Aesir

“ But when Christianity came in, and heathendom fell; when the godlike race of the Aesir became evil demons instead of good genial powers, then all the objects of the old popular belief, whether Aesir, Giants, or Trolls, were mingled together in one superstition, as “no canny”. They were all Trolls, all malignant; and thus it is that, in these tales, the traditions about Odin and his underlings, about the Frost Giants, and about sorcerers and wizards, are confused and garbled ”

“ Hail, living soul of Osiris, crowning him with the moon!
Hail, thou who dost hide his essence in the great shrine of Amen!
Hail, thou hidden God, Osiris in the underworld!
Hail, thou whose soul resteth in heaven,—whose enemy hath fallen!
The Goddess Isis speaketh unto thee, uttering a cry from the river—
"Send the purified 'Abd'-fish from before the boat of Ra, oh lord of the beginning,
Who becometh like the immortal ones that rejoice,—thou egg who becometh as one renewed."
She cutteth off the heads of the enemies in this her name of "Lady of Tepka." ”

“ Now, Isis had a son named Horus, and when he [Pg 85] grew to manhood he challenged Set, fought with him, and defeated him. Then the gods all assembled, and gave judgment that Osiris was in the right, and Set in the wrong. They raised Osiris up from the dead, made him a god, and appointed him to be judge of all men after death. And then, not all at once, but gradually, the Egyptians came to believe that because Osiris died, and rose again from the dead, and lived for ever after death, therefore all those men who believed in Osiris would live again after death, and dwell for ever with Osiris. ”

“ Osiris was the sun-god of the daily and annual circle, who enjoyed his spouse, Isis, the great mother, during the summer months and the daytime, after which he was overcome by the evil Set-Typhon and his wife Nephthys, and tortured in the under-world, until released by his son Horus, the conqueror sun-god, who rose into the upper world as the avenger of his father’s defeat, and liberated the soul of Osiris from torture, to be absorbed by, and for ever shine forth in the constellation Orion, as the soul of Isis shines for ever in Sirius. ”

“ The title Ashir was given to various gods in the south, as Marduk and Nebo, and there is every reason to believe that it represents a direct transfer with the intent to emphasize that Assur is the “leader” or head of the pantheon of the north. He is in fact to all intents and purposes of the north. Originally like Marduk a solar deity with the winged disk—the disk always typifying the sun [1] —as his symbol, he becomes as Assyria develops into a military power a god of war, indicated by the attachment of the figure of a man with a bow to the winged disk. ”

“ Thy soul flyeth to the east, because thou art as the image of Ra.
Those existing in the realms of the dead are accepted with rejoicing:
Sab, who existeth therein, openeth unto thee.
They come to thee with an offering, and travel to thee with an offering from Deddu. [24]
Osiris is exalted before thee—he is exalted twice over in peace.
There cometh unto thee Isis, lady of the horizon, who hath begotten herself alone in the image of the gods.
It is she who is avenged before thee—it is she who is avenged before thee! ”

“ Remember, prince Aziel, that being what you are, a Jew, this act of offering, however small it seems, is yet the greatest of sins, and one with which you should not dare to stain your soul for the sake of a woman, who has chanced to love you to your sorrow. Be guided, therefore, by the true wisdom of Issachar and by my humble prayer. Make an end of your doubts and let me die, knowing that we do but part a while, since in the Gate of Death I shall wait for you, prince Aziel. ”

“ Thou hast heard fair things, O Osiris! Thy strength is vigorous, O Osiris! Thy head is fastened on thy body, O Osiris! Thy neck is made firm, O Osiris! Thy heart is glad, [O Osiris!] . Thy speech is made effective, O Osiris! Thy princes rejoice Thou art established the Bull in Amentet. Thy son Horus hath ascended thy trrone, and all life is with him. Millions of years minister unto him, and millions of years hold him in fear. The Company of the Gods are his servants, and they fold him in fear. The god Tem, the Governor, the only One among the gods, hath spoken, and his word passeth not away. ”

“ The spelling of the name is against our connecting it with the word asiru, “he who blesses” or “consecrates,” from which the Assyrian asirtu, “sanctuary,” is derived, like the name of the Canaanitish goddess Ashêrah.289 On the other hand, the native Assyrian etymology is as inadmissible as the endeavours of our eighteenth century lexicographers to find Greek or Latin derivations for Anglo-Saxon words. The Assyrian scribes saw in Assur merely the old elemental deity Ansar, “the firmament,” who was himself nothing more than the Sumerian spirit of the “heavenly host.” ”

“ Osiris—we will take him as being an Egyptian god, instead of Serapis in whose mysterious attributes you would find much to commend itself even to a Christian soul—Osiris, like your Master, voluntarily passed through death—to redeem the world from death—in this resembling your Christ. He, the Risen One, gives new light, and life, and blossom, and verdure to all that is darkened, dead and withered. All that seems to have fallen a prey to death is, by him, restored to a more beautiful existence; he, who has risen again, can bring even the departed soul to a resurrection ”

“ At the beginning of our knowledge of this region Assyria was only a province, a northern province, of Babylonia, and was ruled from Babylon. But the Assyrians became very strong and revolted, and conquered those who had been their masters, and it was during this victorious period that they made those incursions into Palestine of which the Bible tells us. But at length the Babylonians, their old masters, rose up against them and got the mastery over them again, and after this blaze of glory Assyria sinks back into its old place as a province of Babylon, in the northern part of the empire. ”

“ Enough to say that of all the gods, called into being by the hopes and fears of men who dwelt in times of yore on the banks of the Nile, Osiris was the most beloved. Osiris the benign father, Isis his sorrowful and faithful wife, and Horus whose filial piety and heroism shine like diamonds in a heap of stones—about this trinity were woven the ideals of Egyptian faith and family life. Hear now the story of the oldest drama of the race, which for more than three thousand years held captive the hearts of men. ”

“ In the first place the division of the field into four zones should be noticed; it coincides with what we know of the Assyrian mode of dividing the universe among the powers of heaven, the demons, mankind, and the dead. The chief incident of the third zone shows us that, like the Egyptians, the Assyrians wished to assure themselves of the protection of some benevolent deity after death. In the Nile valley that protector was Osiris, in Mesopotamia Anou, Oannes, or Dagon, the fish god to whom man owed the advantages of civilization in this world and his safety in the next. ”

“ Ra, the bright Sun-god, Seb, the ancient Earth-god, followed; and later still Osiris reigned, the ‘Good Being’ and ‘Lord of life.’ After having conferred manifold blessings and benefits on the land, he was slain by his brother and rival Set. Set concealed the body, but Isis, the ‘great divine Mother,’ sister and wife of Osiris, sought after it. An ancient hymn says, ‘No word of hers fails; good is she, and kind in will and speech. It is Isis, the exalted one, the avenger of her brother: she went up and down the world lamenting him.’ ”

“ Before him, rank upon rank of them, stood the kings and queens of Egypt. As though at a given signal, they bowed themselves to the Osiris, and ere the tinkling of their ornaments had died away, lo! Osiris was gone. But in his place stood another, Isis, the Mother of Mystery, her deep eyes looking forth from beneath the jewelled vulture-cap. Again the congregation bowed, and, lo! she was gone. But in her place stood yet another, a radiant, lovely being, who held in her hand the Sign of Life, and wore upon her head the symbol of the shining disc—Hathor, Goddess of Love. ”

“ Of a truth, O Lord, the kings of the Assyrians have destroyed nations, and the lands of them all.
19:18. And they have cast their gods into the fire: for they were not gods, but the work of men's hands, of wood and stone, and they destroyed them.
19:19. Now therefore, O Lord our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou art the Lord, the only God.
19:20. And Isaias, the son of Amos, sent to Ezechias, saying: Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel: I have heard the prayer thou hast made to me concerning Sennacherib, king of the Assyrians. ”

“ Behold, when men, and gods, and Khus, and the dead see the Osiris Nu in the form of Horus with the ureret crown stablished upon his head, they fall down upon their faces. And the Osiris Nu, the overseer of the palace, the chancellor-inchief, triumphant, is victorious over his enemies in the heights of heaven, and in the depths thereof, and before the divine sovereign chiefs of every god and of every goddess. ”

“ These kings of Assyria thought themselves the greatest and strongest beings in the world; they thought that their might was right, and that they might conquer, and ravage, and plunder and oppress every country round them for thousands of miles, without being punished. They thought that they could overcome the true God of Judæa, as they had conquered the empty idols and false gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Iva. But Isaiah saw that they were wrong. He told his countrymen: “These Assyrian kings are strong, but there is a stronger King than they, Jehovah the Lord of all the earth. ”

“ In one instance only in later times, in Assyria, which had become exclusively Semitic, do we find the idea of one supreme god, who was national and not local, and who overshadowed all other gods, as Jahve in the later days of the Jewish monarchy, and in the conception of the Hebrew prophets, did the gods of the surrounding nations. Assur, the local god of the city of Assur, the first capital of Assyria, became, with the growth of the Assyrian Empire, the one supreme god, in whose name wars were undertaken, cities destroyed, and captives massacred or mutilated. ”

“ The Sumerians had called it "the land whence none return," though in the theology of Eridu and Babylon Asari or Merodach was already a god who, through the wisdom of his father Ea, "restored the dead to life." But as the centuries passed, new and less gloomy ideas grew up in regard to the future life. In a prayer for the Assyrian king the writer asks that he may enjoy an endless existence hereafter in "the land of the silver sky," and the realms of the gods of light had been peopled with the heroes of Babylonian literature at an early date. ”

“ The Isiac mysteries were a representation of the chief events in the myth of Isis and Osiris—the murder of Osiris, the lamentations of Isis and her wanderings, followed by the triumph of Horus over Seth and the resurrection of the slain god—accompanied by music and an exposition of the inner meaning of the spectacle. These were traditional in ancient Egypt, and in their later development were no doubt affected by the Eleusinian mysteries of Demeter. They appealed powerfully to the imagination and the religious sense. ”

“ He shaketh his hand at the mount of the daughter of Zion,
The hill of Jerusalem."
Yet Isaiah, and the little band of prophets, in spite of their perils, did not share the views of the Assyrian party or counsel submission. On the contrary, even as they contemplate in imagination this terrific march of Sargon, they threaten Assyria. The Assyrian might smite Judah, but God should smite the Assyrians. He boasts that he will rifle the riches of the people as one robs the eggs of a trembling bird, which does not dare [Pg 301] to cheep or move the wing. ”

“ The legend of Osiris goes on to say that his sepulchre was at Philæ, in the Cataract of the Nile, where for long centuries the Pharaohs and their people made devout pilgrimage; and thence year by year he still sends blessings to the thirsty land in the overflow of the mighty river. Here still stands the temple of Isis, the sorrowing widow of Osiris, whose little child, Horus, is emblematic of life beyond the grave, and who sits for evermore enthroned on a lotus blossom before the judgment throne of Osiris and Isis, encouraging the spirits during their trial. ”

“ We conceive by the way, that Scaliger and Selden are mistaken in supposing that Siris, the Egyptian name of the Nile, is synonymous with Osiris. Siris seems to us the Sanscrit word Saras, a river in general, or the river, from its imputed superiority. Isis is the consort of Osiris; Isa that of Iswara, or Siva. The attributes of the goddesses might be shown to correspond as precisely as those of their lords.
“The attendants of Iswara resemble, in their frantic demeanour, the furious Bacchants of the god of Naxos. Many tribes of imaginary beings compose his train. ”

“ And of plants and herbs they said that some of them were gods. And they were corrupted by every kind of delusion and defilement more than every people that is on the earth. For from ancient times they worshipped Isis, and they say that she is a goddess whose husband was Osiris her brother. And when Osiris was killed by Typhon his brother, Isis fled with Horos her son to Byblus in Syria, and was there for a certain time till her son was grown. ”