XIFAITHLESSNESS TO SALT

"'It is not this salt I wish to burn,It is my lover's heart to turn;That he may neither rest, nor happy be,Until he comes and speaks to me.'"[182]

There seems to be a special value in the sacred number "three," in the appeals through salt to the spiritual powers. In the Scottish Lowlands, "when a dead body has been washed and laid out, one of the oldest women present must light a candle, and wave it three times around the corpse. Then she must measure three handfuls of common salt into an earthenware plate, and lay it on the breast. Lastly she arranges three 'toom,' or empty dishes, on the hearth, as near as possible to the fire; and all the attendants going out of the room return into it backwards, repeat this 'rhyme of saining:'

"'Thrice the torchie, thrice the saltie,Thrice the dishes toom for "loffie" (i. e., praise),These three times three ye must wave roundThe corpse, until it sleep sound.Sleep sound and wake nane,Till to heaven the soul's gane.If ye want that soul to deeFetch the torch th' Elleree;Gin ye want that soul to live,Between the dishes place a sieve,An it sail have a fair, fair shrive.'"[183]

In connection with the putting of a plate of salt on the breast of a dead body, there were various usages. A plate of bread was sometimes set with the salt, and again a plate of earth was its accompaniment. And different reasons were assigned for the presence of the salt there. Napier says that many persons claimed for it a value in preventing the swelling of the body in process of decomposition, "but its original purpose was to act as a charm against the devil, to prevent him from disturbing the body."[184]

"Pennant tells us that formerly, in Scotland, the corpse being stretched on a board and covered with a close linen wrapper, the friends laid on the breast of the deceased a wooden platter, containing a small quantity of salt and earth, separate and unmixed; the earth an emblem of the corruptible body, the salt as an emblem of the immortal spirit [the life]."[185]

Napier adds: "There was an older superstition which gave another explanation for the plate of salt on the breast. There were persons calling themselves 'sin-eaters,' who, when a person died, were sent for tocome and eat the sins of the deceased. When they came, theirmodus operandiwas to place a plate of salt and a plate of bread on the breast of the corpse, and repeat a series of incantations, after which they ate the contents of the plates, and so relieved the dead person of such sins as would have kept him hovering around his relations, haunting them with his imperfectly purified spirit, to their great annoyance, and without satisfaction to himself."[186]The basis of this plan of vicarious substitution of personality would seem to be, in the entering of the "sin-eaters" into oneness of life with the deceased through the salt covenant or the blood covenant, in partaking of his body and blood in the bread and salt from his breast.

Leland, in his "Etruscan-Roman Remains in Popular Tradition," says that there was, among the Tuscan Romans, an incantation, or an invocation, for every emergency. "If salt upset, they said, 'Dii avertite omen!'"[187]In Sicily, a goddess known as the Mother of the Day "is invoked when salt is spilt."[188]He also cites various incantations and exorcisms, in which salt is an essential factor.[189]

A custom prevails in some portions of Pennsylvania,even to this day, of carrying a bag of salt, with a Bible, over the threshold, on entering a new house for the first time. There are families who would not consent to live in a home which had not been thus consecrated.[190]This would seem to be a survival of the passing over the threshold with an offering of blood. A correspondence of this practice with ancient Etruscan customs seems to be indicated by the collections of Leland.[191]Among the Mordvins, a Finnish people on the Volga, salt on bread is placed under the threshold of the bride's paternal home at the time of a marriage covenant.[192]This may be classed with sacrifices or with divination according to our idea of the workings of the primitive Mordvin mind.

The fact that in its primitive conception a covenant of salt is a permanent and unalterable covenant, naturally suggests to the primitive mind the idea of treachery as faithlessness to salt. The Persian term for a "traitor" isnamak harâm, "untrue to salt," "one faithless to salt;"[193]and the same idea runs through the languages of the Oriental world.

Baron du Tott, referring to the sharing of bread and salt, says: "The Turks think it the blackest ingratitude to forget the man from whom we have received food, which is signified by the bread and salt."[194]But it is obvious that it is faithlessness to salt, not to bread or ordinary food, that is deemed blackest ingratitude. This is in India, as in Turkey. Tamerlane, the Mongol-Tatar chieftain, speaking, in his institutes, of one Share Behraum, who had deserted his service for the enemy and afterwards returned to his allegiance,says: "At length my salt which he had eaten overwhelmed him with remorse, he again threw himself on my mercy, and humbled himself before me."[195]Frazer quotes a rebel chief in India as saying, when he capitulated after a siege, and was asked if he would return to his old allegiance, "No, I can no more visit my country; I must look for service elsewhere. I can never face the rajah again; for I have eaten Ghoorka salt. I was in trust, and I have not died at my post. We can never return to our country."[196]

Burton says that the Bed'ween of Arabia denounce the Syrians as "abusers of the salt," because they cannot be depended on in their agreements.[197]And Dr. Thomson says that Orientals "often upbraid the civilized Frank because he does not keep bread and salt, is not faithful to the covenant of brotherhood."[198]

Burton says also, of the Bed'ween of El Hejaz: "'We have eaten salt together" (nahnu malihin) is still a bond of friendship: there are, however, some tribes who require to renew the bond every twenty-four hours, as otherwise, to use their own phrase, 'the salt is not in their stomachs.'"[199]And he quotes theadvice to him of Shaykh Hamid, concerning the Bed'ween who were to escort him from El Medinah, "never to allow twenty-four hours to elapse without dipping hand in the same dish with them, in order that the party might always be 'malihin,' on terms of salt."[200]Treachery on the part of one who has even partaken of an ordinary meal with another is, however, counted, among Orientals, a peculiar crime, as surprising as it is unusual.[201]

Of course, there is no human bond which will guard human nature against all possible treachery. These references to the measure of fidelity among different peoples or tribes are an indication of the relative degree of faithfulness prevailing among them severally. Those who are faithless to salt cannot be depended on for anything. If a man would not be true to one who is of his own blood, of his own life, and to whom he is bound in a sacred covenant of which his God is a party, he could not be depended on in any emergency. The covenant of salt is all this in the thought of the primitive mind.

Don Raphel says, of the estimate of faithlessness to salt entertained by Arabs generally: "When they have eaten bread and salt with any one, it would be a horrid crime not only to rob him, but even to touchthe smallest part of his baggage, or of the goods which he takes with him through the desert. The smallest injury done to his person would be considered as an equal wickedness. An Arab who should be guilty of such a crime would be looked upon as a wretch who might expect reproof and detestation from everybody. He would appear despicable to himself, and never be able to wash away his shame. It is almost unheard of for an Arab to bring such disgrace upon himself."[202]

It was said by the ancient Jews that Sodom was destroyed because its inhabitants had been faithless to salt, in maltreating guests who had partaken of salt in their city. In a Talmudic comment on Lot's wife, the record is: "Rabbi Isaac asked, 'Why did she become a pillar of salt?' 'Because she had sinned through salt. For in the night in which the men came to Lot she went to her neighbors, and said to them, Give me salt, for we have guests. But her purpose was to make (the evil-minded) people of the city acquainted with the guests. Therefore was she turned into a pillar of salt.'"[203]

This idea of foul treachery as equivalent to faithlessness in the matter of salt, seems to be perpetuatedin Da Vinci's famous painting of the Last Supper, where Judas Iscariot is represented as having overturned the salt-cellar.[204]And even among English-speaking peoples the spilling of salt between two persons is said to threaten a quarrel; as though they had already broken friendship.

Gayton, describing two friends (who were proof even against this ill sign), says:

"I have two friends of either sex, which doEat little salt, or none, yet are friends too;Of both which persons I can truly tell,They are of patience most invincible,—When out of temper no mischance at allCan put,—no, not if towards them the salt should fall."[205]

In both the Old Testament and the New faithlessness to a formal covenant is reckoned a crime of peculiar enormity as distinct from any ordinary transgression of a specific law. Transgressing a covenant with the Lord is counted on the part of Israel much the same as worshiping the gods of the heathen. This is shown in repeated instances in the Old Testament.[206]In the New Testament, Paul includes among the grossest evil-doers of paganism those who are "filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, hateful to God," and so down to "covenant-breakers," and those "without natural affection," as among the lowest and worst of all.[207]This idea shows itself continually in records and traditions, sacred and secular.

Primarily it is the blood, as the life, of two persons entering into a covenant with each other and with the Author of life, that is the nexus of the enduring covenant.[208]Secondarily, it is the blood, or life, of a substitute victim offered as a sacrifice to God, or to the gods, that is accepted as such a nexus,—the blood being shared by the contracting parties, or being poured out as an oblation to God, and the flesh being eaten conjointly by the parties covenanting.[209]

Yet, again, wine is accepted as representing blood. This is not only because wine resembles blood in appearance, and is called in the Bible record the "blood of the grape,"[210]but because wine is actually deemed, by many primitive peoples, real blood, and is supposed to affect its users as it does because it represents the spirit, or life, of the divinity whose blood it is.[211]On this point Frazer calls attention tothe primitive views of Egyptians, Arabians, Aztecs, and others, citing authorities from Plutarch to Robertson Smith.[212]

He says, for example: "We are informed by Plutarch that of old the Egyptian kings neither drank wine nor offered it in libations to the gods, because they held it to be the blood of beings who had once fought against the gods, the vine having sprung from their rotting bodies; and the frenzy of intoxication was explained by the supposition that the drunken man was filled with the blood of the enemies of the gods. The Aztecs regardedpulque, or the wine of the country, as bad, on the account of the wild deeds which men did under its influence. But these wild deeds were believed to be the acts, not of the drunken man, but of the wine god by whom he was possessed and inspired.... Thus it appears that, on the primitive view, intoxication, or the inspiration produced by wine, is exactly parallel to the inspiration produced by drinking the blood of animals.[213]The soul or life is in the blood, and wine is the blood of the vine.... Whoever drinks wine drinks the blood, and so receives into himself the soul or spirit of the god of the vine."

Naturally, a substitute or representative of theoriginal, or real, nexus of a covenant, came to stand for the primary article with such prominence in the popular mind that it would be deemed an essential, not only when the real was lacking, but while the real was actually present. Therefore we find libations of wine accompanying actual blood, in sacrifices,[214]as well as used in substitution for it; so also of other substitutes, such as saffron water, milk, and coffee, at other times.[215]

As salt represents blood and life, quite naturally salt is employed in sacrifices, not only where there is no blood or life, but also where there is. And this accounts for the prominence of salt in sacrifices, and elsewhere, where blood or life is essential as a fitting offering, and as a bond of union.[216]Both wine and salt as substitutes for blood are frequently used together, as though one alone were not sufficient.[217]

Similarly, bread is a recognized representative of flesh. It is so understood in sacred and secular records and traditions. When Jesus spoke of bread as his flesh, and as his body,[218]and of the fruit of the vine as hisblood, he used terms that in his day, and earlier, were known in popular thought as representing the truth at the basis of the covenant by which two became one in a merged common life.[219]Yet while bread was an accepted substitute for flesh, it was much used as an accompaniment of flesh[220]in sacrificial feasts. Thus bread and salt as recognized substitutes for flesh and blood came to be commonly used even where real flesh and blood were the main factors in the sacrifice. Substitutes for bread, such as honey and flour or meal, were, as already shown, also used in connection with bread. Hence it is not unnatural to find salt as blood accompanying blood itself. This is entirely in accord with primitive thought and customs generally.

On the occasion of a sacred alliance between clans, or in a treaty of peace at the close of a war, among the Kookies of India, there is a formal appeal to the gods, in which salt has an important part. Adhar, or short sword, is placed on the ground between the two parties. On it, as on an altar, "are arranged rice, salt, earth, fire, and a tiger's tooth. The party swearing takes thedharand puts the blade between his teeth, and, biting it, says, 'May I be cut with thedharin war and in the field; may rice and salt fail me, my crops wither, and I die of hunger; may fire burn all my worldly possessions, and the tiger devour me, if I am not faithful!'"[221]

Among the Battas, in Sumatra, the more solemn form of their oath is, "May my harvest fail, my cattle die, and may I never taste salt again, if I do not speak the truth."[222]

Among the Dyaks of Borneo, when a question arises between disputants for which there is no ordinary mode of settlement, each litigant is given a lump of salt, which the two drop into water simultaneously, and he whose lump dissolves soonest is adjudged the loser.[223]

In the Kenyah tribe in Borneo, the ceremony of naming a child is made much of. Guests assemble on the occasion. After the more private ceremony, participated in by a favored few, every guest present is given a package of salt and some ginger root, as wedding-cake is given in many lands, for a souvenir of the occasion.[224]

A custom among Slavic peoples of presenting bread and salt to a ruler at the threshold of his domain, as he comes on a visit, would seem to combine the two ideas of hospitality and of worship. When the Emperor of Russia visits one of his provinces, or subject cities, he is met at its threshold by its representative rulers, as his loyal subjects, with bread and salt served on a golden or a silver-gilt placque. In the Winter Palace of St. Petersburg there are hundreds of these suspended over the doorways and on the walls, whichplacques were thus presented to different emperors on the occasion of such visits.

When the Grand Duke Alexis visited America in 1872, he was received in this way by the wife of the Russian Minister at Washington. "As the Grand Duke entered the Legation, Madame de Catacazy carried a silver salver on which was placed a round loaf of plain black bread, on the top of which was imbedded a golden salt-cellar."[225]This was obviously more than a symbol of welcome to the home of the embassy. The Grand Duke came as a ruler and lord to his own, and his own received him loyally, with symbols of reverent submission. It was more like the threshold covenant of the East, when blood is poured out from an offered body at the doorway of a house, as one who would be honored as well as welcomed comes in.

Some years later there was an account in the London Court Journal of the making in Paris of an ornate golden dish for a similar use in Roumania. The burghers of Bucharest were arranging to present on this dish bread and salt to Princess Marie of Edinburgh, when she should make her first entrance into their city as their future queen. The dish was of goldworked in a purely Renaissance design, its edge being an openwork pattern of interlaced ears of corn and branches of laurel. In the center was the salt-cellar, shaped like an open tulip, and resting upon four graceful stalks.

In the days of Queen Elizabeth of England it was a custom of officials of the palace to rub bread and salt on the plates of the dining-table before each royal meal.[226]

Among the Kookies of the Hill Tribes in India, "whenever they send any message of consequence to each other, they always put in the hand of the bearer of it a small quantity of salt, to be delivered with the message as expressive of its importance."[227]This would seem to indicate a life-and-death matter in the message.

An old English custom of having a salt-cellar at a certain point on the family table, and of seating those present above or below it, gave rise to the phrase "sitting below the salt" as indicative of an inferior position at the household table. As salt was a symbol of hospitality and of covenanted union, he who was within the scope of salt-sharing at a table was ina very different position from one who was outside of it.

A reference to this custom by Sir Walter Scott, in his "Tales of My Landlord," in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, provoked much discussion, and doubt was expressed as to the existence of the custom in olden time. But abundant evidence was produced as to its veritableness.[228]An old English ballad was cited, in which one said sneeringly to his inferior:

"Thou art a carle mean of degree,Ye salte doth stand twain me and thee;But an thou hadst been of ane gentyl strayne,I wold have bitten my gant[229]aganie."

And one of Bishop Hall's Satires, in 1597, was instanced as saying:

"A gentle squire would gladly entertaineInto his house some trencher chaplaine;Some willing man that might instruct his sons,And that would stande to good conditions.First, that he lie upon the truckle-bed,Whiles his young maister lieth o'er his head.Second, that he do, on no default,Ever presume to sit above the salt."

It was a custom in Oxford University to give salt to a student who had concluded his course as a "freshman," and was finding admission into the companyof maturer, or salter, students or sophisters. Drinking salt and water, or salt and beer, was a part of this ceremony. It was called "salting a freshman," or "college salting."[230]

A series of plates, illustrative of certain student ceremonies at Strassburg University was published in 1666. "The last [of these] representsthe giving of the salt,—which a person is holding on a plate in his left hand, and with his right hand is about to put a pinch of it upon the tongue of eachbecanus, or freshman. A glass, probably holding wine, is standing near him. Underneath is the following couplet:

"Sal Sophiæ gustate, bibatis vinaque læta,Augeat immensus vos in utrisque Deus!"[231]

In Hungary, at a wedding, there are customs that give solemn emphasis to the truth that two lives are newly made one in a sacred covenant. The ceremony is presided over by the Vajda, or chief ruler, rather than by any Christian ecclesiastic. He stands with his back to a blazing fire as the primitive altar.[232]When his address is concluded, an earthen vessel is dashed to pieces as a symbol of their former life now ended. Then the bridal couple are sprinkled withsalt and brandy, doubly standing for blood on the threshold of their married life.[233]

Bread and salt seem to have a peculiar sacredness among the Hungarian gypsies. This incident, from a gypsy camp, is given in a Hungarian newspaper: A gypsy who had lost his cash informed his leader of the fact, and at once an order was issued for its restoration. The money not appearing, the gypsy chief bound two poles into the form of a cross, and fixed one end in the ground. On the top of the cross he fastened a piece of bread, and sprinkled it with salt. Each member of the band was then called to swear upon this symbol that he had not committed the theft. All stood the test, until the last one, an old woman, came forward. As she was about to take the oath, she turned pale, put her hand in her pocket, and brought out the stolen money. She was then soundly beaten, and kicked out of camp.[234]

The primitive idea that the sovereign properly controls salt as a source or means of life, and that a gift of salt from the sovereign lays a new obligation on the recipient, as illustrated in the days of Cyrus and Darius,[235]shows itself down to our own day. In thedays of Arabi Pasha, the Khedive of Egypt desired to raise a sum of money, at a time when the people were exceptionally poor in consequence of excessive taxation and the rigors of a recent famine. Instead of relying on the ordinary and obnoxious tax collectors, the Khedive resorted to the pressure of the "fidelity to salt idea."

Salt, as a gift, or as an appeal, from the government supply, was sent to every native house. Four pecks of salt to every two males in the house was the average amount. The salt was laid, by a government official, upon the threshold of the house, early in the morning, before the inmates arose. Of course, any person stepping over that salted threshold was brought anew into a covenant with the giver.[236]Later in the day Egyptian soldiers called at every house to receive what the inmates would give in return. The appeal was irresistible. It was not like an ordinary tax, to be evaded or resisted if possible. All would do what they could. The least that any could think of returning was the usual price of the salt. Those who could afford more were glad to show their fidelity and loyalty in a corresponding liberality.[237]

That which is a means of life in one instance may be a means of death in another. A breath that might kindle a tiny spark into a living blaze might also extinguish a quivering flame. The breeze that gives life to fire in one case gives death to fire in the other. And fire itself proves death to that which is perishable, while it gives added value to that which is purified in the furnace flames. Salt, like fire, is a symbol both of life and of death. In different connections it is a preserver and a destroyer. "To the one a savor from death unto death; to the other a savor from life unto life."[238]

Salt is spoken of in the Bible as destructive of vegetable life, and a barrier against new animal life. A piece of ground sown or strewed with salt is deemed dead land: "It is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein."[239]When Abimelech captured Shechem, "he beat down the city and sowedit with salt."[240]The Psalmist, speaking of the power and ways of God, declares:

"He turneth rivers into a wilderness,And watersprings into a thirsty ground;A fruitful land into a salt desert,For the wickedness of them that dwell therein."[241]

The prophet Jeremiah says of one who departs from God's service that he "shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, a salt land and not inhabited."[242]Ezekiel, foretelling a curse on the land of the Jews, says: "The marshes thereof shall not be healed; they shall be given up to salt."[243]And Zephaniah declares that Moab shall become "a possession of nettles, and salt-pits, and a perpetual desolation."[244]Because there can be no fertility for new vegetable life, there is no room or hope for new animal life for land thus sown with salt and thus permanently sterile.

The one great body of water that is called the Dead Sea is the saltest sea in the world. Five times the proportion of salt in the ocean is found in this inland sea of salt. "No fish can exist in the waters, nor is it proved that any low forms of life have been discovered there."[245]An ancient legend declared that birds could not even fly over its waters, because ofthe curse from heaven on its briny depths.[246]Yet this doomed and dead sea of salt is a source of life to man in its exhaustless supply of salt for his use. Preeminently is this salt of the Dead Sea a savor of life and of death.

The salt of the ocean is the world's treasure. Without it the greater portion of the earth's inhabitants would perish for lack of what vivifies and preserves animal life. Yet because of the salt in the ocean the very water, which man and beast must have or perish of thirst, is useless to both man and beast. The cry in the "Ancient Mariner" is the cry of the human, always, on the ocean's surface:

"Water, water, everywhere,And all the boards did shrink:Water, water, everywhere,Nor any drop to drink."

Water, which is the gift of God to the thirsty soul, mocks the thirsty soul when it brings with it salt, which is the representative of life. Salt in water is a savor of death unto death, while salt and water are also a savor of life unto life.

While salt as the equivalent of life is a symbol of permanency, it becomes, as the equivalent of death, a symbol of doom and destruction. Thus the prophetIsaiah, speaking of his salvation as sure and permanent, says: "Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath: for the heavens shall vanish away [literally, shall be salted] like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die in like manner [or, like gnats]: but my salvation shall be forever, and my righteousness shall not be abolished."[247]

Life is in itself the destroyer of death, as light is the destroyer of darkness. Hence that which makes anew does away with that which was of old. When, therefore, salt or fire is spoken of as the destroyer of that which is not worthy of preservation, it is not to be wondered at that this power is possessed by an element that purifies and revivifies through the process of destruction. The ground of a destroyed and condemned city is guarded against a continuance of its old life of evil by being sown with salt, which is a savor from life unto life and from death unto death. The old heavens and the old earth which vanish away as by fire and salt,[248]are replaced by a new heaven and a new earth[249]which shall be enduring as gold tried in the fire, and as a covenant of salt forever.

There is a sense in which that which is devoted toGod is thereby forbidden to the use of man. Thus land sown with salt may be counted as devoted and as destroyed,devotedto God anddestroyedfor man.[250]The Hebrew wordkorbanwas applied to what had thus been dedicated and doomed.[251]

Blood also is used in the twofold sense of life and of death, in different connections. Men say, "We are bound together by blood," and "We are of one blood," and "Blood is thicker than water." They say, also, "There is blood between us," and "Spilled blood cannot be gathered up," and "Blood is a barrier." Salt, that stands for blood, may similarly stand for life or for death, for peace or for discord. It is an old superstition that to put salt on another's plate is an evil omen. Hence the couplet:

"Help me to salt,Help me to sorrow!"

Yet even this portent of ill luck may be canceled by a repetition of the act, helping to a second portion of salt.[252]The taking of blood that becomes a barrier may be followed by the taking of blood as a bond of union. Shedding of blood is atoned for by sharing of blood.

Even the spilling of salt, which is so dreaded in primitive thought, may, it is said, be rendered harmless if the person who was guilty of the mishap will carefully gather up the spilled salt with the blade of a knife, and throw it over his left shoulder, with an appropriate invocation.[253]

It is deemed dangerous to give away salt to a stranger; for because salt is as blood and as life, one must be careful lest he put his blood and his life in the power of an enemy.[254]Salt is essential to the preservation of human life; at the same time, salt is the destruction of human life if it be in too great quantity or proportion. Thus the seeming contradiction is only in seeming.

All life is from the Author and Source of life. Only as two persons become partakers of a common life by each and both sharing in that which is in itself life, can they become one in the all-inclusive Life. Having life from the Source of life, they can merge their common possession in each other, and in that common Source. Such merging in a common life, with an appeal to and by the approval of God, or the gods, has been the root-idea of covenanting, in one way or another, from time immemorial, among all peoples, the world over.

In primitive thought, and in a sense in scientific fact, the blood is the life and the life is in the blood; hence they who share in each other's blood are sharers in a merged and common life. Covenanting in this way with a solemn appeal to God, or to the gods, has been a mode of sacred union from the earliest dawn of human history. Two thus covenanting are supposed to become of one being; the one is the other,and the two are one. Every form of sacrifice, Jewish, Egyptian, Assyrian, or ethnic, is in its primal thought either an evidence and a reminder of an existing covenant between the offerer and the Deity approached, or an appeal and an outreaching for a covenant to be consummated.[255]

Salt is counted as the equivalent of blood and of life, both in primitive thought and, in a sense, in scientific fact; therefore salt, like blood, has been deemed a nexus of a lasting covenant, as nothing can be which is not life or its equivalent. Only as two persons are sharers of a common life can they be supposed to have merged their separate identity in that dual union.

And so we find that, in the primitive world's thought, shared salt has preciousness and power because of what it represents and of what it symbolizes, as well as of what it is. Salt stands for and corresponds with, and it symbolizes, blood and life. As such it represents the supreme gift from the Supreme Giver. Because of this significance of salt, when made use of as the means of a lasting union, the Covenant of Salt, as a form or phase of the Blood Covenant, is a covenant fixed, permanent, and unchangeable, enduring forever.

SUPPLEMENT

All of us are familiar with the Ten Commandments, given from God on two tables, or tablets, of stone, to the people of Israel at Mount Sinai.[256]But not all of us are accustomed to think of these Ten Commandments as ten separate clauses of a loving covenant between God and his chosen people, recorded on stone tablets for their permanent preservation. Yet these witnessing tablets are repeatedly called in the Bible "the tables of the covenant,"[257]and "tables of testimony,"[258]not the tables of the commandments; while the chest or casket which contained them is called "the ark of the covenant,"[259]and "the ark of the testimony,"[260]not the ark of the commandments.

There is obviously a world-wide difference betweena loving covenant that binds two parties to each other in mutual affection and fidelity, and a series of arbitrary commandments enjoined by a sovereign upon his subjects; between a compact of union, having its statement of promises on the one hand and of responsibilities on the other, and an instrument that asserts the rights of the ruler and defines the duties of the ruled. In our estimate of the Decalogue we have made too much of thelawelement, and too little of the element oflove. As a consequence it has not been easy for us to see how it is that God's law is love, and that love is the fulfilling of God's law. But the Ten Commandmentsarea simple record of God's loving covenant with his people, and they arenotthe arbitrary commandings of God to his subjects. They indicate the inevitable limits within which God and his people can be in loving union, rather than declare the limits of dutiful obedience on the part of those who would be God's faithful subjects. A close examination of the Decalogue will show that this is its nature and scope.

It must be borne in mind, in our Bible reading, that the Bible was originally written by Orientals for Orientals, and that it is to be looked at in the light of Oriental manners and customs, and Oriental modes of speech, in order to its fullest understanding. Hencewhen we find the term "covenant," or the term "commandment," in the Bible, we are to inquire into the Oriental meaning of that term, so that we may know the sense in which it was employed by the Bible writers.

Now a "covenant" among Orientals is, and always has been, a sacred compact binding two parties in loving agreement. Oriental covenants are made in various forms and by various ceremonies. The most sacred of all forms of covenanting in the East is by two persons commingling their own blood, by its drinking or by its inter-transfusing, in order that they may come into a communion of very life.[261]Two persons who wish to become as one in a loving blood-friendship will open each a vein in his own arm, and allow the blood to flow into a common vessel, from which both parties will drink of the commingled blood. Or, again, each person will open a vein in one of his hands, and the bleeding hands will be clasped together so that the blood from the one shall find its way into the veins of the other. Or, yet again, the two will share together the substitute blood of a sacred animal. Usually, in such a case, a written compact is signed by each party and given to the other, with the stamp of the writer's blood upon it asa part of the ceremony of covenanting; and this writing is carefully encased in a small packet or casket, and guarded by its holder as his very life. It is in the light of such customs as this that we are to read of the sacred covenant entered into between God and his Oriental people.

It was at the foot of Mount Sinai that Moses came before the people of Israel with God's proffer to them of a covenant, whereby they should bear his name and be known as his people. "And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the Lord hath spoken will we do, and be obedient."[262]Then it was that Moses took of substitute blood and divided it into two portions, one half to be sprinkled on the altar God-ward, and the other half to be sprinkled on the people; and Moses said: "Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words"—or, as the margin of the Revised Version has it, "upon all these conditions."[263]

Moreover, we are told, in the Epistle to the Hebrews,[264]that Moses sprinkled the blood upon the record, or book, of the covenant, as well as upon the people. It was after this—after the breach and the renewal of the covenant between Israel and God—thatthe stone tablets on which the covenant itself had a permanent record were encased in a casket, or an "ark,"[265]which was thenceforward guarded sacredly as containing the charter of Israel's nationality, the witness, the evidence, the testimony, of the loving covenant between God and his people.

But you may ask, Did not the tables of stone bear a record of specific commandments, rather than of articles of a covenant? And are not the words there recorded specifically called in the Bible the "Ten Commandments"? Look for yourselves, and see. It is true that our English Bible speaks of the Ten Commandments recorded on these tables of stone; but the word here translated "commandments" is more literally to be rendered "words,"[266]as indeed it is given in the margin of the Revised Version; and it is applicable to any declaration, injunction, or charge, made by one to another. It is by no means to be understood as simply an arbitrary mandate from an absolute sovereign to his subjects. Looking at the Ten Commandments as a set of moral laws covering man's duties to God and to his fellows, they seem strangely defective, when we find among them no command to pray to or to praise God, nor any command to give sympathy or assistance to man. Butwhen we look at them as clauses of a loving covenant, indicating the scope and limits of relations within which a child of God's duties God-ward and man-ward are to be exercised, we find that they are far-reaching and all-inclusive. Looking at them as the tables of the covenant between God and his people in the light of Oriental views of covenanting, we can see a great deal more in the words on those tables than when we look at them as the tables of the commandments,—in the light of our Western ideas of commandings.

A covenant involves the idea of a twofold agreement between the parties making it. Even though God himself be one of the parties, he will not refuse to be explicit in his words of covenanting. And so we find it to be in the record on the tables of the covenant which were given to Moses at Mount Sinai. We call the opening words of that record the "Preface to the Ten Commandments;" but they are more properly God's covenanting words with his people. "I am Jehovah thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."[267]The very name "Jehovah" includes the idea of a covenant-making and a covenant-keeping God. The declaration of Jehovah's eternally existing personalityas Jehovah is in itself a covenant promise, for all time to come, to those who are his covenant people. It is as though he were to say: "I, who was and am, and am to be, the same yesterday and to-day, yea and forever, will be your God unfailingly. As I have given you a loving deliverance out of Egyptian bondage, so I am ever ready to deliver you from every evil that enthralls you."

Man, when he promises for the future, needs to say, "I will do;" but God can say nothing stronger than "I do," or than "I am." Thus the promise of promises of Jesus to his disciples as their ever-present, all-sustaining Lord, is, "Lo, I am with you alway;"[268]not "Lo, Iwill be," but "Lo, Iam." And so it is that God's covenant promise to Israel, to be their loving, guarding, and guiding God for all time to come, is in the words: "I am Jehovah thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."[269]And this is the promise of "the party of the first part," as we would say in modern legal parlance, in this covenant between God and his people Israel.

Then there follow the covenant agreements of God's people, as "the party of the second part" in this loving compact. As it is God who prescribes ordefines the terms on which this covenant is to be made, the indication of those terms is mainly in the form of such prohibitions as will distinguish the people of God from other peoples about them, in the bearing of that people toward God's personality, toward God's institutions, and toward God's representatives. This is all that is needed in the fundamental articles of covenanting. The details of specific duties may be defined in special enactments under the terms of this covenant, or they may be inferred from its spirit.

The first requirement is, that this covenanting God shall be recognized as the only God; that no other god shall be conceded a place in God's universe. And this requirement is vital to any such covenant. A divided heart is no heart at all. He who can see any other object of love and devotion comparable with the one to whom he gives himself in covenant-union, is thereby incapacitated from a covenant-union. Therefore it is that this first word of the Ten Words of the covenant of God's people with their God is not an arbitrary mandate, but is the simple expression of a truth which is essential to the very existence of the covenant as a covenant of union.

And this principle is as vitally important now as it was in the days of Moses. The human heart is always inclined to divide itself when it ought to beundivided. It is reluctant to be wholly and always true to God alone. But, now as hitherto, without wholeness of heart a covenant of union with God is an impossibility. And, indeed, the very idea of other gods is an outgrowth of man's sense of an unfitness to be in oneness of life with the One God,—in consequence of which man seeks a lower divinity than the supreme God as the immediate object of his worship.

The second requirement in this covenant of union is, that no material image or representation of this covenanting God shall be made use of as a help to his worship by his covenanting people; that, as a Spirit, God shall be worshiped in spirit by his people. Here, again, is no arbitrary mandate, but only the recognition of a vital truth. Because God is Creator of all, no creation of God can be like God. Because God is a Spirit, the human mind can best commune with him spiritually, without having its conceptions of him degraded by any image or representation—which at the best must be wholly unworthy of him.

In this second requirement, as in the first, a danger is indicated to which the Israelites were peculiarly exposed in their day, and to which all the people of God are exposed in any day. In the Assyrian, or Chaldean, home of Abraham, there was practically noimage worship, but there was a belief in a plurality of gods. In the Egyptian home, from which the Israelites had just come out, images in great variety were the objects of worship. As the covenant people of God, the Israelites were to refrain from the polytheism of their ancestral home in the far East, and from the grosser idolatry of their more recent home in the West. And so it must be with the people of God at all times; they must worship only God, and they must worship God without any help from a material representation of the object of their worship.

As there is still a temptation to give a divided heart to God, so there is still a temptation to seek the help of some visible representation or symbol of God's presence in his worship. The Christian believer does not bow down to an idol, but many a Christian believer thinks that his mind can be helped upward in worship by looking at some representation of his Saviour's face, or at some symbol of his Saviour's passion. But just because God is infinitely above all material representations and symbols, so God can best be apprehended and discerned spiritually. Anything coming between man's spirit and God the Spirit is a hindrance to worship, and not a help to it. Suppose a young man were watching from a window for his absent mother's return, with awish to catch the first glimpse of her approaching face. Would he be wise, or foolish, in putting up a photograph of his mother on the window-pane before him, as a help to bearing her in mind as he looks for her coming? As there can be no doubt about the answer to that question, so there can be no doubt that we can best come into spiritual communion with God by closing our eyes to everything that can be seen with the natural eye, and opening the eyes of our spirit to the sight of God the Spirit. This, again, is no arbitrary requirement of God; it is in the very nature of his being and of our own.

The third requirement of this compact is, that there shall be no insincerity on the part of God's covenant people in their claiming and bearing his name, as the name of their covenanting God. This requirement is not generally understood in this light; but all the facts in the case go to show that this is its true light. In the Oriental world, and in the primitive world everywhere, one's name stands for one's personality; and the right to bear one's name or even to call on one by his personal name, is a proof of intimate relation, if not of actual union, with him. God was now covenanting with this people to be his people, thereby authorizing them to bear his name, and to be known as his representatives. In the very nature of things,this laid upon them a peculiar obligation to bear his name reverently and in all sincerity.

It is not that God arbitrarily commanded his people to have a care in thespeakingof his name, as if he were jealous of its irreverent mention; but it is that he reminded them that the coming into the privileges of his name was the coming into the responsibilities of that name. It was as though Mr. Moody were taking a little street waif into his home to train the boy as his own son, and were formally giving to that boy the right to take and bear his name. Naturally he might say: "Understand, now, my boy, that, wherever you go, they'll say, 'There goes a young Moody.' Now, I value my name, and I don't want it disgraced. See to it that you take care of that name wherever you are." So God said to his people: "Thou shalt not take"—shalt not assume, bear, carry—"the name of the Lord thy God in vain"—insincerely, vainly; "for the Lord will not"—cannot—"hold him guiltless that taketh"—claimeth the privileges of—"his name in vain"—vainly, insincerely.

This covenant obligation also is on us as it was on God's people of old. As Christians we are baptized into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.[270]Wherever we go, we are counted asmembers of God's family. His name is on us, and his honor is in our keeping. Wherefore, "let every one that nameth the name of the Lord"—claimeth it as his own name—"depart from unrighteousness;"[271]and let him never feel that it is a light or a vain thing to bear that name before the world.

Thus we see that the first three of the ten requirements of the loving covenant of God's people with their God are simply the requirements to worship God as the only God, to worship him in unhindered spirituality, and to worship him in all sincerity. These three fundamental requirements seem to have been in the mind of our Lord Jesus when he said to the woman of Samaria at the well of Jacob: "God"—the One God—"is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship in spirit and truth."[272]

Coming to the fourth requirement of the loving covenant of God and his people, we find it differing in form from the preceding three requirements; differing also from the form of all but one of those which follow it. The preceding three are in the negative form; this is in the affirmative form, beginning with the injunction, "Remember" (Keep in mind). Of course, there is a reason for this. The first three requirements are in the line of obvious, if not ofself-evident, truths; the requirement of one day in seven for rest and worship is not, however, of obvious importance. Hence this requirement is specifically affirmed as an article of the covenant, while the others guard against departures from primal principles of vital moment.

The "Sabbath" was a recognized institution long before the days of Moses. Traces of its strict and sacred observance in the ancestral home of Abraham are disclosed in the Assyrian records unearthed in these later days. And now that the Lord, at Sinai, is drawing away his covenant people from the sins and errors of their fathers and neighbors, he reminds them that there is good in some of the observances of the past, which they are not to forsake or forget. "Remember," therefore he says, "the sabbath day to keep it holy"—as your fathers in all their polytheism had a care to observe it of old. Bearthatinstitution in mind, as worth your remembering.

And here again there is affirmed a principle which is for all time and for all people. Although the reason for setting apart one day above another for rest and worship is not on the surface of things, the experiences of mankind, as well as the teachings of God's Word, go to show that there is such a reason below the surface. In the long run, man can do morework, and do it better, in six days of a week, than he can in seven; and unless a man worships God at stated times, he is not likely to worship him at all. So it is that God makes it a part of his loving covenant between himself and his people, that ever and always they shall worship him statedly, as well as worship him sincerely, spiritually, and solely; because without this stated recognition of the covenant, the covenant itself would be forgotten.

And now we come to the fifth of the ten covenant requirements: "Honor thy father and thy mother." This also is in the affirmative form, and for a very good reason. God is here declaring, as it were, that those who are in legitimate authority are so far his representatives. He wants it understood that while no other gods are in existence, even in a subordinate place in the universe, he has his representatives in various spheres of human government and rule, and they are to be honored accordingly by his covenant people.

We are accustomed to speak of the division of the Ten Commandments into two tables, the first comprising four requirements, and the second six; but it will be seen that this fifth requirement belongs with the preceding four in the group of those which look God-ward. It is as though the one table pointedupward from ourselves, while the other pointed outward. We are to honor those who are over us in the Lord, not as our fellows, but as our superiors; not because of what they are as men, but because they are, within the scope of their rule, the representatives of our God.

By Oriental custom the terms "father" and "mother" are by no means limited to one's natural parents, but are applicable to superiors in years, or in wisdom, or in civil or religious station. This truth was impressed on my mind by an incident in my journey across the desert of Sinai. My companions in travel were two young men, neither of them a relative of mine,—as my dragoman very well knew. When, however, in mid-desert, we met an old Arab shaykh, through whose territory we were to pass, my dragoman introduced me as the father of these young men. "No, they are not mysons," I said to the dragoman; but his answer was: "That's all right. Somebody must be father here." And when I found that, according to the Arab idea, every party of travelers must have a leader, and that the leader of a party was called its "father," I saw that it would look better for me to be called the father of the young men, than for one of them to be called my father.

Traces of this idea are found in the Bible use of the term "father." In Genesis, Jabal is said to be "thefather of such as dwell in tents, and have cattle;"[273]the man who started the long line of nomad shepherds. Jubal is called "the father of all such as handle the harp and pipe;"[274]the pioneer instrumental musician of our race. Joseph in Egypt speaks of himself as "a father to Pharaoh,"[275]in view of the confidence reposed in him by the ruler of the empire. "Be unto me a father and a priest,"[276]says Micah to the young Levite, in the days of the Judges; because a religious guide is, in the East, counted as in a peculiar sense a representative of God.

It is not merely that the terms "father" and "mother"mayinclude others besides human parents, but it is that no Oriental would think of limiting those terms to that relationship. Hence this fifth requirement of the covenant of God's people with their God, just as it stands, is in substance: Honor those who are over you in the Lord, as the representatives of the Lord; for the powers that be are ordained of God,[277]and he who fails to honor them lacks in due honor to him who has deputed them to speak and to act for himself. And herein is affirmed a principle which is as important to us to-day as it was to the Israelites in the days of Moses. Indeed, it may bequestioned whether any precept of the ten covenant requirements has a more specific bearing on the peculiar needs of the American people, than this injunction to reverence those who are in authority because they are God's representatives in their sphere. Anarchy can have no tolerance in the mind of a child of God; but reverence for rightful authority has its home there.

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