Ancient Faiths And Modern Part 28

** Sampson Low, & Co., 1875.

The a.s.syrian legends tell of seven evil spirits who rebelled against the G.o.ds; of the G.o.ddess Ishtar descending to Hades, and pa.s.sing through seven gates; of a deluge, the duration of which was seven days, &c., &c.

Mr H. F. Talbot, F.R.S., speaks of the great degree of holiness which the a.s.syrians attributed to the number seven, and where that number was sacred, the seventh day could scarcely escape special honours. _Why_ the number seven was sacred, or whether the Babylonian Sabbath was at first any more than an unlucky day, like the sailor's Friday, when it was sowing for the whirlwind to begin any enterprise, are other questions.

I am, yours faithfully,

GEORGE ST. CLAIR.

These observations of Mr St Clair deserve attention, for they show that, from an ancient period, a sixth and seventh day were holy in Egypt, although we cannot discover from the context whether they were reckoned after the first day of a year, a month, or a week. But this is of small importance, as I do not find evidence that the Jews borrowed any Egyptian ideas, even if they ever knew any. It is far more important to know, that in the a.s.syrian calendar the seventh, fourteenth, nineteenth, twenty-first, and twenty-eighth days of the month were days of "rest,"

for all Biblical testimony points to the adoption of the Jewish Sabbath in the time of the second Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel--i.e., not very long after the a.s.syrians made their power felt in Palestine. When we consider the propensity which the Hebrews had to copy parts of the religion of those who conquered them, it is highly probable that some astute priest of the Jews adopted the idea of consecrating a seventh day, as their Mesopotamian adversaries had done, to the most high G.o.d Saturn; and as it was desirable to have some pretence for the introduction of the Sabbath, it was natural that it should be put under the same head as the new moon, and that stories should be invented, and gradually circulated, of the vast antiquity of the new inst.i.tution. It is clear, from the Jewish history, that the Sabbath was not generally known amongst the common people until long after the return from Babylon. Had it been so, Ezra would not have thundered so energetically in its favour. The same remark applies to Nehemiah. I have elsewhere remarked that the Sabbath was unknown to David and Solomon, and may now add that any one who will read the episode in the history of Elijah, recorded 1 Kings xix. 7, 8, will see that this prophet could have known nothing, and the angel who spoke to him could have known no more, of the Mosaic Sabbath, inasmuch as the latter directs, and the former obeys, an order which must have involved a breaking of the "rest" of at least five, and possibly six, Sabbaths. The whole life, indeed, of Elijah shows a perfect ignorance of this so-called Mosaic inst.i.tution.