Phallic symbolism

“ In India, [17] with the Hindus, there still exists an elaborate form of sex worship. The Phallus is carried on festive occasions, it still occupies the most sacred spot in the sanctuary, dancing girls are devoted to the service of the temple, and many other customs associated with phallic rites are carried on much as they were centuries ago in the Ancient World. It is said that there are thirty million phalli in India and that a phallus is found in nearly every Hindu household. ”

“ The lotus then, which is found throughout antiquity, in art as well as in religion, was a sexual symbol, representing to the ancients the combination of male and female sexual organs. It is another expression of the sex worship of that period.
Our present conventional symbols of art are very easily traced to ancient symbols of religion. We may expect these to be phallic in their meaning, to just the extent that phallicism was fundamental in the religions where these symbols originated. ”

“ Ebers gives it as his opinion that “mythological figures of [80] snakes have quite as often a benevolent as a malevolent signification.” [259]
A word must be said about the phallic explanation of the origin of serpent-worship. Mr. Cox, an excellent writer on mythology, is friendly to this theory. After speaking of the phallus as a symbol, he says: “When we add that from its physical characteristics the Ashêrah, which the Greeks called the phallus, suggested the emblem of the serpent, we have the key to the tree- and serpent-worship.” ”

“ Even the British Museum does not include works on phallicism in its catalogue, and special permission has to be obtained to consult them. Yet the subject is of vast importance as concerns the origin and development of religion and philosophy, and the extent of phallic worship may be gathered from the widespread occurrence of obelisks and similar objects amongst ancient relics. Our own maypole dances may be instanced as one survival of the ancient worship of the male generative principle. ”

“ As a phallic symbol, the menhir must have been inseparably related to a Celtic sun-cult; because among all ancient peoples where phallic worship has prevailed, the sun has been venerated as the supreme masculine force in external nature from which all life proceeds, while the phallus has been venerated as the corresponding force in human nature. ”

“ Women only expose their ignorance when they are reddened with blushes at the mention of phallic worship, and at the same time wear the mystic horse-shoe or the crescent upon their immaculate bosoms, eat hot cross-buns, dance around the Maypole, and worship beneath the church steeple. Even the vestments of priests are ornamented with phallic emblems ”

“ Sex worship, by modern writers, is usually referred to as phallicism—from the Greek noun that has been adopted into English in its Latinized form, phallus. It refers, with its adjective phallic, to the male organ of generation. ”

“ All antiquaries of any experience know the great number of obscene subjects which are met with among the fine red pottery which is termed Samian ware, found so abundantly in all Roman sites in our island. “They represent erotic scenes, in every sense of the word, with figures of Priapus and Phallic emblems.”
PHALLUS The Phallus, or Lingam, which stood for the image of the male organ, or emblem of creation, has been worshipped from time immemorial. Payne Knight describes it as of the greatest antiquity, and as having prevailed in Egypt and all over Asia. ”

“ THE UPRIGHT It is perhaps not remarkable that upright objects should be selected because of their form as the simplest expression of phallic ideas. The simple upright for purposes of sex worship is universally found. An upright conical stone is frequently mentioned. Many of the stone idols or pillars, the worship of which was forbidden by the Bible, come under this group. Likewise, the obelisk, found not only in Egypt, but in modified forms in many other countries as well, embodies the same phallic principle. ”

“ The fact is, the phallic idea, has prevailed all over the world to a far greater extent than many have ever imagined, and superficial observers have passed by many things as inexplicable which came properly within its domain, and which thus recognised, would have been readily understood. It is not, of course, to the gross forms of the Priapus used in ancient Greek, Roman, or Egyptian Festivals that we allude, but to the much more refined, and, if we may so call it, modest lingam worship of India.”—The Author. ”

“ The Linga Purana tells us that the linga was a pillar of fire in which Siva was present. This reminds one of Jahveh appearing as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.
So astounded have been many writers at the phenomena presented by phallic worship that they have sought to explain it, not only by the story of the fall and the belief in original sin, but by the direct agency of devils.* Yet it may be wrong to associate the origin of phallic worship with obscenity. Early man was rather unmoral than immoral. ”

“ Hargrave Jennings, the author of several books on some aspects of religions of antiquity, among them one on phallicism deals freely with the phallic principles embodied in these religions. As do many other writers, he identifies fire worship with sex worship, and the following short paragraph shows his conception of their interrelationship, as well as the significance of the upright of antiquity. ”

“ This word survives in German pfahl, and pole in English. Phallus is supposed 11to be of Phœnician origin, the Greek word pallo, or phallo, “to brandish preparatory to throwing a missile,” is so near in assonance and meaning to Phallus, that one is quite likely to be parent of the other. In Sanskrit it can be traced to phal, “to burst,” “to produce,” “to be fruitful”; then, again, phal is “a ploughshare,” and is also the name of Siva and Mahadeva, who are Hindu deities. Phallus, then, was the ancient emblem of creation: a divinity who was companion to Bacchus. ”

“ Phallus, a symbol of the generative power of nature, being a representation of the male organ of generation, and associated with rites and ceremonies of nature-worship in the early stages of civilised life, and the worship of which was supposed to have a magic influence in inducing fertility among the flocks and herds, as well as in the soil of the earth. ”

“ The grotesque abominations of the old Phallic worship had a basis of clean and wholesome truth, but as the obscene rites of that worship desecrated the principle that inspired them, so do the pranks of the "divine waltz" libel the impulse that stirs its wriggling devotees. ”

“ Let us bear in mind, too, that though the Nature Worship of our remote ancestors had other striking features, the facts mentioned would lead to the predominance of the phallic idea, and to its association with Sun-God worship. And as Life, the greatest marvel of all, must have had a symbol allotted to it at a very early date, let us ask ourselves what the untutored mind of Man would be most likely to select as its symbol.
To this question there is, so far as the author can see, but one reasonable answer:—the figure of the cross. ”

“ The worship was indeed both natural and inevitable in the evolution of man from savagery. When, however, phallic worship was established, it naturally led to practices such as those which Herodotus, Diodorus, and Lucian tell us took place in the Egyptian, Babylonian, and Syrian religions. ”

“ The Indian designation of this idol was Lingam, and those who dedicated themselves to its service were to observe inviolable chastity. “If it were discovered,” says Crawford, “that they had in any way departed from them, the punishment is death. They go naked, and being considered as sanctified persons, the women approach without scruple, nor is it thought that their modesty should be offended by it.”
SYMBOLS OR EMBLEMS The Phallus and its emblems were representative of the gods Bacchus, Priapus, Hercules, Siva, Osiris, Baal, and Asher, who were all Phallic deities. ”

“ These symbols all denote the sun victorious over darkness and death, giving life to the world. The phallus is the other great symbol of the Life-Giver, generating life in woman, as the sun in the earth. Bacchus, Adonis, Dionysius, Apollo, Hercules, Hermes, Thammuz, Jupiter, Jehovah, Jao, or Jah, Moloch, Baal, Asher, Mahadeva, Brahma, Vishnu, Mithra, Atys, Ammon, Belus, with many another, these are all the Life-Giver under different names; they are the Sun, the Creator, the Phallus. ”

“ This is, then, the sun whom Palamas worships as a god. It is a sun who possesses all the beauty and power of the actual source of light, but who, at the same time, by the spell of mystic symbolism rises to the splendor of a thrice-fair and almighty divinity containing all that is beautiful and noble and powerful in the world. Upon such a sun he seeks to find a light-flooded palace for his child in the "Mourning Song." To such a sun he offers his hymns and prayers; and such a sun he conceives as a vengeful blood-fed Moloch or a muse of light. ”

“ He gradually came to be regarded as the god of sensuality. His symbol was the phallus, an emblem of productivity and a protection against the evil eye. The first fruits of the gardens and fields, goats, milk and honey, and occasionally asses, were offered to him. He was sometimes represented as an old man, with a long beard and large genitals, wearing a long Oriental robe and a turban or garland of vine-leaves, with fruit and bunches of grapes in his lap. Amongst the Romans, rough wooden images, after the manner of the hermae, with phallus stained with vermilion, were set up in gardens. ”

“ According to Gerald Massey, "it was a dedication of the first-fruits of the male at the shrine of the virgin mother and child, which was one way of passing the seed through the fire to Moloch."
Westrop and Wake (Phallicism in Ancient Religion, p. 37) say "Circumcision, in its inception, is a purely phallic rite, having for its aim the marking of that which from its associations is viewed with peculiar veneration, and it converts the two phases of this superstition which have for their object respectively the instrument of generation and the agent." ”

“ This superstition bears evident marks of near relationship to some of both the Greek and the Indoo, as well as other Eastern mythical faiths. The blossoming staff of Joseph appears to be but a reproduction of the budding thyrsus of the Bacchanals and of Hermes, which is regarded as a phallic symbol, typical of the reproductive forces of nature. In the Teutonic mythology the fylfot, or revivifying hammer of Thor, as previously shown, likewise reproduces a phallic symbol. ”

“ Where the Phœnicians settled, there they introduced their religion, and it is in these countries we find the remains of ancient stone and pillar worship.
LOGGIN STONES, ETC. Loggin stones are by Payne Knight considered as Phallic emblems. “Their remains,” he says, “are still extant, and appear to have been composed of a crone set into the ground, and another placed upon the point of 17it and so nicely balanced that the wind could move it, though so ponderous that no human force, unaided by machinery, can displace it ”

“ The fig was a still more common symbol, the statue of Priapus being made of the tree, and the fruit being carried with the 69Phallus in the ancient processions in honour of Bacchus, and still continuing among the common people of Italy to be an emblem of what it anciently meant: whence we often see portraits of persons of that country painted with it in one hand, to signify their orthodox elevation to the fair sex. ”

“ III. GODS OF ABSTRACT HUMAN QUALITIES. Sahe no kami.--The Sahe no kami are phallic deities. In approaching this subject, it behoves me to walk warily. For, to some writers so repulsive that they shirk even its necessary elucidation, it exercises a fascination upon others which is not conducive to sound reasoning. Has not a President of the Anthropological Institute declared that "so soon as a man begins to study phallicism he goes crazy"? With phallicism we may conveniently associate the corresponding cult of the kteis. ”

“ The union of the Phallus and Cteis, or the Lingam and Yoni, in one compound figure, as an object of adoration, was the most usual mode of representation. This was in strict accordance with the whole system of ancient mythology, which was founded upon a worship of the prolific powers of nature. All the deities of pagan antiquity, however numerous they may be, can always be reduced to the two different forms of the generative principle—the active, or male, and the passive, or female. ”

“ Fragments from the Song to the Sun
"The Fragments from the Song to the Sun" contain some of the noblest lines of Palamas' poetry. We cannot have a complete understanding of the symbolism with which this part of Life Immovable is filled. For, after all, from the great hymn to the light-god, we have here only fragments. But these fragments remind one of the gold-stained ruins of the Akropolis against the bright Attic sky. Throughout, we are aware of a striking duality. ”

“ Though phallic cults proper cannot be shown to be universal among men, they have played a not inconsiderable part in religious history. They appear to have passed through the usual grades of development—simple at first, later more complicated. The attitude of savages and low communities generally, non-Christian and Christian, toward the phallus, suggests that in the earliest stage of the cult some sort of worship was paid the physical object itself considered as a creator of life; satisfactory data on this point, however, are lacking. ”