| Sir James George Frazer (1854–1941). The Golden
Bough. 1922. |
§ 5. Names of
Gods tabooed |
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| PRIMITIVE man creates his gods in his own
image. Xenophanes remarked long ago that the complexion of negro
gods was black and their noses flat; that Thracian gods were ruddy
and blue-eyed; and that if horses, oxen, and lions only believed in
gods and had hands wherewith to portray them, they would doubtless
fashion their deities in the form of horses, and oxen, and lions.
Hence just as the furtive savage conceals his real name because he
fears that sorcerers might make an evil use of it, so he fancies
that his gods must likewise keep their true name secret, lest other
gods or even men should learn the mystic sounds and thus be able to
conjure with them. Nowhere was this crude conception of the secrecy
and magical virtue of the divine name more firmly held or more fully
developed than in ancient Egypt, where the superstitions of a
dateless past were embalmed in the hearts of the people hardly less
effectually than the bodies of cats and crocodiles and the rest of
the divine menagerie in their rock-cut tombs. The conception is well
illustrated by a story which tells how the subtle Isis wormed his
secret name from Ra, the great Egyptian god of the sun. Isis, so
runs the tale, was a woman mighty in words, and she was weary of the
world of men, and yearned after the world of the gods. And she
meditated in her heart, saying, “Cannot I by virtue of the great
name of Ra make myself a goddess and reign like him in heaven and
earth?” For Ra had many names, but the great name which gave him all
power over gods and men was known to none but himself. Now the god
was by this time grown old; he slobbered at the mouth and his
spittle fell upon the ground. So Isis gathered up the spittle and
the earth with it, and kneaded thereof a serpent and laid it in the
path where the great god passed every day to his double kingdom
after his heart’s desire. And when he came forth according to his
wont, attended by all his company of gods, the sacred serpent stung
him, and the god opened his mouth and cried, and his cry went up to
heaven. And the company of gods cried, “What aileth thee?” and the
gods shouted, “Lo and behold!” But he could not answer; his jaws
rattled, his limbs shook, the poison ran through his flesh as the
Nile floweth over the land. When the great god had stilled his
heart, he cried to his followers, “Come to me, O my children,
offspring of my body. I am a prince, the son of a prince, the divine
seed of a god. My father devised my name; my father and my mother
gave me my name, and it remained hidden in my body since my birth,
that no magician might have magic power over me. I went out to
behold that which I have made, I walked in the two lands which I
have created, and lo! something stung me. What it was, I know not.
Was it fire? was it water? My heart is on fire, my flesh trembleth,
all my limbs do quake. Bring me the children of the gods with
healing words and understanding lips, whose power reacheth to
heaven.” Then came to him the children of the gods, and they were
very sorrowful. And Isis came with her craft, whose mouth is full of
the breath of life, whose spells chase pain away, whose word maketh
the dead to live. She said, “What is it, divine Father? what is it?”
The holy god opened his mouth, he spake and
said, “I went upon my way, I walked after my heart’s desire in the
two regions which I have made to behold that which I have created,
and lo! a serpent that I saw not stung me. Is it fire? is it water?
I am colder than water, I am hotter than fire, all my limbs sweat, I
tremble, mine eye is not steadfast, I behold not the sky, the
moisture bedeweth my face as in summer-time.” Then spake Isis, “Tell
me thy name, divine Father, for the man shall live who is called by
his name.” Then answered Ra, “I created the heavens and the earth, I
ordered the mountains, I made the great and wide sea, I stretched
out the two horizons like a curtain. I am he who openeth his eyes
and it is light, and who shutteth them and it is dark. At his
command the Nile riseth, but the gods know not his name. I am
Khepera in the morning, I am Ra at noon, I am Tum at eve.” But the
poison was not taken away from him; it pierced deeper, and the great
god could no longer walk. Then said Isis to him, “That was not thy
name that thou spakest unto me. Oh tell it me, that the poison may
depart; for he shall live whose name is named.” Now the poison
burned like fire, it was hotter than the flame of fire. The god
said, “I consent that Isis shall search into me, and that my name
shall pass from my breast into hers.” Then the god hid himself from
the gods, and his place in the ship of eternity was empty. Thus was
the name of the great god taken from him, and Isis, the witch,
spake, “Flow away, poison, depart from Ra. It is I, even I, who
overcome the poison and cast it to the earth; for the name of the
great god hath been taken away from him. Let Ra live and let the
poison die.” Thus spake great Isis, the queen of the gods, she who
knows Ra and his true name. |
1 |
| From this story it appears that the real name of the
god, with which his power was inextricably bound up, was supposed to
be lodged, in an almost physical sense, somewhere in his breast,
from which Isis extracted it by a sort of surgical operation and
transferred it with all its supernatural powers to herself. In Egypt
attempts like that of Isis to appropriate the power of a high god by
possessing herself of his name were not mere legends told of the
mythical beings of a remote past; every Egyptian magician aspired to
wield like powers by similar means. For it was believed that he who
possessed the true name possessed the very being of god or man, and
could force even a deity to obey him as a slave obeys his master.
Thus the art of the magician consisted in obtaining from the gods a
revelation of their sacred names, and he left no stone unturned to
accomplish his end. When once a god in a moment of weakness or
forgetfulness had imparted to the wizard the wondrous lore, the
deity had no choice but to submit humbly to the man or pay the
penalty of his contumacy. |
2 |
| The belief in the magic virtue of divine names was
shared by the Romans. When they sat down before a city, the priests
addressed the guardian deity of the place in a set form of prayer or
incantation, inviting him to abandon the beleaguered city and come
over to the Romans, who would treat him as well as or better than he
had ever been treated in his old home.
Hence the name of the guardian deity of Rome was kept a profound
secret, lest the enemies of the republic might lure him away, even
as the Romans themselves had induced many gods to desert, like rats,
the falling fortunes of cities that had sheltered them in happier
days. Nay, the real name, not merely of its guardian deity, but of
the city itself, was wrapt in mystery and might never be uttered,
not even in the sacred rites. A certain Valerius Soranus, who dared
to divulge the priceless secret, was put to death or came to a bad
end. In like manner, it seems, the ancient Assyrians were forbidden
to mention the mystic names of their cities; and down to modern
times the Cheremiss of the Caucasus keep the names of their communal
villages secret from motives of superstition. |
3 |
| If the reader has had the patience to follow this
examination of the superstitions attaching to personal names, he
will probably agree that the mystery in which the names of royal
personages are so often shrouded is no isolated phenomenon, no
arbitrary expression of courtly servility and adulation, but merely
the particular application of a general law of primitive thought,
which includes within its scope common folk and gods as well as
kings and priests. |
4 |
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