Part 4 (1/2)

On the bank of the Araxes, in the plain of Armenia, and in full view of Ararat are located the monastery of Khor-Virap and the chapel of St. Gregory close beside it. An Armenian inscription is cut in the walls of the portico of the monastery which marks the spot where a monk, Johannes by name, appeared twice after his death saying that he had seen Gregory the Illuminator. The chapel of St. Gregory covers the traditional well into which he was thrown and imprisoned for thirteen years by King Tiridates. Dubois descended into a sort of tunnel, fifteen or sixteen feet below the pavement of the chapel, which is part of an old fortress, and was shown the worn stones of a niche where the saint prayed, as evidence of the thirteen years, quite as though other pilgrims who knelt in the same place could not have a.s.sisted somewhat the pious work of the saint. [104] The spot is only a few steps from the famous temple dedicated to the princ.i.p.al G.o.d of the Armenians, Aramazd, and it seems clear that the pagan king intended to make a sacrifice to his G.o.ds in casting the young fanatic into the well. The temple was called Achelichad, meaning ”many sacrifices” because of the many offerings here given up to Aramazd. With the era of Christianity, the name Achelichad gave way to the name Khor Virap, meaning dry well. Gregorius Magistros, already mentioned, brought the body of the saint from Constantinople and placed it in the bottom of the well, where it served to cure sick pilgrims.

There is a tradition that the Armenian city of Erzerum, not far from the source of the Euphrates, marks the vicinity of the Garden of Eden. The Persian king Khosref Purveez is said to have encamped in the neighborhood and to have received a message from the prophet Mohammed during his sojourn, in which he was offered the protection of Islam if he would embrace the faith. But the king spurned the proposal and tossed the letter into the Euphrates. Nature, horrified at the sacrilege, dried up the flowers and fruits of the ancient garden and even parched up the sources of the river itself. And so the last relic of Eden became waste. [105]

In the same connection, there is a plaintive Armenian elegy, composed in the person of Adam, who, sitting at the gate of paradise and beholding cherubim and seraphim enter the garden, makes the following defence: he did not eat the forbidden fruit until after he had witnessed its fatal effects upon Eve, when, seeing her despoiled of all her glory, he was touched with pity and tasted the immortal fruit in the hope that the Creator, contemplating both in the same plight might with paternal love take compa.s.sion on them. But in vain. ”The Lord cursed the serpent and Eve,” pathetically cries Adam, ”and I was enslaved between them.” The elegy closes most touchingly,--”When ye enter Eden, shut not the gate of paradise, but place me standing at the gate. I will look in a moment and then bring me back. Ah! I remember ye, O flowers and sweet smelling fountains. Ah! I remember ye, O birds, sweet singing, And ye, O beasts.” [106]

CHAPTER V

INTERPRETATION AND CONCLUSIONS

Because these legends are for the most part based upon older legends, and also because some of them are known only locally, they can not be said to have played so important a role in Armenian social life as the first two groups of legends. It would be a mistake, however, to suppose that all of the Ararat legends have merely a local value. Ararat is the center of the nation, the grand geographical feature of the country, and many of the beliefs cl.u.s.tered about it are held in common. In fact there is a very old belief which considers the sacred mountain to be the center of the world, and to-day it is the common point of meeting of the boundaries of Russian, Turkish, and Persian Armenia. And this is no accident; it is because of the veneration in which the mountain is held, and consequently, the realization of the importance the mountain gives to any territory in which it may be located. The belief that Ararat is the mountain of the Ark, the legend of Noah's vineyard, and the legend of St. Jacob are very commonly accepted. The primeval willow, the church of Arghuri, the legend, or perhaps one should say, the superst.i.tion of the tetagush, and the legend of the wise men in search of the star of the East, enjoy a more restricted circulation. Furthermore, it is natural to suppose that the legends centered in the destroyed city of Arghuri have not been told as frequently as of old, and are therefore dying out gradually, although they seem still to be very much alive. A legend or tradition that is objectified in an old willow, in a monastery, or in a garden, is likely to die out gradually with the destruction of its object. But some of them will never die out, object or no object, as for example the legend of the devout monk who tried to gain the summit of Ararat in order to see the holy Ark. There is something in his waking up each successive morning only to find himself at the same point he had started from the preceding day, which will keep its hold, whether there be a monastery erected in his name or not. And if the vineyard has been destroyed the people may very soon find another. In fact I should be surprised if in traveling through the mountain region of Ararat, I was not shown the legendary vineyard. This, however, would more likely be true of a legend that had a commercial value to the community because of the frequency of travelers, which could certainly not be said of Ararat legends. The same general valuation may be placed upon the Erzerum legends. A legend of this sort is not believed to be true, unless the legend upon which it is based is commonly believed in, and it is certainly safe to suppose that a majority of the Armenian people accept the Old Testament legends. This is important, for when a legend is not a matter of implicit belief by a people it has little social value. The elegy of Adam can not be properly said to be a legend at all.

The preceding pages point out certain points of resemblance, and certain points of difference between the two words, legend and tradition, which require to be brought out at this point, first, because of vague and loose current usage, and second, in order to establish my own use of these terms. In the first place they are beliefs, and here lies the secret of their social value. Let them be disbelieved in and they may furnish material for entertaining after-dinner conversation, but they no more have the power of welding a people together into a nation, a caste, or a sect; they no longer have the power of creating a common sentiment among a large number of people or of creating a national consciousness.

And in the second place, both the tradition and the legend are pa.s.sed on from person to person, and from generation to generation. When a tradition is defined as a belief that is handed down orally from father to son, it is not at all differentiated from the legend which is also a belief, and which may also be pa.s.sed on orally from generation to generation. Neither does a legend or a tradition change its character when the meaning is represented by symbols cut in rock, inscribed on papyrus, or written on paper. The event of inscription is very often a part of their history.

But when it comes to a question of historic value we mark the parting of the ways. A tradition, used in the sense with which we are concerned here, is always rooted in an indisputable historic fact. Consider the traditions of Islam that are centered about the prophet Mohammed. They may have a thousand variations, may have embodied falsehood after falsehood in the course of their transmission from place to place, and from generation to generation, as most of them unquestionably have, but they are traditions, nevertheless, because they are a.s.sociated with a character who is an undisputed historic figure. The refusal of St. Gregory to offer garlands to the G.o.ddess Anahit, and his imprisonment in the well during a period of thirteen years is a tradition because the belief is a.s.sociated with a historic character. Compare this with the beliefs concerning Haic, Vahakn, Semiramis and Ara, and the distinction is clear, for these characters are all mythical. Artasches and Artavasd are generally recognized as historical kings, and are so spoken of by Moses. As such the beliefs concerning them should be cla.s.sed as traditions. However, Moses as a historian has been relegated to a secondary position by Carriere, who gave the work a critical examination. This would make the beliefs concerning Artasches and Satenik and Artavasd purely legendary, unless further research establishes more reliable sources of which we do not know. The first group therefore are legends.

In regard to the second group of beliefs all having to do with the introduction of Christianity, Bartholomew, Thaddeus, Gregory, and Tiridates are unquestionably historic; Rhipsime and Gaiane are mythical; the historic authenticity of Abgar is also questionable. We should therefore speak of the legends of Rhipsime, Gaiane and Abgar, and of the traditions of Bartholomew, Thaddeus, Gregory, and Tiridates.

The Ararat and Erzerum group are of course legends with one or two exceptions. The belief concerning the scorning of the proposal of Mohammed by the Persian king who was encamped on the Euphrates as explaining the barrenness of the Garden of Eden certainly has to do with an historic figure, and perhaps two. But it is a legend, nevertheless, because both the prophet of Arabia and the Persian king are accidental rather than fundamental to the belief. The fundamental basis of belief is the legend of the Garden of Eden. The elegy of Adam in explanation of his sinful conduct is neither legend nor tradition, and the belief concerning the tetagush and the spring of Ararat is a superst.i.tion. It results in a distinct type of conduct marking it off from both tradition and legend.

I have stated my conclusions at various places, and it would be pointless repet.i.tion to summarize them all. I shall therefore sum up only the important ones. The first is that the legends and traditions of Part One are an important part of a larger body of Armenian legends, traditions, folk-songs, and folk-lore, and that their social value lies in the power they have of creating a national sentiment. This national sentiment is the direct result of a social process accomplished through the medium of the traditions, legends, and folk-songs spoken of. An a.n.a.lysis of the national sentiment of ancient Armenia would lead us to the conclusion that it was made up of at least three elements: first, a sentiment of loyalty to the state; secondly, a sentiment of reverence amounting almost to wors.h.i.+p for the past glory of the nation; and thirdly, a sentiment of love for the country.

The last sentiment is an especially real experience to all Armenians. Objectified as it was at first in the vast plains, the broad river valleys, the mountain ranges, or simply in the soil that brought forth its vegetation, it came to be objectified in a spirit of independence and in the ideals of freedom and strength. These two objects of the national sentiment of love, the one material, the other immaterial, are not, however, to be dissociated in the social mind, as I have dissociated them on paper. They are inseparable, the material and the spiritual, and simply do not exist apart from each other. Only the emphasis varies, symbolized in one case by the peasant's kissing his native soil, and in the other by the far-away look toward the summit of some distant mountain. And when this sentiment of love is the most important of those sentiments that go to make up a national sentiment, that is, when it dominates all the others, holding them in subjection, there has come to be a national self. A continuous stream of consciousness envelopes the national self, and inasmuch as it implies a highly-organized and well-developed national self, national-self-consciousness is the larger term. It may be objectified and examined especially at a time of injustice from without, and even at the time of an obvious act of injustice by the state which usually results in civil strife. The latter case is ill.u.s.trative of how one of the sentiments that make up the national sentiment may be under the domination of another, the sentiment of loyalty to the state being subordinate to the sentiment of love for the country in this case.

That the national self is organic, i.e., that it is functional, a vital, living thing which grows and dies is clearly brought out by the second group of legends considered. This is the second general conclusion. The legends and traditions mentioned in this group are of course again part of a larger body, all of which have to do with the introduction of Christianity into the country. The important point is that from this larger body of beliefs there resulted a new national sentiment, new because something had come to be incorporated within it which was not there before. This something was a sentiment of loyalty to the church, evidenced in the readiness to uphold and protect the church with all its recognized enc.u.mbrances of hierarchies and paraphernalia against all foreign intrusion, whether peaceful or military in character. With the destruction of the state, this sentiment of loyalty to the church largely absorbed the sentiment of loyalty to the state. Reverence for the past glory of the nation went on unchanged except in so far as the church intensified it as a means of intensifying the whole national sentiment.

A loosely organized, heterogeneous group of people can not boast of a national sentiment, nor of the united action necessary in times of national crisis, as when a people go to war. This united action is only possible where the diverse sentiments of a more or less heterogeneous people have been woven into a national sentiment of the kind spoken of. This weaving process, as I have shown, is essentially a social process, and the materials by means of which it is carried on are largely such as I have been describing, namely, the legends, traditions, and folk-lore that have somehow grown up among a people.

PART TWO

FESTIVALS

CHAPTER I

THE GREGORIAN CHURCH

As the materials of Part One are part of a larger ma.s.s of legends, traditions, and folk-lore, the social value of which lies in their power of creating a national or group sentiment, so the festivals and ceremonies to be taken up in Part Two are part of a larger ma.s.s of festivals, ceremonies, and rites whose social value lies in the fact that they const.i.tute a necessary vehicle of expression for this same national sentiment. The festivals are a necessary counterpart of the legends, as the latter are a necessary counterpart of the former. Activity is one of the most fundamental of nature's laws. The sentiment of love for an individual dies eventually in the absence of some formal mode of active expression. But be the action ever so little a thing, such as the laying of flowers upon the grave of the dead, the visiting of a shrine, or the sight of some hallowed spot of sacred memory, the sentiment is kept alive. To be sure a sentiment may smoulder for a lifetime, even as a national sentiment may slumber for centuries without a mode of expression, and then all of a sudden burst forth into a flame, or awaken into life at a mere suggestion from outside. Bereft of statehood, the sentiment of loyalty for the state has slumbered for centuries within the breast of the Armenian people, but how often, how too sadly often, has it not suddenly awakened into hot, new life only to be pacified into slumber again. But the last glow, the little flicker at the end is all that separates the living embers from the dead ash.