The Ancient Tradition

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Music

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You’re listening to the Ancient Tradition.  A Wonk Media Production.  Music provided by Joseph McDade.  Here’s your host, Dr. Jack Logan.

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Welcome to the ancient tradition.  I’m your host, Jack Logan.

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great to be back. It’s been a couple of weeks. I hope that while I was gone, and I hope you had some time to catch up on some of the episodes that you have missed or perhaps even listen to or re-listen again to some of the jam-packed episodes so that you don’t miss anything.  I spent the last couple of weeks in Europe. And while I was there, I took advantage of the opportunity to check out some of the artifacts that we’ve been discussing on the program, which was

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which was great fun. I swung by the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford to check out the Sumerian King List, the prism.  I knew it was small, but you really don’t get a feel for how small it is until you see it in person. It’s only about eight inches tall. It’s  such a fantastic artifact. I also swung by the British Museum. I was hoping to lay my eyes on the Ark tablet, but  I  was destined to be disappointed because

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It’s not part of their permanent collection.  I of course think it should be, but it gets rotated in and out and it was on the out rotation. So I was really bummed about that, but I did get to see the Chewbacca stone  and that was a bit of a shock. I had no idea how large it is. That thing is huge. When you read and see study about these artifacts in books, it’s really hard to get a feel for their size. The Chewbacca stone is a whopping four and a half feet long.

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and three feet wide. It was really quite impressive. The Chibagga Stone is part of the British Museum’s permanent display, so if you do get a chance to visit, it will always be there for you to see. While I was in London, I also swung by Westminster Abbey. I wanted to take another look at the Cosmati pavement that we’ve talked about extensively in episode number seven, The King of the Four Corners. It’s definitely a cosmological and theological wonder.

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If you ever get a chance to visit, be sure and pay that extra five pounds so you can get a ticket to go to the tour of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries. The galleries are located way above the Abbey floor. So if you go up there, you get this really beautiful, magnificent aerial view of the entire Abbey. But I want you to go up there so that you can see a painting that’s called the Coronation Theater. It’s this magnificent portrait of Queen Elizabeth and she’s

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standing in her royal robes. She’s looking down at the cosmotti pavement right at the earth stone and she’s got this deep contemplation on her face. The portrait was commissioned  and painted by Ralph Hymans in 2012 to commemorate the Queen’s diamond jubilee.  And I liked the painting so, so much because it’s a great representation of so many of the cosmological and theological concepts that we’ve been discussing on the program.

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I actually purchased a smaller rendition of it so I could hang it in my office. If you’d like to see the portrait, you can find it on the webpage for this episode. And I also have to tell you about Northern Ireland. Oh my word, Northern Ireland is one of the most idyllic places I have ever been.  Especially if you go along the On Trim Coast, it’s absolutely gorgeous. There’s these patchwork of farms and lush rolling hills  and  there are sheep and hairy cows, which are

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So cute. They call them Hedy Kus out there grazing. I just loved it. On the tip of the coast is the UNESCO World Heritage Site, Giant’s Causeway. Do you remember in our last episode where we talked about the battle between the Hittite high god Tesheb and the terrible basalt monster Ulikummi who grew out of the primordial waters? Well,  if you visit this UNESCO site, you’re going to get a much better feel for this monster at Giant’s Causeway because hundreds and

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Hundreds of basalt columns are literally growing out of the sea there. It’s  a UNESCO World Heritage Site because it’s a geological wonder. It gave me a much better feel for the Ulukumi myth. If you do have the opportunity to go,  it’s worth going not just because of the basalt columns, but because the causeway is surrounded by  absolutely stunning,  lush, green cliffs. We hiked down one of these cliffs so we could get to the causeway and

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this  misty rain rolled in and oh my word, we felt like we were in a Lord of the Rings movie. It’s Northern Ireland is just absolutely gorgeous.  Worth going. I mean, it’s important that we get out of the house, get out of the office every once in a while and go explore this gorgeous planet. It will elevate your soul. All right,  let’s jump into today’s episode. For the past couple of episodes, you know, we’ve been examining the high gods marital status.

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we established in those episodes that the vast majority of high gods across the world are portrayed as married. We’re not to the section of the podcast yet where we’re gonna examine ritual in depth, but I wanna pause here for just an episode or two and talk about ritual, in particular the marriage ritual because we’re here. I’m gonna talk about the marriage ritual in Hinduism. I wanna illustrate to you how the Hindu marriage rite is intimately tied to the cosmology

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the theology, the kingship theology,  and  the sacred symbols that we’ve been discussing up to this point in the program. I want you to see how the marriage ritual itself, the ritual objects,  the ritual location, the ritual movements or actions that take place, teach and reinforce the same cosmological and theological stubborn bits we’ve been discussing for months on the program. The stubborn bits

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that we can trace all the way back to deep antiquity to a single fount we call on this program, the ancient tradition. So my goal here is to give you a feel for how  ritual itself reflects,  reinforces, and teaches to the participants, in this case, the bride and groom,  rich cosmological and theological doctrines.

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In our last episode, you’ll recall, we saw in Hindu scripture in the Matsya Purana that right before the high god Brahma and the beautiful goddess Saraswati are wed. The text tells us that Saraswati quote, began to circumambulate him and him is Brahma in reverence. So in this Purana, we see that before the marriage rite is performed.

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Saraswati performs a ritual where she makes a circle around Brahma who sits in the sacred center. And after this ritual of reverence, the two are married. The circumambulation rite precedes the marriage ritual  in the Matsya Purana.  In today’s episode, I’m gonna focus on the first part of the Hindu marriage ritual. Now we’ll talk about the other parts in the next episode.

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Before I get into this, I always want to point out that it’s pretty safe to assume that over time there have been significant changes or alterations or even corruptions to the original rite that have taken place. But despite this, you’re still going to be able to see that the ritual contains significant stubborn bits, which is precisely why we call them stubborn bits, because they stubbornly persist from century to century and place to place and even through the alterations that are made to some of these rituals.

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In  the Hindu marriage ritual, which can vary depending on region and one’s family, a day or two before the marriage or sometimes it’s on the morning of the marriage itself, the bride and groom participate in a pre-wedding ritual known as the Haldi ceremony,  H-A-L-D-I. In Sanskrit, Haldi refers to turmeric, you know, that yellow spice that you use in cooking. In the Vedic religious tradition,

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Tumeric is revered because of its medicinal qualities. Many of you probably already know that tumeric contains an active compound called curcumin, which scientists have actually shown to have neuroprotective and antioxidant effects. So it does have some of these medicinal qualities to it. Tumeric comes from the stem  of the curcuma langa plant.

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which is an herb in the ginger family. So in its native form, it actually looks like ginger, but the flesh of it is this bright orangey yellow color rather than the ivory that you get with ginger. In Vedic ritual, turmeric is used for its medicinal and healing properties, but they also use it for the bright yellow color because the color itself conveys certain symbolic meanings. Sometimes,

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the spice is actually referred to as the golden spice, which is apropos, which you’re gonna see why in a couple of minutes.  In modern day Hinduism, yellow is considered auspicious. It symbolizes happiness and prosperity. So you can see how this would add to the wedding ceremony, but there are some deeper symbolic meanings to the yellow turmeric, which we’ll get into in just a second.

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As part of this Haldi ceremony, the bride and groom will dress completely in bright yellow  and golden saris. And it’s not just the bride and groom, it’s often those who are attending the ceremony too. Traditionally, the Haldi ceremony is conducted separately for the bride and the groom, the bride in her home and the groom in his home.  Generally, the ceremony is this very intimate,  joyful ceremony that’s attended by

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the groom’s close family and friends or the bride’s close family and friends. So for example, if we were in the bride’s home before the ceremony, traditionally all the elder women in her family and her friends come together to make a paste, a ceremonial paste out of the turmeric. And the women do this by mixing the turmeric with other ingredients like sandalwood powder, almond oil or rosewood or milk.

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They mix it up to make this bright yellow fragrant paste. And after they’ve prepared the paste, they place it in a ceremonial vessel.  And it’s presented as a puja, which is an offering of worship  to the gods. And it’s usually accompanied with a small prayer. And this sanctifies the paste for the ritual. So like I mentioned, a day or two before the wedding, or sometimes it’s on the day of the wedding itself,

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The eldest female family member, and this could be the bride’s grandma or great aunt or mother, scoops up some of the holiday paste on her fingertips, and then she applies it directly on the bride’s body.  And usually the ritual starts at the bride’s feet, and then she moves upward. The elder female family member first anoints her feet with the turmeric paste.

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then her legs, then her arms, then her face, and finally her neck. And sometimes the anointing is just a dab. I’ve seen videos where it’s just a dab. I’ve seen other times where they smeared quite a bit of the turmeric paste on, and I’ve seen others where they almost cover the whole section. So I guess it sort of depends. Traditionally,  only women were allowed to apply the Haldi paste on the bride. For example, in a region of India called Haryana,

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the ceremony was historically women only. Today that’s changed and now it’s kind of a joint celebration where men and even children are permitted to attend the ceremony. Sometimes, I mean, if you watch some of these videos  in modern times, sometimes there’s so many people  and this can be men and women and relatives and non-relatives are allowed to  apply the paste on parts of the bride and groom’s body that the ceremony kind of breaks down a little bit.

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Sometimes it can even turn into a paste fight where the bride and groom are literally covered in turmeric paste. But this  is a modern corruption of the original ceremony because originally the paste was considered to be  deeply sacred. This happens to a lot of religious rituals where  they lose a lot of their religious significance as they move out of the religious realm and they become more cultural.

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products and this is why people put them on videos and stuff. So when this happens, you know, the original right becomes more and more corrupt. If you’d like to see a couple of examples of modern day holiday ceremonies where you can see the anointing with turmeric paste, I posted a couple of those to the webpage for this episode. Okay. So this is the, of the pre-marriage rituals in Hinduism.

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At this point, if you’ve been listening to the program for a while,  you should see a clear echo of the kingship and queenship anointing rite that we see all across the ancient world. In the ancient world, in ancient  Egypt,  Mesopotamia, and Israel, we find unambiguous textual and iconographic evidence that the king was anointed with a special oil

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made from the resin or sap of a sacred tree before he was coronated a king. We talked about this quite a bit in episode number eight, the sacred dew of paradise and episode number nine, the green eye of Horus, where in ancient Egypt, parts of the deceased king’s body were individually anointed.  His mouth, eyes, ears, arms, legs, with  sacred tree oils and resins like cedar oil and myrrh and frankincense.

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And we also saw this in ancient Mesopotamia. Do you remember this? On the Mesopotamia tablet known as the standard inscription of Ashur-Nasharpol II.  On this, King Ashur-Nasharpol says, quote,  I am Ashur-Nasharpol, the great king, the powerful king, king of the universe, king of Assyria.  I was anointed with the moshku of divinity. Now, if you remember,  moshku was the name that the ancient Mesopotamians gave to the anointing oil.

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Moshku was a closely guarded  special blend of oil, of plant-based  ingredients like myrrh and cypress and juniper trees. Note in this passage how Ashur-Nashar-Pul makes claim to his kingship by way  of having been anointed with this special oil. He says, I am Ashur-Nashar-Pul, the great king, the powerful king, king of the universe, king of Assyria. I was anointed with the Moshku of divinity

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And the kingship  was bestowed upon me by the command of the God, Osher, my Lord.” So  after he’s been anointed with this special sacred oil, he says, quote, kingship was bestowed upon me. The anointing has to take place before he can become a king, the king of the universe. Why? Well, note in this passage how this

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Beshel Mashku oil is referred to as the oil of  divinity. It’s the oil that transforms Ashur-Nashur-Pul  into a god. He must become a god before he can become a king and be given a kingdom, before he can become a cosmic king, a king  of the universe. And we saw this

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Same thing in ancient Egypt in the pyramid text. Do remember when we saw that the sacred oil had the power to occupy the dead king? To be awk or to be occupied was the name the ancient Egyptians gave to the same process to become awkward to be occupied is to take  on the divine nature to become a God. And like I mentioned in episode number nine, the ancient Egyptians associated this transformational process

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with taking on light. The anointing oil had the power to transform the king into a glorious radiant being where he would shine like an imperishable star. We also saw this in ancient Israel, if you remember, in Exodus chapter 30, verses 22 to 25, when Yahweh explains in detail to Moses which sacred ingredients, all of which were highly symbolic,

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needed to be mixed together to create the sacred anointing oil, the sacred oil which was used to anoint Israelite kings like Saul and David and Solomon. We also saw this among the early Christians among Cyril of Jerusalem, a theologian and bishop of Jerusalem who lived between 313 and 386 AD. And he said this, speaking of early Christians, quote, we too have been anointed with oil.

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symbolically on our foreheads and senses. What’s amazing about what Cyril says here  is that the ritual was not just performed on a person who was to become the next earthly king like a King David, but that it was performed on members of the early church, lay people like you and me. Now, I don’t know if Cyril understood the full theological import, the cosmic nature of the kingship anointing, but  theologically,

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What Cyril says here is pretty profound because when he says,  too  have been anointed with oil, it indicates that this ritual, an anointing for cosmic kingship, was available to many early Christians, not just to the one who was to be the next earthly king. What’s even more interesting is that Cyril tells us that the ritual was a ritual that came down from the original apostles. That’s pretty interesting.

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We also saw this two years ago in England when four Knights of the Garter shrouded Charles III, who was dressed in a plain white anointing gown with that beautiful screen that was adorned with the Tree of Life, concealing him from public view. And inside the Dean of Westminster drew consecrated oil from an eagle-shaped flask, dipped two fingers into the holy oil  and anointed Charles.

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on various parts of his body, like his hands and his breast and his head. After the anointing, Charles emerged from behind the screen, enrobed, head to toe, in a  stunning ornately embroidered gold silk robe. I mean, it just glistens. It’s known as the super tunica. Most people don’t really realize what the gold super tunica symbolizes. And if they don’t, they’re going to miss the theology.

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because the super tunic symbolizes that after having been anointed, Charles has been transformed into a divine being. He’s now a glorious being of light, a God. I mean, that’s why the tunic is just covered in gold. I don’t know if Charles himself recognizes the theology that’s being conveyed here. I don’t know, but I do know it’s the same theology, the ancient Egyptians.

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Mesopotamians, Israelites, and early Christians taught. And that’s what’s astounding. It’s  by way of the anointing that one takes on the divine nature and becomes a god.  It’s just astounding that all of these ancient civilizations taught the same thing here. If you’re interested in seeing Charles’s Super Tunica in person, it’s presently on display in  London.

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at the Tower of London. So a couple of weeks ago, I saw it while I was there. And it is, it’s absolutely stunning. All of the embroidery and gold work and the shimmering silk absolutely convey the notion that the anointing transformed Charles into a divine being. Remember, according to the ancient Egyptians,  gold was the flesh of the gods. The Hindu Holi ceremony conveys this  same theology.

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the ability of the anointing oil to transform one into a divine being. And this is conveyed when the Hindus use the bright yellow turmeric paste to anoint the bride and groom’s bodies.  In a couple of the videos, the bride and groom are completely awash in yellow after the anointing. You can watch the video of Anant Ambani. He’s the son of Asia’s wealthiest man who recently got married.

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you’ll see that his friends dump entire buckets of liquid Haldi over his head, literally coating him head to toe in bright yellow. The after effect, which is very similar to that of King Charles in the Super Tunica, though in a much messier form. On it looks  like a messy radiant being of light. I can’t remember if we’ve talked about the coronation of Nicholas II, the last Tsar of Russia on the program.

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But his anointing is another great example of what we’re talking about here. In May of 1896, the Bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church, Pavel Ivanovich Reyev, anointed Nicholas II as Tsar of Russia by anointing eight specific areas of Nicholas’s body, his feet, hands, breast, ears, mouth, nostrils, eyes, and forehead.

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Pavel also anointed Nicholas’s wife, Alexandra, as the Empress of Russia, but she was only anointed on her forehead. Now listen to this, after Nicholas and Alexandria were anointed, they donned the Imperial mantle. And just guess what color it was. The Imperial mantle was, no surprise, bright golden yellow. If you’d like to see a painting of Nicholas II in Alexandra,

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invested in their yellow imperial mantles. You can find it on the webpage for this episode. And let me also remind you that Chinese emperors traditionally wore yellow robes, particularly during the Qing dynasty. Yellow was a sign of imperial power. The color was strictly reserved for the emperor and the highest ranking members of the imperial family. The color yellow,  no surprise,

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symbolized divine or godly authority. And get this, Yellow also symbolized the center of the universe, the source of stability, balance, and harmony, or cosmic order. Concepts that reflected the emperor’s role as the supreme leader who was responsible for cosmic and social order. Yellow marked the emperor as the fulcrum of the universe.

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All of this is in keeping with what we’ve seen. As I’ve researched China,  I haven’t found any evidence of an anointing ritual among the Chinese. Instead of being linked to an anointing, imperial investiture was deeply tied to the notion of the mandate of heaven, the belief that the emperor’s divine right to rule had been granted by heaven. It was this mandate  and not the anointing that legitimized the emperor’s rule.

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Now, even though that’s the case, despite the lack of an anointing ritual in China, which I think was probably lost from the onset, there is still loads of cosmological, theological, mythological, architectural and symbolical evidence in China to link China’s religious tradition all the way back to deep antiquity to the same source that we can the other religious traditions that we’ve been discussing on the program.

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And this is going to be pretty evident when we get into Chinese architecture and imperial cosmology. I want to remind you that we also find the anointing ritual among Native American tribes like the Hopi, where in their sacred ceremonies, initiates are anointed with honey, which also has a golden hue on the legs,  arms, breast, forehead, and tongue. Now, lest you aren’t convinced,

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that the Hindu pre-marriage Haldi anointing ritual is an echo of the ancient kingship anointing ritual that we find across the ancient world. Vedic scripture actually contains an elaborate description of how Hindu coronation ceremonies are to be performed.  And the anointing plays a  central role in those ceremonies. During the coronation anointing, known as Ubhisheka,

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which in English means sprinkling, 15 parts of the king’s body, including his  arms, legs, thighs, abdomen and chest, are anointed with clay. The clay is supposed to connect the king to the earth  and the fertility of the land that he will now govern. So it’s pretty easy to see here the similarity between the anointing of parts of the body  in the Hindu coronation ritual.

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and the anointing of parts of the body in the Hindu pre-wedding Haldi ritual. I’ll talk more about this down the line, but while we’re on it here, it’s worth noting that A.M. Hocart,  one of the first scholars to examine kingship rituals cross-culturally,  noticed very early on that weddings, and I suspect he would say all weddings were and are modeled  after the royal wedding.

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I mention this because if Hocart is correct, then we shouldn’t be surprised that some royal kingship rituals like the anointing are incorporated like we see with the Haldi anointing in Hinduism  in marriage rituals. On page 59 of his book, Kingship, Hocart writes, quote, one of the most remarkable features of the marriage ceremony is the royal state accorded to the bride and bridegroom.

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Basically what whole court is saying here  is that it’s remarkable that we treat the bride and groom as if they were royalty  on their wedding day. Have you ever noticed this? Have you ever noticed that the bride and groom are treated like royalty? The groom is treated like he is a king and the bride is treated like she is a queen. Sometimes the bride is even told, hey, you look like a princess today. Sometimes.

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The bride even wears a tiara. And the happy couple have a court, a court of groomsmen and a court of bridesmaids. The couple usually stand together or sit together in a position of high authority  at a high table like the kings and queens of medieval Europe. And then almost everybody in attendance gives deference to them. And more often than not, there’s a lot of festivities and fanfare and

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often a celebratory feast. Hocourt notes that in Southeast Asia, in Malay weddings, the bride and groom are actually called Rajasari, which translated into English means sovereigns of a day. Hocourt also notes that a royal interpretation of weddings is no more apparent than in India. On page 59, he writes,

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Now, if we are to understand the salient points of a wedding, particularly a Nagara wedding, Nagara is just a region of India, we must grasp the idea that on their wedding day, the little bride and bridegroom represent Shiva and poverty. What Hocourt says here is interesting. See, Shiva is a God, he’s one of the holy Trimurti in Hinduism, and poverty is his wife.

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So when the young Hindu man and woman get married, Hindus seem to understand that the groom represents the god Shiva and the bride represents the goddess poverty. The young couple’s wedding is modeled after Shiva’s royal wedding. Hohkart goes on, quote, the bridegroom has as much attention paid on him as if he were a ruling chief for an umbrella.

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as an enzyme of rank is held over him. Like a god, the bridegroom sits on derba grass and is worshiped. They are looked on as king and queen till the end of the festivities. And as such, the groom wields a sword. For the time being, he is a king. Did you catch the part where an umbrella is held over the groom and that this marks him as a king?

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Keep the umbrella in your back pocket, because we’re going to talk about the significance of the umbrella in our next episode. Hohkart goes on to note that in ancient Greece and Rome, the bride and bridegroom were crowned with wreaths and garland. In the Russian Orthodox Church, crowns are actually held over the bride and bridegroom’s head. In fact,  the wedding ceremony itself is called  the matrimonial

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coronation, the matrimonial coronation. And I saw evidence of this when I was in Sitka, Alaska a few months back. Like I mentioned while I was there, I visited St. Michael’s, a Russian Orthodox cathedral that sits right in the center of town. They have several artifacts on display in glass cases. And while I was walking around looking at the display cases, I came across two beautiful crowns. I looked below the crowns there was a description that read, pair of

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historic wedding crowns, wedding crowns. And next to that was a picture of a wedding couple, people just like you and me being crowned on their wedding day. I took a picture of those crowns, so if you’d like to see them, you can find them on the webpage for this episode. We see this across Eastern Christianity in West Syriac, East Syriac, Coptic, Byzantine, as well as the Eastern Oriental,

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and Eastern Catholic churches, the bride and groom are crowned as part of the wedding ritual. In most of these religious traditions, marriage is regarded as one of the most significant sacraments or sacred rites of Christian life. The crowning itself is known  as the mystery of crowning. You can see the link here between the crown

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marriage and kingship and queenship is pretty clear. In the Roman Catholic Church, the bride and groom are not crowned as part of the wedding ritual, which is interesting because while I was in the British Isles, I visited the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh, which just happens to house the second set of the famous French painter Nicolas Poussin’s master paintings, The Seven Sacraments, which  are quite magnificent.

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The gallery calls the paintings, quote, one of the greatest sets of paintings in the history of Western art. Okay, why this is relevant to our discussion is because Poussin lived during the 17th century. He spent most of his career in Rome, where he painted primarily Roman Catholic religious themes. So I was pretty intrigued when I saw that the painting that he did of the sacrament of marriage, which portrays the marriage of Mary and Joseph.

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depicts Mary and Joseph wearing crowns. The two of them are depicted kneeling before a priest and each one is crowned with a beautiful wreath of flowers. And if you look closely, you’ll notice that Joseph is depicted holding a staff, a flowering staff, a branch  of the tree of life and his left hand, which further drives home the point that Joseph is to be understood as a king.

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and that the sacrament of marriage is to be understood to be a marriage between a king and a queen. So even though the Roman Catholic Church doesn’t crown the bride and groom during the marriage rite like the Eastern churches do, during the 17th century, there were clearly those in the Roman Catholic Church that understood the marriage rite in royal terms. I’ll develop all of this more when we get into ritual, but for now, since we’ve been discussing God as a married being, I want you to see how marriage

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is linked to the theology of kingship and queenship. Speaking of Christianity in Europe, Hockhart concludes with the following on page 70. Quote,  after all the revelations and thought that have shaken Europe, the marriage ceremony still retains the impress of its royal origin. That’s interesting.

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the marriage ceremony still retains the impress of its royal origin. Here, Hocquart is arguing that the very concept of marriage, particularly the ritual or ceremony surrounding it, is of royal origin. In his book, Kingship, he suggests that the marriage ceremony was initially practiced by royalty and then only later adopted or imitated by the lower classes or commoners.

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On page 60, Hocquart writes, quote, why these royal honors paid to the bride and bridegroom? The most obvious explanation is that in the countries under review, marriage is of royal origin. Originally a ceremony observed by the king and queen. If Hocquart is correct, that would mean whether the bride and bridegrooms today recognize it.

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that every single marriage that has been or that ever will be performed sprung from or is an echo of a royal marriage that took place in deep antiquity when kingship and queenship theology first emerged. Now, I don’t know if Hocord is correct. I’m inclined to think that he is, and this is not because of the evidence that he provides in his book, though that’s pretty compelling, but because of what we’ve learned

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from the ancients about kingship theology to this point on the program. And because of what you’re about to learn from the ancients about the first man and first woman known in the Judeo-Christian tradition as Adam and Eve. I’m pretty excited because we’re be talking about the first man and first woman in detail very, very soon on the podcast. The ancients have a lot of really interesting things to tell us about them. Some of which I think will be new to you.  And of course, marriage and kingship and queenship are

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gonna be part of that. All right, let’s return to Hokart and see what he has to say about Hindu marriages. On page 61, Hokart argues that in ancient India, the king’s consecration, his anointing and setting apart for divine service has always been linked to marriage. Hokart writes, quote, in ancient India, a king could not be consecrated

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without a queen. The rule is actually stated in the Satapatha thus. He’s referring to the Satapatha Brahmana, which is the ancient Hindu text that describes Vedic rituals. Quote, for she,  in as much as she is his wife, is half of himself. Therefore, as long as he does not find a wife, for so long he is not born. For so long,

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he is not complete, but in finding a wife, he is born for then he becomes complete.” Unquote. In other words, a man cannot attain to rebirth in the course of the royal consecration except with his wife,  because without a consort, he is not complete. It is not surprising then that marriage  and coronation  often coincide. What Hocourt argues here,

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He’s drawing from the Satapatha Brahmana, is pretty theologically profound. Basically, he’s arguing that the anointing is a ritual of rebirth, which from what we’ve seen in this episode is definitely what the ancients taught to. The ancient Egyptians taught that the anointing had the power to aquify or transform one into a god, rebirth.  The ancient Mesopotamians taught that the anointing oil, the oil of a divinity, had the power to transform one into the divine.

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rebirth. We get the same idea in ancient Israel in Psalm 2. This is one of the royal Psalms and in the Psalm Yahweh says in verse 6 and he’s speaking to David and this is the King James Version quote, set my king upon my holy hill. The Hebrew word translated as set here is  Nasak. When we look up Nasak in Strong’s dictionary

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It defines Nausach as, quote, to pour out, especially a libation, by analogy to anoint a king. So when Yahweh says, I set my king upon my holy hill, a better English translation would be, I anointed my king upon my holy hill. Smith’s literal translation actually translates it that way. They translate it, quote, and I anointed my king

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over Zion, my holy hill. If you’ve been listening to the program for a while, you should know exactly what Yahweh means by quote, my holy hill or my holy mountain. And you should also know that it’s on the top of the holy hill that the king sits on his throne. Remember, in ancient Egypt, Atum sits on the throne on the top of the primordial hill. He is the king of the world. He reigns over his creation, his kingdom.

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This is what we’re seeing in Psalm 2. Now, it’s what’s said in the next verse that’s important for the point I’m trying to make about the anointing. In verse 7,  David continues, quote,  I will declare the decree the Lord, this is Yahweh, has said unto me. Now listen closely to this part. And this is what Yahweh said to David, quote, thou  art  my son.

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This is the sonship theology I’ve been hinting about for quite a while now. I’m not gonna develop it here yet, but there it is if you’re wondering where it’s talked about in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Quote, this day, so he’s talking about the day of David’s enthronement and anointing on the Holy Hill. Have  I  begotten thee? To be quote, begotten is to be born.

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So when Yahweh talks about begetting or giving birth to David on the day he’s been anointed, Yahweh’s talking about being the father or the source of David’s  rebirth. And because Yahweh is the father of David’s rebirth, David can now appropriately be called Yahweh’s son. We’ll definitely develop this more in the future,

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For the purposes of this episode, to be spiritually reborn as a son or daughter of Yahweh  is to take  on the full divine nature, to be like Yahweh. And note in this song that it’s  after David is anointed that Yahweh declares that David has been born. It’s the anointing that initiates David’s divine transformation. And like we mentioned earlier,

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early Christians also taught that it was by way of the anointing that one acquired the divine nature. When we get into ritual, we’ll talk about how and why the anointing has the power to do this. But for this episode, it’s important to recognize that two of the world’s earliest civilizations, the ancient Egyptians and ancient Mesopotamians, as well as the later ancient Israelites, all taught essentially the same doctrine about the anointing.

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that it had the power to transform one into a divine being, a God. And in each one, the anointing is a precursor to becoming a king. One must become a God via the anointing before one can become a king. This is the theology of divine kingship that we see across the ancient world and that’s talked about in textbooks and history classes even today.

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I know a lot of people think the notion of human deification is heretical, and it definitely is heretical in many circles, but it’s also incredibly logical. If God is God and has immense, practically incomprehensible power, doesn’t it follow that God would have the power to bring about the deification of human beings? I mean, that seems like something a true God would have the power to do.

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To say otherwise, I think, would be to artificially impose our own  limitations  on God. I would love to talk about this more, but I’m getting ahead of myself in terms of the podcast. I do want to stress, though, that the deification of human beings was not heretical in the ancient world. For the purposes of today’s episode, what Hocourt said earlier is really important. What he said is that according to the Satapatha Brahmana,

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Hindu scripture. In Hinduism, the king’s anointing is not fully efficacious without a wife.  Why? Because in the Satapatha Brahmana, it says that without a wife, the future king is not whole. And one who is not whole is not able to be fully reborn. And since the anointing is what brings about full rebirth as a god, the king would need to be married for full

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rebirth to take place. If you put this in the context of the full theology, what this means is that the king cannot be reborn as a god through the anointing, a necessary precursor to being made a king, unless he is married. That’s pretty profound theologically, because it ties marriage directly to the anointing and kingship. What it basically means is that one cannot be made a god or a king

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unless one is married. And don’t forget, this is exactly what we’ve seen in the past three episodes. In the ancient world, the high god, the king of the gods, is almost always depicted as married. Considering that background, it’s pretty easy to see why the anointing or Haldi ceremony shows up in Hinduism as part  of the marriage rite, because according to the Satapatha Brahmana, the two are inextricably tied together.

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On page 61, Hocourt recounts the marriage of Siddhartha. Siddhartha is a very, very important figure in Asia, because he is the man who later became Buddha. Siddhartha is believed to have been born around 563 BC. So we’re talking about a human being here near the foothills of the Himalayas in the town of Lumbini. And Lumbini is located on the Nepal side of the Nepal-India border.

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Not surprisingly, Siddhartha was a prince,  the son of the king of the Shakyak clan. So all of this is in keeping with the kingship theme that we see across the ancient world  and in the ancient tradition. Listen to how Siddhartha’s marriage, anointing, and kingship are all tied together in this account. Hocourt writes, quote, it is not surprising

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that marriage and coronation often coincide. Thus the father of Siddhartha, now remember the father of Siddhartha is the king of the Shakyak clan, who was later to become the Buddha, brought home Yasodhara, his sister’s daughter, to be his son’s bride. Quote, and Hocord is quoting a Buddhist text here. He, Siddhartha’s father, the king, appointed Yasodhara.

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to be the principal queen of Siddhartha. And placing them, Siddhartha and his wife, upon a mound of silver, he poured the oil of consecration upon them, after which he bound upon their heads the royal diadem and delivered over to them the whole kingdom. This is a fascinating account of the Buddha’s marriage. Let’s take a closer look at it. In this account, Siddhartha’s father, the king of the Shakyas, places his son,

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the crown prince and his future daughter-in-law  on quote, a mound  of silver. If you’ve been listening to the program for a while, you know that placing the royal couple on a mound is not insignificant. In Buddhist legend, the mound of silver on which the two are to be wed is also the same place where Siddhartha was believed to have been conceived and where his mother, Queen Maya gave birth to him.

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I’ll talk more about this in a couple of episodes. If you had to guess based on everything that we’ve learned so far in the program, where would you guess this mound of silver is located? Well, it’s located on the top of the Himalaya Mountains. You should see here that the mound of silver in the top of the Himalaya Mountains is the cultural expression of the primordial mound.

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And you’re never going to guess what’s located on the top of the mound of silver. A golden mansion. Yeah, a golden mansion. You should see here that the golden mansion perched atop the mound of silver in the top of the Himalayan mountains is the cultural expression of the cosmic temple, of the inner sanctum, of the Holy of Holies. What this means is that the king of the Shakya took his son and daughter-in-law to be to the sacred

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center of all things to the top of the primordial mound to the inner sanctum to perform their anointing  wedding and coronation The theology here is considerable because it indicates that marriage true marriage true royal marriages are only performed in one place  in The sacred center and you’re see that more in just a second

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We get a similar cosmological message in Hindu scripture  when we read that after the priest anoints the 15 parts of the king’s body, he’s anointed again with five distinct substances. Listen carefully to this part of the ritual and see if you can decipher the deeper cosmological significance encoded within it. Quote, the Brahmana from the East pours ghee and ghee is clarified butter.

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from a golden vessel. The Kshutria from the south pours milk from a silver vessel. The Vaisha from the west pours curd from a copper vessel. And the Sudra from the north pours clear water from an earthen vessel. Now, Bhavrika Brahmana, this is just a priest from the Bhavrika Brahmana tradition, anoints the candidate with honey. So there’s honey. There’s a lot going on here.

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If you’re familiar with Hinduism, the people mentioned in this ritual, the Brahmana, Kshutriya, Vaishya, and Sudra are the varnas, the four main castes in Hinduism. They’re not super important to the cosmology here. You’re going to see later on down the line that the castes are actually derived from the cosmology. What’s important cosmologically speaking is that a member of each caste approaches the king from one of the cardinal points.

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North, South, East and West to anoint him. Whenever we see this in ritual settings, the cardinal points are being used to designate or draw our attention to the center, the sacred center. And in this ritual, who’s seated in the center? The king. And where is the king being anointed?  In the sacred center. Why?

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because that is where true kings are anointed. Do you see the cosmological significance of this ritual? Do you see how this ritual is a microcosm of the macrocosm? The Hindu king is being anointed in the sacred center of the world, which is a microcosm of the sacred center of the cosmos. After the anointing, he is a king of the four corners.

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We see the link between anointing, royal marriage, coronation, and the sacred center in the famous Indian epic, the Ramayana. We’ve talked about this on the program before. I’ll just give you a little quick recap. Scholars believe the Ramayana was written around 300 AD, but they believe the core text dates to between the seventh and fourth centuries BC.

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and they believe the oral tradition existed as far back as 1500 BC. The hero in the epic is Rama, the princely son of King Dasaratha and Queen Kassulia. So  note the royal context of the epic here. Prince Rama is known for his unwavering commitment to Dharma. If you aren’t familiar with Dharma, Dharma is the application or practice of Rita.

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the Hindu Cosmic Law. To practice Dharma is to uphold the Cosmic Law. Hindus believe Rama to be the seventh avatar of the god Vishnu,  and they revere him  as the ideal man who embodies virtues such as righteousness, duty, compassion, courage, and loyalty. So we’re talking again about a human being here. In the epic, before Rama can be coronated a king,

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he must first find a wife. One morning he’s out plucking flowers for worship and he and Rama see each other in a garden near a temple and they immediately feel a spiritual and emotional connection to each other. After passing several tests, Rama wins Sita’s hand in marriage.  In chapter 73, known as the nuptials, we get the account of their wedding.

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Before I read the account to you, it’s important to know on the day that Rama and Sita get married, Rama’s three younger brothers are also gonna get married. They’re gonna get married to Rita’s three younger sisters, which is why you’re gonna hear some of the passages refer to others preparing for marriage too. I’m gonna read from the Red Zamballa version. It’s a readable English translation that’s drawn from Ralph T.H. Griffith’s  19th century English translation.

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In Shloka 11 and 15, a shloka is like a verse, the text tells us that Rama and Sita are ready for their nuptials because they have completed all of the necessary pre-marriage rituals. The Haldi anointing ceremony would have been one of those pre-marriage rituals. This is assuming the Haldi ceremony was performed during that time. In this passage, Sita’s father, King Janaka, so note,

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that Cedda is a princess of royal blood too, is speaking to the priest who’s ready to perform the marriage ceremony. King Janaka says, quote,  oh great sage, my daughters who have performed all the rites preceding the marriage and shining like the flame of a fire have already arrived at the foot of the altar.

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King Janaka is basically telling the priest his daughters, all princesses, are ready.  Note in this passage how after the women have performed all of the necessary pre-marriage rites, that King Janaka describes his royal daughters  as, quote,  shining like the flame of a fire. This is exactly how we would expect the princesses to look after having completed the Haldi ceremony.

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shining like fire. Because remember, it’s the Haldi ceremony, the anointing that transforms one into a divine being, a glorious being of light. And also remember, this is exactly how Azanath described herself after God anointed her with honey, the unction of incorruption in the book of Joseph and Azanath. If you recall,  after Azanath was anointed, she saw a reflection of herself in a basin of water and saw, quote, her own face.

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shining like the sun, her own face shining like the sun, shining like a fire or shining like the sun. It’s the same description of the anointing’s profound transformative effect. And remember the context of Azanath’s anointing was also a pre-marriage ritual. In the text, Azanath is preparing to get married to Joseph when God appears and anoints her.

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It’s only after she’s been anointed that she is fully prepared to marry Joseph and receive her crown, which she does. So take note how the anointing is an important preparatory ritual for Asanus’ royal marriage. All right, back to the Ramayana to Arama and Sita. Starting in verse 18, it reads, quote, afterwards, Janaka, the king of the Vidya,

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spoke these words to Sage Vasitha. Oh Lord who observes Dharma, oh Sage, along with other sages, be pleased to perform the marriage ceremonies of Rama so that the whole world is happy. It’s what the priest Vasitha does next that’s important to this episode. Listen closely. Quote, the godlike Sage Vasitha addressed King Janaka and said, let it be so.

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He along with the sage Vishamitra and virtuous Sathananda reached the center of the marriage arena and constructed an altar according to the scriptures. In Hinduism, the marriage arena actually refers to what is known as the mandap. The mandap is not itself insignificant. The mandap is typically a canopy that’s supported by four pillars.

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which is also not insignificant. And we’ll talk about this down the line. And they’re usually lavishly decorated with flowers and drapes. So what did the priests do? They constructed an altar. And according to the passage, where did they construct the altar? The text says they constructed it in the center of the marriage arena,  in the center. You should recognize why that is important. Now listen to what the priest does next.

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quote, then the lustrous godlike sage Vasitha, according to tradition, placed equal quantity of Durba grass around the altar, recited mantras according to scriptures and started fire on the altar by placing fire on it and started giving ablations. So what did the priest do? The text tells us that the priest started a fire on top of the altar.

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So picture this in your mind. Picture the marriage arena, the mandapa. Now picture an altar in the very center of the arena. Now picture a lively fire burning on top of the altar in the center of the arena. All of this is symbolic. So what does it symbolize? I’m guessing that you have a pretty good idea. What the priest has just done here is create a visual representation

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the sacred center where the gods or God dwells as a fiery glorious being of light. The fire represents God and this isn’t just my take. Book 9 of the Satapatha Brahmana actually states that the fire altar symbolizes the divine presence. Let’s keep reading. Quote, then King Janaka having brought Sita

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adorned with all types of ornaments. We’ll get that real royal regalia sense here. In the presence of fire, placed her facing Rama and spoke to Rama who increased the joy of Kashula, which if you’ll remember is Queen Kashula, Rama’s mother. Here we see that the priest takes Sita directly in front of the fire altar, or as the text says to quote,

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the presence of fire and places her there facing Rama. So take due note of the location where the royal marriage is performed. It’s performed in the center, in the sacred center,  right in front of the fire that symbolizes the divine presence. This interpretation is further substantiated by the fact that the fire altar is placed centrally below the mandap, the canopy supported by four pillars.

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We haven’t discussed this on the program yet, but the Mundop is known as a Sela in ancient Mesopotamia and a Sibirium in Christianity. A Sibirium is the ornate four-pillared canopy usually made out of really pretty wood that covers the altar  and basilicas and cathedrals and really important churches all over the world. It’s a representation of the inner sanctum, the Holy of Holies. Again, the sacred center of the cosmos.

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I’ll explain why and how the mandap and sela does this, but we’ll do that down the line. So when Hindus place an altar, an altar with fire on it in the center, beneath a four-pillared canopy, we’re getting extensive symbolism stacking here, all of which stresses again and again and again that Rama and Sita’s royal marriage is being performed in the sacred center.

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And there’s even more in the ritual that points to this that we’ll get into in our next episode. But unfortunately for now I’m out of time, so I’m gonna have to save it for then. I hope you see how we’re beginning to build a full cohesive theology here. I hope you see how the marriage ritual, at least in Hinduism, is tied to the anointing, deification, kingship and queenship,  and the sacred center. And don’t forget in Buddhism,

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After Siddhartha and his wife are anointed and crowned on the Silver Hill, Siddhartha’s father, the King of the Shakyas, quote, delivered over to them  the whole kingdom. That’s something. That’s it for me. I hope you have a wonderful week. I’ll leave you with the words of William Shakespeare. Knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven.  I’m Jack Logan.

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You’ve been listening to the Ancient Tradition.  A Wonk Media Production.