are frequently depicted. t Hilprecht, 7.c. 480.
RELIGION OF BABYLONIA
RELIGION OF BABYLONIA 579
centres as Sippar, Shirpurla, and Nippur, reveal indeed an astonishing activity of the temples in this direction. Large bodies of labourers were indentured to the temples, and slaves were owned or controlled by the priests acting as the accredited agents of some temple organization. These labourers and slaves were in turn hired out by the temples; banks were established in con- nexion with the temples, and hundreds of tablets have been found recording sums lent on interest, accounts of the temple in disposing of crops, in renting fields, selling and buying cattle, and deal- ing with all the branches of barter and exchange in which lay merchants were engaged.* Such a state of affairs aided materially, not only in pro- moting the importance of the temples, but in maintaining the influence of the priests, to whose more specifically religious functions we now turn.
The political growth of both Babylonia and Assyria contributed directly towards making the religious position of the priests more secure. Military enterprises were never undertaken with- out consulting the wish of the gods by means of omens and oracles. In like manner, the masses, imitating the example of their royal masters, repaired to the temples before setting out on a journey, or before building a house, or in order to secure relief from suffering, to avert impending disaster, or to seek for the interpretation of all strange and unusual occurrences. From being originally the guardians of small shrines and sanctuaries, erected as the dwelling-places of the gods represented by images placed in the most sacred part of the edifice, the priests thus became, and continued to be, the guides, physicians, and counsellors of the king and of his subjects.
The general term for ‘priest’ was shang, the meaning of which is not certain,{| but with the growth of the temples into large establishments a differentiation of priestly functions took place, and we can distinguish three chief classes: bard, ‘soothsayer or omen priest’; dshipu, ‘ exorcizer’ ; and zammaru, ‘singer.’ Each of these classes was probably further subdivided so as to provide for continuous attendance at the shrines. ‘The special duties pertaining to each class are clearly indi- cated by their names, the bdré being the priest versed in the interpretation of omens, the dshipu the one by whom the demons and witches were exorcized, and the zammaru the designation for the body of priests who conducted the service proper at festivals and in connexion with the sacri- fices. But besides these three general classes there must have been others to whom the other functions carried on by the priests were assigned. Such designations for ‘priest,’ as munambi=< wailer,’ lallaru = ‘howler,’ indicate that ‘dirge-singers’ formed a special subdivision, who chanted the lamentations for the dead.
The instruction of aspirants to the temple service was another important function. This led to the institution of schools, and the numerous tablets for exercise and practice, found in Assurbanipal’s library, and in other collections of which fragments are now known to us, introduce us to the methods perfected in these schools. Beginning with the simple acquirements of reading and writing, the exercises led step by step to acquaintance with astrological, medical, and judicial lore, as well as to initiation into the interpretation of omens, methods of divination and exorcizing, sacrificial
* See Peiser’s account of the financial side of the temple establishments, in the Introduction to his Babylonische Vertrage des Berliner Museums (Berlin 1890), pp. Xvii-xxix.
+ Zimmern’s suggestion (Keilinschrijten u. d. Alte Test. p. 590, note 7) of ‘the raging or howling one’ is not plausible. More probable is Jensen’s view (Zeitschr. f. Agsyr. vii. 174) that it is a compound of 3a nai, ‘the one over the sacrifice ’; but this theory also involves difficulties of a grammatical character.
details, the ritual to be observed on various occa- sions, and knowledge of the doctrines taught by the theologians. *
While as yet we know little of the details of the organization of the priesthood at the great temples, beyond the fact of its general divisions, and the existence of a ‘high- priest’ who exercised a measure of authority over all, it is interesting to note that, as among the Hebrews, certain qualifi- cations were required on the part of those who wished to devote themselves to the priesthood. They had to be sound in mind and body, and well proportioned. The leper was excluded, as well as any one who had a bodily defect: a mutilated limb, defective eyesight, or even the lack of a full set of teeth, appears to have been sufficient to exclude one from the priesthood.t The chief classes among the priests formed a kind of guild composed of certain families. To this guild none but members of these families were admitted ; but such restrictions do not seem to have applied to the large body of attendants who performed the menial duties in the great temples, or who were engaged in connexion with their business affairs.
A feature of the Babylonian priesthood which calls for some mention is the presence of women in the priestly service. Gudea refers to ‘wailing women’ in one of his inscriptions. We have had occasion to refer to oracles furnished by women, t and in historical and votive inscriptions of various periods women attached to the service of some god or other are not infrequently mentioned. While such priestesses are by no means limited to temples dedicated to goddesses, Shamash priest- esses being particularly prominent, it would appear that as devotees to the service of the great goddess Ishtar in her temples in the south, as at Erech, Agade, and Babylon, as well as in the north, at Nineveh and Arbela, they retained positions of in- fluence throughout all periods, though the general observation may be made, that this position is more prominent in the earlier than in the later periods. The names for ‘ priestesses’ were: Ka- dishtu, ‘holy one’; kharimtu, which embodies a similar idea of being ‘set aside’; shamkhatu, ‘pleasure maiden’; and kizritw, the meaning of which is not known.§ Priestesses appear also to have been employed in connexion with certain mysterious rites practised in the temples, to sym- bolize the fertility for which the goddess Ishtar stood, though it should be added that no references have as yet been found in the religious literature to justify Herodotus’ statement (i. 199) that obscene rites formed part of the regular Ishtar cult.