made to take place, while (4) Mount Arafat is connected with the traditional reunion of Adam and Eve.

It is unnecessary to point out the significant association of an annual count of days with the stable centre and its importance as an indication that the ancient Arabian star-gazers originally associated the year period with circumpolar rotation. The analogy between the Arabian ideas concerning the dual principles of nature and those of other nations is also too marked to be easily overlooked.

Nor need I emphasize how strikingly the imagery of the celestial kaaba suits Polaris and the circumpolar constellations. But I shall now proceed to point out that the word kaaba itself curiously resembles star-names which are given by Mr. Robert Brown in his recent valuable publication to which I shall revert, namely, the Akkadian name for constellation in general=kakkab and the Babylonian and Assyrian name for the pole-star=Kakkabu. In this connection and upon Professor Sayce’s authority I cite the significant fact that the word for north and for the empire and capital of northern Babylonia was Akkad, and that we thus find in North Babylonia a great centre of government the name of which contains the syllables ak-ka which recur in the appellations for north and for Polaris.

The following star-names, given by Mr. Robert Brown, are of utmost interest considering that a star in Draconis was the pole-star of 2170 B.C. and that in general the serpent was indissolubly connected with the pole-star. “The constellation Drakon is Phœnician=Kanaanite in origin and represented primarily the nâkkâsch qodmun (old serpent)=the guardian of the stars (golden apples) which hang from the pole tree. It is called the crooked serpent=nakkasch in Job XXVI:13 ...” (_op. cit._, p. 29). I further cite Mr. Brown’s authority for the fact that in Phœnicia A.D., 1200, the name for Ursa Major was Dubkabir and for Ursa Minor, Dub.

Before returning to the Euphratean valley let us note some facts concerning the ancient religion of

PERSIA.

The swastika is found in Persia as well as a sacred mountain, the Elburl. The supreme divinity was the invisible Ahuramazda, the “creator of heaven and earth,” who was associated with “eternal light” and appears to be identical with the ancient Aryan god of light, Mithra, the watcher and ruler of the world, who was worshipped under the form of fire.

Mithra and Ahuramazda alike are associated with six spirits named the Amesha-zpenta, who are said, in the first case, to be personifications of the sun, moon, fire, earth, water and air, and in the second, of certain qualities of the supreme power, namely, law, power, goodness, piety, health and immortality, abstract conceptions which evidently pertain to a more advanced intellectual stage. The septarchy thus formed by Mithra and his Amesha appears to assign the Middle to him and to associate the sun with the day, heaven, light and the Above, the moon with the night and darkness and the Below, and the elements with the Four Quarters. It is suggestive of four-fold rule and power to find, on a bas-relief found at the ancient holy city Pasargada, the Persian king Cyrus represented with four wings and a diadem with two uræus serpents like that of Egyptian kings.

The most ancient Persian monarch is said to have been Haha-manis or Akhamanis, who was termed “the king of Anshan.” Subsequent kings bore the title of Hakhamanisija, as for instance, Cyrus and Darius I (520-486 B.C.). At the present day, the title Charkan is that employed to designate the Shah, whereas goda or khoda signifies lord, master, prince or ruler.

In a bas-relief published by Spamer, whose work of reference will be referred to again later on, Darius is represented as standing under the image of Ahuramazda, the supreme deity, who, like the Assyrian god Assur, is figured as a king wearing the royal cap, and issuing from the centre of a winged ring or circlet. In Persia the god holds another ring in his hand (fig. 71, 1). It seems impossible to emphasize more strongly or express more clearly the idea that Ahuramazda was the lord of the circle and of the Above, the wings being emblematic of air or heaven and of motion.

The signification of the symbolical representation of the supreme power and the adoption of fire by the founders of the ancient Parsee religion as the most appropriate image of their highest god, become clear when interpreted as the outcome of pole-star worship. Resisting the temptation to prolong the study of ancient Persia, let us now hasten to the reputed cradle of the civilization of Western Asia.

BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA.

“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.”