In this article Blavatsky explains how occurs this
phenomenon where the statues seem to come to life and start talking.
To whatsoever cause it may be due
matters little, but the word fetish is given in the dictionaries the restricted
sense of “an object selected temporarily for worship,” “a small idol used by
the African savages,” etc., etc.
In his “Des Cultes qui ont précédé et amené l’idolatrie,” Dulaure defines
Fetishism as “the adoration of an object considered by the ignorant and the
weak-minded as the receptacle or the habitation of a god or genius.”
Now all this is extremely erudite
and profound, no doubt; but it lacks the merit of being either true or correct.
Fetish may be an idol among the black men of Africa, according to Webster; and
there are weak-minded and ignorant people certainly who are fetish worshippers.
Yet the theory that certain objects —statues, images, and amulets for example— serve
as a temporary or even constant habitation to a “god,” “genius” or spirit
simply, has been shared by some of the most intellectual men known to history.
It was not originated by the
ignorant and weak-minded, since the majority of the world’s sages and
philosophers, from credulous Pythagoras down to sceptical Lucian, believed in
such a thing in antiquity; as in our highly civilized, cultured and learned
century several hundred millions of Christians still believe in it, whether the
above definitions be correct or the one we shall now give.
The administration of the Sacrament,
the mystery of Transubstantiation “in the supposed conversion of the bread and
wine of the Eucharist into the body and blood of Christ,” would render the bread
and wine and the communion cup along with them fetishes — no less than the tree
or rag or stone of the savage African. Every miracle-working image, tomb and
statue of a Saint, Virgin or Christ, in the Roman Catholic and Greek Churches,
have thus to be regarded as fetishes; because, whether the miracle is supposed
to be wrought by God or an angel, by Christ or a saint, those images or statues
do become —if the miracle be claimed as genuine— “the receptacle or dwelling”
for a longer or shorter time of God or an “angel of God.”
It is only in the “Dictionnaire des Religions” (article on
“Fétichisme”) (2) that a pretty correct definition
may be found: “The word fetish was derived from the Portuguese word fetisso, ‘enchanted,’ ‘bewitched’ or
‘charmed’; whence fatum, ‘destiny,’ fatua, ‘fairy’,” etc.
Fetish, moreover, was and still
ought to be identical with “idol”; and as the author of “The Teraphim of Idolatry” says:
« Fetishism is the adoration of any
object, whether inorganic or living, large or of minute proportions, in which,
or, in connection with which, any ‘spirit’ (good or bad in short — an invisible
intelligent power) has manifested its presence. » (3)
Having collected for my “Secret Doctrine” a number of notes upon
this subject, I may now give some of them à propos of the latest theosophical
novel, “A Fallen Idol,” (4) and thus show that work of fiction
based on some very occult truths of Esoteric Philosophy.
The images of all the gods of
antiquity, from the earliest Aryans down to the latest Semites —the Jews— were
all idols and fetishes, whether called Teraphim, Urim and Thummim, Kabeiri, or
cherubs, or the gods Lares. If, speaking of the teraphim — a word that Grotius
translates as “angels,” an etymology authorized by Cornelius, who says that
they “were the symbols of angelic presence”— the Christians are allowed to call
them “the mediums through which divine presence was manifested,” why not apply
the same to the idols of the “heathen”?
I am perfectly alive to the fact
that the modern man of science, like the average sceptic, believes no more in
an “animated” image of the Roman Church than he does in the “animated” fetish
of a savage. But there is no question, at present, of belief or disbelief. It
is simply the evidence of antiquity embracing a period of several thousands of
years, as against the denial of the XIXth century — the century of Spiritualism
and Spiritism, of Theosophy and Occultism, of Charcot and his hypnotism, of
psychic “suggestion,” and of unrecognized BLACK MAGIC all round.
Let us Europeans honour the religion
of our forefathers, by questioning it on its beliefs and their origin, before
placing on its defence pagan antiquity and its grand philosophy; where do we
find in Western sacred literature, so-called, the first mention of idols and fetishes?
In chapter xxxi (et seq.) of
Genesis, in Ur of the Chaldees in Mesopotamia, wherein the ancestors of
Abraham, Serug and Terah, worshipped little idols in clay which they called
their gods; and where also, in Haran, Rachel stole the images (teraphim) of her father Laban. Jacob may
have forbidden the worship of those gods, yet one finds 325 years after that
prohibition, the Mosaic Jews adoring “the gods of the Amorites” all the same
(Joshua, xxiv, 14-15).
The teraphim-gods of Laban exist to
this day among certain tribes of Mussulmans on Persian territory. They are
small statuettes of tutelary genii, or gods, which are consulted on every
occasion. The Rabbis explain that Rachel had no other motive for stealing her
father’s gods than that of preventing his learning from them the direction she
and her husband Jacob had taken, lest he should prevent them from leaving his
home once more. Thus, it was not piety, or the fear of the Lord God of Israel,
but simply a dread of the indiscretion of the gods that made her secure them.
Moreover, her mandrakes were only another kind of sortilegious and magical
implements.
Now what is the opinion of various
classical and even sacred writers on these idols, which Hermes Trismegistus
calls “statues foreseeing futurity” (Asclepius)? (5)
Philo of Biblos shows that the Jews
consulted demons like the Amorites, especially through small statues made of
gold, shaped as nymphs which, questioned at any hour, would instruct them what
the querists had to do and what to avoid (Antiquities). (6)
In “Moreh Nebhuchim” (lib. III) it
is said that nothing resembled more those portative and preserving gods of the
pagans (dii portatiles vel Averrunci)
than those tutelary gods of` the Jews.
They were veritable phylacteries or animated
talismans, the simulacra spirantia of Apuleius (Book xi), whose answers, given
in the temple of the goddess of Syria, were heard by Lucian personally, and
repeated by him. Kircher (the Jesuit Father) shows also that the teraphim
looked, in quite an extraordinary way, like the pagan Serapises of Egypt; and
Cedrenus seems to corroborate that statement of Kircher (in his “Oedipus
Aegyptiacus,” Vol. III, p. 474-75) by showing that the t and the s (like the
Sanskrit s and Zend h) were convertible letters, the Seraphim (or Serapis) and
the teraphim, being absolute synonyms. (7)
As to the use of these idols,
Maimonides tells us (“Moreh Nebhuchim,” lib. III, chap. xxix) that these gods
or images passed for being endowed with the prophetic gift, and as being able
to tell the people in whose possession they were “all that was useful and
salutary for them.”
All these images, we are told, had
the form of a baby or small child, others were only occasionally much larger.
They were statues or regular idols in the human shape. The Chaldeans exposed
them to the beams of certain planets for the latter to imbue them with their
virtues and potency. These were for purposes of astro-magic; the regular
teraphim for those of necromancy and sorcery, in most cases. The spirits of the
dead (elementaries) were attached to them by magic art, and they were used for
various sinful purposes.
Ugolino (8) puts in the mouth of the sage
Gamaliel, St. Paul’s master (or guru), the following words, which he quotes, he
says, from his “Capito,” chap. xxxvi:
« They (the possessors of such
necromantic teraphim) killed a newborn baby, cut off its head, and placed under
its tongue, salted and oiled, a little gold lamina in which the name of an evil
spirit was perforated; then, after suspending that head on the wall of their
chamber, they lighted lamps before it, and prostrated on the ground, they
conversed with it. » (9)
(“Thesaur,” Vol. XXIII, p. 475.
The learned Marquis de Mirville
believes that it was just such ex-human fetishes that were meant by
Philostratus, who gives a number of instances of the same. He says:
« There was the head of Orpheus which
spoke to Cyrus, and the head of a priest-sacrificer from the temple of Jupiter
Hoplosmios, in Caria, which, when severed from its body, revealed, as Aristotle
narrates, the name of its murderer, one called Ceucidas; and the head of one
Publius Capitanus, which, according to Trallianus, at the moment of the victory
won by Acilius Glabrio, the Roman Consul, over Antiochus, King of Asia,
predicted to the Romans the great misfortunes that would soon befall them. »
(“Pneumatologie des Esprits,” Vol. III,
29; Mémoire to the Academy p. 252)
Diodorus Siculus tells:
« The world how such idols were
fabricated for magical purposes in days of old. Semelê, the daughter of Cadmus,
having in consequence of a fright given premature birth to a child of seven
months, Cadmus, in order to follow the custom of his country and to give it
(the babe) a supermundane origin which would make it live after death, enclosed
its body within a gold statue, and made of it an idol for which a special cult
and rites were established. »
(“Historical Library,” lib. I, 23,
4-5.) (10)
As Fréret, in his article in the “Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions,”
Vol. XXIII, p.
247, pointedly remarks, when commenting upon the above passage:
« A singular thing, deserving still
more attention, is that the said consecration of Semelê’s baby by Cadmus, which
the Orphics show as having been the custom of Cadmus’ ancestors — is precisely
the ceremony described by the Rabbis, as cited by Seldenus, with regard to the
teraphim or household gods of the Syrians and the Phoenicians. There is little
probability, however, that the Jews should have been acquainted with the
Orphics. »
Thus, there is every reason to
believe that the numerous drawings in Father Kircher’s “Oedipus,” little figures and heads with metallic laminae protruding
from under their tongues, which hang entirely out of the heads’ mouths, are
real and genuine teraphims — as shown by de Mirville. Then again in Le Blanc’s “Religions” (Vol. III, p. 277), speaking
of the Phoenician teraphim, the author compares them to the Greco-Phrygian
palladium, which contained human relics.
“All the mysteries of the
apotheosis, of orgies, sacrifices and magic, were applied to such heads. A
child young enough to have his innocent soul still united with the Anima Mundi —the
Mundane Soul— was killed,” he says; “his head was embalmed and its soul was
fixed in it, as it is averred, by the power of magic and enchantments.” After
which followed the usual process, the gold lamina, etc., etc. (11)
Now this is terrible BLACK MAGIC, we
say; and none but the dugpas of old, the villainous sorcerers of antiquity,
used it. In the Middle Ages only several Roman Catholic priests are known to
have resorted to it; among others the apostate Jacobin priest in the service of
Queen Catherine of Medici, that faithful daughter of the Church of Rome and the
author of the “St. Bartholomew Massacre.” The story is given by Bodin, in his
famous work on Sorcery, “De la
Démonomanie des Sorciers” (Paris, 1587); and it is quoted in “Isis Unveiled” (Vol. II, p. 55-56).
Pope Sylvester II was publicly
accused by Cardinal Benno of sorcery, on account of his “Brazen Oracular Head.”
These heads and other talking statues, trophies of the magical skill of monks
and bishops, were fac-similes of the animated gods of the ancient temples.
Benedict IX, John XX, and VIth and VIIth Popes Gregory are all known in history
as sorcerers and magicians. Notwithstanding such an array of facts to show that
the Latin Church has despoiled the ancient Jews of all —aye, even of their
knowledge of black art inclusively— one of their advocates of modern times,
namely, the Marquis de Mirville, is not ashamed to publish against the modern
Jews, the most terrible and foul of accusations!
In his violent polemics with the
French symbologists, who try to find a philosophical explanation for ancient
Bible customs and rites, he says:
« We pass over the symbolic
significations that are sought for to explain all such customs of the
idolatrous Jews (their human teraphim and severed baby-heads), because we do
not believe in them (such explanations) at all. But we do believe, for one,
that ‘the head’ consulted by the Scandinavian Odin in every difficult affair
was a teraphim of the same (magic) class. And that in which we believe still
more is, that all those mysterious disappearances and abductions of small (Christian)
children, practised at all times and even in our own day by the Jews — are the
direct consequences of those ancient and barbarous necromantic practices ...
Let the reader remember the incident of Demas and Father Thomas. »
(“Pneumatologie des Esprits, ” Vol. III, p. 254.)
Quite clear and unmistakable this.
The unfortunate, despoiled Israelites are plainly charged with abducting
Christian children to behead and make oracular heads with them, for purposes of
sorcery!
Where will bigotry and intolerance
with their odium theologicum land
next, I wonder?
On the contrary, it seems quite
evident that it is just in consequence of such terrible malpractices of
Occultism that Moses and the early ancestors of the Jews were so strict in
carrying out the severe prohibition against graven images, statues and
likenesses in any shape, of either “gods” or living men. This same reason was
at the bottom of the like prohibition by Mohammed and enforced by all the
Mussulman prophets. For the likeness of any person, in whatever form and mode,
of whatever material, may be turned into a deadly weapon against the original
by a really learned practitioner of the black art. Legal authorities during the
Middle Ages, and even some of 200 years ago, were not wrong in putting to death
those in whose possession small wax figures of their enemies were found, for it
was murder contemplated, pure and simple.
« Thou shalt not draw the vital
spirits of thy enemy, or of any person into his simulacrum,” for “this is a
heinous crime against nature. (And again) Any object into which the fiat of a
spirit has been drawn is dangerous, and must not be left in the hands of the
ignorant ... An expert (in magic) has to be called to purify it. »
(Pract. Laws of Occult Science, Book
V, Coptic copy.)
In a kind of “Manual” of Elementary
Occultism, it is said: “To make a bewitched object (fetish) harmless, its parts
have to be reduced to atoms (broken), and the whole buried in damp soil” — (follow
instructions, unnecessary in a publication). (12)
That which is called “vital spirits”
is the astral body. “Souls, whether united or separated from their bodies, have
a corporeal substance inherent to their nature,” says St. Hilarius
(Commentarius in Matthaeum, cap. v, 8). (13)
Now the astral body of a living
person, of one unlearned in occult sciences, may be forced (by an expert in
magic) to animate, or be drawn to, and then fixed within any object, especially
into anything made in his likeness, a portrait, a statue, a little figure in
wax, etc. And as whatever hits or affects the astral reacts by repercussion on
the physical body, it becomes logical and stands to reason that, by stabbing
the likeness in its vital parts —the heart, for instance— the original may be
sympathetically killed, without anyone being able to detect the cause of it.
The Egyptians, who separated man
(exoterically) into three divisions or groups—“mind body” (pure spirit, our 7th
and 6th prin.); the spectral soul (the 5th, 4th, and 3rd principles); and the
gross body (prana and sthula sarira), called forth in their theurgies and
evocations (for divine white magical purposes, as well as for those of the
black art) the “spectral soul,” or astral body, as we call it.
« It was not the soul itself that
was evoked, but its simulacrum that the Greeks called Eidôlon, and which was
the middle principle between soul and body. That doctrine came from the East,
the cradle of all learning. The Magi of Chaldea as well as all other followers
of Zoroaster, believed that it was not the divine soul alone (spirit) which
would participate in the glory of celestial light, but also the sensitive soul. »
(“Psellus, in Scholiis, in Orac.”) (14)
Translated into our Theosophical
phraseology, the above refers to Atma and Buddhi —the vehicle of spirit. The
Neo-Platonics, and even Origen— “call the astral body Augoeides and Astroeides,
i.e., one having the brilliancy of the stars”
(“Histoire et Traité des Sciences
Occultes, by Count de Résie,” Vol. II, p. 598) (15)
Generally speaking, the world’s
ignorance on the nature of the human phantom and vital principle, as on the
functions of all man’s principles, is deplorable. Whereas science denies them
all —an easy way of cutting the gordian knot of the difficulty— the churches
have evolved the fanciful dogma of one solitary principle, the Soul, and
neither of the two will stir from its respective preconceptions,
notwithstanding the evidence of all antiquity and its most intellectual
writers. Therefore, before the question can be argued with any hope of
lucidity, the following points have to be settled and studied by our
Theosophists — those, at any rate, who are interested in the subject:
1. The difference between a
physiological hallucination and a psychic or spiritual clairvoyance and
clairaudience.
2. Spirits, or the entities of certain
invisible beings —whether ghosts of once living men, angels, spirits, or
elementals— have they, or have they not, a natural though an ethereal and to us
invisible body? Are they united to, or can they assimilate some fluidic
substance that would help them to become visible to men?
3. Have they, or have they not, the
power of so becoming infused among the atoms of any object, whether it be a
statue (idol), a picture, or an amulet, as to impart to it their potency and
virtue, and even to animate it?
4. Is it in the power of any Adept,
Yogi or Initiate, to fix such entities, whether by White or Black magic, in
certain objects?
5. What are the various conditions
(save Nirvana and Avitchi) of good and bad men after death? etc., etc.
All this may be studied in the
literature of the ancient classics, and especially in Aryan literature.
Meanwhile, I have tried to explain and have given the collective and individual
opinions thereon of the great philosophers of antiquity in my “Secret Doctrine”. (16) I hope the book will now very soon
appear. Only, in order to counteract the effects of such humoristical works as
A Fallen Idol on weak-minded people, who see in it only a satire upon our
beliefs, I thought best to give here the testimony of the ages to the effect
that such post-mortem pranks as played by Mr. Anstey’s sham ascetic, who died a
sudden death, are of no rare occurrence in nature.
To conclude, the reader may be
reminded that if the astral body of man is no superstition founded on mere
hallucinations, but a reality in nature, then it becomes only logical that such
an eidôlon, whose individuality is all centred after death in his personal EGO —
should be attracted to the remains of the body that was his, during life; (17) and in the case the latter was
burnt and the ashes buried, that it should seek to prolong its existence
vicariously by either possessing itself of some living body (a medium’s), or,
by attaching itself to his own statue, picture, or some familiar object in the
house or locality that it inhabited.
The “vampire” theory can hardly be a
superstition altogether. Throughout all Europe, in Germany, Styria, Moldavia,
Servia, France and Russia, those bodies of the deceased who are believed to
have become vampires, have special exorcismal rites established for them by
their respective Churches. Both the Greek and Latin religions think it
beneficent to have such bodies dug out and transfixed to the earth by a pole of
aspen-tree wood.
However it may be, whether truth or
superstition, ancient philosophers and poets, classics and lay writers, have
believed as we do now, and that for several thousand years in history, that man
had within him his astral counterpart, which would appear by separating itself
or oozing out of the gross body, during life as well as after the death of the
latter. Till that moment the “spectral soul” was the vehicle of the divine soul
and the pure spirit. But, as soon as the flames had devoured the physical
envelope, the spiritual soul, separating itself from the simulacrum of man,
ascended to its new home of unalloyed bliss (Devachan or Swarga), while the
spectral eidôlon descended into the regions of Hades (limbus, purgatory, Kama
loka). “I have terminated my earthly career,” exclaims Dido, “my glorious spectre
[astral body], the IMAGE of my person, will now descend into the womb of the
earth.” (18)
« Vixi, et quem dederet cursum fortuna, peregi; et nunc magna mei sub
terras ibit imago. »
(Virgil, “Aeneid,” lib. IV, 653-54)
Sabinus and Servius Honoratus Maurus
(a learned commentator of Virgil of the VIth century) have taught, as shown by
Delrio, the demonologian (lib. ii, ch. xx and xxv, p. 116), (19) that man was composed, besides his
soul, of a shadow (umbra) and a body. The soul ascends to heaven, the body is pulverized,
and the shadow is plunged in Hades. ... This phantom —umbra seu simulacrum— is not a real body, they say: it is the
appearance of one, that no hand can touch, as it avoids contact like a breath.
Homer shows this same shadow in the phantom of Patroclus, who perished, killed
by Hector, and yet “Here he is — it is his face, his voice, his blood still
flowing from his wounds;” (See Iliad, XXIII, 65-68, and also Odyssey, XI, 468.)
The ancient Greeks and Latins had
two souls — anima bruta and anima divina, the first of which is in Homer the
animal soul, the image and the life of the body, and the second, the immortal,
and the divine.
As to our Kama-Loka, Ennius, says
Lucretius — “has traced the picture of the sacred regions in Acherusia, where
dwell neither our bodies nor our souls, but only our simulacra, whose pallidity
is dreadful to behold!” It is amongst those shades that divine Homer appeared
to him, shedding bitter tears as though the gods had created that honest man
for eternal sorrow only. It is from the midst of that world (Kama loka), which
seeks with avidity communication with our own, that this third (part) of the
poet, his phantom — explained to him the mysteries of nature.... (20)
Pythagoras and Plato both divided
soul into two representative parts, independent of each other — the one, the
rational soul, the other, the irrational soul, —
the latter being again subdivided into two parts or aspects, which, with the
divine soul and its spirit and the body, make the seven principles of
Theosophy. What Virgil calls imago, “image,” Lucretius names — simulacrum,
“similitude” (See De Rerum Natura, Bk. I, 123), but they are all names for one
and the same thing, the astral body.
We gather thus two points from the
ancients entirely corroborative of our esoteric philosophy:
a) the astral or materialized figure of
the dead is neither the soul, nor the spirit, nor the body of the deceased
personage, but simply the shadow thereof, which justifies our calling it a
“shell”; and
b) unless it be an immortal God (an
angel) who animates an object, it can never be a spirit, to wit, the SOUL, or
real, spiritual ego of a once living man; for these ascend, and an astral
shadow (unless it be of a living person) can never be higher than a
terrestrial, earth-bound ego, or an irrational shell. Homer was therefore right
in making Telemachus exclaim, on seeing Ulysses, who, reveals himself to his
son: “No, thou art not my father, thou art a demon, a spirit who flatters and
deludes me!” (Odyssey, XVI, 194-95)
It is such illusive shadows,
belonging to neither Earth nor Heaven, that are used by sorcerers and other
adepts of the Black Art, to help them in persecutions of victims; to
hallucinate the minds of very honest and well meaning persons occasionally, who
fall victims to the mental epidemics aroused by them for a purpose; and to
oppose in every way the beneficent work of the guardians of mankind, whether
divine or —human.
For the present, enough has been
said to show that the Theosophists have the evidence of the whole of antiquity
in support of the correctness of their doctrines.
Notes
1. In this essay, Blavatsky uses a good deal of material collected by
the Marquis Eudes de Mirville in his work entitled “Pneumatologie. Des Esprits et de leurs manifestations divers”,
which, in its entirety, consists of three Mémoires addressed to the French
Academy, between the years 1851 and 1868. This material is in many places woven
into her own narrative, and is not necessarily quoted, except in cases of
definite passages which are marked accordingly. Vide Bio-Bibliogr. Index, s. v.
Mirville, for full data regarding this work. (Zirkoff)
2. Reference is
here made to the Dictionnaire Universel historique et comparatif de toutes les
religions du monde, etc., by the Abbé François Marie Bertrand. 4 Vols. Paris, 1848-50. It comprises
Vols. 24-27 of J.P. Migne’s Encyclopédie théologique. The quotation appears to
be merely a summary of the longer explanation in the original work. (Zirkoff)
3. By referring to de Mirville, Des Esprits, etc., Vol. III, p. 249,
where this quote is to be found, the impression can be gathered that de
Mirville speaks in this case editorially, instead of actually quoting from some
other author. This impression is strengthened by the fact that one of the
sub-titles of this Chapter xi in his work is: “Les téraphims idolâtriques,”
which corresponds very well to H.P.B.’s title, “The Teraphim of Idolatry.” It
is probable, therefore, that no special work is meant here, but rather this
particular chapter of de Mirville. (Zirkoff)
4. By F. Anstey—pseud. of Thomas Anstey Guthrie, 1856-1934—New York: J.
W. Lovell Co., 1886; 2nd ed., 1886; 3rd ed., 1902. (Zirkoff)
5. Reference is here made to one of the extant Hermetic fragments. It is
a Dialogue between Asclepius and Hermes Trismegistus, the Greek original of
which is now lost. We have only a Latin translation of it, which used to be
attributed by some to Apuleius. It is known as Hermetis Trismegisti Asclepius, seu de
Natura Deorum Dialogus. Latin text and English translation of it can be found
in the monumental work, Hermetica. The Ancient Greek and Latin Writings which
contain religious and philosophical teachings ascribed to Hermes Trismegistus.
Edited and transl. by Walter Scott. 3 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1924-26.
Hermes speaks therein of “. . . . statuas animatas sensu et spiritu
plenas, tantaque facientes et talia, statuas futurorum praescias, eaque sorte,
vate, somniis, multisque aliis rebus praedicentes, inbecillitates hominibus
facientes easque curantes, tristitiam laetitiamque pro meritus
(dispensantes).”—“. . . statues, animated and conscious, filled with spirit,
and doing many mighty works; statues foreseeing futurity and predicting events
by the drawing of lots, by prophetic inspiration, by dreams, and many other
ways; statues which inflict diseases and heal them, dispensing sorrow and joy
according to men’s deserts.” (Zirkoff)
6. This
statement appears in de Mirville, Des Esprits, etc., Vol. III, p. 251, where it is credited to
Antiquities. It is most likely that this is meant to be a reference to a work
known as Philonis Judaei Antiquitatum Biblicarum liber, which was published at
Basle in 1527, edited by Johannes Sichart. Formerly this Latin version of a
vanished Greek (and most probably a Hebrew) original was ascribed to Philo
Judaeus, known also as Philo of Alexandria, but later research has ascertained
that this is hardly possible, both on account of its style and literary
character. Sichart used for his editorial work two MSS.: one belonging to the
Monastery of Lorsch, and another belonging to Fulda; the latter has since
disappeared. There are MSS. of this work in the Vatican Library (Vaticanus
Latinus 488, 15th cent.) and the Vienna Library (Vindob. Lat. 446). It would
appear that for several centuries the existence of this work, as edited by
Sichart, was unknown or rather forgotten, until brought to light in the last
years of the 19th century. Yet the Latin text of this work on Biblical
Antiquities had been circulated many times together with the translations of genuine
works by Philo Alexandrinus, thus probably giving rise to the belief that it
was from the pen of Philo.
This work is a version of Biblical history from Adam to the death of
Saul, and falls under the general category of Apocrypha. In one of its passages,
it speaks of seven golden idols adorned with precious stones and found by the
tribe of Asher; they belonged to the Amorites and were called by them the Holy
Nymphs; when invoked, the nymphs showed them their tasks from hour to hour. For
further details consult Leopold Cohn’s essay, “An Apocryphal Work ascribed to
Philo of Alexandria,” in the Jewish Quarterly Review, Vol. X, Jan., 1898, p.277-332.
On the other hand, Philo of Biblos (or Byblos), known also as Herennius
Byblius, was an entirely different personage, and the fact of his being
mentioned in this connection by de Mirville is most likely a lapsus calami. (Zirkoff)
7. Page 475, in the chapter entitled “De Penatibus, Laribus, et
Serapibus Aegyptiorum,” has the following passage which expresses definitely
the thought to which H. P. B. refers:
“Atque hace sunt simulachra quae Hebraei Theraphim vocant, quae Rachelem
patri suo Laban furatam facer textus Genes. cap. 31 testatur; de quibus integro
tractatu Tomo primo, Syntagmata IV, fol. 254. egimus & ex Aegypto per
feruos Abrahame in Palaestinam portata, propagataque, ibidem docuimus.
Theraphim dicebant, quia cum S. pronunciare non possent, mutato S in T, more
chaldaeis folito, & mutato ultimo S in im, Theraphim ea simulachra
dicebant, quae Aegyptij Serapes dicebant.” (Zirkoff)
8. Blasius Ugolino, Thesaurus Antiquitatum Sacrarum, etc., Vol. XXIII, col. cccclxxv.
[Vide the
Bio-Bibliogr. Index, s. v.
UGOLINO, for further data. (Zirkoff)
9. The Latin original of this passage is as follows:
“Scriptor antiquissimus R. Elieser Magnus, filius Hircani, qui in Gemars
κατ εξοχην R. Elieser
appellatur, & Rabban Gammalieli secundum, qui fuit praeceptor Apostoli
Pauli, affinitate junctus fuisse fertur, in Capitulis suis Cap. xxxvi. Teraphim
ita describit: (Hebrew script) i.e. mactabant hominem primogenitum, & ungue
secabant caputejus, & saliebant illud sale, & oleo, scribebantque super
laminam auream nomen spiritus immundi, & ponebant illam sub lingua ejus.
Postea reponebant illud caput ad parietam, & incandebant lampadas coram eo,
ac procumbebant coram ipso; & sic loquebatur simulacrum illud cum eis.” (Zirkoff)
10. The Greek original of this passage
uses the expression Χρυοωοαι for “gilded” or
“enclosed in gold.” (Zirkoff)
11. This excerpt is from a work entitled Les religions et
leur interprétation chrétienne, by Th.-Prosper le Blanc d’Ambonne. Paris: J.
Leroux et Jouly, 1852-1855. 3 vols. 8vo. The original French text of this entire
passage is as follows:
“Les mêmes idées
paraissent avoir présidé à la confection des Théraphim ou images par excellence
des Phéniciens. Semblables au Palladium gréco-phrygien, ils renfermaient des
débris humains ou plutôt des reliques de victimes humaines. Tous les mystères
de l’apothéose, des orgies, des sacrifices et de la magie s’y trouvaient
réunis. On immolait un enfant assez jeune pour que son âme innocente ne fût pas
encore séparée de l’Âme du monde; on conservait sa tête embaumée dans laquelle
son âme était fixée par la puissance de la magie et des enchantements; on
mettait dans sa bouche une lame d’or, emblème physique de l’épanouissement de
la lumière et allégorie de la manifestation de la vérité; sur cette lame était
gravé le nom de Dieu, puis la tête était enfermée dans une épaisse muraille,
symbole de la caverne cosmogonique qui recèle la vie de l’univers, maison de
Dieu.” (Zirkoff)
12. The author of A Fallen Idol, —whether through natural intuition or
study of occult laws, it is for him to say— shows knowledge of this fact by
making Nebelsen say that the spirit or the tirthankara was paralyzed and torpid
during the time his idol had been buried in India. That Eidôlon or Elementary
could do nothing. See p. 295. (Blavatsky)
13. Although the original text of H.P.B. has “St. Hilarion,” she means
St. Hilarius Pictaviensis, or St. Hilary of Poitiers (died 368 A. D.), the
original Latin text of the passage being: “. . . . Nam et animarum species,
sive obtinentium corpora, sive corporibus exsulantium, corpoream tamen naturae
suae substantiam sortiuntur; quia omne quod creatum est, in aliquo sit necesse
est . . . .” (J. P. Migne,
Patrologiae Cursus Completus, Series Prima, Paris, 1844, etc., Tomus IX, col.
946) (Zirkoff)
14. This seems to be a rather unsatisfactory reference. It is most
likely to be the Scholiis of Psellus on the Oracles of Zoroaster. A thorough
search has been made in the work bearing the title of: Zoroaster, Oracula
magica cum Scholiis Plethonis et Pselli nunc primum editi. Studio Johannis
Opsopoei, 1607, containing both the Greek and the Latin texts. However, the
passage quoted by H.P.B. has not been found therein. It may be that this
excerpt is merely a general summary of ideas which, as a whole, are to be found
in Psellus’ Scholiis. (Zirkoff)
15. The original French text differs somewhat. It runs as follows: “. .
. . Ils nommaient
ce corps de l’âme séparé des corps grossiers augoeidé astroeeidé c’est-à-dire
semblable aux astres ou semblable à l’éclat.” (Zirkoff)
16. Considering the date when this essay on “Animated Statues” was
written, it is evident that H. P. B. meant by Secret Doctrine her early draft
of it, portions of which had been sent to Adyar in September 1886. The material
she refers to is not to be found in the MSS. which went to Adyar. However, by
turning to pages 234-240 of the Volume published in 1897 in London under the
editorship of Annie Besant, and entitled “The Secret Doctrine, Volume III,” the
student will find a brief essay on “The Idols and the Teraphim,” which in our
estimation is precisely the material spoken of by H. P. B. in the text above.
It is quite probable that H. P. B. meant at first to incorporate it into one of
the volumes of The Secret Doctrine as published in 1888, but for some reason or
other did not do so; however, she included therein brief passages from it, as
can be seen by consulting Vol. I, p. 394-395, and Vol. II, p. 453.
That the essay on “The Idols and the Teraphim” was not what H.P.B.
intended to say on the subject in her prospective Third Volume is evidenced by
the interesting fact that in The Secret Doctrine, Vol. II, p. 455, she
definitely states that “practical methods of such ancient divination will be
found” in “Volume HI, Part II, of this present work.” The real Volume III
having vanished without a trace, her explanations of such methods have never
appeared in print.
In view of the facts outlined above, H. P. B.’s essay on “The Idols and
the Teraphim” follows in immediate chronological sequence her essay on
“Animated Statues.” (Zirkoff)
17. Even burning does not affect its interference or prevent it
entirely—since it can avail itself of the ashes. Earth alone will make it
powerless. (Blavatsky)
18. Which is not the interior of the earth, or hell, as taught by the
anti-geological theologians, but the cosmic matrix of its region — the astral
light of our atmosphere. (Blavatsky)
19. This his has reference to a work by Martin Anton Delrio (1551-1608),
sometimes spelt Del Rio, entitled, Disquisitionum magisarum libri sex. 3 tom.
Lovanii, 1599. 4to. Other editions being those of 1600, 1603, 1608, 1613, 1657.
It is not known which edition is meant by H. P. B.’s reference. In the 1599
edition, however (British Museum, 719. h. 12.), the following passage embodying
the ideas brought out by H. P. B. occurs in Lib. 2. Q. XXVI, Sec. 2, Tom. 1:
“Addit Platonicos (fide excipio) secutus D. Augustinus, hosce malos
vocari Lemureis; Servius Honoratus scribit eos Maneis vocari, quamdiu in alia
corpora nondum migrarunt. Idem Servius & Sabinus, ab anima separant umbram
& simulacrum, putant enim (falso) homine constare umbra, corpore, &
anima; animam caelum petere, corpus in terram dainere, umbram siue simulacrum
descendere ad inferos: umbram volunt esse non verum corpus, sed speciem quandam
corpoream, quae nequeat tangi, instar venti. Conveniunt tamen cum poëtis,
istud, quicquid vel ad coelos adscendat, vel ad inferos descendat, interdum
viuis apparere: ut alio loco docui, & hoc putabant malo magorum carmine
euocari....” (Zirkoff)
20. “etsi praeterea tamen esse Acherusia templa
Ennius aeternis exponit versibus edens,
quo neque permaneant animae neque corpora nostra,
sed quaedam simulacra modis pallentia miris;
unde sibi exortam semper florentis Homeri
commemorat speciem lacrimas effundere salsas
coepisse et rerum naturam expandere dictis.”
[De Rerum Natura, Book I, 120-26] (Blavatsky)
Ennius aeternis exponit versibus edens,
quo neque permaneant animae neque corpora nostra,
sed quaedam simulacra modis pallentia miris;
unde sibi exortam semper florentis Homeri
commemorat speciem lacrimas effundere salsas
coepisse et rerum naturam expandere dictis.”
[De Rerum Natura, Book I, 120-26] (Blavatsky)
Supplementary Note by O.
As a corroboration of the theory that a great volume of psychic force may
be concentrated in an object of worship, we may add the following biblical narrative
of the over throw of the image of the idol Dagon, in its own temple, by the
superior power of the Hebraic ark. It runs thus:
« When the Philistines took the ark of God, they brought it into the
house of Dagon, and set it by Dagon. And when they of Ashdod arose early on the
morrow, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the earth before the ark of
the Lord. And they took Dagon, and set him in his place again. And when they
arose early on the morrow morning, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his "face
to the ground before the ark of the Lord, and the head of Dagon, and both the
palms of his hands were cut of upon the threshold; only the stump of Dagon was
left to him. »
(I Sam. v. 3 and 4)
(Theosophist, November 1886, p.65-73; CW 7, p.213-230)
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