Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 17.djvu/453

SACKIFICE. 413 SACRIFICE. There are many savage tribes who thus offer sacrifice to goblins, gods, or demons whom they regard as quite apart from the clan-life, merely to be on good terms with a power susceptible to such bribery. Besides beneliting or revering a spirit, a third motive lies iti pleasing a god by depriving one's self of something valuable; but this is included in the gift notion, which may be inspired by this idea rather than l)v the notion of benefiting the god. Consult: Robertson Smith, A'c/iV/i'oH of the l!iciiiitcs (new ed., London, lS!t4) ; Jevons, Introduction to the Histor;/ of liclii/ioii (London, ISOG) ; Tiele, Gifford Lectures (New York, 1897-9!)) ; Frazer, The (lolden Bough (3 vols., revised ed., London, 1900); Tylor, Primitive Culture (New York, 1S74); and see the articles Nature- VoRsniP; Shamanism; and TOTEMISM. Sacrifice Among the Hebrews. The Old Testament presents saeritlcial customs belonging to at least three dill'erent periods, the I're-Mo- saic. the Mosaic, and that which resulted in the Post-Exilic ritual; there are also many references to alien rites which intruded into the Israelitish religion. The Hebrew sacrificial ideas are of conmion origin with those of the other Semites, and may have been influenced by the Babylonian religion, but withal the Hebrew system was original enough to make its own selection and to develop in its own way. The materials of sacrifice were of two kinds, flesh and vegetable. In the former the .Jewish ritual is distinguished by the limitation to domestic food-animals, namely, the bull, sheep, goat, turtle-dove, and pigeon. As the most valuable food and as the most typical because of its life, flesh was the preponderating element of sacrifice, and Zetiukh, meat sacrifice, is the general word for sacrifice. The vegetable sacrifices consisted of all culti- vated vegetable products, either in the raw stale or in cakes of flour kneaded with oil and salted, also sometimes incensed. In the later ritual there is no libation of wine or oil. and leaven or other fermenting component was tabooed, with one exception (Lev. vii. 12). The sacrifices may be divided into three classes : the tribute sacri- fice {minkhtlh, 'oblation'); the commensal {she- lf m, 'peace-ofTering') ; the propitiatory, divided into several classes. In the first kind the wor- shiper rendered back to God, as the liege lord of the land, a typical part of his bounties. This included the first-fruits (q.v. ) and the tithes of his fields and flocks; the matter of the sacrifice fell to the ministers of the sanctuary. The commensal sacrifice consisted in the sacrifice and the consumption by family or clan of an animal ; it involved a sacramental meal, with all the necessary accompaniments of a banquet, bread, wine, etc. The Passover is an example. . Here the primitive idea was of the common eon- simiption by the divinity and his people of the same food, the portion consumed in the flame and the blood spilt on the ground being the god's portion, the rest of the carcass being that of the worshipers. While this was the prevailing sacrifice earlier, the later code made it yield to the third kind, ths propitiatory. Vith the growth of ethical consciousness and of the sense of guilt toward offended Deity, and with the development of the transcendental idea of God, the festal, sacramental character of sacrifice was replaced by a solemn act of animal sacrifice to God, in which at the most only the priests shared. Such rites 'atone for' human sin, by pro|iitiating God. At the same time, they were effective only for the general frailty of the Church or for unwitting sins of individuals, never for willful sin. Here are several classes, in all of which the blood appears as the atoning element. First, there is the whole burnt offering; ('o/(//i, hiilil), in which class belonged the stated daily sacrifices. Sccomlly. the sin-ollering (/.Aiif- tfilh), in which the fat was otlered in lire, the llesli being burnt without the sanctuary, or, in individual offering, falling to the priest. To this class belonged the supreme sacrifice of the later ritual, that of the Day of Atonement. The guilt or trespass offering was accompanied with a restitution for some specific ofVense. To this general department also belong the sacrifices of purification. In early times the sacrifieer was the iiiilcrfiiniiliiis, chieftain, or king; in the later devcln|)mcnt sacrifice was confined to the Aaronic pric>tliood. Consult the Kpisllc to the Hebrews and the fifth division of the .Mishna; Kurtz, Dcr alttestamentliche 0/)/'< Wii(//i(*(Mitau, 18l>'2; Eng. trans., Sacrificial Worshi/). Edin- burgh, lS(i3) ; the archieologies of Ewald, Ben- zinger, Nowaek, and the Old Testament theolo- gies of Dillmann, Smend, and Shulz; Edershciui, The Triniilc and Its Ministrt/ (London, 1874); Wcllhnuscn, Reste dcs aruhisclicn HciiUnlhums (Berlin. 1S87) ; Robertson Smith, Ueliijion of the Semites (London, 1894). For conspectus of Levitical laws, see Carpenter, ficxatcuch (Lon- don, 1900, 1902). Sacrifice Among the Greeks and Romans. With the Greeks, sacrifice offered to the gods of the iip])er world was a share in the daily or piddic meal, a rendering to them of a portion of the good things enjoyed by men. It is prob- able that in a sense every slaughter of a beast for food was accompanied by an offering of some parts of the animal to the god. In these bloody sacrifices there were many differences in the ritual, depending on the city, the god. and the period, but the main features of the common rite show no great variation. The victim was adorned with garlands and fillets, and the horns of cattle were frequently gilded. A basin of water was consecrated by plunging into it a brand from the altar, and the sjiectators. animal, and altar were sprinkled. Then barley groats mixed with salt were passed about, strewn on the victim, and thrown by those present into the fire. Hair was then cut from the brow of the animal and thrown into the fire, thus dedicating it to death. Then in solemn silence the victim whs killed by cutting the throat, with the head turned back so that the blood might spurt up- ward. Large animals were first stniuied with an axe. The blood was thrown on the altar, and parts of the entrails, bones, and a little flesh, along with incense, burned for the gods. From these sacrifices must be distinguished those of- fered to the gods of the lower world, to the lieroes or the dead, where the blood was allowad to flow into the earth, and the entire victim was consumed or otherwise destroyed, as when ani- mals were cast into the sea. rivers, or subter- ranean caverns. In these offerings we find dogs and animals unfit for food sometimes slain. Be- sides these bloody sacrifices, unbloody ofTerings of fruits, wine mixed with water, honey, milk. and especially cakes, were very conuuon. Cake.* in the form of animals were used by the poor