Page:Psychology of the Unconscious (1916).djvu/617

(phallus) above and its etymological connection.], in the Old Testament it is the angel of Jehovah, or the countenance of God. Jacob wrestled with the angel during the night at the ford of Jabbok, after he had crossed the water with all that he possessed. (Night journey on the sea, battle with the night snake, combat at the ford like Hiawatha.) In this combat, Jacob dislocated his thigh. (Motive of the twisting out of the arm. Castration on account of the overpowering of the mother.) This "face" of God was compared in the old Jewish philosophy to the mystic Metatron, the prince of the face of God (Josiah 5, 14), who brings "the prayer to God" and "in whom is the name of God." The Naassens (Ophits) called the Holy Ghost the "first word," the mother of all that lives; the Valentinians comprehended the descending dove of Pneuma as "the word of the mother from above, the Sophia." (Drews: "Christ Myth," I, pp. 16, 22, 80.) In Assyria, Gibil, the fire god, had the rôle of Logos. (Tiele: "Assyr. Gesch." (In Ephrem, the Syrian writer of hymns, John the Baptist says to Christ: "A spark of fire in the air waits for thee over the Jordan. If thou followest it and willst be baptised, then take possession of thyself, wash thyself, for]*