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Semitic Magic SEMITIC MAGIC ITS ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT. BY R. CAMPBELL THOMPSON, M.A. (Cantab.). London : LUZAC & CO. 1908. Cfrt&M*. hie IZafa J-ee'd buhl h '?37 PRINTED BY STEPHEN AUSTIN AND S0N8, LTD. HERTFORD. TO MY UNCLE FREDERIC 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 : — xii 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 pi-obable 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 PREFACE. 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 PREFACE. 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 Encyclopcedia 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. CONTENTS. PAGES. Introduction xvii-lxviii I. The Demons and Ghosts 1-94 II. Demoniac Possession and Tabu 95-141 III. Sympathetic Magic 142-174 IV. The Atonement Sacrifice 175-218 V. The Redemption of the Firstlwrn .... 219-244 Appendix 245-256 Index 257-283 List of Biblical Quotations 285-286 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. A.J.S.L. American Journal of Semitic Languages. A.S.K.T. Haupt, Akkadische und Sumerische Keilschrifttexte. C.I.S. Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum. C.T. Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets (British Museum publications). Devils Thompson, Devils and Evil Spirits of Babylonia. G.B. Frazer, Oolden Bough. J.A. Journal Asiatique. J.A.O.S. Journal of the American Oriental Society. J.A.S. Journal of the Asiatic Society. J.B.L. Journal of Biblical Literature. J.E.S. Journal of the Ethnological Society. J.Q. Jewish (Quarterly. K. References to Kouyunjik Tablets in the British Museum. Maklu The Maklu Series, published by Tallqvist, Die assyrische Beschworungsserie Maqhl. O.T.J.C. Robertson Smith, Old Testament in the Jewish Church. P.E.F. Palestine Exploration Fund. P.S.B.A. Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archasology. S. References to Tablets in the British Museum found by George Smith. Surpu The Surpu Series, published by Zimmern, Die Beschworungs- tafeln Surpu. T.S.B.A. Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archasology. W.A.I.Z.A. Rawlinson,Zeitschrift fiir Inscriptions Assyriologie. of Western Asia. Z.D.M.G. Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Oesellschaft. 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 will at once be apparent. We have, therefore, to examine much more than the mere spell of an Arab shekh for 1 Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 90. 2 Martin Del Rio (Disquisitiones Magicw, 1599, i, 12) thus defines magic : " Ut sit ars seu facultas, vi creata, & non supernaturali, queedam mira & insolita efficiens, quorum ratio sensum & communem hominum captum superat." On the beliefs in magic current in the Middle Ages, the curious will find an exhaustive account in Horst's Zauber Bibliothek, and it is refreshing to read even in a book published as late as 1898 {The Book of Sacred Magic of Abrainelin 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 nor believes in Occultism, I care nothing. ' i xviii PRIESTS AND 'WIZARDS. a lovesick Bedawi, or the amulet of some Syrian wise- woman against the Evil Eye ; the principles which underlie such wizardry go deep into the roots of religion itself, and for this reason, if for no other, magic and witchcraft deserve to be considered as something more than the impotent trickery of charlatans. As religious principles developed themselves among primitive savages, men began to learn something of the mysterious natural forces which would enable one tribal wizard to pit himself in ghostly combat against the warlock of another clan, and defeat him by his superior magic.
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