Historical Reprints
Religion
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THE work consists of a group of Hermetic books, which have been called the Funereal Ritual, or Book of the Dead. It is not, indeed, strictly a Ritual in the more extended sense of that term, but consists of several Hermetic works divided into separate chapters, each preceded by a title indicating its purport, and each principal section followed by directions explaining its use.
THE Sibyls occupy a conspicuous place in the traditions and history of ancient Greece and Rome. Their fame was spread abroad long before the beginning of the Christian era. Heraclitus of Ephesus, five centuries before Christ, compared himself to the Sibyl "who, speaking with inspired mouth, without a smile, without ornament, and without perfume, penetrates through centuries by the power of the gods."
The Great Flood holds mankind's awe at the sheer devastation that a flood could bring on civilization. Here's yet another version found in libraries, once buried, now recovered.
Those who have learned a little of the Ancient Wisdom know the illumination, the peace, the joy, the strength, its lessons have brought into their lives. That this book may win some to use its teachings, and to prove for themselves their value, is the prayer with which it is sent forth into the world.
Discover how much of your faith, your Christian or Jewish religion originated from the religion of Babylon.
Theology and Religion are the highest of all studies--the aroma scientiarum--they have attracted the most powerful minds and the subtlest intellects to their elucidation; no other subjects have excited men's minds and aroused their passions as these have done; on account of their unspeakable importance, no other subjects have kindled such heat and strife, or proved themselves more fatal to many of the authors who wrote concerning them.
The seven tracts or treatises before us were published in 1521 in a little quarto volume: "Imprynted at London in Poules chyrchyarde at the sygne of the Trynyte, by Henry Pepwell. In the yere of our lorde God, M.CCCCC.XXI., the xvi. daye of Nouembre."
In ransacking old court records, newspapers, diaries and letters for the historic foundation of the books which I have written on colonial history, I have found and noted much of interest that has not been used or referred to in any of those books. An accumulation of notes on old-time laws, punishments and penalties has evoked this volume. The subject is not a pleasant one, though it often has a humorous element; but a punishment that is obsolete gains an interest and dignity from antiquity and its history becomes endurable because it has a past only and no future. That men were pilloried and women ducked by our law-abiding forbears rouses a thrill of hot indignation which dies down into a dull ember of curiosity when we reflect that they will never be pilloried or ducked again.
Censored by the Catholic and Protestant churches, this book was widely accepted by the Eastern Orthodox church for centuries.
The three manuscripts which we possess of the ancient Maya peoples of Central America, the Dresden (Dr.), the Madrid (Tro.-Cort.) and the Paris (Per.) manuscripts, all contain a series of pictorial representations of human figures, which, beyond question, should be regarded as figures of gods.
Magic appears to have had its origin on the plains of Assyria, and the worship of the stars was the creed of those pastoral tribes who, pouring down from the mountains of Kurdistan into the wide level where Babylon afterwards raised its thousand towers, founded the sacerdotal race of the Chasdim or Chaldeans.
Stone temples are found in all parts of the world, whether inhabited by Celt or Goth, for at a later period all the early inhabitants of the globe seem to have been classed under these two appellatives.
The great flood has been recorded by ancient civilizations throughout the world. The Bible itself records a revered version of the flood. This Sumerian/Babylonian story predates the authorship of the Biblical story.
Though written in 1927, the subject is even more relevant today as Christianity attempts to destroy the American Republic and the Israeli government steals lands and rights from its own citizens.