The Akitu festival brought worshippers from all parts of Babylonia and Assyria to the capitol. Kings and subjects alike paid their devotions to Marduk. The former approached the divine presence directly, and, seizing hold of the hands of Marduk's statue, were admitted into a kind of covenant with the god. The ceremony became the formal rite of royal installation in Babylonia. "To seize the hands of Bel" was equivalent to legitimizing one's claim to the throne of Babylonia, and the chroniclers of the south consistently decline to recognize Assyrian rulers as kings of Babylonia until they have come to Babylon and "seized the hands of Bel."[1548] That this ceremony was annually performed by the kings of Babylonia after the union of the southern states is quite certain. It marked a renewal of the pledge between the king and his god. The Assyrian kings, however, contented themselves with a single visit. Of Tiglathpileser II.[1549] and Sargon,[1550] we know that they came to Babylonia for the purpose of performing the old ceremony; and others did the same.
The eighth and eleventh days of the festival month were invested with special sanctity. On these days all the gods were brought together in the "chamber of fates" of Marduk's temple. In symbolical imitation of the assembly of the gods in Ubshu-kenna,[1551] Marduk sits on his throne and the gods are represented as standing in humble submission before him, while he decrees the fates of mankind for the coming year. The Zagmuku festival in its developed form has striking points of resemblance to the Jewish New Year's Day. On this day, according to the popular Jewish tradition, God sits in judgment with a book before Him in which He inscribes the fate of mankind. Nine days of probation are allowed, and on the tenth day—the Day of Atonement—the fates are sealed. The Jewish New Year is known as Rôsh-hash-shanâ,[1552] which is an exact equivalent of the Babylonian rêsh shatti (or zag-muku). A difference, however, between the Babylonian and the Jewish festival is that the latter is celebrated in the seventh month. It is not correct, therefore, to assume that the Hebrews borrowed their Rôsh-hash-shanâ from the Babylonians. Even after they adopted the Babylonian calendar,[1553] they continued to regard the seventh month—the harvest month—as the beginning of the year. That among the Babylonians the seventh month also had a sacred character may be concluded from the meaning of the ideographs with which the name is written.[1554] The question may, therefore, be raised whether at an earlier period and in some religious center—Nippur, Sippar, or perhaps Ur—the seventh month may not have been celebrated as the Zagmuku. At all events, we must for the present assume that the Hebrews developed their New Year's Day, which they may have originally received from Babylonia, independently of Marduk's festival, though, since the Rôsh-hash-shanâ does not come into prominence among the Jews until the period of the so-called Babylonian exile, the possibility of a direct Babylonian influence in the later conceptions connected with the day cannot be denied.[1555]
Of the other festivals of the Babylonians and Assyrians but few details are known. Several references have already been made to the Tammuz festival.[1556] Originally a solar festival, celebrated in the fourth month at the approach of the summer solstice, it became through the association of ideas suggested by the mourning of Ishtar for her lost consort Tammuz a kind of 'All Souls' Day,' on which the people remembered their dead. Dirges were sung by the wailing women to the accompaniment of musical instruments; offerings were made to the dead, and it is plausible to assume that visits were paid to the graves. The mourning was followed by a festival of rejoicing, symbolizing the return of the solar-god. The Tammuz festival appears to have had a strong hold upon the masses, by reason of the popularity of the Tammuz myth; nor was it limited to the Babylonians. Among the Phoenicians the cult of Tammuz, known by his title Adôn (whence Adonis), was maintained to a late period, and the Hebrews, likewise, as late as the days of Ezekiel,[1557] commemorated with rites of mourning the lost Tammuz. The calendar of the Jewish Church still marks the 17th day of Tammuz as a fast, and Houtsma has shown[1558] that the association of the day with the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans represents merely the attempt to give an ancient festival a worthier interpretation. The day was originally connected with the Tammuz cult. Eerdmans[1559] has recently endeavored to show that the festival of Hosein, celebrated by the Shiitic sect of Mohammedanism in memory of the tragic death of the son of Ali, is in reality a survival of the Babylonian-Phoenician Tammuz festival. The spread of the Tammuz-Adonis myth and cult to the Greeks[1560] is but another indication of the popularity of this ancient Semitic festival.
The old Zagmuku festival in honor of Bau and the Tammuz festival, celebrated in spring and summer, respectively, are also closely associated with agricultural life. The spring as the seedtime is, as we have seen, a natural period for beginning the calculation of the New Year, while a first harvest of the wheat and barley is reaped in Babylonia at the time of the summer solstice. We should expect, therefore, to find a third festival in the fall, at the close of the harvest and just before the winter rains set in. The seventh month—Tishri—was a sacred month among the ancient Hebrews as well as among the Babylonians, but up to the present no distinct traces of a festival period in Tishri have been found in Babylonian texts. We must content ourselves, therefore, with the conjecture, above thrown out, that an Akitu was originally celebrated in this month at some ancient religious center of the Euphrates Valley. Further publications of cuneiform texts may throw light upon this point. The unpublished material in European and American museums harbors many surprises.
In Ashurbanabal's annals[1561] there is an interesting reference to a festival celebrated in honor of the goddess Gula, the goddess of healing,[1562] on the twelfth day of Iyyar, the second month. The festival is described ideographically as Si-gar,[1563] but from the fact that the same ideographs are used elsewhere to describe a day sacred to Sin and Shamash,[1564] it would appear that Si-gar is not a specific appellation, but a general name again for festival. This month Iyyar and this particular day, as a "favorable one," is chosen by Ashurbanabal for his installation as king of Assyria. The same month is selected for a formal pilgrimage to Babylonia for the purpose of restoring to E-Sagila a statue of Marduk that a previous Assyrian king had taken from its place,[1565] and Lehmann is probably correct in concluding[1566] that this month of Iyyar was a particularly sacred one in Assyria, emphasized with intent perhaps by the kings, as an offset against the sacredness of Nisan in Babylonia.
Festivals in honor of Ninib were celebrated in Calah in the months of Elul—the sixth month—and Shabat—the eleventh month.[1567] The sixth month, it will be recalled, is sacred to Ishtar.[1568] Ninib being a solar deity, his festival in Elul was evidently of a solar character. From Ashurbanabal,[1569] again, we learn that the 25th day of Siwan—the third month—was sacred to Belit of Babylon, and on that day a procession took place in her honor. The Belit meant is Sarpanitum in her original and independent rôle as a goddess of fertility. The statue of the goddess, carried about, presumably in her ship, formed the chief feature of the procession. Ashurbanabal chooses this "favorable" day as the one on which to break up camp in the course of one of his military expeditions. We would naturally expect to find a festival month devoted to the god Ashur in Assyria. This month was Elul—the sixth month.[1570] The choice of this month lends weight to the supposition that Ashur was originally a solar deity.[1571] The honors once paid to Ninib in Calah in this month could thus easily be transferred to the head of the Assyrian pantheon. Although in the calendar the sixth month is sacred to Ishtar, her festival was celebrated in the fifth month, known as Ab.[1572] This lack of correspondence between the calendar and the festivals is an indication of the greater antiquity of the latter.
In the great temple to Shamash at Sippar, there appear to have been several days that were marked by religious observances. Nabubaliddin[1573] (ninth century) emphasizes that he presented rich garments to the temple for use on six days of the year,—the 7th day of Nisan (first month), 10th of Iyyar (second month), 3rd of Elul (sixth month), 7th of Tishri (seventh month), 15th of Arakh-shamna (or Marcheshwan, eighth month), and the 15th of Adar (twelfth month). These garments are given to Shamash, to his consort Malkatu, and to Bunene.[1574] Since from a passage in a Babylonian chronicle[1575] it appears that it was customary for Shamash on his festival to leave his temple, we may conclude that the garments were put on Shamash and his associates, for the solemn procession on the six days in question.
The festivals in Nisan and Elul are distinctly of a solar character. The choice of two other months immediately following Nisan and Elul cannot be accidental. The interval of thirty-three days between the Nisan and Iyyar festivals and thirty-four days between the Elul and Tishri festivals may represent a sacred period.[1576] Tishri, moreover, as has been pointed out, is a sacred month in a peculiar sense. Marcheshwan, it may be well to bear in mind, is sacred to Marduk,—a solar deity,—while the 15th of Adar, curiously enough, is an old solar festival that, modified and connected with historical reminiscences, became popular among the Jews of Persia and Babylonia during the Persian supremacy in the Semitic Orient, and survives to this day under the name of the Purim festival.[1577] At all events, the six days may be safely regarded as connected in some way, direct or indirect, with solar worships, and it is natural to find that in so prominent a center of sun-worship as Sippar, all the solar festivals were properly and solemnly observed.
It is disappointing that up to the present so little has been ascertained of the details of the moon-cult—the great rival to Shamash worship—in the old cities of Ur and Harran. In the Babylonian calendar, the third month—Siwan—is sacred to Sin, but since, as we have found, the festivals in honor of the gods do not always correspond to the assignment of the months, we cannot be certain that in this month a special festival in honor of Sin was observed. Lastly, besides the regular and fixed festivals, the kings, and more especially the Assyrian rulers, did not hesitate to institute special festivals in memory of some event that contributed to their glory. Agumkakrimi[1578] instituted a festival upon restoring the statues of Marduk and Sarpanitum to Babylon, and Sargon does the same upon restoring the palace at Calah.[1579] Dedications of temples and palaces were in general marked by festivities, and so when the kings return in triumph from their wars, laden with spoils and captives, popular rejoicings were instituted. But such festivals were merely sporadic, and, while marked by religious ceremonies, were chiefly occasions of general jollification combined with homage to the rulers. Such a festival was not called an isinnu, but a nigatu,[1580]—a 'merrymaking.'[1581] More directly connected with the cult was a ceremony observed in Assyria upon the installation of an official, known as the limmu, who during his year of service enjoyed the privilege of having official documents dated with his name.[1582] The ceremony involved a running[1583] of some kind, and reminds one of the running between the two hills Marwa and Safa in Mekka that forms part of the religious observances in connection with a visit to the Kaaba.[1584] The name of the ceremony appears to have been puru (or buru). To connect this word with the Jewish festival of Purim, as Sayce proposes,[1585] is wholly unwarranted. The character of the Puru ceremony points to its being an ancient custom, the real significance of which in the course of time became lost. Fast days instituted for periods of distress might also be added to the cult, but these, too, like the special festivals, were not permanent institutions. For such occasions many of the penitential psalms which were discussed in a previous chapter[1586] were composed. To conciliate angered gods whose temples had been devastated in days of turmoil, atonement and purification rites were observed. So Ashurbanabal[1587] upon his conquest of Babylonian cities tells us that he pacified the gods of the south with penitential psalms and purified the temples by magic rites; and Nabubaliddin,[1588] incidental to his restoration of the Shamash cult at Sippar, refers to an interesting ceremony of purification, which consisted in his taking water and washing his mouth according to the purification ritual of Ea and Marduk,[1589] preliminary to bringing sacrifices to Shamash in his shrine. Sippar had been overrun by nomads,[1590] the temple had been defiled, and before sacrifices could again be offered, the sacred edifice and sacred quarter had to be purified. The king's action was a symbol of this purification. Many such customs must have been in vogue in Babylonia and Assyria. Some—and these were the oldest—were of popular origin. On the seal cylinders there is frequently represented a pole or a conventionalized form of a tree, generally in connection with a design illustrating the worship of a deity.[1591] This symbol is clearly a survival of some tree worship[1592] that was once popular. The comparison with the ashera or pole worship among Phoenicians and Hebrews[1593] is fully justified, and is a proof of the great antiquity of the symbol, which, without becoming a formal part of the later cult, retained in some measure a hold upon the popular mind. Other symbols and customs were introduced under the influence of the doctrines unfolded in the schools of thought in the various intellectual centers, and as an expression of the teachings of the priests. The cult of Babylonia, even more so than the literature, is a compound of these two factors,—popular beliefs and the theological elaboration and systematization of these beliefs. In the course of this elaboration, many new ideas and new rites were introduced. The official cult passed in some important particulars far beyond popular practices.