Indian Antiquary Vol 26

SR No.: 032518
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 360
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 15 MB

Page 15

JANUARY, 1897.)
SPIRIT BASIS OF BELIEF AND CUSTOM.
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of the house passed into the stranger. In a more formal way families and states were joined by a covenant of hospitality. So, like the salt, the tokens held by the covenanting parties were entbolæ or symbols in which a common guardian influence dwelt. In proof of this, on the dye, of which each party to an union of hospitality kept half, was graven the image of Jupiter hospitalis. "I bring with me," says Plavtus, "the god of hospitality and the tessera." It is this belief in the sacramant of salt that makes the Hindu and the Indian Musalman agree in holding falseness to salt the basest of crimes. The Greek feeling of the divinity of salt continued after the Greeks became Christian. As the classic Greek poured ground cakes of salt and barley on he altar, so the Christian Greek put salt into the sacramental bread. Salt, they said, is life; saltless sacrifice is dead. In the Dionysius Mysteries a lump of salt signified generation.c6 Salt wus sacred among the Romans, and was habitually compared to wit and liveliness,67 The family salt-cellar or salinune was an heirloom, and was always set on the table as a symbol of the family guardians. The Romans mixed salt and water to make holy water. They thought that salt caused cheerfulness and cured disease. Among the Romans a salted cake was broken over the victim's head.71 That salt is as a soul keeping the body wholesome is oddly illustrated by Cicero's saying, the pig has life anima only instead of salt to keep him from rotting.72 So Herrick (1640):
« The body's salt the soul is, which, when gone,
The flesh soon sucks in putrefaction." In the early Christian Western Church any one allowed to be a catechumen or hearer received the gift of salt. This was called Sacramentum Catechumenorum.74 After baptism salt was given and after confession penitents received salt with milk and honey.76 In Constantitiople every house was sprinkled with sea-water.76 Elsewhere the houses of the sick were cleansed with holy water.77 At the dedication of a church, salt, ashes, and water were sprinkled on the corners of the altar.78 Though the Christian organisers admitted that salt was a guardian home, they held that, like water, oil, and other natural shrines, salt was apt to become fiend-tenanted instead of guardian-tenanted, and before use had to be exorcised.70 Both Greeks and Romans placed holy salt-water at the entrance of their temples.s0 For ceremonial cleansing the Greeks preferred sea-water. 81 "All hnman ills," says Euripides, "are cleansed by the sea, whose holy water, according to Wordsworth, perforins his priest-like task of pare ablation loand earth's human shores." Modern Jews throw salt on the fire to drive away evil spirits.82 In North Central Africa, near lake Chad, Denham tells how a Musalman woman burnt salt, praying that neither the devil nor his imps miglit frighten the traveller.$3 In Upper Egypt, when & caravan is about to start, the Ababde women come out carrying earthen vessels filled with burning coals. They set the vessels before the several loads and throw salt over the coals. As the bluish flame rises, they exclaim: “May you be blessed in going and in coming." By this the devil and every evil fiend is put to flight."
Salt-water is a familiar medicine in Chinese cattle-diseases. In Japan, during the purifying ceremonies of the early Shinto religion, the ground is strewn with salt," and salt is
u Potter's Antiquities, Vol. II. PP. 414-416. e Smith's Christian Antiquities, p. 603; Potter's Antiquities, Vol. I. p. 253. - Brown's Grout Dionysiak Myth, Vol. II. p. 66. 67 Smith's Greek and Roman Antiquities, "Salinum." 65 Op. cit., lue. cit.
* Tylor's Primitive Culture, Vol. II. p. 439. 70 Pliny's Natural History, Book xxxi, Chap. 719. Adam's Roman Antiquities, p. 260. 52 Potter's Antiquities, Vol. II p. 854.
- 19 In Hone's Table Book, Vol. I. p. 523. 74 " Baptism," Encyclopædia Britannica, IX. Edition, p. 351. Smith's Christian Antiquities, p. 318.
T6 Op. cit. p. 1839. 17 Op. cit. p. 1889.
Op. cit. p. 1839. 59 Op. cit. p. 1839. 30 Middleton's Conformity of Paganism and Popery, p. 138. 81 Potter's Antiquities, Vol. I. p. 263.
82 Chambers' Book of Days, p. 146. 5 Denham And Clappertoa's Africa, Vol. II. p. 183. Burkhardt's Nubia, p. 169. Gray's China, Vol. II. p. 157.
6 Reed's Japan, Vol. I. p. 61.