“Now are the fig leaves and the covering removed, because thou hast turned to the Lord, for the Lord is the Spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom,[[755]] there the clearness of the Lord is mirrored with uncovered countenance. This is precious before God, and this is the glory of the Lord, and the adornment of our God, when you stand in the image and honor of your God, as God created you, naked and not ashamed.

“Who can ever praise sufficiently in the sons and daughters of the living God those parts of the body which are destined to procreate?

“In the lap of the daughters of Jerusalem is the gate of the Lord, and the Just will go into the temple there, to the altar.[[756]] And in the lap of the sons of the living God is the water-pipe of the upper part, which is a tube, like a rod, to measure the temple and altar. And under the water-tube the sacred stones are placed, as a sign and testimony of the Lord, who has taken to himself the seed of Abraham.

“Out of the seeds in the chamber of the mother, God creates a man with his hands, as an image of himself. Then the mother house and the mother chamber is opened in the daughters of the Living God, and God himself brings forth a child through them. Thus God creates children from the stones, for the seed comes from the stones.”[[757]]

History teaches in manifold examples how the religious mysteries are liable to change suddenly into sexual orgies because they have originated from an overvaluation of the orgy. It is characteristic that this priapic divinity[[758]] returns again to the old symbol of the snake, which in the mystery enters into the faithful, fertilizing and spiritualizing them, although it originally possessed a phallic significance. In the mysteries of the Ophites, the festival was really celebrated with serpents, in which the animals were even kissed. (Compare the caressing of the snake of Demeter in the Eleusinian mysteries.) In the sexual orgies of the modern Christian sects the phallic kiss plays a very important rôle. Unternährer was an uncultivated, crazy peasant, and it is unlikely that the Ophitic religious ceremonies were known to him.

The phallic significance is expressed negatively or mysteriously through the serpent, which always points to a secret related thought. This related thought connects with the mother; thus, in a dream a patient found the following imagery: “A serpent shot out from a moist cave and bit the dreamer in the region of the genitals.” This dream took place at the instant when the patient was convinced of the truth of the analysis, and began to free himself from the bond of his mother complex. The meaning is: I am convinced that I am inspired and poisoned by the mother. The contrary manner of expression is characteristic of the dream. At the moment when he felt the impulse to go forwards he perceived the attachment to the mother. Another patient had the following dream during a relapse, in which the libido was again wholly introverted for a time: “She was entirely filled within by a great snake; only one end of the tail peeped out from her arm. She wanted to seize it, but it escaped her.” A patient with a very strong introversion (catatonic state) complained to me that a snake was stuck in her throat.[[759]] This symbolism is also used by Nietzsche in the “vision” of the shepherd and the snake:[[760]]

“And verily, what I saw was like nothing I ever saw before. I saw a young shepherd, writhing, choking, twitching with a convulsed face, from whose mouth hung a black, heavy serpent.

“Did I ever see so much disgust and pallid fear upon a countenance?[[761]] Might he have been sleeping, and the snake crept into his mouth—there it bit him fast?

“My hand tore at the serpent and tore—in vain!—I failed to tear the serpent out of his mouth. Then there cried out of me: ‘Bite! Bite! Its head off! Bite!’ I exclaimed; all my horror, my hate, my disgust, my compassion, all the good and bad cried out from me in one voice.

“Ye intrepid ones around me! solve for me the riddle which I saw, make clear to me the vision of the lonesomest one.