Isis Unveiled by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol.
2
Theosophical University Press Online Edition
[[Vol. 2, Page 473]]
CHAPTER X.
"Get thee behind me, SATAN" (Jesus
to Peter). -- Matt. xvi. 23.
"Such a deal of skimble-skamble stuff
As puts me from my faith. I tell you what --
He held me, last night, at least nine hours
In reckoning up the several devils' names." -- King Henry
IV., Part i., Act iii.
"La force terrible et juste qui tue eternellement les avortons
a ete nommee par les Egyptiens Typhon, par les Hebreux Samael;
par les orientaux Satan; et par les Latins Lucifer. Le Lucifer
de la Cabale n'est pas un ange maudit et foudroye; c'est l'ange
qui eclaire et qui regenere en tombant." -- ELIPHAS
LEVI: Dogme et Rituel.
"Bad as he is, the Devil may be abus'd,
Be falsely charg'd, and causelessly accus'd,
When Men, unwilling to be blam'd alone,
Shift off those Crimes on Him which are their Own." --
Defoe, 1726.
SEVERAL years ago, a distinguished writer and
persecuted kabalist suggested a creed for the Protestant and Roman
Catholic bodies, which may be thus formulated:
Protevangelium.
"I believe in the Devil, the Father Almighty of Evil, the
Destroyer of all things, Perturbator of Heaven and Earth;
And in Anti-Christ, his only Son, our Persecutor,
Who was conceived of the Evil Spirit;
Born of a sacrilegious, foolish Virgin;
Was glorified by mankind, reigned over them,
And ascended to the throne of Almighty God,
From which he crowds Him aside, and from which he insults the
living and the dead;
I believe in the Spirit of Evil;
The Synagogue of Satan;
The coalition of the wicked;
The perdition of the body;
And the Death and Hell everlasting. Amen."
Does this offend? Does it seem extravagant, cruel, blasphemous?
Listen. In the city of New York, on the ninth day of April, 1877
-- that is to say, in the last quarter of what is proudly styled
the century of discovery and the age of illumination -- the following
scandalous ideas were broached. We quote from the report in the
Sun of the following morning:
"The Baptist preachers met yesterday in the Mariners' Chapel,
in
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 474 ISIS UNVEILED.
Oliver Street. Several foreign missionaries were present. The
Rev. John W. Sarles, of Brooklyn, read an essay, in which he maintained
the proposition that all adult heathen, dying without the
knowledge of the Gospel, are damned eternally. Otherwise,
the reverend essayist argued, the Gospel is a curse instead of
a blessing, the men who crucified Christ served him right, and
the whole structure of revealed religion tumbles to the ground.
"Brother Stoddard, a missionary from India, indorsed the
views of the Brooklyn pastor. The Hindus were great sinners. One
day, after he had preached in the market place, a Brahman got
up and said: 'We Hindus beat the world in lying, but this man
beats us. How can he say that God loves us? Look at the poisonous
serpents, tigers, lions, and all kinds of dangerous animals around
us. If God loves us, why doesn't He take them away?'
"The Rev. Mr. Pixley, of Hamilton, N. Y., heartily subscribed
to the doctrine of Brother Sarles's essay, and asked for $5,000
to fit out young men for the ministry."
And these men -- we will not say teach the doctrine of Jesus,
for that would be to insult his memory, but -- are paid to
teach his doctrine! Can we wonder that intelligent persons prefer
annihilation to a faith encumbered by such a monstrous doctrine?
We doubt whether any respectable Brahman would have confessed
to the vice of lying -- an art cultivated only in those portions
of British India where the most Christians are found.*
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* So firmly established seems to have been the reputation of the
Brahmans and Buddhists for the highest morality, and that since
time immemorial, that we find Colonel Henry Yule, in his admirable
edition of "Marco Polo," giving the following testimony:
"The high virtues ascribed to the Brahman and Indian merchants
were, perhaps, in part, matter of tradition . . . but the eulogy
is so constant among mediaeval travellers that it must have
had a solid foundation. In fact, it would not be difficult
to trace a chain of similar testimony from ancient times down
to our own. Arrian says no Indian was ever accused of falsehood.
Hwen T'sang ascribes to the people of India eminent uprightness,
honesty, and disinterestedness. Friar Jordanus (circa 1330)
says the people of Lesser India (Sindh and Western India) were
true in speech and eminent in justice; and we may also refer to
the high character given to the Hindus by Abul Fazl. But after
150 years of European trade, indeed, we find a sad deterioration.
. . . Yet Pallas, in the last century, noticing the Bamyan
colony at Astrakhan, says its members were notable for an upright
dealing that made them greatly preferable to Armenians. And that
wise and admirable public servant, the late Sir William Sleeman,
in our own time, has said that he knew no class of men in the
world more strictly honorable than the mercantile classes of India."
(1)
The sad examples of the rapid demoralization of savage
American Indians, as soon as they are made to live in a close
proximity with Christian officials and missionaries,
are familiar in our modern days.
-------------------------------------
(1) The "Book of Ser Marco Polo, the Venetian," translated
by Colonel Henry Yule, vol. ii., p. 354.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 475 THE DEVIL IN ALL HIS ASPECTS.
But we challenge any honest man in the wide world to say whether
he thinks the Brahman was far from the truth in saying of the
missionary Stoddard, "this man beats us all" in lying.
What else would he say, if the latter preached to them the doctrine
of eternal damnation, because, indeed, they had passed
their lives without reading a Jewish book of which they never
heard, or asked salvation of a Christ whose existence they never
suspected! But Baptist clergymen who need a few thousand dollars
must devise terrifying sensations to fire the congregational heart.
We abstain, as a rule, from giving our own experience when we
can call acceptable witnesses, and so, upon reading missionary
Stoddard's outrageous remarks, we requested our acquaintance,
Mr. William L. D. O'Grady,* to give a fair opinion upon the missionaries.
This gentleman's father and grandfather were British army officers,
and he himself was born in India, and enjoyed life-long opportunities
to learn what the general opinion among the English is of these
religious propagandists. Following is his communication in reply
to our letter:
"You ask me for my opinion of the Christian missionaries
in India. In all the years I spent there, I never spoke to a single
missionary. They were not in society, and, from what I heard of
their proceedings and could see for myself, I don't wonder at
it. Their influence on the natives is bad. Their converts
are worthless, and, as a rule, of the lowest class; nor do
they improve by conversion. No respectable family will employ
Christian servants. They lie, they steal, they are unclean --
and dirt is certainly not a Hindu vice; they drink -- and no decent
native of any other belief ever touches intoxicating liquor; they
are outcasts from their own people and utterly despicable. Their
new teachers set them a poor example of consistency. While holding
forth to the Pariah that God makes no distinction of persons,
they boast intolerably over the stray Brahmans, who, very much
"off color," occasionally, at long intervals, fall into
the clutches of these hypocrites.
"The missionaries get very small salaries, as publicly stated
in the proceedings of the societies that employ them, but, in
some unaccountable way, manage to live as well as officials with
ten times their income. When they come home to recover their health,
shattered, as they say, by their arduous labors -- which they
seem to be able to afford to do quite frequently, when supposed
richer people cannot -- they tell childish stories on platforms,
exhibit idols as procured with infinite difficulty, which is quite
absurd, and give an account of their imaginary hardships which
is perfectly harrowing but untrue from beginning to end. I lived
some years in India myself, and nearly all my blood-relations
have passed or will pass the best years of their lives there.
I know hundreds of British officials, and I never heard from one
of them a single word in favor of the missionaries. Natives of
any position look on them with the supremest contempt, although
suffering chronic exasperation from their arrogant aggressiveness;
and the British Government, which continues endowments to Pagodas,
granted by the East
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* At the present moment Mr. O'Grady is Editor of the "American
Builder," of New York, and is well known for his interesting
letters, "Indian Sketches -- Life in the East," which
he contributed under the pseudonym of Hadji Nicka Bauker Khan,
to the Boston "Commercial Bulletin."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 476 ISIS UNVEILED.
India Company, and which supports unsectarian education, gives
them no countenance whatever. Protected from personal violence,
they yelp and bark at natives and Europeans alike, after the fashion
of ill-conditioned curs. Often recruited from the poorest specimens
of theological fanaticism, they are regarded on all sides as mischievous.
Their rabid, reckless, vulgar, and offensive propagandism caused
the great Mutiny of 1857. They are noisome humbugs.
"WM. L. D.
O'GRADY.
"NEW YORK, June 12, 1877."
The new creed therefore, with which we opened this chapter, coarse
as it may sound, embodies the very essence of the belief of the
Church as inculcated by her missionaries. It is regarded as less
impious, less infidel, to doubt the personal existence of the
Holy Ghost, or the equal Godhead of Jesus, than to question the
personality of the Devil. But a summary of Koheleth is well-nigh
forgotten.* Who ever quotes the golden words of the prophet Micah,**
or seems to care for the exposition of the Law, as given by Jesus
himself?*** The "bull's eye" in the target of Modern
Christianity is in the simple phrase to "fear the Devil."
The Catholic clergy and some of the lay champions of the Roman
Church fight still more for the existence of Satan and his imps.
If Des Mousseaux maintains the objective reality of spiritual
phenomena with such an unrelenting ardor, it is because, in his
opinion, the latter are the most direct evidence of the Devil
at work. The Chevalier is more Catholic than the Pope; and his
logic and deductions from never-to-be and non-established premises
are unique, and prove once more that the creed offered by us is
the one which expresses the Catholic belief most eloquently.
"If magic and spiritualism," he says, "were both
but chimeras, we would have to bid an eternal farewell to all
the rebellious angels, now troubling the world; for thus, we would
have no more demons down here. . . . And if
we lost our demons, we would LOSE OUR SAVIOUR
likewise. For, from whom did that Saviour come to save us? And
then, there would be no more Redeemer; for from whom or what could
that Redeemer redeem us? Hence, there would be no more Christianity!!"****
Oh, Holy Father of Evil; Sainted Satan! We pray thee do not abandon
such pious Christians as the Chevalier des Mousseaux and some
Baptist clergymen!!
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Ecclesiastes xii. 13; see Tayler Lewis's "Metrical Translation."
"The great conclusion here;
Fear God and His commandments keep, for this is all of man."
** See Micah vi., 6-8, "Noyes's Translation."
*** Matthew xvii. 37-40.
**** "Les Hauts Phenomenes de la Magie," p. 12, preface.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 477 A PERSONAL DEVIL INVOLVES POLYTHEISM.
For our part, we would rather remember the wise words of J. C.
Colquhoun,* who says that "those persons who, in modern times,
adopt the doctrine of the Devil in its strictly literal and personal
application, do not appear to be aware that they are in reality
polytheists, heathens, idolaters."
Seeking supremacy in everything over the ancient creeds, the Christians
claim the discovery of the Devil officially recognized by the
Church. Jesus was the first to use the word "legion"
when speaking of them; and it is on this ground that M. des Mousseaux
thus defends his position in one of his demonological works. "Later,"
he says, "when the synagogue expired, depositing
its inheritance in the hands of Christ, were born into the world
and shone, the Fathers of the Church, who have been accused
by certain persons of a rare and precious ignorance, of having
borrowed their ideas as to the spirits of darkness from the theurgists."
Three deliberate, palpable, and easily-refuted errors -- not to
use a harsher word -- occur in these few lines. In the first place,
the synagogue, far from having expired, is flourishing
at the present day in nearly every town of Europe, America, and
Asia; and of all churches in Christian cities, it is the most
firmly established, as well as the best behaved. Further -- while
no one will deny that many Christian Fathers were born into the
world (always, of course, excepting the twelve fictitious Bishops
of Rome, who were never born at all), every person who will take
the trouble to read the works of the Platonists of the old Academy,
who were theurgists before Iamblichus, will recognize therein
the origin of Christian Demonology as well as the Angelology,
the allegorical meaning of which was completely distorted by the
Fathers. Then it could hardly be admitted that the said Fathers
ever shone, except, perhaps, in the refulgence of their
extreme ignorance. The Reverend Dr. Shuckford, who passed the
better part of his life trying to reconcile their contradictions
and absurdities, was finally driven to abandon the whole thing
in despair. The ignorance of the champions of Plato must indeed
appear rare and precious by comparison with the fathomless profundity
of Augustine, "the giant of learning and erudition,"
who scouted the sphericity of the earth, for, if true, it would
prevent the antipodes from seeing the Lord Christ when he descended
from heaven at the second advent; or, of Lactantius, who rejects
with pious horror Pliny's identical theory, on the remarkable
ground that it would make the trees at the other side of the earth
grow and the men walk with their heads downward; or, again, of
Cosmas-Indicopleustes, whose orthodox system of geography is embalmed
in his "Christian topography"; or, finally, of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "History of Magic, Witchcraft, and Animal Magnetism."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 478 ISIS UNVEILED.
Bede, who assured the world that the heaven "is tempered
with glacial waters, lest it should be set on fire"* -- a
benign dispensation of Providence, most likely to prevent the
radiance of their learning from setting the sky ablaze!
Be this as it may, these resplendent Fathers certainly did borrow
their notions of the "spirits of darkness" from the
Jewish kabalists and Pagan theurgists, with the difference, however,
that they disfigured and outdid in absurdity all that the wildest
fancy of the Hindu, Greek, and Roman rabble had ever created.
There is not a dev in the Persian Pandaimonion half so preposterous,
as a conception, as des Mousseaux's Incubus revamped
from Augustine. Typhon, symbolized as an ass, appears
a philosopher in comparison with the devil caught by the Normandy
peasant in a key-hole; and it is certainly not Ahriman or the
Hindu Vritra who would run away in rage and dismay, when addressed
as St. Satan, by a native Luther.
The Devil is the patron genius of theological Christianity. So
"holy and reverend is his name" in modern conception,
that it may not, except occasionally from the pulpit, be uttered
in ears polite. In like manner, anciently, it was not lawful to
speak the sacred names or repeat the jargon of the Mysteries,
except in the sacred cloister. We hardly know the names of the
Samothracian gods, but cannot tell precisely the number of the
Kabeiri. The Egyptians considered it blasphemous to utter the
title of the gods of their secret rites. Even now, the Brahman
only pronounces the syllable Om in silent thought, and
the Rabbi, the Ineffable Name, 
.
Hence, we who exercise no such veneration, have been led into
the blunders of miscalling the names of HISIRIS
and YAVA by the mispronunciations, Osiris and
Jehovah. A similar glamour bids fair, it will be perceived, to
gather round the designation of the dark personage of whom we
are treating; and in the familiar handling, we shall be very likely
to shock the peculiar sensibilities of many who will consider
a free mentioning of the Devil's names as blasphemy -- the sin
of sins, that "hath never forgiveness."**
Several years ago an acquaintance of the author wrote a newspaper
article to demonstrate that the diabolos or Satan of
the New Testament denoted the personification of an abstract
idea, and not a personal being. He was answered by a clergyman,
who concluded the reply with the deprecatory expression, "I
fear that he has denied his Saviour." In his rejoinder he
pleaded, "Oh, no! we only denied the Devil." But the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See Draper's "Conflict between Religion and Science."
** Gospel according to Mark, iii. 29: "He that shall blaspheme
against the Holy Ghost, hath never forgiveness, but is in danger
of eternal damnation" ([[amartematos]], error).
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 479 "NO DEVIL, NO CHRIST!"
clergyman failed to perceive the difference. In his conception
of the matter, the denying of the personal objective existence
of the Devil was itself "the sin against the Holy Ghost."
This necessary Evil, dignified by the epithet of "Father
of Lies," was, according to the clergy, the founder of all
the world-religions of ancient time, and of the heresies, or rather
heterodoxies, of later periods, as well as the Deus ex Machina
of modern Spiritualism. In the exceptions which we take to
this notion, we protest that we do not attack true religion or
sincere piety. We are only carrying on a controversy with human
dogmas. Perhaps in doing this we resemble Don Quixote, because
these things are only windmills. Nevertheless, let it be remembered
that they have been the occasion and pretext for the slaughtering
of more than fifty millions of human beings since the words were
proclaimed: "LOVE YOUR ENEMIES."*
It is a late day for us to expect the Christian clergy to undo
and amend their work. They have too much at stake. If the Christian
Church should abandon or even modify the dogma of an anthropomorphic
devil, it would be like pulling the bottom card from under a castle
of cards. The structure would fall. The clergymen to whom we have
alluded perceived that upon the relinquishing of Satan as a personal
devil, the dogma of Jesus Christ as the second deity in their
trinity must go over in the same catastrophe. Incredible, or even
horrifying, as it may seem, the Roman Church bases its doctrine
of the godhood of Christ entirely upon the satanism of the fallen
archangel. We have the testimony of Father Ventura, who proclaims
the vital importance of this dogma to the Catholics.
The Reverend Father Ventura, the illustrious ex-general of the
Theatins, certifies that the Chevalier des Mousseaux, by his treatise,
Moeurs et Pratiques des Demons, has deserved well of
mankind, and still more of the most Holy Catholic and Apostolic
Church. With this voucher, the noble Chevalier, it will be perceived,
"speaks as one having authority." He asserts explicitly,
that to the Devil and his angels we are absolutely indebted
for our Saviour; and that but for them we would
have no Redeemer, no Christianity.
Many zealous and earnest souls have revolted at the monstrous
dogma of John Calvin, the popekin of Geneva, that sin is the
necessary cause of the greatest good. It was bolstered up,
nevertheless, by logic like that of des Mousseaux, and illustrated
by the same dogmas. The execution of Jesus, the god-man, on the
cross, was the most prodigious crime in the universe, yet it was
necessary that mankind -- those predestinated to ever-
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Gospel according to Matthew, v. 44.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 480 ISIS UNVEILED.
lasting life -- might be saved. D'Aubignee cites the quotation
by Martin Luther from the canon, and makes him exclaim, in ecstatic
rapture: "O beata culpa, qui talem meruisti
redemptorem!" O blessed sin, which
didst merit such a Redeemer. We now perceive that the dogma which
had appeared so monstrous is, after all, the doctrine of Pope,
Calvin, and Luther alike -- that the three are one.
Mahomet and his disciples, who held Jesus in great respect as
a prophet, remarks Eliphas Levi, used to utter, when speaking
of Christians, the following remarkable words: "Jesus of
Nazareth was verily a true prophet of Allah and a grand man; but
lo! his disciples all went insane one day, and made a god of him."
Max Muller kindly adds: "It was a mistake of the early Fathers
to treat the heathen gods as demons or evil spirits, and we must
take care not to commit the same error with regard to the Hindu
gods."*
But we have Satan presented to us as the prop and mainstay of
sacerdotism -- an Atlas, holding the Christian heaven and cosmos
upon his shoulders. If he falls, then, in their conception, all
is lost, and chaos must come again.
This dogma of the Devil and redemption seems to be based upon
two passages in the New Testament: "For this purpose
the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works
of the Devil."** "And there was war in heaven; Michael
and his angels fought against the Dragon; and the Dragon fought,
and his angels, and prevailed not; neither was their place found
any more in heaven. And the great Dragon was cast out, that old
serpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole
world." Let us, then, explore the ancient Theogonies, in
order to ascertain what was meant by these remarkable expressions.
The first inquiry is whether the term Devil, as here
used, actually represents the malignant Deity of the Christians,
or an antagonistic, blind force -- the dark side of nature. By
the latter we are not to understand the manifestation of any evil
principle that is malum in se, but only the shadow of
the Light, so to say. The theories of the kabalists treat of it
as a force which is antagonistic, but at the same time essential
to the vitality, evolving, and vigor of the good principle. Plants
would perish in their first stage of existence, if they were kept
exposed to a constant sunlight; the night alternating with the
day is essential to their healthy growth and development. Goodness,
likewise, would speedily cease to be such, were it not alternated
by its opposite. In human nature, evil denotes the antagonism
of matter to the spiritual, and each is accordingly purified thereby.
In the cosmos, the equilibrium must be preserved; the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Comparative Mythology," April, 1856.
** 1st Epistle of John, iii. 8.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 481 THE TEMPTING SERPENT OF EDEN.
operation of the two contraries produce harmony, like the centripetal
and centrifugal forces, and are necessary to each other. If one
is arrested, the action of the other will immediately become destructive.
This personification, denominated Satan, is to be contemplated
from three different planes: the Old Testament, the Christian
Fathers, and the ancient Gentile altitude. He is supposed to have
been represented by the Serpent in the Garden of Eden; nevertheless,
the epithet of Satan is nowhere in the Hebrew sacred writings
applied to that or any other variety of ophidian. The Brazen Serpent
of Moses was worshipped by the Israelites as a god;* being the
symbol of Esmun-Asklepius the Phoenician Iao. Indeed, the character
of Satan himself is introduced in the 1st book of Chronicles
in the act of instigating King David to number the Israelitish
people, an act elsewhere declared specifically to have been moved
by Jehovah himself.** The inference is unavoidable that the two,
Satan and Jehovah, were regarded as identical.
Another mention of Satan is found in the prophecies of Zechariah.
This book was written at a period subsequent to the Jewish
colonization of Palestine, and hence, the Asideans may fairly
be supposed to have brought the personification thither from the
East. It is well-known that this body of sectaries were deeply
imbued with the Mazdean notions; and that they represented Ahriman
or Anra-manyas by the god-names of Syria. Set or Sat-an, the god
of the Hittites and Hyk-sos, and Beel-Zebub the oracle-god, afterward
the Grecian Apollo. The prophet began his labors in Judea in the
second year of Darius Hystaspes, the restorer of the Mazdean worship.
He thus describes the encounter with Satan: "He showed me
Joshua the high-priest standing before the angel of the Lord,
and Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary. And
the Lord said unto Satan: 'The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even
the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a
brand plucked out of the fire?' "**
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* 2 Kings, xviii. 4. It is probable that the fiery serpents or
Seraphim mentioned in the twenty-first chapter of the
book of Numbers were the same as the Levites, or Ophite tribe.
Compare Exodus xxxii. 26-29 with Numbers xxi. 5-9. The names Heva,
, Hivi or Hivite,
, and Levi 
,
all signify a serpent; and it is a curious fact that the Hivites,
or serpent-tribe of Palestine, like the Levites or Ophites of
Israel, were ministers to the temples. The Gibeonites, whom Joshua
assigned to the service of the sanctuary, were Hivites.
** 1 Chronicles, xxi. 1: "And Satan stood up against Israel
and moved David to number Israel." 2d Samuel, xxiv. 1: "And
again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he
moved David against them to say: 'Go, number Israel and Judah.'
"
*** Zechariah iii. 1, 2. A pun or play on words is noticeable;
"adversary" is associated with "Satan," as
if from 
, to oppose.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 482 ISIS UNVEILED.
We apprehend that this passage which we have quoted is symbolical.
There are two allusions in the New Testament that indicate
that it was so regarded. The Catholic Epistle of Jude refers
to it in this peculiar language: "Yet Michael the archangel,
when contending with the Devil, he disputed about the body of
Moses, did not venture to utter to him a reviling judgment ([[Krisin
epenegkein Blasphemias]]), but said, 'The Lord rebuke thee.'
"* The archangel Michael is thus mentioned as identical with
the Lord, or angel of
the Lord, of the preceding quotation, and thus is shown that the
Hebrew Jehovah had a twofold character, the secret and that manifested
as the angel of the Lord, or Michael the archangel. A comparison
between these two passages renders it plain that "the body
of Moses" over which they contended was Palestine, which
as "the land of the Hittites"** was the peculiar domain
of Seth, their tutelar god.*** Michael, as the champion of the
Jehovah-worship, contended with the Devil or Adversary, but left
judgment to his superior.
Belial is not entitled to the distinction of either god or devil.
The term 
, BELIAL,
is defined in the Hebrew lexicons to mean a destroying, waste,
uselessness; or the phrase 
AIS-BELIAL or Belial-man signifies a wasteful,
useless man. If Belial must be personified to please our religious
friends, we would be obliged to make him perfectly distinct from
Satan, and to consider him as a sort of spiritual "Diakka."
The demonographers, however, who enumerate nine distinct orders
of daimonia, make him chief of the third class -- a set
of hobgoblins, mischievous and good-for-nothing.
Asmodeus is no Jewish spirit at all, his origin being purely Persian.
Breal, the author of Hercule et Cacus, shows that he
is the Parsi Eshem-Dev, or Aeshma-dev, the evil spirit of concupiscence,
whom Max Muller tells us "is mentioned several times in the
Avesta as one of the Devs,**** originally gods, who became
evil spirits."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Jude 9.
** In the "Assyrian Tablets," Palestine is called "the
land of the Hittites"; and the Egyptian Papyri, declaring
the same thing, also make Seth, the "pillar-god," their
tutelar deity.
*** Seth, Suteh, or Sat-an, was the god of the aboriginal
nations of Syria. Plutarch makes him the same as Typhon. Hence
he was god of Goshen and Palestine, the countries occupied by
the Israelites.
**** "Vendidad," fargard x., 23: "I combat the
daeva AEshma, the very evil." "The Yacnas," x.
18, speaks likewise of AEshma-Daeva, or Khasm: "All other
sciences depend upon AEshma, the cunning." "Serv.,"
lvi. 12: "To smite the wicked Auramanyas (Ahriman, the evil
power), to smite AEshma with the terrible weapon, to smite the
Mazanian daevas, to smite all devas."
In the same fargard of the "Vendidad" the Brahman divinities
are involved in the same denunciation with AEshma-daeva: "I
combat India, I combat Sauru, I com- [[Footnote continued on next
page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 483 SAMAEL AND TYPHON ARE SATAN.
Samael is Satan; but Bryan and a good many other authorities show
it to be the name of the "Simoun" -- the wind of the
desert,* and the Simoun is called Atabul-os or Diabolos.
Plutarch remarks that by Typhon was understood anything violent,
unruly, and disorderly. The overflowing of the Nile was called
by the Egyptians Typhon. Lower Egypt is very flat, and any mounds
built along the river to prevent the frequent inundations, were
called Typhonian or Taphos; hence, the origin of Typhon.
Plutarch, who was a rigid, orthodox Greek, and never known to
much compliment the Egyptians, testifies in his Isis and Osiris,
to the fact that, far from worshipping the Devil (of which
Christians accused them), they despised more than they dreaded
Typhon. In his symbol of the opposing, obstinate power of nature,
they believed him to be a poor, struggling, half-dead divinity.
Thus, even at that remote age, we see the ancients already too
enlightened to believe in a personal devil. As Typhon was
represented in one of his symbols under the figure of an ass at
the festival of the sun's sacrifices, the Egyptian priests exhorted
the faithful worshippers not to carry gold ornaments upon their
bodies for fear of giving food to the ass!**
Three and a half centuries before Christ, Plato expressed his
opinion of evil by saying that "there is in matter a blind,
refractory force, which resists the will of the Great Artificer."
This blind force, under Christian influx, was made to see and
become responsible; it was transformed into Satan!
His identity with Typhon can scarcely be doubted upon reading
the account in Job of his appearance with the sons of
God, before the Lord. He accuses Job of a readiness to curse the
Lord to his face upon sufficient provocation. So Typhon, in the
Egyptian Book of the Dead, figures as the accuser. The
resemblance extends even to the names, for one of Typhon's appellations
was Seth, or Seph; as Satan, in Hebrew, means
an adversary. In Arabic the word is Shatana -- to be
adverse, to persecute, and Manetho says he had treacherously murdered
Osiris and allied himself with the Shemites (the Israelites).
This may possibly have originated the fable told by Plutarch,
that, from the fight between Horus and Typhon, Typhon, overcome
with fright at the mis-
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] bat the Daeva Naonhaiti."
The annotator explains them to be the Vedic gods, Indus, Gaurea,
or Siva, and the two Aswins. There must be some mistake, however,
for Siva, at the time the "Vedas" were completed, was
an aboriginal or AEthiopian God, the Bala or Bel of Western Asia.
He was not an Aryan or Vedic deity. Perhaps Surya was the divinity
intended.
* Jacob Bryant: "Analysis of Ancient Mythology."
** Plutarch: "de Iside," xxx., xxxi.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 484 ISIS UNVEILED.
chief he had caused, "fled seven days on an ass, and escaping,
begat the boys Ierosolumos and Ioudaios (Jerusalem and Judea)."
Referring to an invocation of Typhon-Seth, Professor Reuvens says
that the Egyptians worshipped Typhon under the form of an ass;
and according to him Seth "appears gradually among the Semites
as the background of their religious consciousness."* The
name of the ass in Coptic, AO, is a phonetic of IAO,
and hence the animal became a pun-symbol. Thus Satan is a later
creation, sprung from the overheated fancy of the Fathers of the
Church. By some reverse of fortune, to which the gods are subjected
in common with mortals, Typhon-Seth tumbled down from the eminence
of the deified son of Adam Kadmon, to the degrading position of
a subaltern spirit, a mythical demon -- ass. Religious schisms
are as little free from the frail pettiness and spiteful feelings
of humanity as the partisan quarrels of laymen. We find a strong
instance of the above in the case of the Zoroastrian reform, when
Magianism separated from the old faith of the Brahmans. The bright
Devas of the Veda became, under the religious reform
of Zoroaster, daevas, or evil spirits, of the Avesta. Even
Indra, the luminous god, was thrust far back into the dark shadow**
in order to show off, in a brighter light, Ahura-mazda, the Wise
and Supreme Deity.
The strange veneration in which the Ophites held the serpent which
represented Christos may become less perplexing if the students
would but remember that at all ages the serpent was the symbol
of divine wisdom, which kills in order to resurrect, destroys
but to rebuild the better. Moses is made a descendant of Levi,
a serpent-tribe. Gautama-Buddha is of a serpent-lineage, through
the Naga (serpent) race of kings who reigned in Magadha. Hermes,
or the god Taaut (Thoth), in his snake-symbol is Tet; and, according
to the Ophite legends, Jesus or Christos is born from a snake
(divine wisdom, or Holy Ghost), i.e., he became a Son
of God through his initiation into the "Serpent Science."
Vishnu, identical with the Egyptian Kneph, rests on the heavenly
seven-headed serpent.
The red or fiery dragon of the ancient time was the military ensign
of the Assyrians. Cyrus adopted it from them when Persia became
dominant. The Romans and Byzantines next assumed it; and so the
"great red dragon," from being the symbol of Babylon
and Nineveh, became that of Rome.***
The temptation, or probation,**** of Jesus is, however, the most
dramatic
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Wilkinson's "Ancient Egyptians," p. 434.
** See "Vendidad," fargard x.
*** Salverte: "Des Sciences Occultes," appendix, note
A.
**** The term [[teirasmos]] signifies a trial, or probation.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 485 THE TEMPTATIONS OF JOB AND JESUS.
occasion in which Satan appears. As if to prove the designation
of Apollo, AEsculapius, and Bacchus, Diobolos, or son
of Zeus, he is also styled Diabolos, or accuser. The
scene of the probation was the wilderness. In the desert about
the Jordan and Dead Sea were the abodes of the "sons of the
prophets," and the Essenes.* These ascetics used to subject
their neophytes to probations, analogous to the tortures of
the Mithraic rites; and the temptation of Jesus was evidently
a scene of this character. Hence, in the Gospel according
to Luke, it is stated that "the Diabolos, having completed
the probation, left him for a specific time, [[achri kairou]],
and Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee."
But the [[diabolos]], or Devil, in this instance is evidently
no malignant principle, but one exercising discipline. In this
sense the terms Devil and Satan are repeatedly employed.** Thus,
when Paul was liable to undue elation by reason of the abundance
of revelations or epoptic disclosures, there was given him "a
thorn in the flesh, an angel of Satanas," to check him.***
The story of Satan in the Book of Job is of a similar
character. He is introduced among the "Sons of God,"
presenting themselves before the Lord, as in a Mystic initiation.
Micaiah the prophet describes a similar scene, where he "saw
the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of Heaven standing
by Him," with whom He took counsel, which resulted in putting
"a lying spirit into the mouth of the prophets of Ahab."****
The Lord counsels with Satan, and gives him carte blanche
to test the fidelity of Job. He is stripped of his
wealth and family, and smitten with a loathsome disease. In his
extremity, his wife doubts his integrity, and exhorts him to worship
God, as he is about to die. His friends all beset him with accusations,
and finally the Lord, the chief hierophant Himself, taxes him
with the uttering of words in which there is no wisdom, and with
contending with the Almighty. To this rebuke Job yielded, making
this appeal: "I will demand of thee, and thou shalt declare
unto me: wherefore do I abhor myself and mourn in dust and ashes?"
Immediately he was vindicated. "The Lord said unto Eliphaz
. . . ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my
servant Job hath." His integrity had been asserted, and his
prediction verified: "I know that my Champion liveth, and
that he will stand up for me at a later time on the earth; and
though after my skin my body itself be corroded away, yet even
then without my flesh shall I see God." The pre-
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* 2 Samuel, ii. 5, 15; vi. 1-4. Pliny.
** See 1 Corinthians, v. 5; 2 Corinthians, xi. 14; 1 Timothy,
i. 20.
*** 2d Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, xii. In Numbers xxii,
22 the angel of the Lord is described as acting the part of a
Satan to Balaam.
**** 1 Kings, xxii. 19-23.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 486 ISIS UNVEILED.
diction was accomplished: "I have heard of thee by the hearing
of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee. . . . And the Lord turned
the captivity of Job."
In all these scenes there is manifested no such malignant diabolism
as is supposed to characterize "the adversary of souls."
It is an opinion of certain writers of merit and learning, that
the Satan of the book of Job is a Jewish myth, containing
the Mazdean doctrine of the Evil Principle. Dr. Haug remarks that
"the Zoroastrian religion exhibits a close affinity, or rather
identity with the Mosaic religion and Christianity, such as the
personality and attributes of the Devil, and the resurrection
of the dead."* The war of the Apocalypse between
Michael and the Dragon, can be traced with equal facility to one
of the oldest myths of the Aryans. In the Avesta we read
of war between Thraetaona and Azhi-Dahaka, the destroying serpent.
Burnouf has endeavored to show that the Vedic myth of Ahi, or
the serpent, fighting against the gods, has been gradually euhemerized
into "the battle of a pious man against the power of evil,"
in the Mazdean religion. By these interpretations Satan would
be made identical with Zohak or Azhi-Dahaka, who is a three-headed
serpent, with one of the heads a human one.**
Beel-Zebub is generally distinguished from Satan. He seems, in
the Apocryphal New Testament, to be regarded as the potentate
of the underworld. The name is usually rendered "Baal of
the Flies," which may be a designation of the Scarabaei or
sacred beetles.*** More correctly it shall be read, as it is always
given in the Greek text of the Gospels, Beelzebul, or
lord of the household, as is indeed intimated in Matthew
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Haug: "Essays on the Sacred Language, Writings,
and Religion of the Parsees."
** The "Avesta" describes the serpent Dahaka, as of
the region of Bauri or Babylonia. In the Median history are two
kings of the name Deiokes or Dahaka, and Astyages or Az-dahaka.
There were children of Zohak seated on various Eastern thrones,
after Feridun. It is apparent, therefore, that by Zohak is meant
the Assyrian dynasty, whose symbol was the purpureum signum
draconis -- the purple sign of the Dragon. From a very remote
antiquity (Genesis xiv.) this dynasty ruled Asia, Armenia, Syria,
Arabia, Babylonia, Media, Persia, Bactria, and Afghanistan. It
was finally overthrown by Cyrus and Darius Hystaspes, after "1,000
years" rule. Yima and Thraetaona, or Jemshid and Feridun,
are doubtless personifications. Zohak probably imposed the Assyrian
or Magian worship of fire upon the Persians. Darius was the vicegerent
of Ahura-Mazda.
*** The name in the Gospels is [[beelzeboul]], or Baal
of the Dwelling. It is pretty certain that Apollo, the Delphian
God, was not Hellenian originally, but Phoenician. He was the
Paian or physician, as well as the god of oracles. It is no great
stretch of imagination to identify him with Baal-Zebul,
the god of Ekron, or Acheron, doubtless changed to Zebub,
or flies, by the Jews in derision.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 487 THE GREAT RED DRAGON.
x. 25: "If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul,
how much more shall they call them of his household." He
was also styled the prince or archon of daemons.
Typhon figures in the Book of the Dead, as the Accuser
of souls when they appear for judgment, as Satan stood up to accuse
Joshua, the high-priest, before the angel, and as the Devil came
to Jesus to tempt or test him during his great fast in the wilderness.
He was also the deity denominated Baal-Tsephon, or god of the
crypt, in the book of Exodus, and Seth, or the
pillar. During this period, the ancient or archaic worship was
more or less under the ban of the government; in figurative language,
Osiris had been treacherously slain and cut in fourteen (twice
seven) pieces, and coffined by his brother Typhon,
and Isis had gone to Byblos in quest of his body.
We must not forget in this relation that Saba or Sabazios, of
Phrygia and Greece, was torn by the Titans into seven pieces,
and that he was, like Heptaktis of the Chaldeans, the seven-rayed
god. Siva, the Hindu, is represented crowned with seven serpents,
and he is the god of war and destruction. The Hebrew Jehovah the
Sabaoth is also called the Lord of hosts, Seba or Saba, Bacchus
or Dionysus Sabazios; so that all these may easily be proved identical.
Finally the princes of the older regime, the gods who
had, on the assault of the giants, taken the forms of animals
and hidden in AEthiopia, returned and expelled the shepherds.
According to Josephus, the Hyk-sos were the ancestors of the Israelites.*
This is doubtless substantially true. The Hebrew Scriptures,
which tell a somewhat different story, were written at a
later period, and underwent several revisions, before they were
promulgated with any degree of publicity. Typhon became odious
in Egypt, and shepherds "an abomination." "In the
course of the twentieth dynasty he was suddenly treated as an
evil demon, insomuch that his effigies and name are obliterated
on all the monuments and inscriptions that could be reached."**
In all ages the gods have been liable to be euhemerized into men.
There are tombs of Zeus, Apollo, Hercules, and Bacchus, which
are often mentioned to show that originally they were only mortals.
Shem, Ham, and Japhet, are traced in the divinities Shamas of
Assyria, Kham of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Against Apion," i. 25. "The Egyptians took many
occasions to hate and envy us: in the first place because our
ancestors (the Hyk-sos, or shepherds) had had the dominion over
their country, and when they were delivered from them and gone
to their own country, they lived there in prosperity."
** Bunsen. The name Seth with the syllable an
from the Chaldean ana or Heaven, makes the term Satan.
The punners seem now to have pounced upon it, as was their
wont, and so made it Satan from the verb 
Sitan, to oppose.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 488 ISIS UNVEILED.
Egypt, and Iapetos the Titan. Seth was god of the Hyk-sos, Enoch,
or Inachus, of the Argives; and Abraham, Isaac, and Judah have
been compared with Brahma, Ikshwaka, and Yadu of the Hindu pantheon.
Typhon tumbled down from godhead to devilship, both in his own
character as brother of Osiris, and as the Seth, or Satan of Asia.
Apollo, the god of day, became, in his older Phoenician garb,
no more Baal Zebul, the Oracle-god, but prince of demons, and
finally the lord of the underworld. The separation of Mazdeanism
from Vedism, transformed the devas or gods into evil
potencies. Indra, also, in the Vendidad is set forth
as the subaltern of Ahriman,* created by him out of the materials
of darkness,** together with Siva (Surya) and the two Aswins.
Even Jahi is the demon of Lust -- probably identical with Indra.
The several tribes and nations had their tutelar gods, and vilified
those of inimical peoples. The transformation of Typhon, Satan
and Beelzebub are of this character. Indeed, Tertullian speaks
of Mithra, the god of the Mysteries, as a devil.
In the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse, Michael and
his angels overcame the Dragon and his angels: "and the Great
Dragon was cast out, that Archaic Ophis, called Diabolos and Satan,
that deceiveth the whole world." It is added: "They
overcame him by the blood of the Lamb." The Lamb, or Christ,
had to descend himself to hell, the world of the dead, and remain
there three days before he subjugated the enemy, according to
the myth.
Michael was denominated by the kabalists and the Gnostics, "the
Saviour," the angel of the Sun, and angel of Light. (
,
probably, from 
to manifest
and 
God.) He was the
first of the AEons, and was well-known to antiquarians as the
"unknown angel" represented on the Gnostic amulets.
The writer of the Apocalypse, if not a kabalist, must
have been a Gnostic. Michael was not a personage originally exhibited
to him in his vision (epopteia) but the Saviour and Dragon-slayer.
Archaeological explorations have indicated him as identical with
Anubis, whose effigy was lately discovered upon an Egyptian monument,
with a cuirass and holding a spear, like St. Michael and St. George.
He is also represented as slaying a Dragon, that has the head
and tail of a serpent.***
The student of Lepsius, Champollion, and other Egyptologists will
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Vendidad," fargard x. The name Vendidad is
a contraction of Vidaeva-data, ordinances against the
Daevas.
** Bundahest, "Ahriman created out of the materials
of darkness Akuman and Ander, then Sauru and Nakit."
*** See Lenoir's "Du Dragon de Metz," in "Memoires
de l'Academie Celtique," i., 11, 12.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 489 A NECESSARY AND LONG-DEFERRED
EXPLANATION.
quickly recognize Isis as the "woman with child," "clothed
with the Sun and with the Moon under her feet," whom the
"great fiery Dragon" persecuted, and to whom "were
given two wings of the Great Eagle that she might fly into the
wilderness." Typhon was red-skinned.*
The Two Brothers, the Good and Evil Principles, appear in the
Myths of the Bible as well as those of the Gentiles,
and Cain and Abel, Typhon and Osiris, Esau and Jacob, Apollo and
Python, etc., Esau or Osu, is represented, when born, as "red
all over like an hairy garment." He is the Typhon or Satan,
opposing his brother.
From the remotest antiquity the serpent was held by every people
in the greatest veneration, as the embodiment of Divine wisdom
and the symbol of spirit, and we know from Sanchoniathon that
it was Hermes or Thoth who was the first to regard the serpent
as "the most spirit-like of all the reptiles"; and the
Gnostic serpent with the seven vowels over the head is but the
copy of Ananta, the seven-headed serpent on which rests the god
Vishnu.
We have experienced no little surprise to find upon reading the
latest European treatises upon serpent-worship, that the writers
confess that the public is "still almost in the dark as to
the origin of the superstition in question." Mr. C. Staniland
Wake, M.A.I., from whom we now quote, says: "The
student of mythology knows that certain ideas were associated
by the peoples of antiquity with the serpent, and that it was
the favorite symbol of particular deities; but why that animal
rather than any other was chosen for the purpose is yet uncertain."**
Mr. James Fergusson, F.R.S., who has gathered
together such an abundance of material upon this ancient cult,
seems to have no more suspicion of the truth than the rest.***
Our explanation of the myth may be of little value to students
of symbology, and yet we believe that the interpretation of the
primitive serpent-worship as given by the initiates is the correct
one. In Vol. i., p. 10, we quote from the serpent Mantra, in the
Aytareya-Brahmana, a passage which speaks of
the earth as the Sarpa Rajni, the Queen of the Serpents,
and "the mother of all that moves." These expressions
refer to the fact that before our globe had become egg-shaped
or round it was a long trail of cosmic dust or fire-mist, moving
and writhing like a serpent. This, say the explanations, was the
Spirit of God moving on the chaos until its breath had incubated
cosmic matter and made it assume the annular shape of a serpent
with its tail in its mouth -- emblem of eternity
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Plutarch: "Isis and Osiris."
** "The Origin of Serpent Worship," by C. Staniland
Wake, M.A.I. New York: J. W. Bouton, 1877.
*** "Tree and Serpent Worship," etc.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 490 ISIS UNVEILED.
in its spiritual and of our world in its physical sense. According
to the notions of the oldest philosophers, as we have shown in
the preceding chapter, the earth, serpent-like, casts off its
skin and appears after every minor pralaya in a rejuvenated state,
and after the great pralaya resurrects or evolves again from its
subjective into objective existence. Like the serpent, it not
only "puts off its old age," says Sanchoniathon, "but
increases in size and strength." This is why not only Serapis,
and later, Jesus, were represented by a great serpent, but even
why, in our own century, big snakes are kept with sacred care
in Moslem mosques; for instance, in that of Cairo. In Upper Egypt
a famous saint is said to appear under the form of a large serpent;
and in India in some children's cradles a pair of serpents, male
and female, are reared with the infant, and snakes are often kept
in houses, as they are thought to bring (a magnetic aura of) wisdom,
health, and good luck. They are the progeny of Sarpa Rajni, the
earth, and endowed with all her virtues.
In the Hindu mythology Vasaki, the Great Dragon, pours forth upon
Durga, from his mouth, a poisonous fluid which overspreads the
ground, but her consort Siva caused the earth to open her mouth
and swallow it.
Thus the mystic drama of the celestial virgin pursued by the dragon
seeking to devour her child, was not only depicted in the constellations
of heaven, as has been mentioned, but was represented in the secret
worship of the temples. It was the mystery of the god Sol, and
inscribed on a black image of Isis.* The Divine Boy was chased
by the cruel Typhon.** In an Egyptian legend the Dragon is said
to pursue Thuesis (Isis) while she is endeavoring to protect her
son.*** Ovid describes Dione (the consort of the original Pelasgian
Zeus, and mother of Venus) as flying from Typhon to the Euphrates,****
thus identifying the myth as belonging to all the countries where
the Mysteries were celebrated. Virgil sings the victory:
"Hail, dear child of gods, great son of Jove!
Receive the honors great; the time is at hand;
The Serpent will die!"*****
Albertus Magnus, himself an alchemist and student of occult science,
as well as a bishop of the Roman Catholic Church, in his enthusiasm
for astrology, declared that the zodiacal sign of the celestial
virgin rises above the horizon on the twenty-fifth of December,
at the moment assigned by the Church for the birth of the Saviour.******
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Godfrey Higgins: "Anacalypsis"; Dupuis: "Origines
des Cultes," iii., 51.
** Martianus Capella: "Hymn to the Sun," i., ii.; Movers:
"Phiniza," 266.
*** Plutarch: "Isis and Osiris."
**** Virgil: "Eclogues," iv.
***** Ovid: "Fasti," ii., 451.
****** Knorring: "Terra et Coelum," 53.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 491 THE MYSTERIES OF DEMETER AND
MITHRAS.
The sign and myth of the mother and child were known thousands
of years before the Christian era. The drama of the Mysteries
of Demeter represents Persephoneia, her daughter, as carried away
by Pluto or Hades into the world of the dead; and when the mother
finally discovers her there, she has been installed as queen of
the realm of Darkness. This myth was transcribed by the Church
into the legend of St. Anna* going in quest of her daughter Mary,
who has been conveyed by Joseph into Egypt. Persephone is depicted
with two ears of wheat in her hand; so is Mary in the old pictures;
so was the Celestial Virgin of the constellation. Albumazar the
Arabian indicates the identity of the several myths as follows:
"In the first decan of the Virgin rises a maid, called in
Arabic Aderenosa [Adha-nari?], that is, pure immaculate virgin,**
graceful in person, charming in countenance, modest in habit,
with loosened hair, holding in her hands two ears of wheat, sitting
upon an embroidered throne, nursing a boy, and rightly feeding
him in the place called Hebraea; a boy, I say, named Iessus by
certain nations, which signifies Issa, whom they also call Christ
in Greek."***
At this time Grecian, Asiatic, and Egyptian ideas had undergone
a remarkable transformation. The Mysteries of Dionysus-Sabazius
had been replaced by the rites of Mithras, whose "caves"
superseded the crypts of the former god, from Babylon to Britain.
Serapis, or Sri-Apa, from Pontus, had usurped the place of Osiris.
The king of Eastern Hindustan, Asoka, had embraced the religion
of Siddhartha, and sent missionaries clear to Greece, Asia, Syria,
and Egypt, to promulgate the evangel of wisdom. The Essenes of
Judea and Arabia, the Therapeutists**** of Egypt, and the Pythagorists*****
of Greece and Magna Graecia, were evidently religionists of the
new faith. The legends of Gautama superseded the myths of Horus,
Anubis, Adonis, Atys, and Bacchus. These were wrought anew into
the Mysteries and Gospels, and to them we owe the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Anna is an Oriental designation from the Chaldean ana,
or heaven, whence Anaitis and Anaitres. Durga, the consort of
Siva, is also named Anna purna, and was doubtless the original
St. Anna. The mother of the prophet Samuel was named Anna; the
father of his counterpart, Samson, was Manu.
** The virgins of ancient time, as will be seen, were not maids,
but simply almas, or nubile women.
*** Kircher: "OEdipus AEgyptiacus," iii., 5.
**** From [[therapeuo]], to serve, to worship,
to heal.
***** E. Pococke derives the name Pythagoras from
Buddha, and guru, a spiritual teacher. Higgins makes
it Celtic, and says that it means an observer of the stars. See
"Celtic Druids." If, however, we derive the word Pytho
from 
, petah, the
name would signify an expounder of oracles, and Buddha-guru a
teacher of the doctrines of Buddha.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 492 ISIS UNVEILED.
literature known as the Evangelists and the Apocryphal
New Testament. They were kept by the Ebionites, Nazarenes,
and other sects as sacred books, which they might "show only
to the wise"; and were so preserved till the overshadowing
influence of the Roman ecclesiastical polity was able to wrest
them from those who kept them.
At the time that the high-priest Hilkiah is said to have found
the Book of the Law, the Hindu Puranas (Scriptures)
were known to the Assyrians. These last had for many centuries
held dominion from the Hellespont to the Indus, and probably crowded
the Aryans out of Bactriana into the Punjab. The Book of the
Law seems to have been a purana. "The learned
Brahmans," says Sir William Jones, "pretend that five
conditions are requisite to constitute a real purana:
"1. To treat of the creation of matter in general.
"2. To treat of the creation or production of secondary
material and spiritual beings.
"3. To give a chronological abridgment of the great
periods of time.
"4. To give a genealogical abridgment of the principal families
that reigned over the country.
"5. Lastly, to give the history of some great man in particular."
It is pretty certain that whoever wrote the Pentateuch had
this plan before him, as well as those who wrote the New Testament
had become thoroughly well acquainted with Buddhistic ritualistic
worship, legends and doctrines, through the Buddhist missionaries
who were many in those days in Palestine and Greece.
But "no Devil, no Christ." This is the basic dogma of
the Church. We must hunt the two together. There is a mysterious
connection between the two, more close than perhaps is suspected,
amounting to identity. If we collect together the mythical sons
of God, all of whom were regarded as "first-begotten,"
they will be found dovetailing together and blending in this dual
character. Adam Kadmon bifurcates from the spiritual conceptive
wisdom into the creative one, which evolves matter. The
Adam made from dust is both son of God and Satan; and the latter
is also a son of God,* according to Job.
Hercules was likewise "the First-Begotten." He is also
Bel, Baal, and Bal, and therefore Siva, the Destroyer. Bacchus
was styled by Euripides, "Bacchus, the Son of God."
As a child, Bacchus, like the Jesus of the Apocryphal Gospels,
was greatly dreaded. He is described as benevolent to mankind;
nevertheless he was merciless in punishing whomever failed of
respect to his worship. Pentheus, the son of Cad-
[[Footnote(s)]]--------------------------------------------------
* In the Secret Museum of Naples, there is a marble bas-relief
representing the Fall of Man, in which God the Father
plays the part of the Beguiling Serpent.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 493 JOB EXPLAINED BY THE "BOOK
OF THE DEAD."
mus and Hermione, was, like the son of Rabbi Hannon, destroyed
for his want of piety.
The allegory of Job, which has been already cited, if correctly
understood, will give the key to this whole matter of the Devil,
his nature and office; and will substantiate our declarations.
Let no pious individual take exception to this designation of
allegory. Myth was the favorite and universal method of teaching
in archaic times. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, declared that
the entire story of Moses and the Israelites was typical;* and
in his Epistle to the Galatians, asserted that the whole
story of Abraham, his two wives, and their sons was an allegory.**
Indeed, it is a theory amounting to certitude, that the historical
books of the Old Testament were of the same character.
We take no extraordinary liberty with the Book of Job when
we give it the same designation which Paul gave the stories of
Abraham and Moses.
But we ought, perhaps, to explain the ancient use of allegory
and symbology. The truth in the former was left to be deduced;
the symbol expressed some abstract quality of the Deity, which
the laity could easily apprehend. Its higher sense terminated
there; and it was employed by the multitude thenceforth as an
image to be employed in idolatrous rites. But the allegory was
reserved for the inner sanctuary, when only the elect were admitted.
Hence the rejoinder of Jesus when his disciples interrogated him
because he spoke to the multitude in parables. "To you,"
said he, "it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom
of Heaven, but to them it is not given. For whosoever hath, to
him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; but whosoever
hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath."
In the minor Mysteries a sow was washed to typify the purification
of the neophyte; as her return to the mire indicated the superficial
nature of the work that had been accomplished.
"The Mythus is the undisclosed thought of the soul. The characteristic
trait of the myth is to convert reflection into history (a historical
form). As in the epos, so in the myth, the historical element
predominates. Facts (external events) often constitute the basis
of the myth, and with these, religious ideas are interwoven."
The whole allegory of Job is an open book to him who understands
the picture-language of Egypt as it is recorded in the Book
of the Dead. In the Scene of Judgment, Osiris is represented
sitting on his throne,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* First Epistle to the Corinthians, x. 11.: "All these things
happened unto them for types."
** Epistle to the Galatians, iv. 24: "It is written that
Abraham had two sons, the one by a bond-maid, the other by a freewoman
. . . which things are an allegory."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 494 ISIS UNVEILED.
holding in one hand the symbol of life, "the hook of attraction,"
and in the other the mystic Bacchic fan. Before him are the sons
of God, the forty-two assessors of the dead. An altar is immediately
before the throne, covered with gifts and surmounted with the
sacred lotus-flower, upon which stand four spirits. By the entrance
stands the soul about to be judged, whom Thmei, the genius of
Truth, is welcoming to this conclusion of the probation. Thoth
holding a reed, makes a record of the proceedings in the Book
of Life. Horus and Anubis, standing by the scales, inspect the
weight which determines whether the heart of the deceased balances
the symbol of truth, or the latter preponderates. On pedestal
sits a bitch -- the symbol of the Accuser.
Initiation into the Mysteries, as every intelligent person knows,
was dramatic representation of scenes in the underworld. Such
was the allegory of Job.
Several critics have attributed the authorship of this book to
Moses. But it is older than the Pentateuch. Jehovah is
not mentioned in the poem itself; and if the name occurs in the
prologue, the fact must be attributed to either an error of the
translators, or the premeditation exacted by the later necessity
to transform polytheism into a monotheistic religion. The plan
adopted was the very simple one of attributing the many names
of the Elohim (gods) to a single god. So in one of the oldest
Hebrew texts of Job (in chapter xii. 9) there stands the name
of Jehovah, whereas all other manuscripts have "Adonai."
But in the original poem Jehovah is absent. In place of this name
we find Al, Aleim, Ale, Shaddai, Adonai, etc. Therefore,
we must conclude that either the prologue and epilogue were added
at a later period, which is inadmissible for many reasons, or
that it has been tampered with like the rest of the manuscripts.
Then, we find in this archaic poem no mention whatever of the
Sabbatical Institution; but a great many references to the sacred
number seven, of which we will speak further, and a direct discussion
upon Sabeanism, the worship of the heavenly bodies prevailing
in those days in Arabia. Satan is called in it a "Son of
God," one of the council which presents itself before God,
and he leads him into tempting Job's fidelity. In this poem, clearer
and plainer than anywhere else, do we find the meaning of the
appellation, Satan. It is a term for the office or character of
public accuser. Satan is the Typhon of the Egyptians,
barking his accusations in Amenthi; an office quite as respectable
as that of the public prosecutor, in our own age; and if, through
the ignorance of the first Christians, he became later identical
with the Devil, it is through no connivance of his own.
The Book of Job is a complete representation of ancient
initiation, and the trials which generally precede this grandest
of all ceremonies.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 495 PERVERSIONS OF THE TEXT AND INTERPOLATIONS.
The neophyte perceives himself deprived of everything he valued,
and afflicted with foul disease. His wife appeals to him to adore
God and die; there was no more hope for him. Three friends appear
on the scene by mutual appointment: Eliphaz, the learned Temanite,
full of the knowledge "which wise men have told from their
fathers -- to whom alone the earth was given"; Bildad, the
conservative, taking matters as they come, and judging Job to
have done wickedly, because he was afflicted; and Zophar, intelligent
and skilful with "generalities" but not interiorly wise.
Job boldly responds: "If I have erred, it is a matter with
myself. You magnify yourselves and plead against me in my reproach;
but it is God who has overthrown me. Why do you persecute me and
are not satisfied with my flesh thus wasted away? But I know that
my Champion lives, and that at a coming day he will stand for
me in the earth; and though, together with my skin, all this beneath
it shall be destroyed, yet without my flesh I shall see God. .
. . Ye shall say: 'Why do we molest him?' for the root of the
matter is found in me!"
This passage, like all others in which the faintest allusions
could be found to a "Champion," "Deliverer,"
or "Vindicator," was interpreted into a direct reference
to the Messiah; but apart from the fact that in the Septuagint
this verse is translated:
"For I know that He is eternal
Who is about to deliver me on earth,
To restore this skin of mine which endures these things,"
etc.
In King James's version, as it stands translated, it has no resemblance
whatever to the original.* The crafty translators have rendered
it, "I know that my Redeemer liveth," etc.
And yet Septuagint, Vulgate, and Hebrew original, have
all to be considered as an inspired Word of God. Job refers to
his own immortal spirit which is eternal, and which,
when death comes, will deliver him from his putrid earthly body
and clothe him with a new spiritual envelope. In the Mysteries
of Eleusinia, in the Egyptian Book of the Dead, and
all other works treating on matters of initiation, this "eternal
being" has a name. With the Neo-platonists it was the Nous,
the Augoeides; with the Buddhists it is Aggra;
and with the Persians, Ferwer. All of these are
called the "Deliverers," the "Champions,"
the "Metatrons," etc. In the Mithraic sculptures of
Persia, the ferwer is represented by a winged figure
hovering in the air above its "object" or body.** It
is the luminous Self -- the Atman of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See "Job," by various translators, and compare the
different texts.
** See Kerr Porter's "Persia," vol. i., plates 17, 41.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 496 ISIS UNVEILED.
the Hindus, our immortal spirit, who alone can redeem our soul;
and will, if we follow him instead of being dragged down by our
body. Therefore, in the Chaldean texts, the above reads, "My
deliverer, my restorer," i.e., the
Spirit who will restore the decayed body of man, and transform
it into a clothing of ether. And it is this Nous, Augoeides,
Ferwer, Aggra, Spirit of himself, that the triumphant Job
shall see without his flesh -- i.e., when he has escaped
from his bodily prison, and that the translators call "God."
Not only is there not the slightest allusion in the poem of Job
to Christ, but it is now well proved that all those versions by
different translators, which agree with that of King James, were
written on the authority of Jerome, who has taken strange liberties
in his Vulgate. He was the first to cram into the text
this verse of his own fabrication:
"I know that my Redeemer lives,
And at the last day I shall arise from the earth,
And again shall be surrounded with my skin,
And in my flesh I shall see my God."
All of which might have been a good reason for himself to believe
in it since he knew it, but for others who did not,
and who moreover found in the text a quite different idea,
it only proves that Jerome had decided, by one more interpolation,
to enforce the dogma of a resurrection "at the last day,"
and in the identical skin and bones which we had used on earth.
This is an agreeable prospect of "restoration" indeed.
Why not the linen also, in which the body happens to die?
And how could the author of the Book of Job know anything
of the New Testament, when evidently he was utterly ignorant
even of the Old one? There is a total absence of allusion
to any of the patriarchs; and so evidently is it the work of an
Initiate, that one of the three daughters of Job is even
called by a decidedly "Pagan" mythological name. The
name of Kerenhappuch is rendered in various
ways by the many translators. The Vulgate has "horn
of antimony"; and the LXX has the "horn
of Amalthea," the nurse of Jupiter, and one of the constellations,
emblem of the "horn of plenty." The presence in the
Septuagint of this heroine of Pagan fable, shows the
ignorance of the transcribers of its meaning as well as the esoteric
origin of the Book of Job.
Instead of offering consolations, the three friends of the suffering
Job seek to make him believe that his misfortune must have come
in punishment of some extraordinary transgressions on his part.
Hurling back upon them all their imputations, Job swears that
while his breath is in him he will maintain his cause. He takes
in view the period of his prosperity "when the secret of
God was upon his tabernacles," and he was a judge
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 497 JOB A SYMBOLICAL POEM UPON INITIATION.
"who sat chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, or one that
comforteth the mourners," and compares with it the present
time -- when vagrant Bedouins held him in derision, men "viler
than the earth," when he was prostrated by misfortune and
foul disease. Then he asserts his sympathy for the unfortunate,
his chastity, his integrity, his probity, his strict justice,
his charities, his moderation, his freedom from the prevalent
sun-worship, his tenderness to enemies, his hospitality to strangers,
his openness of heart, his boldness for the right, though he encountered
the multitude and the contempt of families; and invokes the Almighty
to answer him, and his adversary to write down of what he had
been guilty.
To this there was not, and could not be, any answer. The three
had sought to crush Job by pleadings and general arguments, and
he had demanded consideration for his specific acts. Then appeared
the fourth; Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred
of Ram.*
Elihu is the hierophant; he begins with a rebuke, and the sophisms
of Job's false friends are swept away like the loose sand before
the west wind.
"And Elihu, the son of Barachel, spoke and said: 'Great men
are not always wise . . . there is a spirit in man; the
spirit within me constraineth me. . . . God speaketh
once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth it not. In a dream;
in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon man, in
slumberings upon the bed; then he openeth the ears of men, and
sealeth their instruction. O Job, hearken unto me; hold thy peace,
and I shall teach thee WISDOM.' "
And Job, who to the dogmatic fallacies of his three friends in
the bitterness of his heart had exclaimed: "No doubt but
ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you. . .
. Miserable comforters are ye all. . . . Surely I would speak
to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God. But ye
are forgers of lies, ye are physicians of no value!"
The sore-eaten, visited Job, who in the face of the official clergy
-- offering for all hope the necessarianism of damnation, had
in his despair nearly wavered in his patient faith, answered:
"What ye know, the same do I know
also; I am not inferior unto you. . . . Man cometh forth like
a flower, and is cut down: he fleeth also as a shadow, and
continueth not. . . . Man dieth, and wasteth away, yea, man
giveth up the ghost, and where is he? . . . If a man
die shall he live again? . . . When a few years are come
then I shall go the way whence I shall not return.
. . . O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth
for his neighbor!"
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The expression "of the kindred of Ram" denotes that
he was an Aramaean or Syrian from Mesopotamia. Buz was a son of
Nahor. "Elihu son of Barachel" is susceptible of two
translations. Eli-Hu -- God is, or Hoa is God; and Barach-Al --
the worshipper of God, or Bar-Rachel, the son of Rachel, or son
of the ewe.
Chapter 10, part 2
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