The Alchemy Key.pdf - Veritas File System

the rock of sacrifice, beneath which lay the human representative of
Tammuz, while the silent watchers waited for the golden dawn in the East
to proclaim the great truth “Adonis, the Lord, hath risen from the dead;
the whole earth will be fertilised through his Divine energy.” Then, no
doubt, the watchers seizing the bough or tree sniffed it ceremonially. 26
Thus we see a tendency to unite in Tammuz, the Vegetation
Spirit, or Corn God, and also the Sun God, nor is evidence lacking that he
also gathered up details which in strictness belonged to the Moon. For
example, the mourning for Adonis lasted three days, which is meaningless
if he was either a purely Solar or a purely Corn God, whereas the Moon
vanished from the sky for three whole days every month. On the other
hand, this occurs thirteen times in the year and not once a year, as does
the burying of the seed. Astarte also takes on, at quite an early date, the
attributes of the Moon and of Venus, a point which is of some importance
to us. It should also be noted that she was from the very earliest not only
the Goddess of Love but of War and Destruction, therein showing her
similarity to Kali in India, and giving a good reason why her mate should
bear such a title as “He who destroys.”
The date of the mourning for Tammuz seems to have been near
Midsummer in Judea, in other words, at the gathering in of the Harvest,
which in Palestine takes place in two sections :—the barley in April and
the wheat towards the end of May and the beginning of June. The second
half of June and the first half of July is still called Tammuz by the Jews.
The mourning synchronized with the threshing, 27 hence the significance
of the fact that the Temple was built on the threshing floor of Arunah the
Jebusite. It is generally believed that it actually occurred about
Midsummer Day, or St. John in Summer, as we should call it, and
Professor Jastrow says :—‘ ‘The calendar of the Jewish church still marks
the seventeenth day of Tammuz as a fast, and Houtsma has shown that the
association of the day with the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans
represents merely the attempt to give an ancient festival a worthier
interpretation.” 28
26
Compare the ritual death and resurrection rite among the Australian
Blacks. See Chap. XX.
27
Frazer, “Adonis, Attis, Osiris.” 3rd ed. Vol. I. p. 231.
28
Prof M. Jastrow, “The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria.” pp. 547,
682.
449