RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Moody Moon
left its mark. Thus with Terah may be compared Assyr. tarahu, " gazelle " (sacred to Ishtar) ; Nahor is connected with Nannar, the name of 2. Concep- a moon-god; Abram recalls aburammu, tion of the " exalted father," a frequent title of Moon the moon-deity; Sarah ("princess") and Its and Milcah (" queen ") are titles of Functions, the moon-goddess; Laban is to be connected with labanu, " the white one," cf. lebhenah above; while Lamech may be brought into relations with Assyr. Lamgu, a name of Sin. Yet with the Hebrews the moon was subordinate and secondary to the sun. Whether this represents the original Semitic conception is uncertain, since it is held, though not demonstrated, that the moon-cult represented an earlier Semitic stage of culture. The age of the worship of Sin is not determined; the Aramean cult at Haran was of great antiquity and persisted into the Roman period. Sahar, the name of a moon-god, is probably to be seen in the Mandffian Sauriel, while the Palmyrene deities Yarhibaal and Aglibaal were moon-deities. The Hebrews were, therefore, in the provenance of the moon-cult, and their conceptions of this body were in general agreement with those of their neighbors. The idea that the moon influenced the earth and its products was practically universal, and this influence was conceived as either malign or benign. This body was thought to be an agent in the production of crops, perhaps through its supposed function as a creator of dew (W. von Baudissin, Jahve et Moloch, p. 24, Leipsic, 1874; W. H. Roscher, Ueber Selene, pp. 49-99, ib. 1890). The Aryans went further than this and attributed to the moon the growth of animals (Avesta, Mah Yast, Mah Nyayis, SBE, xxiii. 88-91, 355); the Indo-Iranians connected the moon with the primeval bull, itself a symbol of fertility; Pliny (Hist, vat., ii. 221) associated growth with the moon; Macrobius (" On the Dream of Scipio," I., xi. 7) attributes to the moon power over terrestrial objects for increase or decline; while it is a worldwide superstition that a waxing moon brings increase of crops, and occasionally even the power of impregnation is attributed to that body. The Old- Testament references to this notion are necessarily scanty, yet beyond question Deut. xxxiii. 14, " the precious things put forth by the moon," is to be brought into relationship with this idea. In the Assyrian hymns the moon is called " the mighty bull, with large horns, perfect form, and flowing beard, bright as crystal " (the bull is also a Semitic symbol of fertility) ; the supposed beard in seals is probably the effect of a necklace with pendants. On the malign side pestilence was associated with the moon (Ps. cxxi. 6), while the Greek notion of the lunar origin of epilepsy (cf. the Greek verb sdeniazesthai, " to be struck with epilepsy," from selene, " moon ") is shown to be held by Jews (Matt. iv. 24, xvii. 15). With this may be connected the name of the Mandaean angel of death, Sauriel, as well as such passages in the Old Testament as Gen. xxxi. 40 and Jer. xxxvi. 30. In the imagery of the Day of Yahweh (q.v.) the moon was to participate with the. other heavenly bodies in the cataclysmic phenomena of that time (Isa.
xiii. 10; Ezek. xxxii. 7; Joel ii. 10, iii. 4, 15; Matt. xxiv. 29; Acts ii. 20; Rev. vi. 12); also in the repair and glorifying of all nature (Isa. xxx. 26), though in the new era there will be no need for its light, since God is to be the light of his people (Isa. lx. 19; cf. Rev. xxi. 23, xxii. 5). Yet its stability is one of the images of eternal duration (Ps. Ixxii. 5, 7, Ixxxix. 37), and it is also a synonym of beauty (Job xxxi. 26; Cant. vi. 9; Ecclus. 1. 6).
Worship of the moon appears to have been native with the Semites. Wadd in Arabia, Sin and Nannar in Babylonia, Sahar in Mesopotamia (appearing on Aramaic steles at Merab near Aleppo; cf. C. Clermont-Ganneau, in Bibliotheque de Vicole des hautes etudes, fasc. 113, pp. 193-195, 211-215, Paris, 1897) are but a few of the examples which
might be cited, the moon being rep-
3. Worship resentative of both male and female
of the deities. Apart, however, from the
Moon. suggestions contained in the tracing
of Abraham to centers of moon-worship and in the connections of names in the Abrahamic family with names or titles of moon-deities, there is little or nothing in the early history of the Hebrews to connect them with worship of the moon (cf. Smith, Rel. of Sent., 2d ed., p. 135). It was only toward the end of the monarchy, in the period of declension and of eclectic religious practises, that the worship of this body appears among them, when it is registered by the denunciation of the prophets (Jer. viii. 2, xix. 3; Zeph. i. 5), by prohibition through legislation (Deut. iv. 9, xvii. 3), by the repressive measures of Josiah (II Kings xxiii. 5), and later by the -disavowal of participation in the cult by the righteous sufferer (Job xxxi. 26-27). In general the worship of the moon was associated with that of other heavenly bodies, and the method was by prostration, and by kissing of the hands (Job. xxxi. 26-27), the latter a custom mentioned by Pliny (Hist, nat., XXVIII., ii. 25). In Jer. vii. 18, xliv. 17-19, 25, there is mention of the " queen of heaven " in which a distinct cult is evidently distinguished, and its peculiarities in part given, as in the offering by fire of special cakes in the preparation of which men, women, and children united. The prophet in chap. xliv. represents the people as arguing for this worship on the experiential ground that its practise was attended with prosperity and the cessation of it was contemporaneous with disaster. It has been the custom since Jerome to identify this " queen of heaven " with the moon, though from the time of Isaac of Antioch (c. 450) she was also identified with Venus. The concrete deity with whom identification was made, however, was Ishtar, whose most intimate connection was with Venus and not with the moon (see Ashtorkth, § 5); accordingly later scholars are disposed to see in the cult under question the Ishtar- Venus type and to disconnect it from the moon. Perhaps the last word has not been said on the subject. As cults passed from the East to the West, Ishtar was associated with the moon, and this association registered itself in the Greek religion as well as in the Sidonian conception of Astarte as the moon. It is not beside the mark to note that cakes were offered in Athens to Artemis (the moon-
Moon Moore