of the various modern religions. He was worshipped under different names, according to the time of the year, and painted in different forms, much as he is represented in our own days in pictures of the old and new years. At the winter solstice he was an infant; at the spring equinox he was a young man; in summer a man in full age, with a flowing beard; and in the autumn an old man.

The fable of Osiris was founded on this idea. The Egyptians represented him as a hawk, and the moon as the ibis; and to these two, worshipped under the names of Osiris and Isis, they attributed the government of the world, and built a city-Heliopolis-to the former, in the temple of which they placed his statue. There he was worshipped in each sign or month; also as the summer and winter gods, represented in Persia by Ormuzd and Ahriman-benevolence and malevolence.

The six summer signs were considered specially bountiful and holy, while the six winter signs were accounted less holy, but quite as powerful for evil as the others were for good. Each god was associated with romantic stories of struggles, victories, and defeats; and each, according to his position in the zodiac, was accounted powerful and victorious at one time, weak and dying at another.

The sun has been looked up to by nearly every nation on the face of the earth with special veneration; and not unnaturally, for all the benefits received by man from nature were seen to be derived from the rays of the sunlight, heat, fruit, crops, and life itself; and much that was detrimental was attributed to the absence of sunshine.

When the "Bull" was at the vernal equinoxial point, the sun "in Taurus was supreme God; and, when the "Ram" or "Lamb," the sun "in Aries" was supreme God. "Although it was only in March that the sun was at the vernal equinoxial point, yet the Bull-god, for 2,000 years prior to 2188 B.C., was always supreme; and the Ram-god (in Egypt), or Lamb-god (in Persia), after that date.”*

The Ram-god became Ammon, or the sun in ram, and el, eloh, or alah--the same with Bel of Babylonia. The old Semitic sun-god was Shamsh, or Shamash, the Hebrew Shemosh; the same with the Greek Hercules, the history of

* H. J. Hardwicke, Evolution and Creation.

whom is reproduced in that of Samson, which was probably derived from Shamsh. Ies, the Phoenician Hercules, wrestled with Typhon-the sun at the meridian-in the sand, just as Israel, or Jacob, wrestled with Elohim in the dust; Hercules, like Jacob, being wounded in the sacred thigh. The Canaanites knew the Greek Hercules, who wrestled with Zeus, by the name of "Ysrael." In the Vedas the sun has twenty different names-not pure equivalents, but each term descriptive of the sun in one of its aspects when brilliant, Surya; the friend, Mitra or Mithra; generous, Aryaman; beneficent, Bhaga; nourishing, Pushna; creator, Tvashtar; master of the Sky, Divaspati; and so on. Men could not fail to note the change of days and years, of growth and decay, of calm and storm; but the objects which so changed were to them living things, and the rising and setting of the Sun, the return of Winter and Summer, became a drama in which the actors were their enemies or friends. These gods and heroes, and the incidents of their mythical career, would receive each a local habitation and name, and these would remain as genuine history, when the origin and meaning of the words had been either wholly or partly forgotten.

As the number seven became sacred in connection with moon worship, so the number twelve became sacred in connection with the sun's passage through the twelve signs of the zodiac. Both numbers are to be found conspicuous in the different religious systems of the world, as well as in the Bible. We may instance the twelve labours of Hercules; the twelve gods of Egypt; the twelve pillars supporting the earth of the Vedic priests; the twelve angels of the Persian Zoroastrians; the twelve Apostles of Osiris, John the Baptist, and, later, of Jesus; the twelve governors of the Manichean system; the twelve Adectyas of the East Indies; the twelve Patriarchs; the twelve sons of Jacob, or the twelve tribes; the twelve altars of Janus; the twelve shields of Mars; the twelve brothers Arvaux; the twelve asses of the Scandinavians; the twelve gates in the Apocalypse; the twelve wards of the city; the twelve sacred cushions on which the creator sits in the cosmogony of the Japanese; the twelve precious stones of the "Rational," or ornament worn by the High Priest of the Jews; the division of the night and day into twelve hours each, and the months of the year into twelve.

In

Titles preserve old ideas and connect modern worship of gods with the ancient worship of the sun and moon. the same way that the ruling sovereign of Egypt was the living image and vicegerent of the Christian triune God, and the Pope of Rome, "vicar" of the same, in imperial edicts Roman emperors were styled "Nostra Divinitas," "Nostra Perenitas," and "Nostra Eternitas." Theodosius and Valentinian were addressed as "Vestra Numen" (your godhead); the Emperor of China is "His Celestial Majesty," "Brother of the Sun and Moon"; and the Sultan of Turkey, as Kalif, is "The Shadow of God on earth.”

It is not difficult to trace some of the zodiacal references in the O. T. In Job (xxxviii. 31, 32) we read: "Canst thou influence the Pleiades [the seven stars], or loose the bands of Orion? Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth [the twelve signs of the zodiac] in his season?" Solomon worshipped Ashtaroth (Astarte), Chemosh, and Moloch, and there is plenty of further evidence to show that the Jews were worshippers of a plurality of gods; Iahuh or Yahuh (Jehovah) being simply the tribal god. Psalm lxxxii. says: "God standeth in the congregation of the mighty ones [gods]; he judgeth among the gods." The two "angels" who appeared at Lot's house at Sodom (Gen. xix. 1) are literally translated gods." And the fact of the use of the plural word elohim, or aleim, in the first chapter of Genesis, which means "gods," and the constant allusion to the human attribute of jealousy in connection with the chief god Yahuh, is conclusive in showing that the Hebrew tribes were worshippers of more than one god. But it appears to have been a primary object with the translators to suppress this fact. In Judges (xi. 30) we find that the name Moses has been suppressed and "Manasseh" inserted, in order to prevent the reader from being made aware of the fact that the descendants of Moses worshipped other gods than Yahuh. Psalm lxxxiv. II says: "For the Lord God [Yahuh of the gods] is a sun.” Psalm lxviii. is positively a song to the Sun-God! It opens with the invocation, "Let God arise" (literally-" Let the Mighty One arise "), and bids all inferior creatures cast up a highway for him that rideth through the heavens by his name Iah [or Yah]." The frequent references to sun-gods under various names are all disguised in the English version. The idea of the Jew writer in the above was evidently

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taken from the Egyptian "Book of the Dead," where we read in the prayers to Osiris: "I adore the sun in the happy west......A path has been made for me. Glory, glory, to Osiris." In another to Amen-Ra we find: "Hail to thee, Amen-Ra; Lord of the thrones of the earth; Chief in Ap-Tu [Thebes, and No of the O. T.], Lord of Truth; Father of gods; Maker of Man; Creator of Beasts...... Sailing in heaven in tranquillity," etc.

We have seen that the primitive Christians worshipped the sun as Serapis, who was represented under the emblem of a serpent, and to whom Jesus is made to compare himself in John (iii 14). Two Christian sects of Armenia and Syria-the Jezides (or followers of Jesus) and the Shemsi (or Solars)-worship the sun to this day Remains of sun worship are to be seen still among Christians, in their sacred day (Sunday), their praying to the east (the early Christians never prayed without turning to that point of the compass where the sun rose), and the frequent use of the word "glory," and of the "Nimbus" and "Tonsure.” The Emperor Hadrian accused the Christians of being sun worshippers, and Tertullian admits that they were only looked upon as such.

The name given to the sun by the Oracle of Claros in Macrobius (Sat. l.i., cap. xviii.) was IAO (YAO). "Jehovah," or, more correctly, "Yahuh," was the chief of the gods (Aleim), the tribal god or Ruler of the Hebrews, another sun-god. The name was of very ancient date; it was known among the Assyrians, Semites, Phoenicians, and the Egyptians, and was worshipped at Thebes. As there were no vowels or stops in ancient Hebrew, the name rendered as Jehovah which does not convey any idea of the correct pronunciation might be written many different ways. The name consisted of the letters corresponding with I or Y, H, U or V, H, and may be read YAHUH, YAHWEH, or YAHVEH; but the first is the correct reading, as is shown by its being sometimes written Yeho and Yahu, as is exemplified in the word "Jehoram" = Yehoram, and Elijah = Eli-yahu. The Phoenicians wrote it Yho (Yahou). The name was never pronounced by the Hebrews; Adonai," or Lord, was substituted. In Greek, according to Diodorus Siculus, it was Tao, and, according to Clemens Alexandrinus, Iaou. It was frequently abbreviated to Yah.

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ZODIACAL REFERENCES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 81

Among the Chaldeans it was Iao, the letter I representing the sun, and the a and o (alpha and omega, the beginning and the end) representing the moon and Saturn, to whom the topmost and lowest temples in the Tower of Babel were dedicated; the one to the sun being in the middle.

In the reign of the Assyrian king, Sargon II., the throne of Hamath was occupied by Yahou-behdi, which name literally means the "Servant of Yahou." The Phoenicians venerated this deity also, for in the inscriptions of Assurbani-pal, another Assyrian king, we read that the name of the then crown prince of Tyrenus was Yahu-melek=“Yahuh is my king." On a coin from Gaza of the fourth century B.C., now in the British Museum, is a figure of a deity in a chariot of fire, over whose head is written Yho in old Phoenician characters. But Yahuh held only a subordinate position in the general mythology of the Semites, and he only owes his notoriety to the fact that he was chosen as the tribal deity of the Beni-Israel.

The name "Yah" was frequently met with in conjunction with El, eloh, al, or Alah. In the Bible we find "Yahuh The word el or al means a

=

Elohim" Yahuh of the gods. ram and strength, the ram god, or the sun god in Aries. "Al" is the Greek root of helios, the sun. "Eloh," pronounced el-yah, means the ram or ram god will be (alluding to the time when the sun would be in Aries at the vernal equinox). El or al alone represented the god (singular number) of the winter period-the evil principle as distinguished from Eloh (El-yah) or Alah, the ram sun of Aries, and aleim or elohim (plural), the good principles or gods of the summer months —from equinox to equinox, when the ram or lamb and the sun are together. In the Synagogue copies of the Pentateuch the word rendered in the Bible "elohim " is "aleim "; and "Yahuh aleim" with the Hebrews meant "Adonai," the ruler or chief of the gods. The words "Yahuh aleim" have been erroneously rendered in the Bible "the Lord God"; in the first chapter of Genesis the word aleim is retained as "Elohim," and made to appear as the name of a god, there being no attempt to translate it, evidently for fear of admitting the fact which it was the object of the translators to suppress, that the Hebrews believed in a plurality of gods; though aleim in other parts of the Bible is rendered "gods," as, for instance, in Exodus (xx. 23),

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