In regard to that the “Biblia pauperum” observes (according to an old German incunabulum of 1471):
“One reads in the third chapter of the prophet Daniel that Nebuchadnezar, the King, caused three men to be placed in a glowing furnace and that the king often went there, looked in, and that he saw with the three, a fourth, who was like the Son of God. The three signify for us, the Holy Trinity and the fourth, the unity of the being. Christ, too, in His explanation designated the person of the Trinity and the unity of the being.”
According to this mystic interpretation, the legend of the three men in the fiery furnace appears as a magic fire ceremony by means of which the Son of God reveals himself. The Trinity is brought together with the unity, or, in other words, through coitus a child is produced. The glowing furnace (like the glowing tripod in “Faust”) is a mother symbol, where the children are produced.[[329]] The fourth in the fiery furnace appears as Christ, the Son of God, who has become a visible God in the fire. The mystic trinity and unity are sexual symbols. (Compare with that the many references in Inman: “Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism.”) It is said of the Saviour of Israel (the Messiah) and of his enemies, Isaiah x:17:
“And the light of Israel shall be for a fire, and his Holy One for a flame.”
In a hymn of the Syrian Ephrem it is said of Christ: “Thou who art all fire, have mercy upon me.”
Agni is the sacrificial flame, the sacrificer, and the sacrificed, as Christ himself. Just as Christ left behind his redeeming blood, φάρμακον ἀθανασίας,[[330]] in the stimulating wine, so Agni is the Soma, the holy drink of inspiration, the mead of immortality.[[331]] Soma and Fire are entirely identical in Hindoo literature, so that in Soma we easily rediscover the libido symbol, through which a series of apparently paradoxical qualities of the Soma are immediately explained. As the old Hindoos recognized in fire an emanation of the inner libido fire, so too they recognized, in the intoxicating drink (Firewater, Soma-Agni, as rain and fire), an emanation of libido. The Vedic definition of Soma as seminal fluid confirms this interpretation.[[332]] The Soma significance of fire, similar to the significance of the body of Christ in the Last Supper (compare the Passover lamb of the Jews, baked in the form of a cross), is explained by the psychology of the presexual stage, where the libido was still in part the function of nutrition. The “Soma” is the “nourishing drink,” the mythological characterization of which runs parallel to fire in its origin; therefore, both are united in Agni. The drink of immortality was stirred by the Hindoo gods like fire. Through the retreat of the libido into the presexual stage it becomes clear why so many gods were either defined sexually or were devoured.
As was shown by our discussion of fire preparation, the fire tool did not receive its sexual significance as a later addition, but the sexual libido was the motor power which led to its discovery, so that the later teachings of the priests were nothing but confirmations of its actual origin. Other primitive discoveries probably have acquired their sexual symbolism in the same manner, being also derived from the sexual libido.
In the previous statements, which were based on the Pramantha of the Agni sacrifice, we have concerned ourselves only with one significance of the word manthâmi or mathnâmi, that is to say, with that which expresses the movement of rubbing. As Kuhn shows, however, this word also possesses the meaning of tearing off, taking away by violence, robbing.[[333]] As Kuhn points out, this significance is already extant in the Vedic text. The legend of its discovery always expresses the production of fire as a robbery. (In this far it belongs to the motive widely spread over the earth of the treasure difficult to attain.) The fact that in many places and not alone in India the preparation of fire is represented as having its origin in robbery, seems to point to a widely spread thought, according to which the preparation of fire was something forbidden, something usurped or criminal, which could be obtained only through stratagem or deeds of violence (mostly through stratagem).[[334]] When onanism confronts the physician as a symptom it does so frequently under the symbol of secret pilfering, or crafty imposition, which always signifies the concealed fulfilment of a forbidden wish.[[335]] Historically, this train of thought probably implies that the ritual preparation of fire was employed with a magic purpose, and, therefore, was pursued by official religions; then it became a ritual mystery,[[336]] guarded by the priests and surrounded with secrecy. The ritual laws of the Hindoos threaten with severe punishment him who prepares fire in an incorrect manner. The fact alone that something is mysterious means the same as something done in concealment; that which must remain secret, which one may not see nor do; also something which is surrounded by severe punishment of body and soul; therefore, presumably, something forbidden which has received a license as a religious rite. After all has been said about the genesis of the preparation of fire, it is no longer difficult to guess what is the forbidden thing; it is onanism. When I stated before that it might be lack of satisfaction which breaks up the autoerotic ring of the displaced sexual activity transferred to the body itself, and thus opens wider fields of culture, I did not mention that this loosely closed ring of the displaced onanistic activity could be much more firmly closed, when man makes the other great discovery, that of true onanism.[[337]] With that the activity is started in the proper place, and this, under certain circumstances, may mean a satisfaction sufficient for a long time, but at the expense of cheating sexuality of its real purpose. It is a fraud upon the natural development of things, because all the dynamic forces which can and should serve the development of culture are withdrawn from it through onanism, since, instead of the displacement, a regression to the local sexual takes place, which is precisely the opposite of that which is desirable. Psychologically, however, onanism is a discovery of a significance not to be undervalued. One is protected from fate, since no sexual need then has the power to give one up to life. For with onanism one has the greatest magic in one’s hands; one needs only to phantasy, and with that to masturbate, then one possesses all the pleasure of the world, and is no longer compelled to conquer the world of one’s desires through hard labor and wrestling with reality.[[338]] Aladdin rubs his lamp and the obedient genii stand at his bidding; thus the fairy tale expresses the great psychologic advantage of the easy regression to the local sexual satisfaction. Aladdin’s symbol subtly confirms the ambiguity of the magic fire preparation.
The close relation of the generation of fire to the onanistic act is illustrated by a case, the knowledge of which I owe to Dr. Schmid, in Cery, that of an imbecile peasant youth who set many incendiary fires. At one of these conflagrations he drew suspicion to himself by his behavior. He stood with his hands in his trouser pockets in the door of an opposite house and gazed with apparent delight at the fire. Under examination in the insane asylum, he described the fire in great detail, and made suspicious movements in his trouser pockets with his hands. The physical examination undertaken at once showed that he had masturbated. Later he confessed that he had masturbated at the time when he had enjoyed the fire which he had enkindled himself.
The preparation of fire in itself is a perfectly ordinary useful custom, employed everywhere for many centuries, which in itself involved nothing more mysterious than eating and drinking. However, there was always a tendency from time to time to prepare fire in a ceremonious and mysterious manner (exactly as with ritual eating and drinking), which was to be carried out in an exactly prescribed way and from which no one dared differ. This mysterious tendency associated with the technique is the second path in the onanistic regression, always present by the side of culture. The strict rules applied to it, the zeal of the ceremonial preparations and the religious awe of the mysteries next originate from this source; the ceremonial, although apparently irrational, is an extremely ingenious institution from the psychologic standpoint, for it represents a substitute for the possibility of onanistic regression accurately circumscribed by law. The law cannot apply to the content of the ceremony, for it is really quite indifferent for the ritual act, whether it is carried out in this way or in that way. On the contrary, it is very essential whether the restrained libido is discharged through a sterile onanism or transposed into the path of sublimation. These severe measures of protection apply primarily to onanism.[[339]]