[1] Bath Kol,—“daughter of a voice.”
[2] This may, however, have been flotsam from the Orient. Mahanshadha, a sort of Solomon in Buddhist tales (see ante chap. ii), had a wonderful parrot, Charaka, which he employed as a spy. It revealed to him the plot to poison King Janaka, whose chief Minister he was. (Tibetan Tales, p. 168.)
[3] M. Didron (Christian Iconography, Bohn’s ed., i., p. 464) mentions a picture of the thirteenth century in which the dove moving over the face of the waters (Gen. 1) is black, God not having yet created light. It may be, however, that the mediæval idea was that the Holy Ghost, as a heavenly spy, was supposed to assume the color of the night in order to detect the deeds done in darkness without itself being seen. In later centuries this dark dove was shown at the ear of magicians and idols, the inspirer of prophets and saints being the white dove.
[4] The amorous relations between Ahuramazda, the deity, and Armaîti, genius of the earth, are referred to ante Chap. VIII., in a passage from West’s Palahvi Texts. In the Vendîdâd she is sometimes called his daughter.
[5] Cf. Gospel of Peter: “They behold three men coming out of the tomb, and the two supporting the one, and the cross following them, and the heads of the two reached to the heavens, and that of him who was being led went above the heavens.”
[6] Invoke, O Zoroaster, the powerful Spirit (Wind) formed by Mazda (Light) and Spenta Armaîti (earth-mother), the fair daughter of Ahuramazda. Invoke, O Zoroaster, my Fravashi (deathless past), who am Ahuramazda, greatest, fairest, most solid, most intelligent, best shapen, highest in purity, whose soul is the holy Word.
“Invoke Mithra (descending light), the lord of wide pastures, a god armed with beautiful weapons, with the most glorious of all weapons, with the most fiend-smiting of all weapons.
“Invoke the most holy glorious word.”—Zendavesta. (Vend. Farg. xix. 2)