3. TEMPLE THRESHOLDS IN ASIA.

In all the modern excavations in the region of Babylonia and Assyria, including Tello, Nippur, Sippara, Borsippa, Khorsabad, and Nineveh, it has been found that the threshold, or foundation-stone, of the temple doorway is marked with inscriptions that show its peculiar sanctity; while underneath it, or near it, are frequently buried images and symbols and other treasures in evidence of its altar-like sacredness. On this point evidence has been furnished by Botta,[[304]] Bonomi,[[305]] Layard,[[306]] George Smith,[[307]] Lenormant,[[308]] and yet more fully by Dr. Hilprecht, in his later and current researches.

Bonomi suggests that the word “teraphim,” as an image of a household divinity, has its connection with the threshold or the boundary limit; and that the phrase “thy going out, and thy coming in,” which is common in Egyptian, Babylonian, and Hebrew[[309]] literature, has reference to the threshold and its protecting deities.[[310]] The outgoing and the incoming are clearly across the threshold and through the door.

The inscriptions of Nebuchadrezzar II., concerning his building of the walls of Babylon, comprise various references to the foundations, to the thresholds, and to their guardians. He says: “On the thresholds of the gates I set up mighty bulls of bronze, and mighty snakes standing upright.”[[311]] Again of the gates of Imgur-Bêl and Nimitti-Bel, of these walls of Babylon, he says: “Their foundations I laid at the surface (down at) the water, with pitch and bricks. With blue enameled tiles which were adorned with bulls and large snakes, I built their interior cleverly. Strong cedars I laid over them as their covering (or roof). Doors of cedarwood with a covering of copper, a threshold (askuppu) and hinges of bronze, I set up in their gates. Strong bulls of bronze, and powerful snakes standing upright, I set upon (or at) their threshold (sippu). Those gates I filled with splendor for the astonishment of all mankind.”[[312]]

In a similar manner Nebuchadrezzar describes his work at the gates of “the royal castle of all mankind,” at Babylon,[[313]] and of his palace.[[314]] In connection with the shrine or chapel of Nebo (Ezida), within the walls of the temple of Merodach, in Babylon, he says: “Its threshold (sippu), its lock and its key, I plated with gold, and made the temple shine daylike.”[[315]] When he built Ezida (the “eternal house”), the temple of Borsippa, Nebuchadrezzar says: “The bulls and the doors of the gate of the sanctuary, the threshold (sippu), the lock, the hinge, I plated with zarîru”[[316]] (an unknown metal, a kind of bronze).

References to the foundations, to the thresholds, to the gates and doorways, and to bulls and upright serpents, as the guardians of the threshold of the temples and palaces of Babylonia and Assyria, are numerous on unearthed cylinders and tablets, and always in such a way as to indicate their peculiar sacredness. In the recent unearthing, at Nippur, of a small building or shrine, between two great temples, an altar was found in the eastern doorway.

It is to be borne in mind that many early temples in Babylonia, as in Mesopotamia, in Egypt, in Mexico, Central America, and Peru, and in the South Sea Islands, were in the form of a stepped pyramid, or a staged tower, with either inclined planes or stairways from each lower stage to the next higher, and with an altar, or a sanctuary or shrine, at the summit.[[317]] Herodotus, describing one of these temples in Babylon, says that the altars, larger and smaller, were outside the temple.[[318]]

Light is thrown on the dream of Jacob at Bethel by the shape of the ancient temple in the East. In his vision it was probably not a ladder, but a conventional stepped-temple structure, with its stairways rising heavenward, and its sanctuary, that Jacob saw.[[319]] The angel ministers were passing up and down the steps, in the service of the Most High God, who himself appeared above the structure. When Jacob waked he said: “Surely the Lord is in this place [or sanctuary]; and I knew it not.... How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven;” and he took the stone which had been his pillow at the threshold of that sanctuary, and set it up for an altar pillar.[[320]]

In the literature and legends of Babylonia, as of other portions of the ancient world, there is prominent the idea that an entrance into the life beyond this, as in the entrance into this life, the crossing of a threshold from the one world to the other, from the earlier state and the passing of a door, or gate, marks the change to the later, from the sacred to the more sacred. This is peculiarly illustrated in the famous legend of Ishtar’s descent into the under-world in order to bring back to earth her lover Dumuzi.

The Hades of the Babylonians was surrounded by seven high walls, and was approached through seven gates, each of which was guarded by a pitiless warder. Two deities ruled within it–Nergal, “the lord of the great city,” and Beltis-Allat, “the lady of the great land,”–whither everything which had breathed in this world descended after death. Allat was the actual sovereign of the country; and even the gods themselves could enter her realm only on the condition of submitting to death, like mortals, and of humbly avowing themselves her slaves.[[321]] “The threshold of Allat’s palace stood upon a spring, which had the property of restoring to life all who bathed in it or drank of its waters.” Yet it was needful that another life should be given for one who would be reborn into this life, after crossing the threshold of the regions beyond.[[322]]

In the descent of the goddess Ishtar into Allat’s realm, in pursuit of her lover Dumuzi, Ishtar was gradually stripped of her garments and adornings at the successive gates, until she appeared naked, as at birth, at the final threshold of the new state.[[323]] But she was held captive by Allat until Ea, chief among the gods, exerted himself in her behalf, and sent his messenger to secure for both Ishtar and Dumuzi the waters of life which were underneath the threshold of Allat’s realm,–which must be broken in order to their outflowing.[[324]]

There would seem to be a reference to this primitive idea of the waters of life flowing from under the threshold of the temple, in the vision of the prophet Ezekiel, writing in Babylonia, concerning restored Jerusalem and its holy temple. “Behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward, for the forefront of the house was toward the east: and the waters came down from under, from the right side of the house, on the south of the altar.” (Evidently the altar in this temple was near the threshold.) These flowing waters from under the threshold were life-giving. “Upon the bank of the river,” as it swelled in its progress, “were very many trees on the one side and on the other;” and it was said of this stream: “It shall come to pass, that every living creature which swarmeth, in every place whither the rivers come, shall live; and there shall be a very great multitude of fish: for these waters are come thither, ... and every thing shall live whithersoever the river cometh.”[[325]] In a curse pronounced against Assyria by the prophet Zephaniah, it was declared that “drought shall be in the thresholds,”[[326]] instead of life-giving waters.

So, again, the waters of the life-giving Jordan flow out from the threshold of the grotto of Pan, a god of life.[[327]] And both at the beginning of the Old Testament, and at the close of the New, the waters of life start from the sanctuary of the Author of life.[[328]]

This Dumuzi of Babylonia has linkings with Tammuz of Syria, with Osiris of Egypt, and with Adonis of Greece, and there are correspondences in all these legends in the references to the door and the threshold of the under-world and the life beyond. Thus, for instance, the Lord’s prophet counts as most heinous of all idolatries the transfer of the weeping worship of Tammuz from the door in the hole of the temple wall to the door of the temple sanctuary.[[329]]

At the right hand of the entrance of the larger temple unearthed at Nineveh by Layard, a sculptured image of the Assyrian king, with his arm uplifted, was on a doorway stele just outside. And an altar for offerings was in front of that image. Altars

were found similarly situated, just outside the doorway, in a smaller temple in the same region.[[330]]

An exceptional reverence is shown to the doorway and threshold of their sanctuary, or temple, by the sect of the Yezidis, in the neighborhood of ancient Nineveh, at the present time. Describing an evening service which he attended, Layard says: “When the prayers were ended, those who marched in procession kissed, as they passed by, the right side of the doorway leading into the temple, where a serpent is figured on the wall.” Again, “Soon after sunrise, on the following morning, the sheikhs and cawals offered up a short prayer in the court of the temple.... Some prayed in the sanctuary, frequently kissing the threshold and holy places within the building.”[[331]]

When the sacred ark of the Hebrews was captured by the Philistines, and brought into the house of the god Dagon, the record is: “When they of Ashdod arose early on the morrow, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the Lord. And they took Dagon, and set him in his place again. And when they arose early on the morrow morning, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the ground before the ark of the Lord; and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands lay cut off upon the threshold.” It is added, in our present Bible text: “Therefore neither the priests of Dagon, nor any that come into Dagon’s house, tread on the threshold of Dagon in Ashdod, unto this day.”[[332]]

It would seem, from the words “unto this day,” that this added statement was a gloss by a later writer or copyist. The original force of the wonder was in Dagon’s being overthrown at his very shrine, falling maimed on the threshold altar of his temple. But the suggestion of the gloss is that the unwillingness of the Philistines to tread on the threshold of the temple (which appears to have been of primitive origin) did not exist among the worshipers of Dagon prior to this incident. The Septuagint adds,[[333]] concerning the later practice of the Philistines at the threshold, “because leaping they leap over it.”

Leaping over the threshold is at times spoken of in the Bible as if it had a taint of idolatry. Thus Zephaniah, foretelling, in the name of the Lord, the divine judgments on idolaters, says: “In that day I will punish all those that leap over the threshold.”[[334]] This is explained in the Targum as “those that walk in the customs of the Philistines.” Yet the Bible sometimes refers to the temple threshold as a fitting place of worship, and its recognition as a holy altar as commendable.

Ezekiel prophesies that the restored Prince of Israel “shall worship at the threshold of the gate”[[335]] of the Lord’s house; and he sees, in vision, “the glory of the Lord ... over the threshold of the house.”[[336]] Again the Lord complains of the profanation of his temple by idolaters “in their setting of their threshold by my threshold, and their door-post beside my door-post, and there was but the wall between me and them.”[[337]]

That it was the threshold or doorway of the tabernacle which was counted sacred, is evident from the wording of the Levitical laws concerning the offering of blood in sacrifices. “This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded, saying, What man soever there be of the house of Israel, that killeth an ox, or lamb, or goat, in the camp, or that killeth it without the camp, and hath not brought it unto the door of the tent of meeting, to offer it as an oblation unto the Lord before the tabernacle of the Lord: blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood; and that man shall be cut off from among his people: to the end that the children of Israel may bring their sacrifices, which they sacrifice in the open field, even that they may bring them unto the Lord, unto the door of the tent of meeting, unto the priest, and sacrifice them for sacrifices of peace offerings unto the Lord. And the priest shall sprinkle the blood upon the altar of the Lord at the door of the tent of meeting, and burn the fat for a sweet savour unto the Lord.... Whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among them, that offereth a burnt offering or sacrifice, and bringeth it not unto the door of the tent of meeting, to sacrifice it unto the Lord; even that man shall be cut off from his people.”[[338]]

It was at the doorway of the tent of meeting that Aaron and his sons were consecrated to the holy priesthood;[[339]] and it was there that the bullock was sacrificed, and its blood was poured out as an offering at the base of the altar.[[340]] It was at the doorway of that tent, above the threshold, that the pillar of cloud descended in token of the Lord’s presence, when Moses met the Lord there in loving communion, while the people stood watching from the doorways of their own tents.[[341]] The altar of burnt offering, at the base or foundation of which the blood of the offerings was outpoured, was itself at the doorway of the tent of meeting, and he who offered a sacrifice to the Lord offered it at that threshold.[[342]]

A post of honor in the temple was as a guardian of the threshold, as was also the place of a keeper of the gate. In the assignment of the priests and Levites to service, by Jehoiada the priest, in the days of Athaliah, a third part of them were in attendance at the “threshold,” and a third part “at the gate of the foundation.”[[343]] Later, in the days of Josiah and Hilkiah, the guardians of the threshold had the care of the money collected for the repairs of the Lord’s house.[[344]] And a keeper of the threshold, or of the door, of the house of God, was always mentioned with honor.[[345]] When the Psalmist contrasts the house of God with the tents of wickedness, he speaks of the honor of a post at the temple threshold, not of the humble place of a temple janitor, when he says:

“For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand [elsewhere].

I had rather stand at the threshold of the house of my God,

Than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.”[[346]]

In the Temple at Jerusalem, the altar of burnt offering was before the threshold of the Holy Place; and those who came with sacrifices must stop at that threshold, and proffer the blood of their offering to the priests, who then reverently poured it out at the altar-threshold’s base.[[347]]

When offerings were accepted for the repairs of the temple, in the days of Jehoash, king of Judah, it is said that “Jehoiada the priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid of it, and set it beside the altar, on the right side as one cometh into the house of the Lord. And the priests that kept [or guarded] the threshold put therein all the money that was brought into the house of the Lord.”[[348]] This would seem to decide the position of the altar as at the threshold, where “one cometh into the house of the Lord.”

An altar stood at the doorway, or before the door, of temples of later date in Phenicia and Phrygia, as shown on contemporary medals and coins.[[349]] And so in temples in other lands.

Among the early Christian remains unearthed in Asia Minor are indications of the former position of an altar on the threshold of a sanctuary. At the site of ancient Aphrodisias, “some of the sarcophagi of the Byzantine age are richly wrought, and although many are of Christian date, they appear to have retained the pagan devices.” At the end of one of these sarcophagi “appears an altar burning in front of a door,” standing indeed on the very threshold.[[350]]

An oath of peculiar sacredness among Hindoos is at the threshold of a temple, as at its primal altar. “Is a man accused of a great crime? He goes to the temple [threshold], makes his prostrations; he pauses, then steps over it, declaring at the same time that he is not guilty of the crime laid to his charge. It is therefore very common to ask a person who denies anything that he is suspected to have done, ‘Will you step over the threshold of the temple?’”[[351]]

Among the stories told in India of judgments at the temple threshold, is one of a thieving goldsmith, who had secreted himself in a pagoda of Vishnoo, in order to take from the sacred image one of its jewel eyes. Having obtained the precious stone, he waited for the opening of the pagoda doors in the morning, in order to escape with his booty. But as he attempted to cross the threshold, when the door was opened, he was stricken with death by Vishnoo “at the very threshold.”[[352]] Justice was administered at the very seat of justice.

Bloody sacrifices are still known at the temple thresholds in India, notwithstanding the prejudice of Hindoos against the shedding of blood. Within recent times an English gentleman, in an official position in India, discovered a decapitated child at the very door of a celebrated pagoda; and an investigation showed that a father had there sacrificed his son to avert an impending evil.[[353]]

When a famous idol was destroyed in the temple of Somnauth, during the Muhammadan conquest of India, pieces of the shattered image were sent by the conquerors to the mosks of Meccah, Medina, and Ghuznee, to be thrown down at the thresholds of their gates, there to be trodden under foot by devout and zealous Mussulmans.[[354]] The accursed idol fragments might be trampled on at the threshold, even while the threshold itself was counted sacred.

In Muhammadan mosks generally the threshold is counted sacred. Across the threshold proper, at the beginning of the sacred portion of the interior, “is a low barrier, a few inches high.”[[355]] Before this barrier the worshiper stops, removes his shoes, and steps over it, with the right foot first. In some smaller mosks a rod above the outer door-sill stands for this barrier.

Describing his visit to one of the mosks in Persia, Morier says: “Here we remarked the veneration of the Persians for the threshold of a holy place.... Before they ventured to cross it, they knelt down and kissed it, whilst they were very careful not to touch it with their feet.”[[356]]

On the tomb of the kings of Persia, at Com, the inscription appears: “Happy and glorious the believing one who in reverence bows his head upon the threshold of this gate, in imitation of the sun and moon.[[357]] All that he will ask with faith in this gate, shall be as the arrow that reaches the mark.”[[358]] And on the tomb of Alee, son-in-law of Muhammad and one of his successors, there stands the declaration: “The angel messenger of the truth, Gabriel, kisses every day the threshold of thy gate; for that is the only way by which one can come to the throne of Muhammad.”[[359]]

Even among Christians in this primitive region, this reverence for the threshold as the earliest altar of the temple and the church manifests itself in various ways. Dr. Grant, an American missionary, tells of seeing the Nestorian Christians kissing the threshold of the church on entering the sanctuary for the Lord’s Day service.[[360]]

At Baveddeen, near Bokhara, is the tomb of Baha-ed-deen Nakishbend, the national saint of Turkestan, which is a place of pilgrimage second only to the tomb of Muhammad. “In the front of the tomb,” as a threshold, “is the famous senghi murad,” the “stone of desire,” “which has been tolerably ground away, and made smooth, by the numerous foreheads of pious pilgrims that have been rubbed upon it.”[[361]]

A peculiar sacrifice in Tibet is the disemboweling of a devotee in the presence of a great multitude, as an act of worship. An altar on which this act is performed is erected for the occasion “in front of the temple gate.”[[362]]

In the more sacred shrines of Japan and Korea, Shinto or Booddhist temples, pilgrim worshipers are permitted to go no farther than the threshold of the inner sanctuary. There they may deposit their offerings and may prostrate themselves in prayer, but they cannot pass beyond.

At Kitzuki, “the most ancient shrine of Japan,” multitudes of pilgrims gather for worship. They are coming and going ceaselessly, but all pause before the threshold of the inner sanctuary. “None enter there: all stand before the dragon-swarming doorway, and cast their offerings into the money-chest placed before the threshold; many making contributions of small coin, the very poorest throwing only a handful of rice into the box. Then they clap their hands, and bow their heads before the threshold, and reverently gaze through the hall of prayer at the loftier edifice, the holy of holies beyond it. Each pilgrim remains but a little while, and claps his hands but four times; yet so many are coming and going that the sound of the clapping is like the sound of a cataract.”[[363]] The same is true of “the great Shrines of Isé, chief Mecca of the Shintō faith,”[[364]] of those of famous Nikkō, and of other centers of worship.[[365]]