Part 13 (2/2)
I fainted, but no one stretched forth his hand!
I groaned, but no one drew nigh!
I cried aloud, but no one heard!
O Lord, do not abandon thy servant!
In the waters of the great storm seize his hand!
The sins which he has committed turn them to righteousness. [184]
This Psalm would hardly be out of place in the English burial-service, which deplores death as a visitation of divine wrath. Wherever such an idea prevails, the natural outcome of it is a belief in demons of disease. In ancient Egypt--following the belief in Ra the Sun, from whose eyes all pleasing things proceeded, and Set, from whose eyes came all noxious things,--from the baleful light of Set's eyes were born the Seven Hathors, or Fates, whose names are recorded in the Book of the Dead. Mr. Fox Talbot has translated 'the Song of the Seven Spirits:'--
They are seven! they are seven!
In the depths of ocean they are seven!
In the heights of heaven they are seven!
In the ocean-stream in a palace they were born!
Male they are not: female they are not!
Wives they have not: children are not born to them!
Rule they have not: government they know not!
Prayers they hear not!
They are seven! they are seven! twice over they are seven! [185]
These demons have a way of herding together; the a.s.syrian tablets abundantly show that their occupation was manifested by diseases, physical and mental. One prescription runs thus:--
The G.o.d (...) shall stand by his bedside: Those seven evil spirits he shall root out, and shall expel them from his body: And those seven shall never return to the sick man again!
It is hardly doubtful that these were the seven said to have been cast out of Mary Magdalen; for their father Set is Shedim (devils) of Deut. x.x.xii. 17, and Shaddai (G.o.d) of Gen. xvi. 1. But the fatal Seven turn to the seven fruits that charm away evil influences at parturition in Persia, also the Seven Wise Women of the same country traditionally present on holy occasions. When Arda Viraf was sent to Paradise by a sacred narcotic to obtain intelligence of the true faith, seven fires were kept burning for seven days around him, and the seven wise women chanted hymns of the Avesta. [186]
The entrance of the seven evil powers into a dwelling was believed by the a.s.syrians to be preventible by setting in the doorway small images, such as those of the sun-G.o.d (Hea) and the moon-G.o.ddess, but especially of Marduk, corresponding to Serapis the Egyptian Esculapius. These powers were reinforced by writing holy texts over and on each side of the threshold. 'In the night time bind around the sick man's head a sentence taken from a good book.' The phylacteries of the Jews were originally worn for the same purpose. They were called Tefila, and were related to teraphim, the little idols [187] used by the Jews to keep out demons--such as those of Laban, which his daughter Rachel stole.
The resemblance of teraphim to the Tarasca (connected by some with G. teras, a monster) of Spain may be noted,--the serpent figures carried about in Corpus Christi processions. The latter word is known in the south of France also, and gave its name to the town Tarascon. The legend is that an amphibious monster haunted the Rhone, preventing navigation and committing terrible ravages, until sixteen of the boldest inhabitants of the district resolved to encounter it. Eight lost their lives, but the others, having destroyed the monster, founded the town of Tarascon, where the 'Fete de la tarasque'
is still kept up. [188] Calmet, Sedley, and others, however, believe that teraphim is merely a modification of seraphim, and the Tefila, or phylacteries, of the same origin.
The phylactery was tied into a knot. Justin Martyr says that the Jewish exorcists used 'magic ties or knots.' The origin of this custom among the Jews and Babylonians may be found in the a.s.syrian Talismans preserved in the British Museum, of which the following has been translated by Mr. Fox Talbot:--
Hea says: Go, my son!
Take a woman's kerchief, Bind it round thy right hand, loose it from the left hand!
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