time the method and results of the modern science of mythology were independently applied to the domain of Hebrew antiquity. It must be called a happy accident that the mythical character of the Hebrew heroes could be proved by so convincing an example as Shimshôn (Samson); for even the wildest scepticism cannot doubt that this name is equivalent to shemesh, ‘sun,’ and that this fact gives us an undeniable right to maintain the solar significance of the hero, and to see in his battles the contest of the Sun against darkness and storms.
§ 4. c.) But the Old Testament stories do not cease to be a source for mythological investigation exactly where the traditions of Genesis and the Book of Judges are succeeded by really historical accounts. For it is an admitted fact that, as soon as ever the myths have lost their original meaning by the personification of their figures, mythical characteristics are not limited to their proper domain, but often actually attach themselves to historical persons and historical actions. Alexander the Great, for example, is a phenomenon whose historical character could not be shaken by the very boldest criticism. Yet the story even of Alexander’s acts and fortunes has been forced to bear some characteristics of the Solar myth, traits which were originally peculiar to the Sun-hero, as especially the journey into the realm of darkness.[[74]] Accordingly, not every phenomenon in the traditional characteristics of which we discover solar features is mythical, even though, strictly speaking, it can scarcely be classed with history (as e.g. William Tell). It is highly erroneous to speak, as is often done, of myth and history as two opposites which exclude any third possibility.
However, there are two points to which we ought to attend when considering the attachment of mythic elements to historical phenomena. First, it is usual, as we have just mentioned, to find one or another mythical characteristic attached to historical phenomena, as we may observe (to keep on specifically Hebrew ground) in the portraiture of the character of David or of Elijah (see Chap. V. [§ 8]). The residence of the Hebrews in Egypt, and their exodus thence under the guidance and training of an enthusiast for the freedom of his tribe, form a series of strictly historical facts, which find confirmation even in the documents of ancient Egypt. But the traditional narrative of these events, elaborated by the Hebrew people, was involuntarily associated with characteristics of that Solar myth which forms the oldest mental activity of mankind in general. Thus, for example, the passage through the sea by night is to be compared with the myth of the setting sun, which travels all night through the sea, and rises again in the morning on the opposite side. Similarly, we find attached to the picture of the life of Moses, which the Biblical narrative presents with a theocratic colouring, solar characteristics, indeed more specifically features of the myth of Prometheus. These have been clearly exhibited by Steinthal in his fine Treatise on the Prometheus-story, to which I will here only refer without reproducing its contents.[[75]] Secondly, we must consider the converse relation—that historical facts, the names of the agents of which have not been preserved in the popular mind, may be attached to mythical names. We can go back to the time of the Judges for an example of this. It is evidently real history that we read of the embittered contests waged by the Hebrews in that age against the Philistines and other tribes of Canaan. Remembrance of these contests, in the absence of historical names, helped itself out by the mythical appellations which, after the individualising of mythical figures, had obtained significance as personal names. In the first case the bearers of the names are historical persons, and the features of the story belong to mythology; in the second, history is wedded to mythical names. In both directions, accordingly, the Hebrew history treated critically is a source for mythological investigation.
§ 5. d.) One of the most reliable, but at the same time most hazardous, sources of Hebrew, as of Aryan, mythological investigation is the language itself, and above all, the appellations to which the myth is attached. These appellations, which in the process of transformation of the original meaning of the myth became personal names, are in their proper original sense appellatives; and we have to find the appellative signification in order to establish the mythological character. In this investigation it is best to follow the method, the use of which in Aryan mythology has brought such brilliant results to light. In many appellations the appellative sense can be found without much difficulty, being explicable from the language itself, in our case from the known treasures of the Hebrew tongue. In others the known material of the Hebrew language refuses its aid, and we must then take refuge in a cautious employment of the group of allied languages, i.e. the Semitic stock. In this connexion we must never leave out of sight the fact that the treasury of Hebrew words which is contained in the books of the Old Testament does not even approximately embrace the wealth of the ancient Hebrew vocabulary which we are enabled to infer from this fraction. In the proper names much ancient linguistic property is preserved which occurs nowhere else. The discovery of the appellative signification of mythological proper names consequently does an important service to mythological investigation, by finding a tangible starting-point for the determination of the mythical sense of the root-word in question. But it does more: it also fills up gaps in the Hebrew lexicon, and rescues many an old component part of that important language, which otherwise would remain utterly unknown.
An example will make this clear, and show that linguistic investigation and mythology have an equal share in the instruction to be derived from such inquiries.
We often meet in Hebrew with the verb hishkîm, denoting ‘to perform some occupation early in the morning’ (the occupation itself being determined by a dependent verb), ὀρθρεύειν. It represents the so-called Hiphʿîl-stem, which has regularly the sense of a factitive, but is not unfrequently used to express the entrance into a certain time or place, the doing of an act in certain conditions of time or place. In this case the Hiphʿîl verb is always derived from the noun which describes this place or time. Here the conditions of time concern us most. We say, for instance, heʿerîbh with the sense ‘to enter on the evening,’ ‘to do something in the evening;’ e.g. ‘the Philistine came near morning and evening,’ hashkêm we-haʿarêbh (I Sam. XVII. 16). The last word is derived from the noun ʿerebh, ‘evening.’ From the word shachar, which denotes ‘the dawn,’ is formed at a late stage of the language hishchîr, ‘to do something at that time;’ and this Hiphʿîl form of shachar can then appear beside that from ʿerebh exactly like hishkîm in an earlier age.[[76]] Now of course this verb hishkîm must have a noun for its basis, which would denote ‘morning.’ But no such is found in the known Hebrew thesaurus, for the nominal form belonging to this root, shekhem, means ‘neck,’ and etymologists have given themselves much useless labour in trying to find any tolerable connexion between the meaning of this noun and hishkîm. The most bearable which they could give is that one who rises early to go after his business loads his neck with labour.[[77]] But any one may reply, Does one who does his work after dinner or in the evening load his neck with no labour? Considering the relation in which these Hiphʿîl-forms stand to the nouns from which they are derived, we might almost a priori assert that in the ancient language shekhem must have denoted ‘morning’ also. And in this instance mythological inquiry offers us the safest clue. The name Shekhem [Shechem] figures in the Hebrew myth as the ravisher of Dinah, Jacob’s daughter. Without anticipating the analysis of this myth, which fits into the context of one of the next chapters, we immediately recognise in the mythic name Shekhem the noun from which the verb hishkîm is derived. Thus the mythical appellation refers to the early morning, the red glow, as the ravisher of the sun; and the same amorous connexion is expressed in various ways in the Aryan mythology also.
No one can deny that the consideration of the myth has here enriched the knowledge of the old Hebrew vocabulary; and thus, even on Hebrew ground, mythology and linguistic studies go hand in hand. This makes the investigation of language one of the richest sources for the discovery of the mythical ideas of early humanity.
§ 6. e.) While the circle of thoughts which guide the prose style moves on the level of the general principles current at the time of the writer, poetical language and style, on the other hand, have a tendency to adopt modes of expression produced in a long past age in accordance with the ideas then prevalent. These modes of expression, when they arose, corresponded accurately with the general ideas of the time, and had the signification which the literal sense yields; they were used whenever occasion offered for their employment, and everyone understood what was meant by them, for the thought would in that age never be expressed otherwise. The poetical language of a later time preserves such modes of expression even when their significance in the general conception of things is lost, and the occurrences thereby indicated are imagined in a different way altogether; the language then becomes figurative, as it is called.[[78]] Thus the language of the Hebrew poetry and of those writers who speak in a lofty style bordering on that of poetry, and are called Prophets, preserves many of the modes of expression derived from the ancient mythological ideas of the world. Mythical material may consequently be found now and then here also.
When e.g. Isaiah says (XIV. 28), ‘I will sweep it with the besom of destruction,’ this is what we call a poetic figure—destruction being pictured as a broom that sweeps away from the surface of the earth those who are to be destroyed. But from another side it is seen to be something more and different from a mere poetical figure, since its origin is due, not to an artistic idea of the speaker, but to an old-world mythical conception here employed figuratively, a conception which occurs in many cycles of mythology. For instance, the Maidens of the Plague are represented with brooms in their hands, with which they sweep before house-doors and bring death into the village.[[79]] But Isaiah says again (XXVII. 1) that ‘Jahveh with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish Leviathan the piercing serpent, even Leviathan that crooked serpent, and he shall slay the dragon (tannîn) that is in the sea;’ and Job (XXVI. 13), in his grand picture of the contest which Jahveh wages against the tempest, and the defeat of the latter by the omnipotence of Jahveh, says ‘By his breath the heavens are brightened; his hand has pierced the flying serpent (nâchâsh bârîach)’; and the prophet living in the Babylonian captivity addresses Jahveh in the following words (Is. LI. 9): ‘Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Jahveh! awake, as in the ancient days, in the generations of old! Art thou not it that didst kill the monster (rahabh), and wound the dragon (tannîn?)’ &c.[[80]] In these expressions we observe that prophets and poets employ the long outgrown and obsolete notions of the myth of the battle of the Sun against the flying serpent (Lightning) and against the recumbent or curved serpent (Rain)—the monsters which want to devour the Sun, but which the Sun shoots down with his arrows (Rays) or wounds with a volley of stones; or else of the myth of the battle of the Sun already set against the monster that lies in wait at the bottom of the sea to devour him (a myth which is also preserved in the story of Jonah), only that the monotheistic mind substituted Jahveh for the Sun. Many prophets frequently speak in a perfectly general way, without reference to a definite historical event, of a passage through the sea. This is by no means a reminiscence of the Passage of the Red Sea, as an event in the primeval history of the Hebrew people, unless a pointed reference is made to that; it is another application of an old mythical notion of the course taken by the Sun-hero after sunset through the sea, so as to shine again on the following morning on the opposite shore. Indeed, that Hebrew story of the Exodus itself, as we have indicated, is only a myth transformed into history by a process which we can follow, step by step, in the history of the evolution of Mythology. This becomes very clear when we examine the sequel of the above-quoted words of the anonymous Prophet of the Captivity (Is. LI. 10): ‘Art not thou it which dryeth the sea, the waters of the great deep; that maketh the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over?’ What is pictured in this verse is in the mind of the speaker an event of the same character as that referred to in the preceding verse—the killing of the Rahabh and the wounding of the Tannîn. The description of Canaan, too, as a land ‘flowing with milk and honey,’ points back to the myth of a sun-land; for the myths call the rays of the sun and moon ‘milk and honey,’ regarding the moon as a bee[[81]] and the sun as a cow. In [Excursus E] we shall speak of the mythological conception of rays of light as fluids. Palestine, which the writer wished to pourtray as possessed of every blessing, thus receives attributes which the myth gave to a place above the earth, whence the blessings of light streamed down to it. It is noteworthy that in the Çatapatha Brâhmaṇa the same mythic conception which is employed poetically in Hebrew meets us tinged already with an eschatological colour. This work (XI. 5. 6. 4) makes milk and honey flow in the abodes of the Blest.[[82]] We also see from this that the notion of a ‘poetical figure’ requires frequent limitation. Many apparently poetical figures have their origin in an ancient mythical conception. Not everything that has the look of a poetical or rhetorical figure is one. Who would doubt, for instance, on a superficial glance, that such a phrase as nâr al-ḥarb, ‘the fire of war,’ was a figure of poetry or rhetoric? Yet it is not; it is not derived from what only exists in the fancy of the speaker, but from something which has a concrete, objective existence. We learn this from the Arabic commentary on the proverb Nâr al-ḥarb asʿaru, ‘the fire of war is burning.’ The scholiast[[83]] says ‘When the ancient Arabs began a war, they used to light a fire, to serve as a beacon for those eager for the fight.’ It is also said (of the Jews): ‘As often as they light a fire for war, Allâh extinguishes it.’[[84]] Thus the fire of war of which the ancient Arabs spoke was only a material or natural one.
§ 7. f.) The Hebrew mythic tradition is not contained exclusively in the Old Testament. This canon, indeed, was very far from receiving all the remains of the old myths that were current among the people in an historical transformation. Much of it is contained in the tradition which was not incorporated with the canon, especially in the so-called Rabbinical Agâdâ, which contains many a treasure of as high an antiquity as the mythological sources which we have named within the canon. In the discovery of such elements in the Agâdâ circumspection and cautious criticism are necessary, because the valuable portion is only an excessively small fraction of the whole, and has to be picked out of a preponderating mass of very different character. Still we must acknowledge the Agâdâ as a source for the discovery of the old Hebrew myths. It has indeed already been employed for this purpose, though not always wisely. The learned Professor F.L.W. Schwartz has referred to this source,[[85]] and Julius Braun goes even too far in his mythological estimate of the Agâdâ, when he says without limitation,[[86]] ‘The Rabbinical stories are anything but arbitrary inventions; they are echoes of primeval memories only refused entrance into the Bible by the compilers of the canon. If Rabbinical erudition sometimes makes unfortunate attempts to confirm extrabiblical tradition by a Biblical quotation, and to prove its existence in Biblical times by imagined allusions, this is no proof that the whole tradition is only a speculation derived from misunderstood Bible-words.’ But Braun makes a very bad use of the Rabbinical tradition, and vies with the foolish writer Nork in taking from right and left without selection or judgment whatever he can find, not caring whether it is Veda or Bible, Homer or the Fathers, cuneiform inscriptions or some obscure allegorical writer.