Semitic Magic: Its Origins and Development

355 Pages·2000·12.642 MB·English

by  R. Campbell Thompson

SEMITIC MAGIC
ITS ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT.
BY
R. CAMPBELL THOMPSON, M.A. (Cantab.).
London
:
LUZAC & CO.
1908.
PRINTED HY
STEPHEN AUSTIN AND SONS, LTD.
HERTFORD.
TO MY UNCLE
FREDEEIC THOMPSON,
WHOSE COUNSELS
ON THE HILLSIDE, BY THE LOCHSIDE, AND ON THE
BROAD WATERS,
HAVE OFTTIMES SERVED ME.
PREFACE.
The theories put forward or maintained in this book
are based on a study of that intricate demonology
which has gradually developed throughout the lands
of Western Asia. The earliest written records of this
magic are found in the cuneiform incantation tablets
from Assyria ; and, aided by the various stepping-
stones afforded by Rabbinic tradition, Syriac monkish
writings, and Arabic tales, we can trace its growth
and decadence through three thousand years down to
its survival in modern Oriental superstition. Further-
more, the parallels afforded by Aryan and Hamitic
nations show how close the grooves are in which savage
ideas run, and that the principles of magic are, broadly
speaking, coincident in each separate nation, and yet,
as far as we know, of independent invention. All these
superstitions combine to throw light on many of the
peculiar customs of the Old Testament, and help to
explain the hidden reason why these customs existed.
From a study of the characteristics of the evil spirits,
which the Semite believed to exist everywhere, certain
deductions can be made which bear intimately on our
knowledge of the origins of certain tabus and the
principle of atonement. These may be briefly stated
thus
:
Xll PREFACE.
(1) All evil spirits could inflict bodily hurt on man.
(2) The relations between spirits and human beings
were so close that both semi-divine and semi-demoniac
offspring could be born of intermarriage between them,
either of human mothers or fathers.
(3) From this belief in intermarriage with spirits
arose the tabus on certain sexual functions. These
(according to the present theory) indicate the advent,
proximity, or presence of marriageable demons who
would tolerate no meddling in their amours. Hence
the tribesman, fearing their jealousy, segregated the
contaminated person from the rest of the tribe for such
time as he deemed expedient.
(4) It frequently happened that, in spite of the care
taken to isolate all persons or things tabu, a man might
break an ' unwitting' tabu, and as a result would
fall sick from the attack of a resentful spirit. The
priest was then called in to exorcise the demon, which
he was able to do by a transference of the demoniac
influence from the body of his patient into some other
object.
(5) This is the base of the atonement principle. The
priest first of all inveigled or drove out the demon
from the sick man into a wax figure or slaughtered kid,
and he was then able to destroy it. As civilisation
proceeded, the most probable theory is that the original
idea of the slaughtered kid became merged in that of
the ordinary sacrifice representing a common meal with
the god. The carcase of the kid then played the part
1*KEFACE. Xlll
of a ' sin-offering ' in the sense in which it is now
understood, instead of being a receptacle for the demon
cozened forth from the patient.
(6) Having proceeded thus far, the principle of
substitution for the firstborn demands attention. This
apparently takes its origin in primitive cannibal feasts,
the horror of which was softened as the Semites
advanced in progress. With their migration perhaps
to a more fertile land where stress of poverty and
famine did not demand such extremities as cannibalism,
and also from a contemporaneous rise in civilisation,
it became natural to substitute a beast for a tribesman
at the tribal sacrificial feasts.
The study of tabu from the Assyrian side has been
comparatively neglected, and yet the evidence hitherto
gleaned from the cuneiform writings shows that it
existed in practically the same forms in Mesopotamia
as in other countries. I had hoped to find more proof
of its presence in certain cuneiform tablets dealing with
medical and kindred subjects in the British Museum,
but my two applications for permission to copy un-
published tablets of this nature were refused by the
Museum authorities. Hence the material at hand for
a study of a most interesting branch of Comparative
Religion is more imperfect than I could have wished,
and the relative scientific value of what we actually
know on this subject is proportionate to the amount
of evidence which may be afforded at some later date
by these privy documents.
xiv PKEFACE.
It is almost unnecessary to say how much I am
indebted to Robertson Smith's Religion of the Semites
and Frazer's Golden Bough for the many quotations
bearing on this subject which I have taken from them ;
to the Encyclopaedia Biblica and Jewish Encyclopcedia ;
to that storehouse of Arabic folklore, Doughty's Arabia
Deserta to Curtiss' Primitive Semitic Religion to
; ;
Skeat's Malay Magic and to King's various works
;
on Assyrian religion.
To my uncle, Frederic Thompson, I owe hearty
thanks, not only for the care and trouble which he
has taken in reading the proof - sheets, but also for
many appropriate suggestions of which I have gladly
availed myself.
Such a book as this must necessarily be imperfect,
and not everyone will agree with the deductions that
have been made. But, as Hume says in his discussion
on Miracles, "a wise man, therefore, proportions his
...
belief to the evidence he weighs the opposite
experiments : he considers which side is supported by
the greater number of experiments : to that side he
inclines with doubt and hesitation and when at last
;
he fixes his judgment, the evidence exceeds not what
we properly call probability."
R. Campbell Thompson.
London.
July, 1908.

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.
A.J.S.L. AmericanJournal of Semitic Languages.
A.S.K.T. Haupt, Akkadische undSumerische Keilschrifttexte.
C.I.S. CorpusInscriptionum Semiticarum.
C.T. Cuneiform Textsfrom Babylonian Tablets (British Museum
publications).
Devils Thompson, Devilsand Evil SpiritsofBabylonia.
G.B. Frazer, Golden Bough.
J.A. Journal Asiatique.
J.A.O.S. Journalofthe American Oriental Society.
J.A.S. Journal ofthe AsiaticSociety.
J.B.L. Journal ofBiblical Literature.
J.E.S. Journalofthe Ethnological Society.
J.Q. Jewish Quarterly.
K. References to Kouyunjik Tablets in the British Museum.
Maklu The Maklu Series, published by Tallqvist, Die assyrische
Beschwomngsserie Maqlu.
O.T.J.C. Robertson Smith, Old Testament in theJewish Church.
P.E.F. PalestineExploration Fund.
P.S.B.A. Proceedingsofthe Society ofBiblical Archaeology.
S. References to Tablets in the British Museum found by
George Smith.
Surpu TheSurpuSeries,published byZimmern,DieBeschwb'rungs-
tafeln Surpu.
T.S.B.A. Transactionsofthe Society of Biblical Archaeology.
W.A.I. Rawlinson, Inscriptionsof Western Asia.
Tt.K. Zeitschriftfur Assyriologie.
Z.D.M.G. Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft.
INTRODUCTION.
"Magic and sorcery, though they lay outside of religion
and were forbidden arts in all the civilised states of
antiquity, were yet never regarded as mere imposture."1
The difficulty lies in distinguishing magic from religion,
and we can best quote the broad definition laid down by
Robertson Smith, that the difference between religion and
magic is that, while the former is the worship for the good
of the community, magic is the supernatural relation for
the individual.2 When it is remembered how great an
influence the principle of Atonement has in the Levitical
laws, and yet, on the other hand, that a Babylonian
sorcerer will conjure a demon forth from a sick man with
a little dough figure, just as though he were a vindictive
wizard of the Middle Ages, using the selfsame word as
the Hebrews as the name of his exorcism, the difficulty
We
will at once be apparent. have, therefore, to examine
much more than the mere spell of an Arab shekh for
1 Kobertson Smith, Religion oftheSemites, 90.
2 Martin Del Rio (Disquisitiones Magicce, 1599, i, 12) thus defines
magic : "Ut sit arsseufacultas,vicreata,&nonsupernaturali,qusedam
mira & insolita efficiens, quorumratio sensum & communem hominum
captum superat." On the beliefsin magic current in the Middle Ages,
the curious willfindanexhaustiveaccount in Horst'sZauberBibliothek,
and it is refreshingto read even in a book published as late as 1898
{The Book of Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Sage, ed. Mathers) the
remarks which are written by the editor who apparently expects to
be taken seriously ; his explanatory Introduction is intended purely
and solely as a help to genuine Occult students, and ends with his
defiance, "that for the opinion of the ordinary literary critic who
neither understands norbelieves in Occultism, I care nothing. '
b