It is to the Semitic race that God has been most liberal in his gift of inspiration. Gathering up and treasuring the old common inheritance of religion, and eliminating from it the accretions of superstition, the children of Abraham at one time stood alone, or almost alone, as adherents of a belief in one God the Creator. Their theology was added to from age to age by a succession of prophets, all working in one line of development, till it culminated in the appearance of Jesus Christ, and then proceeded to expand itself over the other races. Among them it has undergone two remarkable phases of retrograde development—the one in Mohammedanism, which carries it back to a resemblance to its own earlier patriarchal stage, the other in Roman and Greek ecclesiasticism, which have taken it back to the Levitical system, along with a strong color of paganism. Still its original documents survive, and retain their hold on large portions of the more enlightened Aryan nations, while through their means these documents have entered on a new career of conquest among the Semites and Turanians. They are, however, it must be admitted, among the Aryan races of Europe, growing in a somewhat uncongenial soil; partly because of the materialistic organization of these races, and partly because of the abundant remains of heathenism which still linger among them; and it is possible that they may not realize their full triumphs over humanity till the Semitic races return to the position of Abraham, and erect again in the world the standard of monotheistic faith, under the auspices of a purified Christianity.
It follows from this hasty survey that it is the Semitic solution of the question of origins, as contained in the Hebrew Scriptures, that mainly concerns us; and in the first place we must consider the foundation and historical development of this solution, as many misconceptions prevail on these points. We may discuss these subjects under the heads of the Abrahamic Genesis and the Mosaic Genesis, and may in a subsequent chapter consider the results of these in the Genesis of the later Scripture writers.
THE ABRAHAMIC GENESIS.
It has been a favorite theory with some learned men that the earlier parts of the book of Genesis existed as ancient documents even in the time of Moses, and were incorporated by him in his work, and attempts have been made to separate, on various grounds, the older from the newer portions. Until lately, however, these attempts have been altogether conjectural and destitute of any positive basis of archæological fact. A new and interesting aspect has been given to them by the recent readings of the inscriptions on clay tablets found at Nineveh, and to which especial attention has been given by the late Mr. G. Smith, of the Archæological Department of the British Museum.
Assurbanipal, king of Assyria, one of the kings known to the Greeks by the name of Sardanapalus, reigned at Nineveh about B.C. 673. He was a grandson of the Biblical Sennacherib, and son of Esarhaddon, and it seems that he had inherited from his fathers a library of Chaldean and Assyrian literature, written not on perishable paper or parchment, but on tablets of clay, and containing much ancient lore of the nations inhabiting the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates. Assurbanipal, living when the Assyrian empire had attained to the acme of its greatness, had leisure to become a greater patron of learning than any preceding king. His scribes ransacked the record chambers of the oldest temples in the world; and Babel, Erech, Accad, and Ur had to yield up their treasures of history and theology to diligent copyists, who transcribed them in beautiful arrow-head characters on new clay tablets, and deposited them in the library of the great king. It would appear that, at the same time, these documents were edited, archaic forms of expression translated, and lacunæ caused by decay or fracture repaired. They were also inscribed with legends stating the sources whence they had been derived.
The empire of Assyria went down in blood, and its palaces were destroyed with fire, but the imperishable clay tablets which had formed the treasure of their libraries remained, more or less broken it is true, among the ruins. Exhumed by Layard and Smith, they are now among the collections of the British Museum, and their decipherment is throwing a new and strange light on the cosmogony and religions of the early East. Though the date of the writing of these tablets is comparatively modern, being about the time of the later kings of Judah, the original records from which they were transcribed profess to have been very ancient—some of them about 1600 years before the time of Assurbanipal, so that they go back to a time anterior to that of the early Hebrew patriarchs. Their genuineness has been endorsed, in one case, by the discovery by Mr. Loftus, in the city of Senkereh, of an apparent original, bearing date about 1600 years before Christ, and other inscriptions of equal or greater antiquity have been found in the ruins of Ur, on the Euphrates. Nor does there seem any reason to doubt that the scribes of Assurbanipal faithfully transcribed the oldest records extant in their time. Their care and diligence are also shown by the fact that where different versions of these records existed in different cities, they have made copies of these variant manuscripts, instead of attempting to reduce them to one text. The subjects treated of in the Nineveh tablets are very various, but those that concern our present purpose are the documents relating to the creation, the fall of man, and the deluge, of which considerable portions have been recovered, and have been translated by Mr. Smith.
These documents carry us back to a time when the Turanian religions had not yet been separated from the Semitic. The early Chaldeans, termed Cushites in the Bible, and who under Nimrod seem to have established the first empire in that region, are now known to have been Turanian; and among them apparently arose at a very early period a literature and a mythology. The Chaldeans were politically subjugated by the Semitic Assyrians, but they retained their religious predominance; and until a comparatively late period existed as a learned and priestly caste. To these primitive Chasdim were undoubtedly due the creation legends collected by the scribes of Assurbanipal. They were obtained in the old Chaldean cities, in the temples under the guardianship of Chaldean priests; and their date carries them back to a time anterior to the Assyrian conquest, and in which Chaldean kings still reigned. Here, then, we have an important connecting link between the cosmogonies of the Turanian and Semitic races; and leaving out of sight for the present the legends of the deluge and other matters allied to it, we may inquire as to the nature and contents of the Assyrian and Chaldean record of creation.
The Assyrian Genesis is similar in order and arrangement to that in our own Bible, and gives the same general order of the creative work. Its days, however, of creation, as indeed there is good internal evidence to prove those of Moses also are, seem to be periods or ages. It treats of the creation of gods, as well as of the universe, and thus introduces a polytheistic system; and it seems to recognize, like the Avesta, a primitive principle of evil, presiding over chaos, and subsequently introducing evil among men. These points may be illustrated by an extract from Mr. Smith's translation. It relates to the earlier part of the work:
"When above were not raised the heavens,
And below on the earth a plant had not grown up
The deep also had not broken up its boundaries
Chaos (or water) Tiamat (the sea or abyss) was the producing mother
of them all
These waters at the beginning were ordained
But a tree had not grown a flower had not unfolded
When the gods had not sprung up any one of them
A plant had not grown and order did not exist
Were made also the great gods
The gods Lahma and Lahamu they caused to come * * *
And they grew * * *
The gods Sar and Kisar were made
A course of days and a long time passed
The god Anu * * *
The gods Sar and * * *"
Here the first existences are Chaos (Mummu, or confusion) and Tiamat, which is the Thalatth of Berosus, representing the sea or primitive abyss, but also recognized as a female deity or first mother. Then we have Lahma and Lahamu, which represent power or motion in nature, and are the equivalents of the Divine Spirit moving on the face of the waters in our Genesis. Next we have the production of Sar or Iloar and Kisar, representing the expanse or firmament. Sar is supposed to be the god Assur of the Assyrians, a great weather god, and after whom their nation and its founder were named. The next process is the creation of the heaven and the earth, represented by Anu and Anatu. Anu was always one of the greater gods, and was identified with the higher or starry heavens. In succeeding tablets to this we find Bel or Belus introduced, as the agent in the creation of animals and of men; and he is the true Demiurgus or Mediator of the Assyrian system. Next we have the introduction of Hea or Saturn, who is the equivalent of the Biblical Adam, and of Ishtar, mother of men, who is the Isba or Eve of Genesis. The rest of this legend evidently relates to deified men, among whom are Merodach, Nebo, and other heroes.