coloured by Oriental traditions. The Jews speak of the thread-like hell-bridge, and the Mahommedans believe that in the middle of hell all souls must pass over a bridge narrower than a hair, sharper than a sword, and darker than night.[1] According to the Avesta, the souls of the old Parsees, on the third night after death, had to cross the 'high Hara'—a mountain which surrounds the earth and reaches right to heaven—in order to arrive at the Tsjinvatbridge which is guarded by two dogs. In the Pehlevi writings, this bridge is said to widen out to nearly a parasang when the souls of the pious pass over it, but it narrows in before the ungodly until they topple down into hell, which lies right under.[2]
An analogous conception is found (compare Sophus Bugge, op. cit.) in the old folk-song 'Draumekvædi,' as to the Gjallar bridge on the way to the land of the dead. It hangs high in air so that one grows dizzy upon it ('Gjallarbrui, hon henge saa högt i vinde'), and in some variants of the song it is expressly stated to be narrow, whilst in others it is said to be 'both steep and broad.' In
- ↑ See Sophus Bugge, Mythologiske Oplysninger til Draumekvædi, in Norsk Tidsskrift for Videnskab og Literatur, 1854-55, p. 108-111; Grimm, Mythologie, p. 794; Liebrecht, Gervasius Otia Imperialia, p. 90. Compare also H. Hübschmann, Die parsische Lehre vom Jenseits und jüngsten Gericht, in Jahrbücher für protestantische Theologie, v. (Leipzig, 1879), p. 242.
- ↑ Compare H. Hübschmann, op. cit., pp. 216, 218, 220, 222.
