can be discovered among other nations. The supposed allusions on the sacrificial tablet of Marseilles are too uncertain for clear inferences. It is true, the Romans designated the act of offering to the gods the entrails of victims, or of laying them upon the altar or at any other appropriate place, by the special and technical term porricere; but that term, merely retained from the old religious phraseology, implied no ceremony or fixed form of dedication. The eastern and imaginative character of the Hebrews was more fertile and inventive in significant religious symbols.

13. THE BURNING OF THE Offering.

The sacrificial rites were completed by the combustion of the offering or of those parts of it that were destined for the Deity. Though common to animal and vegetable sacrifices, the act and its meaning are best understood in reference to the former. In bringing the victim to the door of the Sanctuary, the worshipper signified his intention of dovoting it to God; by the imposition of the hand ho marked it as his own gift and his substituto; as such he proved and surrondered it by the act of killing; then the sprinkling of the blood signified the devotion or wrought the justification of his soul; while lastly the burning, that is, not the annihilation but the rising up of the offering in smoke, represented the soaring of the soul, cleansed and hallowed, heavenward to the throne of God, who graciously accepts the humble oblation. It indicated that the end of the sacrifice was fully attained; for it practically gave up the sacrifice as "the food of God", and as "the offering made by fire, a sweet odour to the Lord." It was, therefore, the final consummation of the pious deed. In holocausts and thank-offerings, it symbolised the worshipper's unlimited submission to God, whether in reverence or gratitude, but in expiatory sacrifices, it typified the complete removal or covering of the transgressions thenceforward effaced in the sight of God. It was equal in significance to the imposition of the hand and the sprinkling of the blood. For those threo ritos mirrored the chief stages in the inward transformation of the offerer from his feeling of meok dependence or of sinfulness, through the hope of moral liberty and atonement, to the certainty of acceptance and spiritual regeneration. One of them possessed pre-eminent weight in one of the three chief classes of sacrificethe burning in holocausts, the sprinkling of the blood in expiatory offerings, and the imposition of the hand in thank-offerings; and thus the specific character of each is unmistakably marked. In any case a portion of the victim was burnt on the altar, and it was this circum

stance that stamped the animal as a sacrifice in holocausts, the whole animal with the exception of the skin; in eucharistic and most of the expiatory offerings, the fat and some fat parts which might well be taken to represent the whole victim; while in the most solemn of the sin-offerings, those killed for the High-priest or the whole people, the remaining flesh together with the hide was burnt, in a clean place, without the camp or town, where the ashes, temporarily preserved in the Court eastward of the brazen altar, were poured out by a priest not clad in his pontifical robes or his official garments of white linen, but in his ordinary dress; for the flesh could, in those cases, not be burnt on the altar, nor within the camp or holy city which represented the community of God, because the victims had been laden with the punishment of those in whose name they had been offered yet it could be burnt in a clean spot only, because it was the flesh of sacrifices, which could never be divested of their sacred character, and inherently differed from ordinary animals.

The bloodless offering of the High-priest and the priests was burnt entirely; for it could not be consumed by priosts, because they were the offerers, nor could it be allowed to the Israelites, because none of them was entitled to touch the "food of God." In all other vegetable oblations, which, with a few remarkable exceptions, were invariably accompanied by incense and oil, a small portion only, generally a hand-full, was burnt by the priest on the altar, together with all the frank-inconse, as "a sweet odour" or as a "memorial" to God, significantly so called, because it was designed to bring the worshipper into the grateful remembrance of God, whether the minchah was the usual cereal gift, or the extraordinary offering presented in cases of conjugal jealousy, or merely the frank-incenso put on the show-bread and then burnt. This explanation, simple and obvious as it is, seems in harmony with the whole sacrificial ritual, and therefore preferable to the various conjectures that have been ventured. But we are utterly unable to understand the process of reasoning which suggested the opinion, that the burning of the sacrifice the hope and means of grace typified the eternal punishment of hell, wherefore the fire on the brazen altar, miraculously kindled by lightening from heaven, was to burn perpetually, and salt, the emblem of permanence, was to bo employed with every offering: an opinion which confusedly throws the flesh of sin-offerings into the same category as the oil and incense of vegetable oblations, and which interprets the "sweet odour" ascending to God to mean the unspeakable and ever relentless torture of wretched sinners.

It is true that the smell of the burnt animals or of parts of them must have been most offensive; we can well understand the surprise of strangers who asked, "whether the smoke and stench of burning hides, bones, bristles, fleeces, and feathers, a smell intolerable to the sacrificers themselves, could possibly bo pleasing to the deity"; and it is not impossible that the desire to counteract that ill-odour originally prompted the addition of the frank-incense. But it ought to be remembered that the sacrifices had an ulterior or symbolical significance; that the burning of the victim or of its best parts, whatever the attendant circumstances, was an act of self-denial, or of pious submission, or of grateful acknowledgement, and that the physical inconvenience which it engendered, was utterly insignificant compared with the noble and spiritual ends desired.

The sacrificial portions, unless placed before the gods as lectisternia, were by most other nations also devoted to them by means of the flumos; in which respect wo find oven the curious notion that the smoke of the burning oblation carried the worshipper's name to the knowledge and the abode of the deity. The Thobans in Egypt buried in a sacred vault the ram which they annually killed in honour of Jupiter and Hercules; and the Phocaeans in Tithorea buried in an appointed place the remains of victims killed at the festivals in honour of Isis. The Scythians, after having strangled the victim, completed the sacrifice "without kindling any fire." The Greeks generally buried the animals slain to propitiate the lower gods or to ratify oaths; and both Greeks and Romans threw the dedicated portions of victims destined for marine deities into the sea. But flesh buried or thrown into the water is inseparable from putrefaction, a notion scrupulously avoided in connection with sacrifices; while the burning not only makes the offering rise heavenward towards the Divine abode, but secures a complete and perfect removal, free from all impurity, on which subject more will be said in another place.

14. SACRIFICIAL MEALS.

Lest any act connected with pious offerings should have been meaningless, a symbolical significance was attached even to those parts that were not burnt on the altar, but eaten either by priests or Israelites. Indeed sacrificial meals formod, in one of the chief classes of offering, the most prominent and characteristic feature. They could of course not take place in holocausts which were burnt on the altar entirely, with the exception of the skin; nor in the most important sin-offerings those slain for the whole people or for the High-priest, which were

partly burnt on the altar and partly without the camp; nor in the bloodless oblations of the High-priest and the common priests, which were also delivered to the flames entirely, since they could appropriately be eaten neither by the offering Aaronites nor the inferior Israelites. But the meals were ordained in reference to all other offerings, though they differed in meaning and in the degrees of importance. The bloodless oblations prosented by Israelites fell to tho share of the priests, with the exception of the "memorial", and were to be consumed by the males among them alone, in the holy place, that is, in the Court of the Sanctuary, near the altar, where the solemn act had been performed, and later in special cells at the side of the Court of the Temple; for those oblations were "most holy": in which respect the provident arrangement was made that some of the oblations namely those prepared in an oven, a pan, or a cauldron were allotted to the officiating priest individually, while others especially those consisting of flour only whether mixed with oil or not were assigned to all the Aaronites collectively, to serve as their common sustenance. In praise-offerings, four kinds of cake accompanied the animal sacrifico; ono cako of oach sort was delivered up to the priest who performed the sprinkling,' and who had to eat his portion also on the consecrated spot, near the Divine abode. Though in these cases the ordinances served chiefly the material subsistence of the elected tribo, they aimed also at hallowing the romains of tho gifts that had been dedicated to God and which He graciously allowed to His servants. Analogous to those bloodloss oblations were the trospass-offerings, the flesh of which belonged, in the first instance, to the acting priest, but might be shared by him with all the males of his order, and was to be consumed in the Court of the sacred edifice.3 But the case was different with respect to those less important sin-offerings of which no blood had been brought into the interior of the Sanctuary; the priests received as their portion all the flesh that had not been burnt on the altar, and they, the male Aaronites exclusively, were bound to eat it in the holy place, to indicate by that meal, that they were the appointed mediators of propitiation between God and the Israelitos; for God gave them tho sin-offoring "to remove the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonomont for them before the Lord": the repast was a part of their official functions; its omission was a grave offence and a criminal dereliction of duty certain to provoke the dire anger of God." The nature of the sacrificial meal

1 Lev. VII. 9, 10; see Sect. XI.

2 Lev. VII. 12-14.

3 Comp. Lev. VII. 6, 7.

4 Lev. X. 17.

* Comp. Lev. X. 16–18; see also Sect. XV.

3

was still more marked in reference to eucharistic sacrifices; for it constituted their distinctive trait. It appears indeed that the public thank-offerings were entirely handed over to the priests, with the exception of the fat and fat parts which were burnt on the altar; this is at least certain with respect to the two lambs which, on Pentecost, were presented with the first-fruit loaves as thank-offerings', and is fully in accordance with the character of the class, though a general and distinct precept is not given in the Pentateuch: thus the public thankofferings would, with regard to the meals, fall into the same category as the trespass-offerings. But the flesh of private thank-offerings was so divided that the fat and fat parts were burnt on the altar,' the right shoulder was surrendered to the officiating priest, and the breast to all the Aaronites as common provision, while the remainder was left to the offering Israelite. Now the portions reserved to the priests could be eaten by them together with their families and servants, both males and females, at any placo, provided it was levitically clean:" the meal had therefore not, like that connected with sin-offerings, an official or symbolical charactor, but it was merely designed for the external support of the priests and the maintenance of their households, or as a compensation and return for their services at the Sanctuary. But very different was the repast of the offering Israelite on such occasions. He had to eat his portions of the eucharistic sacrifice, within a fixed and limited time, not only with his family, his wife, his sons, and his daughters, nor only with his man-servants and his maid-servants, but he was onjoined to invite also as his guests poor people, especially Lovites who had no cortain or regular incomo; the moal was to be held, not at any place the offerer might chose, but within the town of the common Sanctuary alone; and all those who partook of it were rigidly ordered to be free from uncleanness, a contravention of which command was threatened with excision. Similar regulations obtained with regard to the tithes of corn, wine, and oil, the firstlings of the herds and flocks, to vows and free-will gifts of any kind. The character of these feasts cannot be mistaken; it was that of joyfulness tempered by solemnity, of solemnity relieved by joyfulness: the worshipper had submitted to God an offering from his property;

1 Lev. XXIII. 20.

2 Lev. III. 3-5, 9-11, 14-16; VII. 31. 3 Lev. VII. 31-34; X. 14, 15. 4 Lev. X. 14

5 Lev. VII. 15-18; XIX. 5-8; XXII. 29, 30; comp. Exod. XII. 10; XXIX. 34; Lev. VIII. 32.

• Comp. Lev. VII. 19-21; Deut. XII. 6, 7, 11, 12; comp. XVI. 11, 14; 1 Sam. IX. 12, 13, 19, 22–24; XVI. 3, 5; 2 Sam. VI. 18, 19.

7 According to the Deuteronomist; see Treatise on Priesthood, section III. 8 Deut. XII. 6, 7, 11, 12, 17, 18.