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Amulets: Ancient, Medieval, and Oriental: Judas

That some of the Hebrew patriots who fought under the banner of Judas Maccabaeus toward the middle of the second century B.C. were tinged with the prevailing superstition regarding amulets, appears in a passage of the second book of Maccabees, where it is stated that when Judas collected together for burial the bodies of those patriots who had fallen in battle before Odolla, they were found to have worn beneath their tunics certain idolatrous amulets, a custom strictly forbidden to the Jews. Their death was then looked upon as a signal instance of divine justice, which "had made hidden things manifest," and Judas exhorted the people to take this lesson to heart and guard themselves from sin.

The wealth of books on magic and divination produced in the ancient city of Ephesus, in Asia Minor, was so great that the designation "Ephesian writings" was quite generally given to writings of this kind, more especially to denote short texts that could be worn as amulets or charms. We read in the Acts of the Apostles (xix, 19) that after hearing the fervent discourses of St. Paul, in which he eloquently attacked the superstitions of the Ephesians, many of those who owned books of this description were so deeply moved that they burned up all such books in their possession, to the value of 50,000 pieces of silver, that is to say $9000, equivalent perhaps to $90,000, if we make due allowance for the greater purchasing power of money nearly two thousand years ago. The small literary value of the writings of this sort that have been preserved for us indicates that the loss to posterity by this auto-da-fe was not very considerable, and yet many queer superstitions and strange usages of which we now lack information must have been noted in these magic rolls and sheets.

The following lines may serve to show how highly the jasper was esteemed in ancient times, this designation covering jade as well: Auro, quid melius? Jaspis. Quid Jaspite? Virtus. Quid virtute? DEUS. Quid deitate? Nihil.

What is better than Gold? Jasper. What is better than Jasper? Virtue. What is better than Virtue? GOD. What is better than the deity? Nothing. The first mention of the famous charm Abracadabra, which so often appears engraved on Gnostic gems, occurs in a Latin medical poem written by Serenus Sammonicus who lived in the third century and is said to have bequeathed his library consisting of sixty-two thousand volumes to the Emperor Gordian the Younger. The poem recommends this mystic word, or name, as a sovereign remedy for the "demitertian" fever, if it were written on a piece of paper and suspended by a linen thread from the neck of the patient. To have its full efficacy the word should be written as many times as there are letters in it, but taking away one letter each time, so that the inscription assumed the form of an inverted cone.

It is interesting to note that De Foe, writing in the seventeenth century of the Great Plague in London (1665), alludes to this strange talisman as still in use. Treating of the curious prophylactics employed at that time, he reproaches those who employed such methods, and acted "as if the plague was not the hand of God, but a kind of possession of an evil spirit, and that it was to be kept off with crossings, signs of the zodiac, papers tied up with so many knots, and certain words or figures, as particularly the word Abracadabra formed in triangle or pyramid, thus:

A B R A C A D A B R A A B R A C A D A B R A B R A C A D A B A B R A C A D A A B R A C A D A B R A C A A B R A C A B R A A B R A B A A curious charm which was extensively used as an amulet in medieval times consists of five Latin words so arranged that they can be read backwards or forwards and also upwards or downwards. The disposition of the letters is as follows: s a t o r a r e p o t e n e t o p e r a r o t a s This charm has been preserved for us in Greek and Coptic as well as in Roman characters, and examples of it have been found cut in a marble slab above the chapel of St. Laurent at Rochemaur (Ardeche), France, and also in the plaster wall of an old Roman house at Cirncester, Gloucestershire, England. In a Greek manuscript in the Bibliotheque Nationale, in Paris, the Latin words are transliterated and translated as follows: ? the sower ? the plough ? holds ? works ? wheels Another and more ingenious explanation of this puzzle has, however, been given. Beginning with the last word "rotas," and taking the other words in their order, it is proposed to read as follows: "The plough-wheels (rotas), the laborer (opera), holds (tenet), creep after him (arepo), I, the sower (sator)." The chief defect in this version appears to be the assumption that "opera" can be rendered "laborer," an interpretation which is, at best, supported by a doubtful use of the word in that sense by Horace. This charm appears in an Italian manuscript of the fourteenth century, where it is recommended to be used for the assurance of a speedy delivery. Touching the wonderful and mystic power attributed to the seven vowels of the Greek alphabet by the Gnostics, C. W. King cites the following words from the Pistis Sophia of Valentinus:

Nothing therefore is more excellent than the mysteries which ye seek after, saving only the mystery of the Seven Vowels and their forty and nine Powers, and the Numbers thereof. And no name is more excellent than all these [Vowels], a Name wherein be contained all Names and all Lights and all Powers. The last sentence probably refers to the arrangement of these vowels often met with in inscribed Gnostic talismans, the so-called Abraxas gems. Here we often find them in the following order I E H ?? O ?? A, and the sound of these vowels really suggests the conventional pronunciation of the Hebrew name Jehovah (yehowah). The words quoted from the Pistis Sophia are placed in the mouth of Jesus, and King calls attention to the fact that in Greek the same word is used for voice and vowel ??. He therefore believes that the passage in Revelations (x, 3-4): "The seven thunders uttered their voices," signifies that the sound of the seven vowels "echoed through the vault of heaven, and composed that mystic utterance which the sainted seer was forbidden to reveal unto mortals."

Certain talismans were supposed to afford protection not only to individuals but even to entire cities. Of this class were two talismans described by Gregory of Tours. He relates that Paris had enjoyed from ancient times a surprising immunity from serpents and rats, as well as from fires. However, in clearing out the channel beneath a bridge across the Seine, the workmen found, embedded in the mud, two brazen images, one of a serpent and the other of a rat; after these had been removed from their resting place, serpents and rats appeared, and conflagrations became common.