There remained yet one more plague, the instant destruction of all the first-born of Egypt at the dead of night, which so terrified the whole population with dread of immediate and utter extermination, that with one voice they urged the departure without delay of all the Israelites, with all their flocks and goods, and with whatever gifts and supplies they wished. “And they took their journey; and Jehovah went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light, to go by day and night.”
Thus the Messenger Jehovah, who introduced this train of visible wonders by appearing to Moses in the burning bush, signalized the triumphant rescue and march of his people out of Egypt by reäppearing, and going before them in the cloud-like appendage, visibly luminous as fire by night, and as an irradiant form by day, which continued as the constant signal of his presence during the whole period of their wanderings in the wilderness.
But their departure, which took place in the night, was no sooner made known to the Egyptians than “the heart of Pharaoh and of his servants was turned against them.” They reproached themselves for having let them go, and were infatuated to pursue and bring them back. “And all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh, and his horsemen and his army pursued and overtook them at the Red Sea.” Still more stupendous exhibitions of power, supremacy and triumph on the one side,and of incurable and fatal delusion on the other, were required for the instruction and conviction of that and succeeding ages. “And Melach (the) Elohim, which went before the camp of Israel, removed and went behind them; and the pillar of the cloud went from before their face, and stood behind them, and it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel; and it was a cloud and darkness to them, but it gave light by night to these, so that the one came not near the other all the night.”
Thus the final trial was arranged and conducted under the visible direction of the Messenger Jehovah. The sea was divided, and the hosts of Israel went over as on dry land. Pharaoh’s chariots and army followed. “Jehovah looked unto the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled them;” threw them into consternation by “taking off their chariot wheels,” and by causing the waters to return, overwhelmed and drowned them in the midst of the sea. “Thus Jehovah saved Israel, and Israel saw that great work which Jehovah did upon the Egyptians; and the people feared Jehovah, and believed Jehovah and his servant Moses.”
The greatness and wonderfulness of this deliverance, as referred to and celebrated in other parts of Scripture, if regarded, not as a signal and never-to-be-forgotten triumph of the Messenger Jehovah over Satan, and the agents of his idolatry and imposture, but simply in its relation to the numbers, power, or unassisted skill of the Egyptians, are out of all proportion to the result. Instead of such an array of preparations, such threats and remonstrances, such a succession and selection of miracles and plagues, had the object been only to loosentheir covetous hold on the labor and service of Israel, a single blow might as easily have destroyed them all in a moment as their first-born, or whelmed them in the Nile, as in the Red Sea. But their idolatry denied the supremacy, prerogatives, and rights of Jehovah, and ascribed them, not to irrational animals and senseless elements, except as vehicles and mediums of homage, but to an intelligent and powerful rival, competitor, and pretender to the throne and government of the world, who claimed, prescribed, and received their worship, arrogated the credit of bestowing the blessings of providence, sanctioned the indulgence of their passions, instigated their magical delusions, and had their confidence as to his power to protect them. It was to vindicate himself, and to confound that arrogant pretender, that Jehovah vouchsafed these demonstrations in the view of the Hebrews, who needed the lesson which they taught, and in a way to be rehearsed and known among the Canaanites and other nations of the earth. It was a marked and memorable scene in the progress of that great antagonism which hitherto has constituted the basis, and, however obscured to the blinded view of the actors, or concealed by their craft and policy, has furnished the elements of history, and is yet in the view of the whole universe, with all the accompaniments of publicity and conclusiveness, to have its issue.
It would require a chapter to refer to all the descriptions and allusions commemorative of this scene, in the triumphant song of Moses, recalled and sung, Rev. xv. 3, by the redeemed, in celebration of their resembling deliverance, to the praise of the Lamb as their Redeemer, whom they address as the Lord God Almighty—Jehovah, the Elohim; and in the Psalms, cxxxv., cxxxvi.,and other Scriptures, where to Jehovah are referred the wonders done in Egypt and in the wilderness, which by Moses are ascribed to him as Melach Jehovah.
But, waiving these references, it may be noticed as an additional evidence that it was the Delegated One, the Personal Word, who, after appearing visibly to Moses, and investing him with his ministerial office, executed those wondrous demonstrations in Egypt, that, prior to the signal exercise of his power and justice by which he destroyed all the first-born of the opposing party, he instituted for the benefit and as auxiliary to the faith of his people, the ordinance of the passover; of which, the slaughter of the paschal lamb, the sprinkling of the blood as the means of exemption from death, and other details, had a counterpart in the circumstances, reference, import, and Scripture narrative of his sacrifice of himself, Christ our Passover sacrificed for us; the Lamb of God, slain virtually and in effect, as by covenant and oath, from the foundation of the world.
Further Illustration of the Antagonism—Idolatry a Counterfeit Rival System in opposition to the Messiah and the True Worship—Its Origin and Nature—Satan the God of it—The Tower of Babel devoted to his Worship—That Worship extended thence over the Earth at the Dispersion.
The illustration of this mighty and ceaseless conflict requires particular reference to the system of idolatry by which, in opposition and rivalship to the worship and service of Jehovah, Satan organized his followers under Nimrod; and on their dispersion to different regions of the globe, enslaved and held in bondage all the tribes and nations which they planted, and to which he at length seduced the kings, princes, priests, and all but a remnant of the chosen people. It was one comprehensive antagonist rival system, copied and counterfeited in all its leading features from the doctrines and ritual revealed to the race at first, and renewedly taught and practised by Noah, on his egress from the ark. In what forms the great Adversary had instigated the corruption and wickedness, and led on the masses of the race before the Deluge to their total destruction by that instrument of Jehovah’s power, is but faintly intimated. The earth was filled with violence; and it is not unlikely that Cain’s example in presenting, contrary to the Divine command and the ritual prescription, an offering not of blood, not typical of the expiatory sacrifice of Messiah, the promised Son, but an offering intended for the occasion, by its nature, and in contrast to that of Abel, to express his denial and rejection of the typical sacrifice and its antitype; and his sullen and arrogant denial of his being in the wrong, and needing an atonement and forgiveness; and the example of his persecuting malevolence, in killing his brother, may furnish a clue to the theory and practice of his party afterwards.
But while Noah, conformably to the earlier practice, erected an altar to Jehovah, offered typical offerings, and otherwise complied with the ritual, professed the doctrines, and exercised the faith of the revealed system of religion, and was a preacher of righteousness; his early descendants, like those of Adam, were soon separated into opposite parties of true and false worshippers.
The false or idolatrous party, originally characterized as the seed of the serpent, the followers and servants of Satan, having, under Nimrod—a name signifying rebel—united in their antagonist scheme, commenced the erection of the tower of Babel—otherwise Bel, Belus, or Baal—in Babylon.
From a comparison of the terms employed with reference to this structure, and the object and nature of the idolatry to which it was devoted; its history and that of the structures and idolatry of other countries which were copied from the model here furnished; the descriptions in the Scriptures of that idolatry, both as practised by the heathen and by the Israelites, and the references to it by Herodotus, Thucydides, and other secular historians, the following summary statement in the present and two succeeding chapters is believed to be well founded.
This tower or temple was originally destined, as it was afterwards devoted, to the worship of the great Adversary, who palmed himself upon his followers asgod of this world, god of providence, bestower of benefits and blessings; the good principle or intelligence of the Babylonians, Persians, and other heathen nations, by whom he was regarded as a creature intermediate between the supreme, self-existent, invisible Being, and the human race, and in that character as creator and ruler of the world; having his residence in the sun as his tabernacle and shekina, and manifesting himself locally and at pleasure to his votaries in fire, as his element, and as the medium of their worship, sacrifices, incense, &c., and in light, and in the effects of the solar heat upon vegetation, and otherwise as causing the chief blessings and comforts of life. These visible objects and benefits appealed directly to the senses and the unrestrained passions of his followers, who, being at enmity with the righteous party, and irreconcilably opposed to the doctrines, duties, and restraints of their religion; and yet, as well from social considerations as from their natures as dependent creatures, requiring a substitute, a rival antagonist system, and a head and leader consistent with it, may well be supposed to have entered into this system with a zeal, a pertinacity and desperateness, not exceeded by their successors in Babylon or elsewhere, nor even by that of the apostate Jews, who, in direct opposition to the doctrines and worship of Jehovah, established in his temple this idol system, with its emblems and rites, and the public and formal worship of its god in the sun, most boldly and impiously turning their faces to the East, and their backs to the visible Shekina in the holy place.
The system of corruption, delusion, and bondage, by which the great Adversary commenced his second experiment of lordship over his party, and of renewed and perpetual hostility towards the righteous, and treason,rebellion, impiety, and insult towards Jehovah their Elohe, required not only to be such as would gratify their depraved hearts and grovelling passions, so as to insure success to his craft and subtlety, but to be contrived, adopted, and put in practice so as to unite, combine, and govern them, as soon as possible after the repeopling of the earth commenced.
That it was in fact contrived, adopted, and practised prior to the dispersion, is proved by the resumption and practice of it by the dispersed tribes and nations both in the Eastern and Western hemispheres: and that the nature, object, doctrines, rites, bearings, and ends of it, were originally well understood, and matter of common intelligence and notoriety, is proved by the close resemblance of the system, as established in other quarters of the world, to the model metropolitan establishment in Babylon.
This original tower or temple—which there is no reasonable ground to doubt continued near two thousand years, till Xerxes pillaged and destroyed it, together with the structures around it which had been added by Nebuchadnezzar—was six hundred feet square at the base, and six hundred feet in height, its cubic contents far exceeding those of the largest of the pyramids. It was devoted to the worship of the god of their idolatry, the intelligence to whom they ascribed the works of creation and providence, under the names Bel, Baal, Beelzebub, and other designations of Satan; and also to astronomical observations, which appear to have led to the appropriation, subsequently, of the moon to Astarte, consort of Baal and Queen of heaven, the prototype—not in respect to her moral character, which was wholly opposite, but to her mediating office—of the deified Maryof the Papists; and of the planets and stars, to subordinate auxiliary mediating demons of different species.
The projectors and architects of this great paragon and wonder of the world were not a horde of ignorant, wandering nomades. They had knowledge and arts adequate to an undertaking, whether considered merely as a physical undertaking, or in connection with the stupendous and enduring system of imposture, impiety, and misery it was devoted to, which has not been equalled since: and which may well be conceived of as sufficient to occasion the local and special interposition of the Messenger Jehovah to confound their language and scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth. Their astronomy, and probably their geometry and other abstruse branches of knowledge, were, at least in respect to their leading principles, not inferior to those of the present day. Prideaux, speaking of this tower, which he holds to be the same with that destroyed Xerxes, observes, that “when Alexander took Babylon, Callisthenes the philosopher, who accompanied him thither, found they had astronomical observations for nineteen hundred and three years backward from that time, which carrieth the account as high as the one hundred and fifteenth year after the flood, which was within fifteen years after the Tower of Babel was built. For the confusion of tongues, which followed immediately after the building of that tower, happened in the year wherein Peleg was born, which was an hundred and one years after the flood, and fourteen years after that, those observations began. This account Callisthenes sent from Babylon into Greece, to his master Aristotle,” &c. (Book II., part 1.)
The system of Idolatry founded on a perversion of the Doctrine of Mediation—References to the Worshippers of Baal, Israelite and Pagan.
This system of idolatry was founded on the doctrine of mediation, which was the basis of the revealed system of true religion. But in the application of that doctrine, idolatry exhibited an entire perversion, ascribing the mediatorial office and relations, not to Messiah, the Messenger Jehovah, the one only Mediator between God and man, but to his adversary, antagonist, and competitor, who emphatically in this respect, and as creator and administrator of providence, arrogated the office, prerogatives, relations and works of Jehovah, the delegated Personal Word.
This consideration alone affords a clue to any intelligent understanding of the system in its details, or of the succeeding history of the antagonism; of the enormity and turpitude of idolatry as a crime; and of the amazing retributions and judgments which it called down upon the Canaanites and other nations devoted to the worship of Baal, and upon the Israelites on their apostatizing to that worship.
The doctrine of mediation and of one Divine Mediator, as it involved the relations of men to the Creator, moral and providential Ruler and Redeemer, was the basis and prime element in the patriarchal and Levitical economies, which prescribed a religion not merely for dependent, but for fallen, guilty creatures, no acts ofwhom, whether of obedience in performing ordinary duties, or of religious homage, sacrifices, prayers or offerings, could be accepted unless rendered in the exercise of faith in the appointed Mediator, and a consciousness of entire dependence on his merits, and the efficacy of his mediation, as the only ground of acceptance, and of the bestowment of blessings on them. Hence the typical sacrifices, and all the rites, ordinances, and prescriptions of that system.
But from the nature of the case, and the consciousness of dependence, helplessness and misery in those who turned away from the true worship, a sense of the necessity of mediation and a mediator must naturally have been felt by them, as well as by those of the other party. Without a sense of that necessity they would neither have projected nor adopted any religion whatever. It is the sole basis of all false religions. Those who have it not, must be classed with atheists or deists. The Jews who nominally reject the doctrine, and really reject the true Mediator, palpably contradict and pervert the religion which they profess, and virtually assign to their rites and forms the office of mediation.
Nothing can be more unlikely or more absurd than the supposition that nations, tribes, or individuals should contrive or adopt or persevere in the practice of a false religion, without a notion more or less correct, and a conviction more or less strong and effective, of the existence of a Supreme Being, to whose will the striking events of providence, the vicissitudes in their own experience, their acts, their prayers, their fears and hopes, had a real, though it might be a mysterious and incomprehensible, reference. But with such conviction, their false religion, naturally in theory, and necessarily in order to such effect upon their hopes and fears as toinduce their perseverance in it, refers ultimately to that mysterious, unseen, and, without intermediate agencies and instruments of mediation, inaccessible Being. Such fears and such conviction, coupled with the uncertainties of the future, and with impending or foreboded evils, are, like instincts, deep seated, in the very nature of man. And hence, with reference to the false system under consideration, the facility, on the one hand, with which imposture, delusion, and desperate infatuation might take effect; and the absurdity, on the other hand, of supposing that Baal, whose tabernacle in the sun, and whose manifestations in fire, light, air or water were ever visibly or sensibly present and familiar; or that any of the animals consecrated to him, or of the representative material images of animate or inanimate, rational or irrational forms, called idols, were ever mistaken by any of his worshippers for that Being whom they regarded as supreme, ever invisible, and far removed from immediate intercourse and familiarity with mortals. Such a mistake would argue that the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Asiatics, Polynesians, Mexicans, and all other pagans, as well as the devotees of Popery, were more senseless than the animals, or even the material forms and figures, before which they bowed themselves down, and presented their gifts and offerings.
But not to waste words on so plain a matter, let it be illustrated by reference to Scripture. The Israelites were so terrified by the thunders and lightnings at the giving of the Law, when Jehovah spoke to them directly, that “they removed and stood afar off; and they said unto Moses: Speak thou with us, and we will hear, but let not Elohim speak with us, lest we die. And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, for (the) Elohim has come to prove you, and thathis fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not.” Ex. xx. Moses, referring to this, Deut. v., says: “Jehovah,” that is, the Messenger Jehovah, “talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire, (I stood between Jehovah and you at that time, to show you the word of Jehovah: for ye were afraid by reason of the fire, and went not up into the mount;) saying, I am Jehovah thy Elohe, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other Elohim before me. Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, nor any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters under the earth; thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: For I, Jehovah thy Elohe, am a jealous El,” &c. Shortly after this, Moses, Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel were called up into the mount, and “they saw the Elohe of Israel.” Then Aaron and the others returned to the people, except Moses, who was called up into the cloud on the mount, and remained there forty days and forty nights. In the meantime, “the sight of the glory of Jehovah was like devouring fire on the top of the mount, in the eyes of the children of Israel.” The appalling terrors of this sight, from which they were, at the announcement of the Law, so anxious to be relieved, being thus prolonged from week to week, and despairing of the return of their chosen interlocutor between Jehovah and them, the minds of the people reverted to the image representative of Baal, and with other images and idolized objects familiarly called Elohim, with which their sojourn in Egypt had made them acquainted: and they said to Aaron, “Up, make us Elohim which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us upout of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him.” Aaron accordingly made a molten calf, “and they said,This is thy Elohe, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt:” plainly meaning, This image represents, is a visible representative of thy Elohe, and stands between him and us, as Moses, the man that brought us out of Egypt, stood between Jehovah and us at the giving of the Law. They wanted and deemed that they had in this molten image a visible representative of the Elohe of Israel. But no one can suppose that Aaron, after having witnessed the wonders in Egypt, and assisted Moses as an instrument of them, and, with the elders, “seen the Elohe of Israel” in the mount, could mistake and ascribe to the brute image the power and prerogatives of that Being; neither did the people imagine any thing to that effect. The crime of which they were guilty, and for which they were punished, was that of breaking a positive command; doing what was expressly forbidden; making a graven image; worshipping it as a representative emblem of Jehovah, and medium of their homage of him; placing itbefore him, between them and him, in imitation of the Egyptians, who made and worshipped similar images as the immediate, local, visible, familiar objects or media through which they offered their sacrifices and prayers to Baal. There is no intimation that they intended on this occasion to ascribe their deliverance from Egypt to Baal. On the contrary, they had witnessed the most amazing demonstrations in the plagues and at the Red Sea, that their deliverance was effected by the high hand and outstretched arm of Jehovah, in opposition to that adversary. They were required by sacrifices and prayers to worship the Elohe of Israel directly in spirit and in truth, conformably to the letter of their ritual,the divine doctrine of mediation, and his relations as the only Mediator between the invisible God and men. The introduction of a representative image or deified object between him and them, and offering burnt offerings in that relation, as Aaron did, was not only wholly inconsistent with the nature, theory, and ritual of their religion, and a flagrant act of disobedience; but was calculated to lead them, as it afterwards did, to renounce Jehovah, and turn away to the exclusive worship of Baal through the medium of idols. Against this tendency they were often cautioned and warned; and were commanded to destroy the images and altars of Baal wherever they encountered them. They were forbidden to inquire after the idol gods, or how the idolatrous nations served them, and were commanded to put to death members of their families, false prophets and others who should endeavor to entice them to idolatry, and utterly to destroy those who were enticed, with their families and all their effects. Deut. xii., xiii., &c.
The first public defection of any of the Israelites, or any considerable number of them, took place nearly forty years after the Exodus, when, in their forty-second journey, they entered the plain of Moab, and were seduced by the Moabites to attend “the sacrifices of their gods; and the people did eat, and bowed down to their gods, and Israel joined himself unto Baal-peor”—that is, Baal, as worshipped on the eminence called Peor, where the vilest abominations were practised. Twenty-four thousand of the people were slain in rebuke of this apostasy. Under the Judges, after the death of Joshua, the children of Israel “forsook Jehovah, and served Baal and Ashtaroth,” Judges ii. 3, 6; and again in the reign of Ahab, who, having married Jezebel, a heathen woman and zealous devotee of that idolatry,built a house or temple of Baal in Samaria, erected an altar for him, and served and worshipped him.
In the meantime, however, there continued generally among the Israelites a restless propensity for such visible and familiar images as were common in Egypt and other nations, and which, notwithstanding the prohibition in the Decalogue, and the wrath incurred for the violation under Aaron, and in the plain of Moab, they seem to have deemed consistent with their religion, provided the worship offered through them was directed to Jehovah and not to Baal. Thus, in the narrative of Micah, Judges xvii., it appears that silver which had been dedicated to Jehovah was wrought into a graven image, not for any purpose of secret or heathenish idolatry, but as an instrument to be employed in his daily domestic worship of Jehovah. He accordingly engaged a Levite to officiate as priest, who, on the arrival of a company of Danites in search of a place to dwell in, made no secret of his occupation. Micah, on engaging him, said, “Now know I that Jehovah will do me good, seeing I have a Levite to my priest;” which plainly implies that he professed to worship Jehovah, and to expect benefits only from him. An illustration to the like effect is furnished in the history of Gideon, a true worshipper of Jehovah, to whom the Messenger Jehovah appeared, and who, in obedience to his command, destroyed the altar of Baal; and yet, after having been the instrument, with three hundred men, of the destruction of the kings of Midian, and of an army of one hundred and twenty thousand, took of the spoils of gold, and made an ephod and put it in his city; an imitation no doubt of that prescribed to Moses, but intended, at a distance from the tabernacle, as an instrument of worshipping and consulting Jehovah; butwhich, as naturally as if it had been a graven image, became a snare to him and to the people.
Another illustration occurs in the history of Jeroboam, late a refugee and perhaps idolater in Egypt, who, fearing that if the people of the ten tribes, and the Levites who dwelt among them, should continue to go up to Jerusalem to worship Jehovah in the temple, their hearts would be turned from him to Rehoboam as their rightful king, “made two calves of gold, and said unto the people, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem; behold thy Elohe, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. And he set the one in Bethel, and the other put he in Dan. And this thing became a sin.” Doubtless the people regarded these graven images in the same light as that made under the direction of Aaron; for, with the exception of the priests and Levites, they acquiesced in the change, though a week before they were ready, as subjects of the legitimate successor of Solomon, to continue in the established worship of Jehovah in the temple. The priests and Levites were expelled as too closely connected with the service in Jerusalem; new priests were appointed, and the same rites were observed before the images as before Jehovah in the temple. And when Jehu, in his zeal for Jehovah, slew all the partisans of Baal, he still adhered to the golden calves in Dan and Bethel, as not in his view inconsistent with the true worship. 2 Kings x.
In the same class of acts, in point of turpitude, and in respect to the apparent intention of the actors and the tendency of their acts, may be included that of Nadab and Abihu, in “offeringstrange firebefore Jehovah, which he commanded them not. And there went out fire from Jehovah and devoured them, and theydied before Jehovah;” and that of Korah and his company, who usurped the priests’ office and burned incense, and were destroyed with their families and fourteen thousand of their adherents.
These illustrations show that the worship rendered to images did not terminate in them as its object, but referred to an unseen Intelligence beyond them, who was supposed to be cognizant of their circumstances and their acts, and to be able to protect them and grant their requests. It proceeded on the assumption that the visible emblem, the graven image, or whatever was selected by individuals or canonized by the priests, and worshipped as an idol—the proper signification of which is, a figure, likeness, or representation—was a medium of intercourse with the Being worshipped.
This was the case, not merely with the Israelites in their use of images in the real or pretended worship of Jehovah, but equally of the devoted worshippers of Baal. A few references out of many which might be made, will show that their prayers and offerings were directed to the unseen object of their homage. Thus, in the formal controversy between Elijah, as prophet of Jehovah, and the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal, to demonstrate by fire, to Ahab and the people, which was supreme, whether Jehovah ortheBaal wastheElohim to be worshipped and obeyed; Elijah proposed that each party should offer a sacrifice of animals, and let it be seen which would be miraculously consumed, and said: “Call ye on the name of your Elohe,”—rendered here and elsewhere erroneouslygodsin the plural, as if there were more than one Baal,—“and I will call on the name of Jehovah; andtheElohim that answereth by fire, let him be the Elohim. And all the people answered and said, It is well spoken. AndElijah said unto the prophets oftheBaal, Choose you one bullock for yourselves, and dress it first, for ye are many, and call on your Elohe; but put no fire under. And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name oftheBaal from morning even until noon, saying, OtheBaal, hear us! But there was no voice, nor any that answered. And they leaped upon the altar that was made. And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud, for he is an Elohim; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked. And they cried aloud, and cut themselves, after their manner, with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them. And they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, and there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded.” 1 Kings xviii.
In this case there does not appear to have been any intervening image or idol. The priests called on the name of the absent, invisible Baal, but he answered not. He could not assist them by working a real miracle, and under the circumstances they could not counterfeit one; and with the approbation of the people, who saw that they were impostors, they were all slain.
That the real object of their worship was distinct from their images, is implied in their selecting high places for their religious rites, and erecting lofty towers for that purpose, where the sun could be earliest seen at rising, and where the stars or host of heaven could be most advantageously observed; and in burning their children as sacrifices, making them pass through the fire to Baal or Moloch. Thus, in the reign of Ahaz, 2 Kings xvii., “They made them molten images, even two calves, and made a grove, and worshipped all thehost of heaven, and served Baal. And they caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire.” Manasseh made his son pass through the fire; and in Josiah’s reformation he put down the idolatrous priests “that burned incense unto Baal, to the sun [literally, to Baal, the sun] and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the host of heaven.” 2 Kings xxiii. Jeremiah says: “They have built also the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal.” Chap. xix. 5. Again: “And they built the high places of Baal, to cause their sons and their daughtersto pass through the fireunto Moloch.” Jer. xxxii. 35. And of Josiah it is said, that he defiled Tophet—“that no man might make his son or his daughterto pass through the fireto Moloch.” 2 Kings xxiii. 10. Their idea evidently was, that by sacrificing in this way the most valued offering they could make, that of their children, they would pass in and through that element to Baal, whose residence was conceived to be in the solar orb.
The term Moloch—variously written Melech, Moloch, Malcom, Milcom—as a designation, refers to the same being as Baal; the literal import of the latter being the same as that ofthe Lord, as the sun is lord of the day; and that of the former, the same asthe king, as the sun is king of the day. The molten images, representative of Moloch, in the heated chest or arms of which, children offered in sacrifice were burnt, are somewhat variously described, but generally as having the head of a calf and the body of a man, with an opening in the chest, into which, when heated from below, the victims were cast alive; and to drown their cries, as in the burning of widows in India, under the same general notion, drums were beaten.
It appears evident from the passages in which they occur in the Scriptures, that the terms Bel, Baal, and Baalim, are personal designations of the intelligence worshipped by the Chaldeans, and other idolaters, as their god, and by the Israelites in opposition to Jehovah. Thus, Jer. l. 2: “Declare ye among the nations, ... Babylon is taken, Bel is confounded, Merodach is broken in pieces;” and li. 44: “I will punish Bel in Babylon.... The nations shall not flow together any more to him.” That is, by the destruction of Babylon, Bel, the god of their idolatry, is confounded, punishment is inflicted on him; Merodach, the chief idol representative of Bel, is broken in pieces.
In most of the instances in which the same designation is renderedBaal, it has the article, making the personal reference emphatic.
“Throw down the altar oftheBaal that thy father hath, and out down the grove [statue of wood, or pillar carved statue or image-like] that is by it: and build an altar unto Jehovah thy Elohe.... And when the men of the city arose in the morning, behold, the altar oftheBaal was east down, &c.... If he be an Elohim, lethimplead forhimself.... LettheBaal plead against Gideon, because he hath thrown downhisaltar.” Judges vi. 25, 26, &c.
Ahab “went and servedtheBaal, and worshippedhim. And he reared up an altar for Baal in the house oftheBaal which he had built in Samaria.” 1 Kings xiv. 31, 32.
“And Elijah said, If Jehovah betheElohim, follow him: but iftheBaal, then follow him.” 1 Kings xviii. 21.
So in the narrative of the destruction of the house, and the prophets, priests, and worshippers oftheBaal, by Jehu, 2 Kings x. 18-28, the article occurs with thename in the successive verses. And chap. xi. 18: “All the people of the land went into the house oftheBaal and brake it down;hisaltars andhis imagesbrake they in pieces.”
It is manifest from these and other like passages, that while the statues and images of Baal were many and various, in all countries and places,theBaal, the real object of worship, represented by them, was one. To him, under another of his designations, that ofMoloch, human victims offered in sacrifice were supposed to pass through the element of fire.
Nor does this conclusion appear to be invalidated by the occurrence of the designation in a plural form, rendered Baalim. The usage in this respect seems analogous to that of the word Elohim. In both cases the article is often prefixed; and the reference is to one agent only. Thus, Judges viii. 33: “The children of Israel turned again ... aftertheBaalim, and made Baal-berith their Elohim.” Again, chap. x. 10-16, the children of Israel said: “We have forsaken our Elohe, and also servedtheBaalim. And Jehovah said, ... Ye have forsaken me, and served other Elohim.... Go and cry unto the Elohim which ye have chosen.... And they put away the strange Elohe from among them, and served Jehovah.”
The terms,Baal-berith, signifythe god of the covenant,i. e., of the covenant between Baal and his worshippers; asMelach Berith, Mal. iii. 2, signifiesthe Messenger of the Covenantof grace.
It is thus presumed to be evident beyond a doubt, that the whole system was based upon a theory and a sense of the necessity of mediation; and whether the earlier or later idolaters, the instructed or the ignorant, referred in their worship to a being beyond or superiorto Baal, regarding him as created by that superior being, and yet himself as creator of the world, or whether their homage terminated in him, does not affect the question under consideration.
Mosheim, in his Commentaries on the three first centuries of the Christian era, observes, with respect to the costly and sumptuous buildings of the pagans, called temples, fanes, &c., and dedicated to the worship of their gods, that internally “they were ornamented with images of the gods, and furnished with altars,” &c. “The statues were supposed to be animated by the deities whom theyrepresented; for though the worshippers of gods like those above described must, in a great measure, have turned their backs upon every dictate of reason, they were yet by no means willing to appear so wholly destitute of common sense as to pay their adorationto a mere idol of metal,wood,or stone; but always maintained that the statues, when properly consecrated, were filled with the presence of those divinities whose forms they bore.” Vol. i. 16.
Idolatry an imposing and delusive Counterfeit of the Revealed System, in respect to the leading features of its Ritual, and the prerogatives ascribed to the Arch-deceiver—Reference to the Symbols of the Apocalypse.
This antagonist system was, in respect to the attributes and prerogatives impiously arrogated by the great Adversary, and in respect to the leading features of its ritual, a bold, seductive, and imposing counterfeit of the revealed system taught and practised by Noah and his descendants in the line of Shem.
To substitute a false appearance, a deceitful imitation, a resembling counterfeit, a cheat, a lie, was as obviously expedient, and even necessary, in such a case, as it is in keeping with the craft and subtlety of Satan to deceive and beguile. He had to entice, allure, and impose on those who knew what the true system was, and by what miracles and wonders it had been sanctioned; who witnessed its effects in the lives of those who practised it, were familiar with its institutions and public observances; and whose understandings must have been more or less influenced by its inherent and its hereditary claims, and by its voice of encouragement and hope to the righteous, and of alarm and terror to the wicked. Under such circumstances, to resist and counteract the system divinely prescribed and established, it was necessary to impose on the understandings of men, as well as to enlist their feelings, give scope to their propensities, and gratify their passions. To have called on them to worship him directly in his true character, withoutdisguise, or to worship him as a being of inferior claims to those of Jehovah, or by rites and ceremonials less significant and imposing, would not have been likely to secure their homage and allegiance. His own undisguised character would have been revolting; an inferior could not protect them against the superior Being; to dispense with public and visible rites and ceremonies would have been to disappoint and resist their propensities and passions; and no others but such as were already in use could be made to maintain a competition with them.
Accordingly, he arrogated the name, power, prerogatives, works, relations and government of Jehovah. He claimed to be god of this world: its creator, providential ruler, dispenser of benefits, protector of his followers, and rightful object of their homage and obedience, in opposition to Jehovah. He took the then current name in Babylon of the sun, Bel—or, as pointed and commonly rendered, Baal—Lord of Heaven, Supreme Ruler, like the sun in the visible heaven; afterwards, with the same import, the Egyptian name of the same object, On, (often rendered Aven.) Also, Moloch, (Melek,) King; Baal-Zebub, Lord of Hosts—Zebub being a corruption of Zebaoth, hosts, as in the formula, Jehovah Zebaoth, Lord of Hosts; and among the Phœnicians, Baal Samen, Lord of Heaven.
He arrogated the sun as his tabernacle or shekina, and the solar fire and light as his element: imitating, we may well believe, in respect to the first of these particulars, what had been exhibited in Eden, and from time to time prior to the age of Abraham, as it was afterwards, and especially to Moses in Midian, in the pillar of cloud, at the Red Sea, on Mount Sinai, and in the tabernacle. And in imitation of the tabernacle erected by Moses inthe wilderness, the partisans of Baal created the tabernacle of Moloch,i. e., Baal under that name. Amos v.; Acts vii.
Prideaux, Part I., Book 3, treating of the origin of idolatry, and yet describing it at an advanced stage, when, in addition to the sun, the planets and stars had been brought into its service, observes: “That they took upon themselves to address the being whom they worshipped,” and whom he supposes they regarded as the true God, “by mediators of their own choosing. And their notion of the sun, moon, and stars being, that they were the tabernacles or habitations of intelligences which animated those orbs, in the same manner as the soul of man animates his body, and were the causes of all their motions; and that those intelligence were of a middle nature between God and them; they thought these the properest beings to become the mediators between God and them; and, therefore, the planets being the nearest to them of all these heavenly bodies, and generally looked on to have the greatest influence on this world, they made choice of them in the first place for theirGod’s-mediators, who were to mediate for them with the Supreme God, and procure from him the mercies and favors which they prayed for; and accordingly they directed divine worship unto them as such. And here began all the idolatry that hath been practised in the world. They first worshipped themper sacella, that is, by theirtabernacles, and afterwards by images also. By thesesacellaortabernaclesthey meant the orbs themselves, which they looked on only as thesacellaorsacred tabernaclesin which the intelligences had their habitations. And therefore, when they paid their devotions to any one of them, they directed their worship towards the planetin which they supposed he dwelt. But these orbs, by their rising and setting, being as much under the horizon as above, they were at a loss how to address to them in their absence. To remedy this, they had recourse to the invention of images, in which, after their consecration, they thought these intelligences, or inferior deities, to be as much present by their influence as in the planets themselves, and that all addresses to them were made as effectually before the one as before the other. And this was the beginning of image worship among them. To these images were given the names of the planets they represented.... After this, a notion obtaining that good men departed had a power with God also to mediate and intercede for them, they deified many of those whom they thought to be such; and hence the number of their gods increased, in the idolatrous times of the world. This religion first began among theChaldeans, which their knowledge of astronomy helped them to. And from this it was that Abraham separated himself when he came out ofChaldea. From theChaldeansit spread itself over all the East, where the professors of it had the name of Sabians. From thence it passed into Egypt, and from thence to the Grecians, who propagated it to all the western nations of the world; and therefore those who mislike the notion advanced by Maimonides, that many of the Jewish laws were made in opposition to the idolatrous rites of the Sabians, are much mistaken when they object against it that the Sabians were an inconsiderable sect, and therefore not likely to be so far regarded in that matter.... Anciently, they were all the nations of the world that worshipped God by images. And that Maimonides understood the name in this latitude is plain from hence, that he tells us the Sabians whomhe spoke of were a sect whose heresy had overspread almost all mankind.... That which hath given them the greatest credit among the people of the East is, that the best of their astronomers have been of this sect, as Thebat Ebn Korrah, Albatani, and others; for the stars being the gods they worshipped, they made them the chief subject of their studies. These Sabians, in the consecrating of their images, used many incantations to draw down into them, from the stars, those intelligences for whom they erected them, whose power and influence they held did afterwards dwell in them.”
“Directly opposite to these were the Magians, another sect, who had their original in the same Eastern countries. For they, abominating all images, worshipped God only by fire.” These, instead of branching off from the Sabians, doubtless preceded them. “Their chief doctrine was, that there were two principles: one which was the cause of all good, and the other the cause of all evil: that is to say, God and the Devil. That the former is represented by light and the other by darkness, as their truest symbols, and that of the composition of these two all things in the world are made.... And concerning these two gods there was this difference of opinion among them—that whereas some held both of them to have been from eternity, there were others that contended that the good God only was eternal, and that the other was created. But they both agreed in this, that there will be a continual opposition between these two till the end of the world. That then the good God shall overcome the evil god, and that from thenceforward each of them shall have his world to himself: that is, the good God his world, with all good men with him, and the evil god his world, with all evil men with him. That darkness is the truest symbol of the evil god, andlight the truest symbol of the good God: and therefore they always worshipped him before fire, as being the cause of light, and especially before the sun, as being, in their opinion, the perfectest fire, and causing the perfectest light. And for this reason, in all their temples, they had fire continually burning on altars created in them for that purpose. And before these sacred fires they offered up all their public devotions, as likewise they did all their private devotions before their private fires in their own houses. Thus did they pay the highest honor to light, as being in their opinion the truest representative of the good God, but always hated darkness, as being what they thought the truest representative of the evil god, whom they ever had in the utmost detestation, as we now have the Devil.”
The author’s account of the origin and nature of idolatry is in most particulars undoubtedly correct. The exceptions, however, are of great significance. He seems to suppose that the system was contrived and adopted by men, without the instigation of Satan, and that their object was the worship of the true God, in opposition to that evil being. But the intelligence whom they called the good God was Satan himself, supposed to be in the sun as his tabernacle, and in fire and light as his element. And as to what they termed the evil god, it was obviously necessary to the success of his system, as a counterfeit of the true, that it should pretend to have a devil and a perpetual antagonism. It was probably as well known then, and perhaps more generally believed than it is now, that there was such an evil being; and that he was and would continue to be utterly opposed to the true God. And a false or counterfeit system, in which the false god was to arrogate the name and pass himself off for the true God,must provide also an antagonist, a competitor, a devil; and to carry out the cheat, assign to him darkness as his tabernacle, in opposition to light as his own.
It were superfluous to dwell on the imposing and plausible aspect of the scheme in the particulars above referred to, considered as addressed to the depraved hearts, corrupt imaginations, and evil passions of men; opposed to the purity, the requirements, and the restraints of the true religion, and willingly the followers and servants of the Evil One. While it imposed no restraint upon their corruptions, every point in the contrast must have had its effect. It excluded mystery, and appealed directly to their senses; presenting in the sun an object of homage, not only familiar to their view without causing fear, but apparently the beneficent and constant source of their daily comforts and greatest blessings; and by means of fire and light, artificially produced, enabling every individual to avail himself of the immediate presence and the beneficial influence and effects of that object, brought thus within their control, in their dwellings and on their hearths.
The ritual of worship prescribed the erection of altars, a priesthood, various offerings besides the sacrifice of animals, prayers, the burning of incense, feasts, celebrations, and other counterfeits of the revealed system. As a counterpart to the sacred oracle and the gift of prophecy, the worshippers of Baal had auguries, divinations, and pretended oracles in every country. Their prophets prophesied in the name of Baal. Jer. ii. 8; xxiii. 13. “Ahaziah being sick, sent messengers, and said unto them, Go and inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover of this disease.” 2 Kings i. The responses of their oracles, which continued till after the destruction of the first temple and the cessationof true prophets, and more or less down to the Advent, when they appear to have ceased, were studiously contrived so as to admit equally well of different interpretations, and so as not to be interpreted with any confidence till after the event; and in this respect they were just what the great mass of learned interpreters and expositors of the Scripture prophecies have for ages taken them to be; imputing to them a double sense: to their literal language a figurative meaning, to their definite local references a symbolical import, capable only of being guessed at, and in general regarding them as enigmas—inspired indeed by Him who is head over all things for the information and preservation of his Church, but not intended to be understood, unless by those who survive the events predicted.
It would be easy to show, by tracing the parallel in numberless other and more minute details, that the false system was throughout a parody of the true; and to illustrate the ceaseless antagonism and rivalship which was carried on, in the face of the universe, by the conflict of the two systems, with their visible agencies, institutions, instrumentalities, and effects; occupying, directing and stimulating the attention and the energies, the thoughts and feelings, the hopes and fears, and involving the temporal well-being and the immortal destiny of the whole race: presenting a scene which, whether considered in relation to one period or another, the past or the present, Paganism or Romanism, superstition or rationalism, can be accounted for, with or without the Bible, upon no assumption or theory but that of the enmity and opposition announced and commenced in Eden, which is still in progress and still has a future.
In the progress of this war, the Devil and his angels,the Prince of the power of the air, with the principalities, powers, and rulers of the darkness of this world under him, has, from policy if not from necessity, kept concealed behind his instruments. But the heads and leaders of his visible partisans among men, whether in the abominations of heathenism, the enormities of idolatry, the wars and butcheries of nations, the tyrannies of government, the horrors of anarchy, the immolation of human victims, the persecution and slaughter of prophets and martyrs, or in the no less fatal systems of heresy, false theology, and false philosophy, have never scrupled or been backward to do the utmost he could wish in furtherance of his object. Many of them, like the Cerinthians, Marcionites, Valentinians, and other prevalent sects in the first ages of Christianity, ascribed to him the works of creation and providence; and there were not wanting such as worshipped him by name, and others under the designation of the Serpent; and still others who paid the highest honors to Cain, Judas, and similar characters, as his most conspicuous representatives.
The popular notion of idolatry, under the name of polytheism, as if it involved the supposition of a plurality of supreme deities, owes its influence, at least among those who read the English version of the Scriptures, to the fact that the translators rendered the designations of the god of the idolatrous system as plural, though in the Hebrew they are written in the singular number. Knowing that there was but one true God, they uniformly rendered Elohim as well as Elohe, when employed with reference to that Being, in the singular number; but when employed with reference to the rival usurper, the false god, their rendering is plural,gods; as if the molten images and numberless idols in otherforms, instead of being all representative of one supposed deity, or being regarded as mediators, or representatives of mediators between them and him, were themselves so many independent deities. Thus, in Laban’s remonstrance with Jacob: “Wherefore hast thou stolen myElohe?” renderedgods, and in Jacob’s answer: “With whomsoever thou findestthy Elohe,” renderedgods, the meaning plainly is, (though there seems to have been more than one image, teraphim-images, v. 34,) that which represents my Elohe. Gen. xxxi. 30-32. Again, Exod. xx. 1-23: “And Elohim spake all these words: I am Jehovah thy Elohe; thou shall have no other Elohim before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. Ye shall not make with me Elohe of silver;” an Elohe, a god, renderedgods. “Neither shall ye make unto you Elohe of gold;” an Elohe, a molten image representative of me, renderedgods.“Against theEloheof Egypt I will execute judgment.” Exod. xii. 12, rendered, “against all thegodsof Egypt,” &c. “Thou shalt not bow down to their Elohe,” (Eng. gods.) “Ye shall serve Jehovah yourElohe,” (Eng. God.) Exod. xxiii. 24, 25. “Aaron made it a molten calf: and they said, This isthy Elohe, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.” Exod. xxxii. 4, rendered, “These be thy gods, O Israel.” Undoubtedly the meaning is: This molten image is a visible token or representative of Jehovah thy Elohe—a visible mediator or medium of intercourse with thy Elohe, in place of Moses. So Jeroboam, having madetwosuch images, two calves of gold, said: “Behold thyElohe, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.” 2 Kings xii. 28: rendered, Behold thygods, O Israel. This usage characterizes the translation.
Besides the absurdity of supposing that the Israelites,with the revelation of the one Supreme Being by which they were distinguished, or that the heathen should admit the notion of a plurality of such beings, it is apparent from the nature of the case that the counterfeit of the true system must originally, in order to its success, have been a counterfeit in this, the first and most essential of all its particulars. The very nature of the antagonism, and the false system of mediation by which idolatry was sustained and rendered practically successful, required this. Even when Astarte, as Queen of heaven, was associated with Baal, it was only in a subordinate relation, as mediatrix, the moon being her shekina, and her office being the prototype of that of the Popish Mary; while Baal arrogated the prerogatives of Jehovah, and the sun as his shekina.
To this evil being, among others, the following designations are applied in the Hebrew Scriptures:Serpent, as in Gen. iii.: “Jehovah Elohim said unto theserpent, I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed.” Thee, the “tempter,” “the dragon, that oldserpentwhich is the Devil and Satan.” Rev. xx. “The great dragon, that oldserpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world.” Rev. xii. The apostle expresses his fear “lest by any means” the false teachers should corrupt his converts, “as theserpentbeguiled Eve through his subtlety.” 2 Cor. xi. The original word, when not employed as a personal designation, is often rendered “enchantment, divination,” &c.Satanis commonly renderedadversary; but frequently Satan, as a personal designation of the Evil One, where his local agency is particularly mentioned, as Job i, and ii.; 1 Chron. xxi. 1; Zech. iii. 1, 2.
“By collecting all the passages where Satan or theDevil is mentioned, it may be observed that he fell from heaven, with all his company; that God cast him down from thence for the punishment of his pride; that by his envy and malice, sin, death, and all other evils came into the world; that by the permission of God he exercises a sort of government in the world over his subordinates, over apostate angels like himself; that God makes use of him to prove good men and chastise bad ones; that he is a lying spirit in the mouth of false prophets, seducers, and heretics; that it is he or some of his that torment or possess men; that inspire them with evil designs, as he did David, when he suggested to him to number his people; to Judas, to betray his Lord and Master, and to Ananias and Sapphira, to conceal the price of their field. That he roves full of rage, like a roaring lion, to tempt, to betray, to destroy us, and to involve us in guilt and wickedness. That his power and malice are restrained within certain limits, and controlled by the will of God. In a word, that he is an enemy to God and man, and uses his utmost endeavors to rob God of his glory and men of their souls.” “Devil—a most wicked angel, the implacable enemy and tempter of the human race. He is called Abaddon in Hebrew, Apollyon in Greek; that is, destroyer, Rev. ix. 11. Angel of the bottomless pit, Prince of the world, John xii. 31. Prince of darkness, Ephes. vi. 12. A roaring lion and an adversary, 1 Pet. v. 8. A sinner from the beginning, 1 John iii. 8. Beelzebub, Matt. xii. 24. Accuser, Rev. xii. 10. Belial, 2 Cor. vi. 15. Deceiver, Rev. xx. 10. Dragon, Rev. xii. 3. Liar, John viii. 44. Leviathan, Isa. xxvii. 7. Lucifer, Isa. xiv. 12. Murderer, John viii. 44. Serpent, Isa. xxvii. 1. Satan, Job ii. 6. Tormentor, Matt. xviii. 34. The god of this world, 2 Cor. iv. 4. He is compared to adog, Ps. xxii. 16. Fowls, Matt. xiii. 4. A fowler, Ps. xci, 3. Lightning, Luke x. 18. Locusts, Rev. v. 3. A wolf, John x. 12. An adder, Ps. xci. 13. These names are given to the Prince of devils. Devil is put for, [1] Idols, Ps. cvi. 37; 2 Chron. xi. 15. [2] A wicked man, John vi. 70. [3] Persecutor, Rev. ii. 10.” Cruden’s Concordance, Art. “Satan and Devil.”
This fallen being was expressly worshipped in or through the form of theserpent, by the ancient Persians, under the nameAhriman; by the Egyptians, under that ofTyphon; by the Greeks, under that ofPython; and by the Syrians, Hindoos, Mexicans, and other nations, under different designations.
In Leviticus xvii. 7, Satan and his angels appear to be referred to under the worddevils, where the children of Israel are commanded “to sprinkle the blood of animals slain by them on the altar of Jehovah, at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and to burn the fat for a sweet savor unto Jehovah.” “And,” it is added as a reason of the command, “they shall no more offer their sacrifices untodevils, after whom they have gone a whoring.” Probably the images before which they thus offered sacrifices were those of goats, as the same word is often renderedgoats. Again, 2 Chron. ii. 15, it is said of Jeroboam that “He ordained him priests for the high places, and for thedevils, and for the calves which he had made.” This may with propriety be rendered, “and for the devils,evenfor the calves,” the representatives of Satan which he had made. A different original word is rendereddevils, Deut. xxxii. 17, where it is said that Israel “forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the rock of his salvation. They provoked him to jealousy, &c. They sacrificed untodevils, not to God; to Elohim whom they knewnot.” The word here translateddevilsis often renderedspoiler,destroyer,destruction, &c. Doubtless the reference is to an intelligence beyond any visible image. The same word occurs, Ps. cvi. 36, 37: “They served their idols, which were a snare unto them; yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters untodevils.”
Since the existence of the fallen angels and of their prince and leader was known from the beginning; and that he was prince and leader also of the party of the human race which was at enmity with the true worshippers of Jehovah; and since they manifested their hostility chiefly in their false system of religion, it seems reasonable and even necessary to conclude that they followed and supported their leader in his rivalship, and regarded him, however represented by images, as the object of their worship, in opposition to Jehovah, the object, through sacrifices, of the homage of his worshippers. In this view of their conduct, it is easy to conceive that their serving and worshipping idols should provoke Jehovah to jealousy. They served and worshipped an antagonist, a rival.
Let the reader suppose himself to have been present as a disinterested spectator of the condition of the Hebrew Church in Egypt prior to the legation of Moses; to have witnessed their practice of the rites and forms of the patriarchal worship, in contrast with the idol worship of the Egyptians; to have witnessed instances, like that of Moses, of individuals “choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season; esteeming the reproach ofChristgreater riches than the treasures of Egypt;” to have heard their sighs and cries to God by reason of their bondage, and known that “God heard their groaning, and remembered his covenant with Abraham, withIsaac, and with Jacob, and looked upon the children of Israel, and had respect unto them;” and that the Messenger Jehovah said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people, and have heard their cry by reason of their task-masters; for I know their sorrows, and I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians;” and further, to have known that they were familiar with the historical facts of the patriarchal history, and of the appearances of Jehovah in the form and under the designation of man to Abraham and to Jacob, and often visibly as the Messenger Jehovah; and that altars were erected, and sacrifices and prayers were offered to him in that form; and that he was customarily recognized and worshipped in that form, at places specially appropriated by him for that purpose, where he was to be invoked and acknowledged as Jehovah the Elohe of Abraham; and he will the more easily conceive, in some degree, of the enormity of the insult and provocation offered by the partisans of the rival counterfeit system, in erecting altars, offering sacrifices, and bowing themselves down before molten images as representatives of the great antagonist intelligence; or, as in the case of Aaron, Micah, Jeroboam and others, as representatives of Jehovah. If the reader suppose himself to have witnessed the appalling demonstrations against the false system, in the plagues of Egypt, at the Red Sea, at Mount Sinai, and in the wilderness, in connection with the visible presence, agency, and glory of the Messiah; or under a vivid impression of the reality and import of these scenes and wonders; to have been present at those periods and on those occasions when the defection of the Israelites to image and Baal worship was specially marked and signally punished, his impression of the nature of the antagonism, and the enormityof the provocation and insult, cannot fail to be heightened.
The apostle Paul, treating (Rom. i.) of the defection of men to idolatry, says, “they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things:” meaning, it is presumed, that they ascribed to the images of those creatures—which they made and served as representatives of the created intelligence whom they worshipped—the attributes, perfections, and prerogatives which he had conspicuously and gloriously manifested in his works of creation and providence. Whether the formation of such images was coëval with the earliest practice of idolatrous rites or not, may be a question. But in the selection of men, birds, and four-footed beasts as models of the forms of the images earliest employed in their idolatry, there is ground to presume that they copied or simulated the cherubic figures so familiar to the Israelites under the Levitical economy, and probably to the Church at all previous times, as a constituent of the instituted system of manifestation and instruction, from the appearance of the cherubim at the gate of Eden. That primeval appearance demonstrates that they were not borrowed from any institution or example of the idolaters; and in so capital a point as that of instituting representative images in their antagonist system, they would be sure to counterfeit, and to pervert from its office and meaning in the true system, whatever would serve the purpose of craft and deception. In respect to “creeping things,” they had in the serpent a prototype altogether their own, which, when the images previously mentioned had been adopted, and impiously consecrated to idolatry, might easily be brought into use.
Pankhurst, under the word Cherubim, in his Hebrew Lexicon, describes no less than sixty examples in which heads or other parts resembling the cherubic figures are incorporated in the objects of idolatrous homage of different heathen nations.
Maimonides, as quoted by Parkhurst, says that the first idolaters regarded the heavenly bodies as messengers or mediators of a supreme, infinite, invisible Being. In the worship of those bodies, or rather of the mediating intelligence supposed to reside in them, either because they were often out of sight, or for other reasons, they selected representative creatures, chiefly of the species comprised in the four-faced cherubim, but sometimes of other species, and among them of the serpent, and at length of mineral and metallic images of such creatures.
In a number of the examples cited by Parkhurst, the serpent, or the serpent’s head, appears conspicuous; and particularly in idol forms representative of the sun or Baal. In most of the images, the human form predominates; around which the serpent often appears entwined. The cherubic wings are indifferently attached to the human and the leading animal forms, and to the serpent. The combinations, especially of heads, in these representative images, strikingly suggest that the example of the cherubic faces was perverted to be the basis of the system, and that the serpent, when not exhibited as a distinct and sole object of homage, was foisted in and superadded to the figures which were familiar in the original system of revealed religion. In most of the complex forms in which different animals are combined, reference appears to have been had to the sun or Baal,i. e.to Satan, the supposed mediating intelligence resident in the sun.
In a published account of two “sculptured images”disinterred by Mr. Layard from the ruins of ancient Nineveh, and forwarded by him to Williams College, Mass., being supposed to have “been buried in the ruins of that city not less than twenty-five hundred years,” and to be samples of the earliest “idols” instituted in that capital, the date of which is supposed to be about one hundred and thirty years after the deluge, the figure of one is described as “that ofa man with wings and an eagle’s head and beak, well proportioned. The two wings, springing from the back of the shoulders, are gracefully spread.” The other is a figure simply of a man, seven and a half feet in height. They are pronounced “perfect of their kind. The slabs on which they are sculptured are dark gypsum, such as are described as lining the walls of the rooms and passages of the ruin, which Layard regards as having constituted at once the temple and palace of the king. One of the slabs is seven feet, and the other seven and a half feet high, and they are each three feet and two inches wide. The figures are the whole length of the slabs.”
Here is a manifest, and in all likelihood a surreptitious combination of two of the figures in the cherubic emblem, which, without some prototype, and a prototype already associated with the religion which was to be renounced, perverted, and counterfeited, would not be likely to occur, or to be easily brought into use and favor. An existing and familiar prototype might be copied exactly—as altars, sacrifices, incense, and various rites appear to have been—or with some modifications, and yet be readily adopted. In this view it would be obvious to argue, that as Jehovah often appeared on earth in the similitude of man, and thereby taught and virtually anticipated his future predicted incarnation; and as that form was associated with others in the cherubic emblem, therefore that emblem might be taken as representative of the Intelligence to be worshipped, and as teaching the doctrine of his incarnation not merely in the form and nature of man, but also in birds, four-footed beasts, and all other creatures brought into existence by him. Such pantheism undoubtedly resulted. But had the first forms of images been wholly an original device of the idolaters, they would naturally have selected not complex, but simple ones. They would have copied nature. They would in all probability have selected first the human form; but they would have taken that as it visibly appears, without a mysterious and inexplicable combination of inferior natures with it.
Next, they would very likely select the bird—the eagle—whose flight transcends the clouds, and whose eye endures the blaze of solar light; and next, the most docile and most useful, and then the most powerful and sagacious quadrupeds; in all instances, as is held by Warburton and others, and is highly probable in itself employing images and pictures long before they idolized the animals themselves.
A progress and an analogy of this kind—notwithstanding that the whole subject of idolatry, its origin, its nature, its rationale, its import as an antagonism to the revealed religion, and as involving the reason and an intelligible and ample justification of the jealousy, wrath, indignation, judgments, retributions, and finally of exterminating vengeance against it, has been mystified and misrepresented, under the rabbinical and figurative systems formerly adverted to—might be traced, and indefinitely illustrated, by reference to the Sphinxes, Centaurs, Pans, &c., of the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans; the Brahmas, the Vishnus, the Sivas, and the incarnations and transmigrations of India, and the Boodism and Lamaism of the whole Eastern world.