Eternal lights, ostracism, and sacrifices in the ancient world

TSAV Leviticus Chapters 6-8

By Irv Jacobs, MD

 

Irv Jacobs

LA JOLLA, California — This parsaha is largely a redundant version of last week’s reading, organized differently, and to my mind more incoherent. Sacrificial details are re-presented. Nevertheless I have found four useful passages for comparison with ancient pagan practices.

I.  Leviticus 6:6 “A perpetual fire shall be kept burning on the altar, not to go out.”

Seeps from which gas and oil escape were formative to many ancient cultures around the world.  When set aflame, they gave rise to ‘perpetual’ fire.  An example is the Delphi Oracle of Greece. Occasionally, ancient naturalists and historians, e.g. Pliny the Elder, chronicled these occurrences. He wrote about Chimaera, a large burning gas seep in Anatolia. The temple of Hephaestus, the Greek god of fire, was built next to it.

Eternal fires often were integrated into religious practice, e.g. Zoroastrians worshiped the “Pillars of Fire” in Azerbaijan. The Buddhists, since the 15th Century CE, and to this day, have an annual ceremony at the Manggarmas flame in Indonesia. [1] [2]

I should add that ancient myths have grown out of supposed mysterious lamps that burned for centuries without human intervention. Egyptians believed the dead required light to guide them through the underworld and to keep away evil spirits. Accordingly they sealed a light source within tombs, which according to legends were seen momentarily if a tomb was later opened, only to promptly fade out.

Such tales of eternal lamps came from disparate places around the world. Plutarch wrote of an ever-burning lamp over the entrance to Jupiter’s temple. The Romans wrote similarly.

Even St. Augustine wrote of such a light in an Egyptian temple dedicated to Venus, but he believed it to have been fashioned by the Devil.  He alleged that the flame could not be put out by any means, and was convinced it was fueled by dark, ancient magic. [3]

II.  Leviticus 7:19-20 “…only he who is clean may eat such flesh. But the person who, in a state of uncleanliness, eats flesh from the Lord’s  sacrifices…,that person shall be cut off (karet) from his kin.”

On the internet, I found no equivalent metaphor among ancient pagan nations. The expression is borrowed from the image of felling a tree. In Hebrew literature, the karet curse could either mean immediate death, premature death, childlessness, or even the death of a descendent. However it has come to mean ostracism, i.e. banishment from the community. In ancient times this could mean a slow death. [4]

III.  Leviticus 7:37 “Such are the rituals of the burnt offering, the meal offering, the sin offering, the guilt offering, the offering of ordination, and the sacrifice of well-being…”

On the internet, one does indeed find similar categories of sacrifice, and even more among ancient pagans.

Sacrifice could be specified as to time and place of the sacrifice, and the motive of the rite.

It could be prophylactic, an appeal to avert misfortune. It could be for a communion, i.e. a bond between the worshiper and the sacred power. Such bonds were consummated by a meal, ‘shared’ with the deity.

The Greeks had separate types of sacrifice for the upper Olympian deities (joyful and daytime) vs. the deities of the underworld and the earth (sombre and nocturnal). The sacrificial objects in thanksgiving could be all kinds of animals, vegetables, fruits, cheese, and honey (N.B. honey was prohibited in Hebrew sacrifices).

Afield from the Hebrew, a sacrificial animal could serve as a substitute for a guilty person.  In some West African cults, a person believed to be under death penalty by the gods offers an animal to which he transfers his sins. The animal, then ritually killed, is buried with complete funeral rites as though it were the guilty human. Thus the human is now ‘innocent,’ free to begin a new life!

A ‘mortuary sacrifice,’ common throughout history, is also strange to us. In this, the living offer libations (milk, water, wine, oil) poured onto a grave, or they leave solid food. The intention is to increase the power of life of the departed. Thereby the dead partake of the life of the gods, i.e. sacrifices to the dead are in effect sacrifices to the gods.

A communion sacrifice in Hindu or in the Aztec nation is one in which the deity somehow indwells the oblation so that worshipers actually consume the divine.  The Aztecs made dough images of the sun god and consecrated them to him. Thus it was transubstantiated into the god’s flesh. Thereafter, they ate it with fear and reverence. [5]

IV.  Leviticus 8:23  “ram)…slaughtered. Moses took some of its blood and put it on the ridge of Aaron’s right ear, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the big toe of his right foot.”

On the internet, I found no mention of an ancient pagan sacrificial component of an analogous description.  According to the Hebrew tradition, this is a rite of purification.  It is similar to the ceremony following recovery from a skin disease, in which case the blood is from a lamb (Lev. 14:14).  Symbolically the person is “treated literally from head to foot.” [6]

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[1] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150518102031.htm

[2] https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g303962-d324082-Reviews-Zoroastrian_Fire_Temple-Yazd_Province.html

[3] https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2018/10/the-mystery-of-the-ancient-eternal-flames/

[4] The JPS Torah Commentary Leviticus, The Jewish Publication Society, 1989, Baruch A. Levine, pp. 241-2

[5] Encyclopedia Brittanica, the editors, July 7, 2000

[6] ibid. JPS Torah Commentary Leviticus, pp. 53, 87

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Irv Jacobs is a retired medical doctor who enjoys writing about a variety of interests, including both religion and science.  To access more of his articles, please click on his byline at the top of this page.  He may be contacted via irv.jacobs@sdjewishworld.com