Beacon Lights of History, Volume 01: The Old Pagan Civilizations

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John Lord. Beacon Lights of History, Volume 01: The Old Pagan Civilizations

PUBLISHERS' NOTE

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

ANCIENT RELIGIONS:

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RELIGIONS OF INDIA

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RELIGION OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS

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CONFUCIUS

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ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY

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SOCRATES

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PHIDIAS

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LITERARY GENIUS:

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It has been my object in these Lectures to give the substance of accepted knowledge pertaining to the leading events and characters of history; and in treating such a variety of subjects, extending over a period of more than six thousand years, each of which might fill a volume, I have sought to present what is true rather than what is new.

Although most of these Lectures have been delivered, in some form, during the last forty years, in most of the cities and in many of the literary institutions of this country, I have carefully revised them within the last few years, in order to avail myself of the latest light shed on the topics and times of which they treat.

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Ranking after El in Babylon, Asshur in Assyria, and Baal in Phoenicia,–all shadows of the same supreme God,–we notice among these Mesopotamians a triad of the great gods, called Anu, Bel, and Hea. Anu, the primordial chaos; Hea, life and intelligence animating matter; and Bel, the organizing and creative spirit,–or, as Rawlinson thinks, "the original gods of the earth, the heavens, and the waters, corresponding in the main with the classical Pluto, Jupiter, and Neptune, who divided between them the dominion over the visible creation." The god Bel, in the pantheon of the Babylonians and Assyrians, is the God of gods, and Father of gods, who made the earth and heaven. His title expresses dominion.

In succession to the gods of this first trio,–Anu, Bel, and Hea,–was another trio, named Siu, Shamas, and Vul, representing the moon, the sun, and the atmosphere. "In Assyria and Babylon the moon-god took precedence of the sun-god, since night was more agreeable to the inhabitants of those hot countries than the day." Hence, Siu was the more popular deity; but Shamas, the sun, as having most direct reference to physical nature, "the lord of fire," "the ruler of the day," was the god of battles, going forth with the armies of the king triumphant over enemies. The worship of this deity was universal, and the kings regarded him as affording them especial help in war. Vul, the third of this trinity, was the god of the atmosphere, the god of tempests,–the god who caused the flood which the Assyrian legends recognize. He corresponds with the Jupiter Tonans of the Romans,–"the prince of the power of the air," destroyer of crops, the scatterer of the harvest, represented with a flaming sword; but as god of the atmosphere, the giver of rain, of abundance, "the lord of fecundity," he was beneficent as well as destructive.

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