Scatalogic Rites of All Nations: A dissertation upon the employment of excrementitious remedial agents in religion, therapeutics, divination, witchcraft, love-philters, etc., in all parts of the globeBourke, John Gregory
Religion
Scatalogic Rites of All Nations: A dissertation upon the employment of excrementitious remedial agents in religion, therapeutics, divination, witchcraft, love-philters, etc., in all parts of the globe
Bourke, John Gregory
Scatology
The Celtic stock, it is now generally admitted, represents a very early
migration from India. Exactly when this migration began and was completed
we have no means of determining; but we may safely say, judging from the
prominence in Celtic folk-lore of the chicken-dung, that it did not occur
until the cultus of India was beginning to cast about for some suitable
substitute for human sacrifice.[39]
Inman takes the ground that the very same substitution occurred among
the Hebrews. Commenting upon 1 Kings xix. 18, he says: “In the Vulgate
the passage is thus rendered: ‘They say to these, Sacrifice the men who
adore the calves;’ while the Septuagint renders the words, ‘Sacrifice
men, for the calves have come to an end,’ indicating a reversion to human
sacrifice.”—(Inman, “Ancient Faiths Embodied in Ancient Names,” London,
1878, article “Hosea.”)
“He that killeth an ox as if he slew a man; he that sacrificeth a lamb as
if he cut off a dog’s neck; he that offereth an oblation as if he offered
swine’s blood; he that burneth incense as if he blessed an idol.”—(Isaiah
lxvi. 3. Reference given to the above by Prof. W. Robertson Smith.)
“In the earliest period the horse seems to have been the favorite animal
for sacrifice.”—(“Teutonic Mythology,” Jacob Grimm, vol. i. p. 47.)
“The Brahmans show how, in Hindostan, the lower animals became vicarious
substitutes for man in sacrifice.”—(“Myth, Ritual, and Religion,” Andrew
Lang, vol. ii. p. 40, footnote.)
If the cow have displaced a human victim, may it not be within the
limits of probability that the ordure and urine of the sacred bovine
are substitutes, not only for the complete carcass, but that they
symbolize a former use of human excreta?[40] The existence of ur-orgies
has been indicated in Siberia, where the religion partakes of many of
the characteristics of Buddhism.[41] The minatory phraseology of the
Brahminical inhibition of the use of the fungi which enter into these
orgies has been given _verbatim_; so that, even did no better evidence
exist, enough has been presented to open up a wide range of discussion
as to the former area of distribution of loathsome and disgusting
ceremonials, which are now happily restricted to small and constantly
diminishing zones.
HUMAN ORDURE AND URINE STILL USED IN INDIA.
It is well to remember, however, that in India the more generally
recognized efficacy of cow urine and cow dung has not blinded the
fanatical devotee to the necessity of occasionally having recourse to the
human product.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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