Evolution and creation

by Herbert Junius Hardwicke

Turning to the third great division of the Iranians—viz., the Semites, who migrated to the Valley of the Euphrates, we find a more or less complicated religious system, varying in accordance with the amount of intercommunication which took place between the Semites and the tribes belonging to the Aryan, Mongolian, and Egyptian families. The earliest Semitic settlement was in the district stretching from the Euphrates to the Red Sea and Mediterranean, and their religion was, at first, one of pure animistic polydæmonism, varying enormously in details of drama in the different tribes, but exhibiting in all common characteristics.

All early Semitic peoples worshipped the sun-god, Shamsh, and all were moon, planet, and star-worshippers to a very large extent; but, as the race became divided into Northern and Southern Semites, a distinct difference gradually arose between the religious cults of the two branches. The Southern, or Arab, tribes, on account of their more isolated situation, retained the original Semitic mythology, worshipping the sun as their chief god, Shamsh, the moon as his consort, and the stars and planets as inferior gods and goddesses, the Pleiades being objects of special homage. Shamsh was father of all, and disappeared to the under-world at night to rest in slumber until awakened into activity in the morning as Yachavah, his son, who became one with his father.

The Northern Semites, on penetrating, at a later period, the borders of Mesopotamia, came in contact with a powerful and advanced civilisation, which had been already established by the Akkadian branch of the Northern Mongolian family, and thus the original Semitic religion became very much modified by the introduction into it of many of the Mongol, as well as some also of the Aryan, myths.

Very little is known of the Akkadian mythology; but it is pretty certain that they were, at a very early period, acquainted with the science of astronomy, and that the Chaldeans, their successors, who were a mongrel race, partly Akkadian and partly Semitic, invented the cuneiform writing to take the place of the old Mongolian hieroglyphic characters. From what we know of the religion of the old Mongol Chinese empire prior to 1200 B.C., it was a kind of spirit-worship, the Shang-ti, or supreme spirit, being Thian (Heaven), who, in co-operation with Heu-thu (earth), produced everything. Man, according to this cultus, had two souls, one of which ascended after death to heaven, while the other descended into the earth, both being absorbed respectively into Thian and Heu-thu.

The Akkadians, who were but a branch of the same race as the progenitors of the ancient Chinese, also worshipped spirits, the greatest of whom was Ana (the highest heaven), the next Mulge (the hidden heaven in the interior of the earth), and the third Ea, the god of the atmosphere and of moisture. After these came an inferior group—Uru-ki, the moon-god; Ud, the sun-god; and Im, the wind-god. The spirits were divided into good and bad, which were constantly at war with each other; and thus was introduced into the religion of the semi-Semitic Chaldeans the dualistic notion of good and evil existing in conflict throughout all time.

The Northern Semites may be conveniently divided into four distinct nations—viz., the Chaldeans (Babylonians and Assyrians), who were partly Semitic and partly Akkadian, the Aramæans, the Canaanites, and the Phœnicians. These peoples soon became acquainted with the astronomical learning of the Akkadians, and were taught the wonderful phenomenon of the precession of the equinoxes; and it is highly probable that the fact of the vernal equinoctial sign having changed shortly before B.C. 2000 from that of the Bull to that of the Ram or Lamb had much to do with the changing of the old Semitic name Shamsh to that of El, as a designation of the sun-god, El (אל) being the old Chaldean word for Ram.

Owing to the mixed character of the Chaldean nation, their religion was a peculiar blending of the Akkadian and Semitic mythologies, El Ilu, or Ilah, being their chief deity; but, instead of sinking into the lower world each night for peaceful slumber, as the older Shamsh had done, he became the victim of the wicked demons, who tormented him all through the dark hours, until he was avenged by his son Yachavah, who thereby became the conqueror and saviour god, one with his father Ilu, and yet different. To a great extent the religion of the purely Semitic tribes of the north was affected by this Chaldean myth; but there arose many points of difference between them. The Assyrians worshipped El under the name of Asur, their national deity, the Babylonians converting the name into Bel; while the pure Semites worshipped him as Bel and Baal in the west, and as Al in the south. Out of the story of El and Yachavah was fabricated the great Adonis myth of the Chaldeans, which became so popular in future times among all the Semites except the Arabs of the south, who retained the original character of the supreme Shamsh, El or Al (afterwards Allah), and his son Yachavah, afterwards Yahouh. This Adonis drama, as originally conceived, was that El reigned in supreme power and glory in the highest heaven, enjoying the delights of his spouse Istar, but that in the autumn the wicked gods of winter overcame him, separating him from his lover, and tormenting him all through the winter months, until in the spring he conquered the evil demons as Adon, the beautiful youth, who is restored to his mourning Istar. The worship of Adonis, or Adon was generally adopted by all the Northern Semites, the god becoming eventually the most popular deity of the Semitic people, being known as Yao (ΙΑΟ of the Greeks) to the Phoenicians, Yahoo (יהו) to the Canaanites, and Tammuz to the Aramæans, while his lover Istar became the Phoenician Ashtoreth. Iēs, the god of wine, and Greek Dionysos, was another saviour sun-god worshipped largely by the Phœnicians; but was most probably of Egyptian origin, being identical with Mises, the Egyptian Bacchus. As already stated, the Southern Semites of Arabia retained, in common with their Ethiopian brethren, the old and simpler worship of the supreme god El and his son Yahouh, although, owing to their propinquity to Egypt, many strange inferior deities had been introduced into Arabia from that country, which resulted, in much later times, in the formation of various religious sects, each having a particular tribal deity, or patron god, though all recognising El as supreme. One of these tribes, with Yahouh as their tribal god, on which account they were called Yahoudi, having left their native Arabian home, penetrated far into the country of the Northern Semites, learning from the Canaanites, Phœnicians, and Babylonians the strange legends of the Northern Semitic deities, including the Adonis myth; and, after wandering about for many years, one large portion of their tribe settled in the delta of the Nile, while the remainder crossed the desert of Syria and approached the confines of Babylonia, finally settling in the barren and rocky interior of Syria, and making the spot where now stands the small town of El-Khuds (Jerusalem) their headquarters. During their long wanderings they became acquainted not only with the various Semitic myths of the north, but also with the Babylonian and Persian legends, and incorporated a quantity of strange deities and customs into their own rude and primitive religion, thus manufacturing a very complicated and weird system of mythology.

The date of the Yahudean migration into Syria was certainly not earlier than about B.C. 250, despite the declaration of interested parties that these people were known as Israelites and Jews for centuries before that time. The following quotation from Major-General Forlong’s “Rivers of Faith” is worth reproducing on this point:—“The first notice of the Jews is, possibly, that of certain Shemitic rulers of the Aram, paying tribute about 850 B.C. to Vool-Nirari, the successor of Shalmaneser of Syria, regarding which, however, much more is made by Biblicists than the simple record warrants. This is the case also where Champollion affirms that mention is made on the Theban temples of the capture of certain towns of the land we call Judea, this being thought to prove the existence of Jews. Similar assumption takes place in regard to the hieratic papyri of the Leyden Museum, held to belong to the time of Rameses II.; an inscription read on the rocks of El-Hamamat, and the discovery of some names like Chedorlaomer in the records of Babylonia; but this is all the ‘evidence’ as to the existence of ancient Jews which has been advanced, and the most is made of it in Dr. Birch’s opening address on ‘The Progress of Biblical Archæology,’ at the inauguration of that Society. The only logical conclusion justifiable, when we give up the inspiration theory, is that Arabs and Syro-Phenicians were known to Assyrians and Egyptians, and this none would deny. Indeed, we readily grant with Dr. Birch that, ‘under the nineteenth and twentieth Egyptian dynasties, the influence of the Armenœan nations is distinctly marked; that not only, by blood and alliances, had the Pharaohs been closely united with the princes of Palestine and Syria, but that the language of the period abounds in Semitic words, quite different from the Egyptian, with which they were embroidered and intermingled.’ Could it possibly be otherwise? Is it not so this day? Is a vast and rapidly-spawning Shemitic continent like Arabia not to influence the narrow delta of a river adjoining it, or the wild highlands of Syria to its north? Of course, Arabs, or Shemites, were everywhere spread over Egypt, Syria, and Phenicia, as well as in their ancient seats of empire in Arabi Irak (Kaldia), and on the imperial mounds of Kalneh and Kouyunjik, but not necessarily as Jews. I cannot find that these last were anything more than possibly a peculiar religious sect of Arabs, who settled down from their pristine nomadic habits, and obtained a quasi government under petty princes or sheks, such as we have seen take place in the case of numerous Arabian and Indian sects.”

Again, the author of “Rivers of Faith” remarks: “No efforts, say the leaders of the Biblical Archæological Society, have been able to find, either amid the numerous engravings on the rocks of Arabia Petrea or Palestine, any save Phenician inscriptions—not even a record of the Syro-Hebrew character, which was once thought to be the peculiar property of Hebrews. ‘Most of those inscriptions hitherto discovered do not date anterior to the Roman Empire’ (Dr. Birch, President of Soc, op. cit., p. 9). ‘Few, if any, monuments (of Jews) have been obtained in Palestine’ or the neighbouring countries of any useful antiquity, save the Moabite Stone, and the value of this last is all in favour of my previous arguments on these points. At the pool of Siloam we have an ‘inscription, in the Phenician character, as old as the time of the kings.... It is incised upon the walls of a rock chamber, apparently dedicated to Baal, who is mentioned on it.’ So that here, in a most holy place of this ‘peculiar people,’ we find only Phenicians, and these worshipping the Sun-God of Fertility, as was customary on every coast of Europe, from unknown times down to the rise of Christianity. The Biblical Archæological Society and British Museum authorities tell us frankly and clearly that no Hebrew square character can be proved to exist till after the Babylonian captivity, and that, ‘at all events, this inscription of Siloam shows that the curved or Phenician character was in use in Jerusalem itself under the Hebrew Monarchy, as well as the conterminous Phenicia, Moabitis, and the more distant Assyria. No monument, indeed,’ continues Dr. Birch, ‘of greater antiquity, inscribed in the square character (Hebrew), has been found, as yet, older than the fifth century, A.D.; and the coins of the Maccabean princes, as well as those of the revolter Barcochab, are impressed with Samaritan characters.’” As to the Moabite Stone, I would refer my readers to a little work entitled “An Inquiry into the Age of the Moabite Stone,” by Samuel Sharpe, the celebrated author of “The History of Egypt,” in which will be found abundant evidence to prove that the inscription on the Stone is a forgery of about the year A.D. 260.

Apart from the history contained in the books of the Old Testament, there is absolutely no record of the Jews as an independent people, except that contained in the writings of Josephus (about A.D. 100); and, although that author may be tolerably trustworthy when relating matters near to his own time, yet in his description of Jewish antiquities he evidently, as he himself asserts, rests only on tradition. For instance, he alone records the story of Alexander entering the holy place at Jerusalem and offering sacrifice on the altar; but Arrian, in his “Anabasis of Alexander the Great,” where he specially treats of the life and actions of this great conqueror, says not one word about such a place as Jerusalem, or about such a story as that recorded by Josephus. Curtius, who wrote a far more detailed account of the life and conquests of Alexander, mentions neither Jerusalem nor the story of Alexander and the holy place. Herodotus, about B.C. 430, when narrating the two raids of the Scythians through Syria, as far as Egypt, says not a word about any Jews. Xenophon, who wrote 150 years after they were said to have returned from Babylon, or about B.C. 386, appears to have been unconscious of their existence, only mentioning the Syrians of Palestine. Neither did Sanchoniathon, Ctesias, Berosus, nor Manetho even once mention them as a nation. Diodorus also, when writing of the siege of Tyre by the soldiers of Alexander, neither mentions the Jews as a nation nor Jerusalem as their chief town. In fact, we have no account of them at all, except that contained in the Old Testament and that in the writings of Josephus, until we find them subject to the Romans, under Antiochus Epiphanes, about B.C. 165, when in all probability they had just settled down into a dependent nation, having been driven into Syria by the Babylonians, whose fertile valleys these Arabian nomads had attempted to colonise. Being surrounded on all sides by nations whose religions so very far surpassed their own in development, it did not take long for the Yahoudi (afterwards called Jews) to become affected by the mythological dramas of their neighbours; and, in carefully examining the mythical records of their tribe, we find that they very soon became acquainted with, and in some cases offered worship to, almost all the purely Semitic and Chaldean, as well as to a few of the Egyptian, deities. Their principal god always remained as before, El (אל) signifying the zodiacal sign Aries, the heavenly ram and first of the twelve zodiacal figures. Combined with Yah (יה), the abbreviation of Yahouh (יהוה), their tribal deity, it formed a compound word, Eloh (אלוה), or Elyah (אליה, the ו and י being interchangeable), the plural of which was Elohim (אלהים), a word used frequently in the Bible to signify the supreme God. Bearing in mind the fact that the fables of the Bible are not actual history, but merely so many accounts of the ever-recurring phenomena of the sidereal heavens, and that in the various saviour myths the vernal equinoxial sign, or saviour sign, Aries, was looked upon as the supreme god, who housed the new-born sun on his first appearance in the upper world, just as in the present day the song of praise on Easterday is “Worthy is the lamb who was slain (crucified) to receive the power and bring back salvation to the world,” the meanings of these names of the supreme deity become apparent at once. All the words—and, in fact, almost every divine name found in every divine record—signify the sun in one or other of the divisions of his annual or daily apparent march, or else one of the divisions itself. El signifies the first and saviour sign of the zodiac, the celestial ram, and is always used when the winter period is referred to, because from the autumnal to the vernal equinox the sun-god, Yahouh, is separated from the ram, El, which remains god of the lower world, until again united with its spouse, the sun, at the vernal equinox, becoming the ram-sun-god, El-Yah or Eloh, whose plural is Elohim, the ram-sun-gods, from the vernal to the autumnal equinox, when the sun and Aries are together for six months. At a later time, when the old Bacchus worship was revived at Alexandria in the person of the young Semitic Yahoshua, who was named Iesous, we have a good illustration of this when the sun-god, in his agony at being separated from the ram at the autumnal equinox or crucifixion, exclaimed: “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?”—“My ram, my ram, why hast thou forsaken me?” In, I believe, every instance in which the plural word, Elohim, is used in the Bible the reference is to the summer half of the year, from the vernal to the autumnal equinox, when El and Yah are together. We meet with El—in its Babylonian form, Bel; in its Aramæan forms, Bel and Belus; and in its Phenician form, Baal—frequently in the Bible, and often in combination with other deities, as El-Shaddai and Bel-Shaddai (בעלשדי), signifying the “breasted ram,” or the ram at the vernal equinox, the period of suckling.[2] Other forms of the same divine name were Baal-Berith, god of the equinox or covenant (co-venire, to come together, as when the ecliptic crosses the equator at the two equinoxes or crucifixions); Baal-Yah and El-Yah, rendered in the authorised version respectively Bealiah and Elijah, when in reality they signify the god Yahouh, or ram-sun-god; El-Yah also does duty for Joel; Elishah signifies the saviour ram; Eliakim, the setting ram; Eleazar, the creating ram; Samuel, the god of fame, or famous ram; Daniel, the ram judge; and Israel, the struggle with El. The Phenician Hercules wrestled with Typhon (the sun at the meridian) in the sand, just as Israel or Jacob wrestled with Elohim in the dust—Hercules, like Jacob, being wounded in the thigh; and the Canaanites knew the Greek Hercules, who wrestled with Zeus, by the name of Ysrael.