Temples among the Egyptians Diogenes Laertius in the Life of Cleobulus writes that he was of Lindus or as some said of Carea and that he restored the Temple of Minerva built by Danars the Passage is somewhat imperfect but made compleat by Causabon with refeence to that which Diodorus Siculur writes lib. 5. cap. 13. where he writes Danaus ex Aegypto cum filiabus aufugiens in Lindiam Cypri appulit susceptusque ab incolis erecto Minervae Templo statuam ingentem dedicavit He adds that Cadmus about the same time being sent to Sea to seek Europa did perform his Vows at the same Temple Now Lidiat accounts Cadmus his leaving Phaenicia and sailing into Grece to have been at the same time that Joshua entered the Land of Canaan with his Ifraclites and on the same occasion affrighted with the Invasion made by Joshua and that Danaus his Expulsion out of Egypt by his Brother Aegyptus was originally derived from the Confusion that was brought upon the Land by reason of the slaughter of the First Born among them and the Destruction of Pharaoh and his Hoste in the Red Sea And in all likelihood this brought great Consusion in Egypt and amongst the Seed Royal whereupon fore Contentions might arise the issue whereof was as some prevailed so the expulsion of the Opposites Aegyptus himself being driven out afterwards as he had been a means of driving out Danaus before For so Pausanias writes in Achiacis Patrae and Aroe are all one Aegyptum Aroenvenisse tradunt Patrenses filiorum luctu confectum cum ipsum Argorum nomen exhorresceret imprimis à Danao sibi plurimum metneret And after this there were two Temples of Serapis built and in one of them was erected a Monument of Aegyptus the Son of Belut Herodotus ascribes the building of this Temple at Lindus to Danaus his Daughters about the end of his Second Book And whereas Diodorus Siculus reports the Temple to have been built in the Island of Cyprus Stephanus Bizantinus acknowledgeth no other City of Lindins or Lindia but that at Rhodes 16. Eusebius in his 9th Book of his Prepar Evangel and cb 23. Writes that two Temples one at Athens another at Heliopolis in Egypt were built by the Children of Israel in the time of their Bondage there But this he writes not according to his own Judgment only sets down the narration hereof out of one Artapanus an Heathen Author Now we have no Reason to give Credit to his Relation in this particular for albeit the Children of Israel were oppressed with sore Bondage and had Cruel Task-masters set over them who urged them to the making of Brick in abundance Yet the Scripture expresly tells us to what use these Bricks were employed Exod. 1.11 They did set Task-masters over them and they built the City Pithom and Raaemses for the Treasures of Pharaoh Thus they made them weary of their Lives by sore Labour in Clay and in Brick and in all Work in the Field with all manner of Bondage which they laid upon them most cruelly as v. 14. Herodotus makes relation of one Menon the first King of Egypt who built Memphis and therein Templum Vulcani a Temple to Vulcan great and memorable And this I confess was most Acient and long before the days of Moses if it be true which there is reported to him from the Priests of Egypt namely how they rehearsed to him out of a Book the names of three hundred and thirty Kings beginning from this Menon and ending with Mevis the Father of Sesostris who is supposed to be Shishak King of Egypt mentioned in Scripture who came to Jerusalem with a great Army and took it and carried away all the golden Shields that King Solomon had made The Providence of God being very remarkable herein as it is commended unto us 2 Chron. 12.5 6 7 8 Now Shishak's Depopulation of Judea came to pass in the fifth year of Rehoboam and Jeroboam the year of the World 3029. by Lydiat and 3033 in Usher Yet this Shishak was the Successor of Mevis the last of those three hundred and thirty Kings in Egypt whose names were related to Herodotus by the Priests of Egypt And this Menon King of Egypt in Herodotus is made all one with Amosis by Lydiat Euseb Prep Evangel l. 10. c. 9. I do not here mention how Porphyry makes Moses more ancient than Inachus who is more ancient then this Amosis nor how Africanus placeth him as Coaetaneous to Ogyges Nor how Appion the Grammarian makes him of the same time with Amosis Ibid. c. 10. as in whose days he led the Children of Israel out of Egypt Though in truth the Pastoral Nation which Manetho that Egyptian Historian mentioneth to have gone out of Egypt and planred themselves in the Neighbour-Country of Syria about Jerusalem were rather the Philistines who came of the Caslucheans and Caphtoreans who were of the Egyptian Nation and seized upon Palestine and Maritime Coast of Judea whose Trade also was the keeping of Sheep And to these refers that of Herodotus in the beginning of his History namely that the Phoenicians came from the Red-Sea by Phoenicians understanding Strians dwelling by the Sea Coast from Cassiolis the border of Egypt But these things are more clearly and truly shewn by Usher in his Annals from A.M. 2114. seq And how this was done in the days of Abraham many hundred years before Moses But if any Man shall hence conclude that therefore Temples were in Egypt many hundred years before Moses by the Testimony of Herodotus I answer That Herodotus's Testimony proceeded upon the Faith of the Egyptian Priests and their Registers which deserve no Credit with us Christians they making the King Menon to be many years more ancient than the World Yet Lydiat shews how to salve their Credit in a tolerable way namely by supposing that the first reigning in Egypt which he takes to have been sixty years after the Dispersion of the Gentiles which is a hundred sixty one years after Noah's Flood by the Computation made by George and Constantine Manasses out of the Fragments of ancient Historians and set down in their Chronicles all were not governed under one King but look how many Cities so many Kings like as Joshua found it in the Land of Canaan when he entred among them with the Israelites And the Years of the Reigns of each King might be reckoned as succeeding one another whereas indeed they reigned together in several Dynasties at the same time As that which followeth in the Relation of those Priests made to Herodotus namely That in that vast space of time the Sun changed his Course four times as having twice risen where now he sets and twice set where now he rises to astonish their Hearers with legends of great Admiration They had an addition also which was That before all these Kings their Gods reigned conversing familiarly with Men and the last of them was Orus the Son of Osiris
The same Herodotus writes That the Egyptians much differed from the Grecians in the Estimation of their Gods For whereas among the Grecians the last of their Gods were Hercules and Dionysius and Pan Contrariwise among the Egyptians Pan was Vetustissimus the most Ancient even of the number of the first Rank which were but eight and Latona was another of them as elsewhere he tells us Hercules was one of the second Rank which were twelve in number and Dionysius of the third Rank which contained such as were begotten of the former twelve This Dionysius is Osiris as he saith whose Son Orus was the last of the Deities regnant among the Egyptians 17. Of this Osiris Diodorus Siculus writes which is also related by Eusebius in his Preparat Evangel l. 2. c. 1. That babuit Jovi Junonique parentibus sacram aedem item Diis caeteris aurea Templa which carry a very ill Accent that to Jupiter and Juno his Parents he should dedicate a Holy House only and to other Gods golden Temples And withal he adds That whatsoever was indeed verified of Osiris the Egyptian that Orpheus the Poet transferred unto Bacchus for the Honour of the Grecians even to that Bacchus whom Jupiter begat of Semele Cadmus his Daughter as if Osiris were no ancienter than so but that Cadmus might have been his Grandfather Whereas we have very good Ground and Testimony concerning the Antiquity of Cadmus as a Man unknown to the Grecians till he left Phoenicia which was at the time that Joshua entered the Land of Canaan with his great Host of Israclites And I do not think the Gods of the Egyptians were a making in those days He was a great and a proud King that oppressed Israel and we know what Mischief befel him and his People Manetho makes mention of one Amenophis King of Egypt whose Fortunes were to be devoured of a Sea-Horse Probably this was that Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red-Sea Great Benefactors while they lived were honoured by Heathens with Divine Honour after their Death but this Pharaoh was a Plague to the whole Land and People and nothing likely that any of his Posterity came to be deified by the Egyptians and a long time after great Confusion seized upon that Nation witness Danaus flying out of Egypt into Thebes in Greece from the Fury of his Brother Aegyptus and after that Egyptus himself leaving Egypt and coming into Patre in Greece mourning for the loss of his Children And we read in Scripture of the Gods of Egypt while Israel lived under them yea and how they were corrupted by them Osiris was a great Euergetes or Benefactor chiefly for the Invention of Tilling of the Ground and Planting of Grapes that of Virgil Georgic 1. Uncique puer monstrator aratri touching the first Inventer of the Plow It was well saith Servius that he mentioned not his name but in general saith The Boy that found it out For it was not one Body that acquainted all the World with the Plow but divers Persons in divers Places And if you ask who is chiefly meant here His answer is That some say Triptolemus others Osiris Which is the truer of the two in the Judgment of Servius So Sabinus Pliny relates That Bizeser the Athenian some that Triptolemus did this But the Tradition is That Osiris was the first of all Mortals who Plowed with Oxen in memorial whereof two Oxen are honoured of the Egyptians Apis in the City Memphis and Meuris in Heliopolis and in the Offices of Isis Ears of Corn are carried before and in the time of Harvest Ears of Corn are consecrated unto her Now Isis was the Sister of Osiris saith Pomponius though that by the way is but a Figment and Probus confirms the same Nevertheless some have seemed to smell a Mystery in this And Coelius Rodiginus lib. 5. c. 12. observes That before the Temples of the Egyptians was wont to be placed the Figure of Sphinx to signifie thereby that the Wisdom of their Theology was obscure and vested in Fables and that in the City Sais there is a Temple of Palles which some think to be Pallas that hath this Inscription in the Face of it I am that which was and is and shall be my Veil no Mortal Man hath ever unfolded Yet I conceive these to be but Illusions of Satan to blanch and set a fair Face upon foul things under the Pretence of Mysterious Significations Coelius adds the Opinion of some to have been That by Osiris is meant no other thing than the River Nilus the overflowing whereof and the Mud which it brings soiling it is a great means for the enriching of that Land The same Interpretation is made by Eusebius Preparat Evangel l. 3. c. 10. p. 115. And Suidas on the word Serapis writes Hunc Deum alii Jovem esse dixerunt alii Nilum propter modium quod in capite habet cubilum mensuram aquae scilicet alii verò Joseph And in Forsterus there is a fair Derivation of Osiris from the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bos ille for under such a shape he was worshipped and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is in Hebrew the usual name of the River Nilus by reason of the blackness of the Mud which it brings with it Others conceive Osiris and Isis to signifie the Sun and Moon and first these natural things being glorious to behold were adored and invoked by them according to that in Virgil Vos clarissima mundi Lumina labencem Coelo quae dueit is annum Liber alma Ceres vestro si munere tellus Chaoniam pingui glandem mutavit arista Poculaque invent is Acheloia miscuit uvis Here Liber and alma Ceres are no other than the Sun and Moon and Isis and Ceres are all one Euseb Preparat Evangel l. 2. c. 1. and the same things are attributed to them in their kind by the * Martianus in Nuptiis ad Solem Te Serapim Nilus Memphis veneratur Osirim Poet which are usually attributed to Osiris and Isis in their kind by Historians Namely the Prospering and Maturating of Corn and Wine according to their several proper Seasons wherein they are to be Sown or Planted and the Fruit thereof to be expected But leave we the Mysterious Signification and come to the Historical Truth Lydiat thinks that Menon the first King reigning over all Egypt by what variety of names soever called wherein there is found very great Variety as he shews was the Man that married Isis and commonly received to be Osiris or Serapis for these two are both one But others conjecture that Serapis being represented bearing a Bushel upon his Head doth fairly signifie Joseph who was so great a Benefactor to the whole Land of Egypt and to King Pharaoh himself and that especially in providing Corn for them against the seven sore years of Famine and that by a wise managing of the abundance of the seven plentiful years And this hath peculiar reference to that
very particular which made Osiris so renowned namely the Provision of Corn and he was married to Asenath which taking away the last Syllable founds very near to Isin the Daughter of Potipherah Priest of On and the last two Syllables of his name comes near to Phorom the Argive whose Sister as some say or Daughter as others say she was and that from Pharoneus the Argive the Kings of Egypt took the name of Pharaoh Lydiat conjectures Schindler saith it signifies immunem esse to be free from Taxes and Impositions which is the Prerogative of Absolute Kings and it may seem to some that in the seven plentiful years Pharaoh took up the fifth part of all their Increase throughout the Land by vertue of his absolute Regal Prerogative I am not acquainted with the manner of the Government of Egypt in those days But that the fifth part was rather bought by the King to his singular great Advantage as appeared by the event Corn being little worth in those plentiful years I have this reason out of the Holy Text. For we read that when the years of Dearth came the Egyptians were at length driven to sell their Land after they had sold their Castle and all means sailed them And Joseph bought all their Land for the King providing them Corn for their present Necessity both for Food and Sowing their Land and the Bargain was this They should have the use of the Land still only the fifth part of their Increase they should pay unto the King Now if he had but a fifth part of the Harvest after the Land was his and he gave them the use of it How unlikely is it that by vertue of his Royal Prerogative he either could or did take the same Proportion when the Land was none of his but theirs for in this case it had been but a very ill Purchase if hereby he had no more than he had formerly right unto when as yet he had paid nothing for it And this is the more unlikely considering what course was taken to make the Purchase good and that no Man might plead Right of Inheritance thereunto for he changed their Habitations so that albeit they might have as much Land as they had before yet they had not each one the same Land which he enjoyed before 18. Eusebius saith that Serapis had upon his Head discum as the Latin renders it But Alexander ah Alexandro l. 4. c. 12. of his Genial days Aegyptii Serapidi modium apponunt supra caput The Egyptians represent Serapis with a Bushel upon his Head but like enough both took it from Suidas and it is mentioned by Ludovicus Vives upon Aust de Civit. Dei l. 18. c. 5. and the truth is in Coquaeus upon Austin de Civit. Dei l. 18. c. 5. writes the same in these words Nonnulli Serapin esse volunt Joseph consecratum immani Sepulchro fano exornatum in quo bos nutriebatur in agriculturae Symbolum quod famem septennem singulari prudentia ab Aegyptiis detulisset And this might be a very congruous Memorial of Osiris of whom it is written by divers that primus mortalium boves aratro junxit the first who taught the World to Plow with Oxen And for this cause the Oxe Apis might be a fit Emblem of him and of all such who ever since have provided the People with Bread Like as Menenius Agrippa if my Memory fail me not was the Man who for the like Service was honoured by the Romans with making Coins in his name and the Inscription of an Oxe upon one side of it And in this respect as Dr. Reynolds observes might the Israclites think to represent God in the form of a young Bullock in the Wilderness to notifie thereby that God who provided Manna for them in the Wilderness And it is like enough that if the Egyptians had an Apis in those days some Oxe or other which they worshipped they by the Egyptians might be acquainted with the meaning of it as a Memorial of Osiris who taught them to Plow their Ground with Oxen that so with greater ease they might have Corn yearly in abundance Yet I deny not but Joseph deserved to be in everlasting remembrance with them for this very cause But the Text saith A new King arose that knew not Joseph and though all Israel deserved well at the Egyptians hands for Joseph's sake yet we know how proudly they dealt with them and how barbarously they carried themselves toward them not only oppressing them with Burthens but causing their Male children to be cast into the River Nilus even Joseph's who was a greater Blessing to them and to their King especially than ever the River Nilus was and the People of Israel might have been so still had they used them well for ten Persons such as Lot had saved Sodom how much more 600000. And truly Pineda upon Job is of Opinion that this Pharaoh was that Busiris King of Egypt of whose Barbarousness in Sacrificing Strangers that came into his Country the World so much talkt of Surely had they made a God of Joseph they would not have plaid the Devils yea such arrant Devils with his Posterity But the Lord to make them amends in a congruous way first turned the Water of Nilus into Blood a fair means to revive the remembrance of their Merciless Course in Drowning the Hebrew Children but when that would not serve the turn to bring them to Repentance the Lord drowned Pharaoh and his Host in the Red-Sea So perish all thine Enemies O Lord but Grace and Peace and plenteous Redemption ever be upon the true Israel of God 19. Yet I rather think Osiris to have been more ancient than Joseph Sure I am they had their Gods in the days of Moses Exod. 6.26 by whom the Children of Israel were corrupted and Hebrew Shepherds were an Abomination to the Egyptians Gen. 46.34 not only in the days of Moses but in the days of Joseph And Herodotus writes Non eosdem Deos similiter colunt universi Aegyptii praeter Isidem Osiridem quem Bacchum esse aiunt Hos peraeque universi colunt Herein they all agreed in worshipping Isis and Osiris not so in the worshipping of other Gods So that I am content to tread in Mr. Lydiat's steps that the first King of Egypt Menon or Ammon or Amosis or Amuris or Amenophis to have been the Egyptians Osiris whose Memorial was an Oxe because he was primus omnium mortalium qui boves aratro junxerat the first that taught Men to Plow with Oxen and thence might his name be derived namely from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bos as Forsterus conceives and Serapis which at first was Sorapis from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Apis for as Suidas saith Sepulchrum bujus Apidis in quo est ejus corpus conditum Alexandriam translatum est afterwards by Corruption it came to be called Sarapis and last of all Serapis and that Isis his Queen was
from the Creation considered in his works His best proof for this is out of Homer who brings in Jupiter and the rest of the Gods with him going in Progress into Ethopia both to the Sacrifices there made unto them and for the sweetness of the odours there And surely it is most congruous that such Gods as are devised by the fancies of Men and made at their pleasures should be well content to be served and worshipped according to the Fancies of Men and at their plea sure for undoubtedly Man hath as much power to devise a Divine and Religious Worship as to make a God any Service being good enough and too good to be bestowed upon the work of their own hands yea or upon their own Fancies either Yet the truth is there was a time when the Bridegroom of God's Church was pleased with bodily Sacrifices offered with good hearty and had his abode in the Mountains of Spices Cant. 8.14 Make haste my beloved and be thou like unto a Roe or to a young Hart upon the Mountains of Spices But this was only for a time until the day did break and the shadows fled away Cant. 2.17 The Lord Christ now adays is the most sweet smelling Savour both to God the Father and us by whom alone the Father is satisfied and our Souls sweetly refreshed Indeed I read that Hesiod and Homer were Primi Deorum opifices apud Graecos the first Crafts-masters in coining Gods among the Grecians in Herodotus lib. 2. p. 124. Graeco-Lat Hesiodus atque Homerus qui quadringent is non amplius annis ante me extitere fuere qui Graecis Theogoniam introduxerunt eisque cognomina honores diversa artificia figuras attribuerunt And p. 166. Ipsi Aegyptij extiterunt principes conventus pompas conciliabula factitandi ab iis Graeci didicerunt Cujus rei hoc apud me argumentum est quod illa constet priscis temporibus Graecanica verò recens fuisse institua And we know Homer lived after the Wars of Troy some say 80 years some 100 others 140 others 180 years after the taking of Troy Nay there are that make him 200 years yea 240 later than that yea some 400 others 500 later as Talianus gives instance in several Authors thus tar differing about the time of Homer as any may read in Eusebius his Evangelical Preparation Book 10. p. 492. Graeco-Lat We by the Word of God are brought acquainted not only with the Creation of Man but of the World also and how in 1656. it was drowned and all Flesh perished by the Waters of a general Deluge in whom was the breath of Life except those four couple eight persons in all who were reserved for a Seed to sow the World anew and preserved in the Ark which setled in Ararat commonly conceived to be a Mountain in Armenia though some think otherwise and from those parts near adjoyning and particularly from Babel after the Consusion of Languages began the dispersion of the People And as the Lord by his extraordinary Providence provided both for the making of the Ark and bringing all sorts of Creatures thereinto and maintenance for them and their preservation there did make himself known unto them after a degenerate time that came upon all both as a God of Vengeance in destroying others and also as a God of Mercy and Salvation in preserving them from that common Destruction promising withal never to destroy the World so again so from them and by them was the knowledge of God propagated to their Posterity which about 101. years after the Flood began to be dispersed over all the World And upon Nimrod's Usurpation Rebel-like his Nature answering to his Name it seems that both his Father and Grandfather and many of them separated themselves from him Cush into Ethiopia Misraim into Egypt Canaan into Palestine where we find Sidon a principal City by the Sea And as Egypt is called in Scripture the Land of Ham so by as good reason Ethiopia also Lydiat is of opinon concerning Ham that he was the eldest of Noah's three Children and by the younger Son of Noah Gen. 9.24 is meant Canaan Noah's Grandchild for even our Grandchildren we count our Children and Noah's Curse we know passed not upon Ham but upon Canaan which makes it probable that the lewd prank which gave such offence to Noah and he sound out by examination was play'd by Canaan and by him his Father Ham came to the knowledge of it who told his two Brethren thereof Sem and Japhet And thus indeed the Egyptians and Ethopians and whole house of Ham may be accounted the eldest House of the World if he were elder than his two Brethren Sem and Japhet But in this Lydiat is almost alone most Authors being for Sem or Japhet which is more likely being the eldest as may be seen at large in Usher's Chronol Sacra c. 4. Japhet separated towards the North both East and West but chiefly towards the West Sem's Posterity continued in the East towards the South Assur his Son having erected a Monarchy in Niniveh But as yet no testimony for Temples any where 9. Diogines Laertius an approved Writer in his fifth Book of the Lives of Philosophers in the Life of Epimenides saith of him That Construxit apud Athenienses phanum verendorum Deorum ut ait Lobon Argivns in libro de Poetis Fertur etiam primus domus atque agros expiasse delubraque erexisse This Epimenides of Crete built a Temple to the Gods call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dij reverends some that deserved to be reverenced as he thought more than all the pack and he alledgeth Lobon of Argos in his Book of Poets testifying this This Epimenides also is said to have been the first that shewed a course for the expiation of Houses and Fields and that erected Temples The expiation here spoken of was by Sacrifice as appears by the Story mentioned a little before For having mentioned how the fame of this Man flying throughout all Grece he was reputed a Man most dear to God thereupon an Instance thereof is given thus The Athenians were sometimes visited with a sore Pestilence who thereupon asking counsel hereabouts as their manner was at the Oracle of Delphos Pythia the Nun Priest answered them That the City of Athens was to be expiated And they being ignorant how this was to be performed dispatched Niceas the Son of Niceratus by Ship into the Island of Crete to Epimenides to intreat him to come over unto them Upon their intreaty he came and expiated or purged their City after this manner He took Sheep some white some black and brought them to Mars his Street and there let them go whither they would sending some after them to observe where they lay down and wheresoever any of them lay down there he gave charge they should be sacrificed peculiari cuipiam Deo to some peculiar God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Laertius to a