1 imputed to them on that account. Thus, after reciting the zeal of Asa against idolatry, the account is thus wound up: "But the high places were not taken away out of Israel: nevertheless the heart of Asa was perfect all his days." And when the penitent Manasseh signalised his sincerity by removing all the strange gods out of the land, the same exception occurs: "Nevertheless the people did sacrifice still in the high places, yet unto the Lord their God only."" Of Solomon it is said, that he loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David his father: only he sacrificed and burnt incense in high places. And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there; for that was the great high place; and the Lord appeared to him in a dream by night.3 Since therefore God vouchsafed an extraordinary favour to Solomon on that occasion, it is certain that there was nothing of offensive superstition in his choice of a place for sacrifice; on the contrary, we may infer that it was an acceptable service. When therefore Ezekiel upbraids the House of Israel for polluting themselves after the manner of their fathers, the nature of the sin to which he alludes is recited thus: "When I had brought them into the land, for the which I lifted up my hand to give it to them, then they saw every high hill-and they offered there their sacrifices and poured out there their drink-offerings. Then I said unto them, What is the high place whereunto ye go?" In this expostulation a 1 2 Chron. xv. 17. 3 1 Kings, iii. 2. VOL. II. R 2 Ibid. xxxiii. 17. distinction is implied: to some high places they might have gone unblamed; but what was the character of that to which they went? To answer the question, we must observe, that the place retained the name of Bama at the time when the Prophet wrote. Now when the Israelites were entering on the borders of the promised land, they arrived at Bamoth in the valley; a description which might lead us at once to conclude, that there was another Bamoth, or Bama on the heights: and so there was; for on the adjoining hill of Pisgah, Baal had his Bamoth, or high places. Lowth makes a false distinction between Bamah and Bamoth: he maintains, that the masculine form is always a place of worship, and the feminine a height.2 Jerome's opinion, that both always mean a high place, is much more correct; for, in truth, the place of worship being always either on a height, or the representative of a height, they always coincide. It was precisely at this period of their journey, that the Israelites first polluted themselves with the practices of idolatry. The Psalmist charges them with joining themselves to Baal Peor, and eating the sacrifices of the dead *; sacrifices like those which the Hindoos offered to 1 Outram says, that when the Ark was not in its proper place, it was lawful for the Israelites to use for divine worship sacella ista, quæ quoniam editioribus in locis posita erant, Bamoth appellari solent, - De Sacrificiis, lib. i. c. 2. 2 Lowth in Isaiah, liii. 9. 3 Bama singulariter, et Bamoth pluraliter, Excelsa significat. Hieron. in Ezek. xx. 28. He says, that Abbana, the reading of the Seventy, Hebraico sermone nil resonat; but its meaning may be found in, a Stone (Op. vol. iii.); ex quo Scholion illud. 'A6βανὰ λίθος ἑρμηνεύεται. · Drusius in loco. 4 Psalm cvi. 28. the Pitris, to their dead progenitors; or which Ulysses offered to the Manes, when he visited the islands of the West. Theodoretus observes upon this passage, that Baal Peor was believed to be Saturn', and consequently Noah; he was the same person whom the Japonese call Peirun 2, the virtuous king of a very fertile island, whose subjects became so corrupt, that they drew down the vengeance of heaven, and the island was swallowed up in the sea. But Peirun being beloved of the gods was warned of the catastrophe, and saved in a ship, which conveyed him and his family to another country. He disappeared, and still on the fifth day of the Moon in June they look for him in Gondolas, crying out, "Peirun, Peirun!" Jerome makes him the same as Priapus; and Vallancey observes, that the Bal Phearba of the Irish, who was the Baal Peor of the Moabites, the Peor Apis of Egypt, and the Priapus of the Greeks, was also a marine and aquatic deity." So too Orpheus says, that the unwearied and fathomless ocean is subject to Priapus. There is no reason, however, to suppose that he was the Priapus of more modern times; for the licentiousness, into which the Israelites were seduced by the crafty counsel of Balaam, may be imputed to a sort of anniversary celebration of the sensual indulgence enjoyed by the family of Noah, when they were released from the prohibitions and austerities of the Ark. And therefore it is said, that "the people sat down to eat and to drink, and 1 Vossius, note on Maimonides de Idol. p. 38. 2 Kæmpfer, Hist. of Japan. 3 Vallancey, Collectanea, vi. 464. 1 rose up to play." Both Balak and Balaam seem to have been Arkites; and this will account for the neutral position which they occupy, between idolatry and true religion. It does not appear that the king placed any confidence in idols, or in any other than the great invisible God, who inspired the prophet; and he conducted him to three dif ferent summits of the Abarim Mountains, where he was to offer sacrifice, not to Baal, but to God. The number of seven altars, and seven victims, may be explained by the tradition current among the Afghans, that only seven persons were saved from the Deluge. A similar deviation from historical truth may have then prevailed in Aram. The people of Palæstine long retained their local traditions connecting their high places with the Deluge; for the Talmud relates how a Samaritan contended for the holiness of Gerizim, because it was not covered by the waters of the flood; and the Jews claimed the same exemption from that visitation for their own country, because it was the Holy Land. 1 Exodus, xxxii. 2 2 Bereschith Rabha. Parascha, xxxii. 16. Lightfoot. Hor. Heb. in Joh. iv. 20. Preland. Dissert. de Monte Gerizim, i. 146. BRITAIN, ON THE ALPS, APENNINES, ATLAS, AND ATHOS. Ir was a natural consequence of that fond veneration for mountains, which universally appropriated them to the purposes of religion, that imitations of them in miniature should be constructed to answer the same purpose, with the advantage of greater convenience. Hence arose those sacred heaps of earth or stones, in valleys as well as on heights, denominated by the Hebrews Bamoth, by the Greeks Bomoi, and by the British Cairns. Kern, or Karn, says Richardson, is pure Arabic, a top of a mountain higher than the rest.' They could only, therefore, be so entitled mystically and emblematically, when they were constructed, as they frequently were, on plains: in such situations, indeed, they were most wanted. The principal motive for making them in valleys, was to bring them nearer to water, which constituted an important feature in the accuracy of the emblem; and when the practice had once grown common, the fashion would be readily followed by all who consulted their ease; since it was a much more easy matter to visit an artificial mound, than to climb a mountain. But 1 Vallancey's Introduction to Irish Hist. p. 15. |