Lecture VII. The Sacred Books. 367
themselves. They were, furthermore, the framework in which
the hymns and spells were set; and they all formed together a
single act of divine worship, the several parts of which could not
be separated without endangering the efficacy of the whole.
That the incantations were the older portion of the sacred
literature of Chaldæa, was perceived by Lenormant. They go
back to the age of animism, to the days when, as yet, the
multitudinous spirits and demons of Sumerian belief had not
made way for the gods of Semitic Babylonia, or the sorcerer
and medicine-man for a hierarchy of priests. Their language as
well as their spirit is Sumerian, and thezior“spirit”of heaven
and earth is invoked to repel the attack of the evil ghost, or to
shower blessings on the head of the worshipper. They transport
us into a world that harmonises but badly with the decorous and
orderly realm of the gods of light; it is a world in which thelil
and theutuk, thegallaand theekimmu, reign supreme, and little
room seems to be left for the deities of the Semitic faith. The [401]
gods themselves, when they are introduced into it, wear a new
aspect. Ea is no longer the creator and culture god, but a master
of magic spells; and his son Asari displays his goodness towards
mankind by instructing them how to remove the sorceries in
which they have been involved, and the witcheries with which
they are tormented.
But it must be borne in mind that the incantations do not all
belong to the same age. The description I have just given holds
good only of the oldest part of them. The Sumerian population
continued to exist in Babylonia after the Semitic occupation
of the country, and Sumerian animism continued to exist as
well. By the side of the higher Semitic faith, with its gods and
goddesses, its priesthood and its cult, the ancient belief in sorcery
and witchcraft, in spells and incantations, and in the ghost-world
of En-lil, flourished among the people. And as in India, where
Brahmanism has thrown its protection over the older cults and
beliefs of the native tribes, assimilating them as far as possible,