Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 February 1893 — Ancient Worship of Animals. [ARTICLE]

Ancient Worship of Animals.

The figures of the gods in ancient Egypt were represented on the monuments for ages in animal form. The organization of the local population ran on totem lines. Each city had different beast gods. In the royal genealogies, beasts are named as ancestors; showing that the early Egyptians actually considered themselves descendants of animals. The primitive element in the early Greek religion' has been preserved in the “sacred chapters,” fragments of which have been given us by Herodotus, Pausanias, and otners—proving that the oldest images of the Grecian gods were represented in animal forms, and that the different royal houses claimed descent from animals, as do the savages of America and Australia. Mr. J, McLennan, in his papers on The Worship of Plants and animals, calls our attention to many evidences that the early Romans as weil as the Greeks worshiped totems. The Old Testament records show—notwith-standing-the various revisions through which these venerated books have passed —many indications of animal-worship among the Israelites, which must have lasted for ages before the prohibition inculcated in the second line of the Decalogue was formulated. At a comparatively late date “Jehovah was worshiped under the popular symbol of a bull, while the twelve oxen upholding the laver in Solomon’s temple, as well as the horns adorning the altar, were drawn from the prevalent bull-worship.” Modern research has also proved that the cherubim were represented in the form of winged bulls. M. Lenormant, in his famous book on the Beginnings of History, says that, during the time of the kings and prophets, “most assuredly the cherubim, as there described, are animals.”—[Popular Science Monthly.