EUROPEAN HELLS.

129

the real Hell, in which Europe had been tortured for fifteen centuries. Some industrious Germans had got together in one large room several hundreds of the instruments of torture by which the nations of the West were persuaded to embrace Christianity. Every limb, sinew, feature, bone, and nerve of the human frame had suggested to christian inventiveness some ingenious device by which it might be tortured. Wheels on which to break bones, chairs of anguish, thumbscrews, the iron Virgin whose embrace pierced through every vital part; the hunger-mask which renewed for Christ's sake the exact torment of Tantalus; even the machine which bore the very name of the enemy that was cast down-the Dragon's Head! By such instrumentalities came those quasimiraculous 'Triumphs of the Cross,' of which so much has been said and sung! The most salient phenomenon of christian history is the steady triumph of the Dragon. Misleader and Deceiver to the last, he is quite willing to sprinkle his fork and rack with holy water, to cross himself, to label his caldrons 'divine justice,' to write CHRIST upon his forehead; by so doing he was able to spring his infernal engine on the best nations, and cow the strongest hearts, till from their pallid lips were wrung the 'confessions of faith,' or the last cry of martyred truth. So was he able to assault the pure heavens once more, to quench the stars of human faith and hope, and generate a race of polite, learned, and civilised hypocrites. But the ancient sunbeams are after him: the mandate has again gone forth, 'Let there be light,' and the Light that now breaks forth is not of that kind which respects the limit of Darkness.

VOL. II.

I

( 130 )

CHAPTER XII.

STRIFE

Hebrew god of War - Samaël - The father's blessing and curse— Esau - Edom-Jacob and the Phantom - The planet MarsTradesman and Huntsman-'The Devil's Dream.'

WHO is this that cometh from Edom,
In dyed garments from Bozrah ?
This that is glorious in his apparel,
Travelling in the greatness of his strength?
I who promise deliverance, mighty to save.
Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel,

And thy garments like him that treadeth the wine-vat?

I have trodden the wine-press alone;

And of the peoples there was none with me:

And I will tread them in mine anger,

And trample them in my fury;

And their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments,

And I will stain all my raiment.

For the day of vengeance is in my heart,

And the year of mine avenged is come.

And I looked, and there was none to help;

And I wondered that there was none to uphold;
Therefore mine own arm gained me the victory,
And mine own fury, it upheld me.

And I will tread down the peoples in mine anger,
And make them drunk in my wrath,

And will bring down their strength to the earth.1

This is the picture of the god of War. Upon it the comment in Emek Hammelech is: The colour of the godless Samaël and of all his princes and lords has the

Isa. lxiii. 1-6.

aspect of red fire; and all their emanations are red. Samaël is red, also his horse, his sword, his raiment, and the ground beneath him, are red. In the future the Holy God shall wear his raiment.'1 Samaël is leader of the Opposition. He is the Soul of the fiery planet Mars. He is the Creator and inspirer of all Serpents. Azazel, demon of the Desert, is his First Lord. He was the terrestrial Chief around whom the fallen angels gathered, and his great power was acknowledged. All these characters the ancient Rabbins found blended in his name. Simmé (dazzling), Sóme (blinding), Semól (the left side), and Samhammaveth (deadly poison), were combined in the terrible name of Samaël. He ruled over the sinister Left. When Moses, in war with the Amalekites, raised his ten fingers, it was a special invocation to the Ten Sephiroth, Divine Emanations, because he knew the power which the Amalekites got from Samaël might turn his own left hand against Israel.2 The scapegoat was a sacrifice to him through Azazel.

Samaël is the mythologic expression and embodiment of the history of Esau, afterward Edom. Jacob and Esau represented the sheep and the goat, divided in the past and to be sundered for ever. As Jacob by covering his flesh with goat-skins obtained his father's blessing due to Esau, the Israelites wandering through the wilderness (near Edom's forbidden domain) seemed to have faith that the offering of a goat would convince his Viceroy Azazel that they were orthodox Edomites. The redness of Samaël begins with the red pottage from which Esau was called Edom. The English version does not give the emphasis with which Esau is said to have called for the pottage" the red! the red!" The characteristics

1 Fol. 84, col. 1.

2 Maarecheth haëlahuth, fol. 257, col. I.

132 THE FATHER'S BLESSING AND CURSE.

ascribed to Esau in the legend are merely a saga built on the local names with which he was associated. 'Edom' means red, and 'Seir' means hairy. It probably meant the 'Shaggy Mountains.' 1

It is interesting to observe the parting of the human and the theological myths in this story. Jacob is the third person of a patriarchal trinity,-Abraham the Heavenly Father, Isaac the Laugher (the Sun), and Jacob the Impostor or Supplanter. As the moon supplants the sun, takes hold of his heel, shines with his light, so does Jacob supplant his elder brother; and all the deadliness ascribed to the Moon, and other Third Persons of Trinities, was inherited by Jacob until his name was changed by euphemism. As the impartial sun shines for good and evil, the smile of Isaac, the Laugher, promised great blessings to both of his sons. The human myth therefore represents both of them gaining great power and wealth, and after a long feud they are reconciled. This feature of the legend we shall consider hereafter. Jehovah has another interest to be secured. He had declared that one should serve the other; that they should be cursed who cursed Jacob; and he said, 'Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.' Jahvistic theology had here something more important than two brothers to harmonise; namely a patriarch's blessing and a god's curse. It was contrary to all orthodoxy that a man whom Jehovah hated should possess the blessings of life; it was equally unorthodox that a father's blessing should not carry with it every advantage promised. It had to be recorded that Esau became powerful, lived by his sword, and had great possessions.

It had also to be recorded that 'Edom revolted from under the hand of Judah and made a king unto themGesenius, Heb. Lexic.

selves,' and that such independence continued 'unto this day' (2 Kings viii, 20, 22). There was thus no room for the exhibition of Jacob's superiority,—that is of Israel's priority over Edom,-in this world; nor yet any room to carry out Isaac's curse on all who cursed Jacob, and the saying: 'Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness' (Mal. i.).

Answers to such problems as these evolve themselves slowly but inevitably. The agonised cry of the poor girl in Browning's poem There may be heaven, there must be hell '-marks the direction in which necessity led human speculation many ages before her. A future had to be invented for the working out of the curse on Esau, who on earth had to fulfil his father's blessing by enjoying power, wealth, and independence of his brother. In that future his greatness while living was repaid by his relegation to the desert and the rock with the he-goat for his support. Esau was believed to have been changed into a terrible hairy devil.1 But still there followed him in his phantasmal transformation a ghostly environment of his former power and greatness; the boldest and holiest could not afford to despise or set aside that 'share' which had been allotted him in the legend, and could not be wholly set aside in the invisible world.

Jacob's share began with a shrewd bargain with his imprudent brother. Jacob by his cunning in the breeding of the streaked animals (Gen. xxx.), by which he outwitted Laban, and other manoeuvres, was really the

1 Hairiness was a pretty general characteristic of devils; hence, possibly, the epithet 'Old Harry,' i.e., hairy, applied to the Devil. In 'Old Deccan Days,' p. 50, a Rakshasa is described as hairy :- Her hair hangs around her in a thick black tangle.' But the beard has rarely been accorded to devils.