HAVING seen that the Beard is a natural feature of the male face, and that the Creator intended it for distinction, protection, and ornament, let us turn lightly over the pages of history and examine the estimation in which it has been held at various times among the leading people, ancient and modern.
The first nation which suggests itself is the Egyptian, and very peculiar forms of Beard were assigned by them on their monuments to their gods, kings, and common people. That of the gods is curled and the length of the oval of the face: that of the kings is shaped like an Egyptian doorway, and three fourths of the same standard: of which the people’s is one fourth and nearly square. This appendage seems from the appearance of an attaching band to have been frequently artificial, and probably the Egyptians, who, as you may see by the wig in the British Museum, wore false hair, also wore false Beards. Some have supposed the forms alluded to, to be mere symbols of the male sex on the monuments; but this notion is disproved by male persons being represented without them. That they were occasionally so used, however, is clear from the kingly Beard on that symbol of royalty the Sphynx.
The priests of this ancient nation are stated to have removed every hair from the body thrice a week; and they ultimately compelled the people to shave both their heads and faces; and all slaves and servants, though foreigners, were obliged to do the same. That this arose from some superstitious notion of cleanliness, is confirmed by the remark of Herodotus, “that no Egyptian of either sex, would on any account kiss the lips of a bearded Greek, or make use of his knife, spit, or cauldron, or taste the meat of an animal which had been slaughtered by his hand.”
In times of mourning, however, the Egyptians allowed the hair of the head and Beard to grow in token of grief.
Jews.
Such was the practice of the Egyptians; and it is highly important to take the Jews next, because at the period of our first knowledge of them as a people, they appear in bondage to the former nation; and it is now generally believed that most of the usages established by Moses had more or less reference to Egyptian customs, from which he was desirous of weaning them. As might be expected from the inspired Lawgiver, whose sublime books start with the grand assertion, that man was made “in the express image of God,” any attempt to alter the natural features of the “human face divine,” was denounced and emphatically interdicted. Twice is the commandment issued—first to the whole people, “thou shalt not mar the corners of thy Beard,” in other words, thou shalt not alter the form thereof, which I thy God have appointed! Then to the Priests, with the addition, that they should not make baldness upon their heads. It is of the utmost consequence to recall the superstitious practice of the Egyptian Priests, and to remember that Moses issued this command to the Aaronites, fresh from Egypt, because it most convincingly shews that the practice of shaving, even when resorted to with the view of pleasing the Deity, by an extreme degree of external purity, in approaching His mysterious presence, was directly and most absolutely forbidden. It is as if God had said, “What art thou, O man! who thinkest in thy vain imagination that I, thy Creator, knew not how to fashion thee! and blasphemously supposest that thou canst please me, by superstitiously sacrificing what I, in my Almighty wisdom, had endowed thee with, for protection and ornament!” And, as if to mark the distinction more strongly, Moses enjoined in the strictest manner every ordinary and natural method of purifying the person.
It cannot but be instructive to note, that thus on the very threshold of history, we have two customs so opposite brought into contrast—the one strongly condemned, the other most awfully sanctioned. And it is the more necessary to mark this, because there are many religious persons who have by custom acquired the Egyptian notion, and forgotten its emphatic condemnation. There are many who, though told that certain diseases to which the more active of the clergy are specially liable, might be prevented and may be cured, by simply wearing the Beard, will still insist upon their ministers paying the penalty invariably attaching to a violation of God’s laws, because their prejudices lead them to fancy a smooth face rather than a manly one.
As further confirmation of our idea that the object of this law of Moses was to prevent any of the natural features from being materially altered—he objected not to trimming the Beard, which was a common Jewish practice—is to be found in the first verse of the 14th chapter of Deuteronomy, where the people are commanded not to shave their eyebrows; which was a customary mark of grief among some bearded nations. The Jews too, unlike the Persians and others, instead of shaving the Beard in time of mourning—though in the violence of oriental grief they sometimes plucked it—usually left it merely untrimmed or veiled, till the days of mourning were passed.
You all remember the fearful vengeance David took when his ambassadors were disgraced by shaving their Beards.