The sacred dance

I

In the Old Testament there are quite a number of references to marriage[308], but there is very little about the ritual in connexion with or about the festivities which took place at weddings. The wedding feast is mentioned in Judg. xiv. 12, 17, where it is spoken of as lasting seven days; in the Apocrypha we also have mention of it in Tobit ix. 1 ff., xii. 1; according to x. 7 it lasts fourteen days. The Chuppah, i.e. the canopy under which the bride and bridegroom stand during the wedding-ceremony, is referred to in Ps. xix. 5 (6 in Hebr.), Joel ii. 16; cp. Tobit vii. 14, 15. The marriage procession is mentioned in 1 Macc. ix. 37 ff., in connexion with it “timbrels and minstrels” are spoken of. The only place in the Old Testament in which the ceremonial dance at a wedding is specifically referred to is in Cant. vi. 13 (vii. 1 in Hebr.); this runs, according to the R.V. rendering:

The passage may be explained in this way (the justification for the interpretation will be given afterwards): It is the beginning of the “king’s week”; the people are gathered to witness the sword-dance of the bride; as she is the “queen” she is spoken of as the “Shulammite” (= “Shunammite”)[309] because this was the type of a “fair damsel” (see 1 Kings i. 3, 4; cp. Cant. i. 8, v. 9); it is an honorific title conferred on brides during their “queenship.” The people cry out to her: “Turn, turn,” i.e. in her dance; it is a word of encouragement, they wish also to observe all her movements. The bridegroom, who is standing by, is pleased at the favourable reception accorded to his bride, and, in oriental fashion, asks them why they gaze upon this fair damsel who is dancing with a sword in her hand? They reply, as he expects them to, with a song in praise of her beauty: “How beautiful are thy feet in sandals ...” (vii. 1 ff.), i.e. they begin with a reference to the dance she is performing before them, to her step and other movements of her body. The expression “dance of Maḥanaim[310]” is applied to the dance because of the sword that is carried and waved about during its performance; there is a warlike look about it, hence the name war-dance or “dance of hosts”; probably also the name contains a reference to the purpose for which the dance was performed; to this we shall come in a moment.

Now there can be little doubt but that this passage reflects the customs at weddings such as are to be seen at the present day among the Syrian peasants who, like the dwellers in the Arabian Desert, have preserved their customs from time immemorial[311]. A most interesting account of a wedding among the Syrian peasants, which throws a flood of light upon this difficult passage in Canticles, is recorded by Wetzstein[312]; the points which specially concern us may be briefly mentioned here. When, among these peasants, the day of a wedding is fixed the neighbours gather at the village threshing-floor where the marriage takes place. The bridegroom and bride are proclaimed king[313] and queen, and are treated as such during the seven days after the wedding, which are given up to dancing and feasting. The throne of the “royal” pair is the threshing-sledge; here they sit and watch the festivities during the “king’s week,” as these seven days are called. The threshing-floor is the court of the king and queen. It is in the evening of the wedding-day that the sword-dance takes place; this is performed by the bride alone before the “king” and the assembled villagers. The sword which the bride carries and brandishes during her dance is said to symbolize and proclaim the fact that she is prepared to defend herself from all unlawful approach from other suitors. This explanation is probably not the original one; for it is questionable whether among the Syrian peasants this dance was always performed by the bride. Kremer describes a marriage, for example, in the neighbourhood of Beirut, at which during the wedding procession a sword-dance took place; it was performed by two young men, friends of the bridegroom; they were very lightly clad in light-blue kumbâz with white turban. Each held a small round shield made of hide and a sword; they fought in rhythmic time, smiting each other’s shields, and moving forward the whole time with the procession[314]. Among the Bedouin Arabs again, according to Doughty[315], a sword-dance forms one of the ceremonies at weddings; here, too, it is performed by friends of the bridegroom. This is also the case among the Moslems in Palestine[316].

The object and meaning of this sword-dance, by whomsoever performed, is difficult to ascertain. It is held, and at first sight the contention seems partly justified, that we have here a relic of the very ancient custom of marriage by capture; but apart from the fact that the sword in the hand of the bride scarcely bears this out, grave doubts exist as to whether there ever was such a custom[317]. There are reasons for believing that this dance may originally have had a different purpose altogether. The subject is far too large and intricate to go into here, but Crawley has shown by numerous examples that certain evil influences are supposed to be abroad at the time of marriages, and that these have to be warded off by various means[318]. To give but one or two of these examples: “Amongst the Bheels and Bheelalahs the groom touches the ‘marriage shed’ with a sword.” This, like the custom among the Bechuanas of the bridegroom throwing an arrow into the hut before he enters to take his bride, is done in order to scare away evil spirits or other harmful influences; this is also the reason, as Crawley points out, of the old Roman custom of a bridegroom combing the bride’s hair with a spear, the coelibaris hasta. So that it is quite conceivable that the sword-dance is a relic of the custom of warding off what are supposed to be invisible foes who gather around at the time of marriages[319].

A dance of another kind, but which may also be a relic of the same custom, is mentioned by Dalman as existing among the Bedouin Arabs. When the bride comes into the house of the bridegroom she performs a dance in slow movement while holding a lighted candle in each hand with outstretched arms; she turns in all directions so as to appear like a star[320].

A few details may now be given of the dance as a marriage rite among the Jews of post-biblical times who have in innumerable ways kept up customs dating from time immemorial. We are not thinking here, any more than in the preceding examples, of the ordinary dancing at weddings which invariably took place as an expression of festive enjoyment; our concern is with ritual dances which, originally at any rate, had a specific and serious object, justifying the epithet “sacred” being applied to them.

During the wedding procession through the streets it was customary for all who could do so to join in and dance in front of the bride, who is spoken of as the “queen”; this was done in her honour. Rabbi Tarphon (2nd century A.D.), we are told, on one such occasion caused the bride to be brought into his house, where she was bathed, anointed, and adorned by his mother and sister. Then he bade his pupils accompany her with songs and dances to the house of the bridegroom[321]. Rabbis of high repute danced in front of brides with myrtle-boughs in their hands. It was also part of the marriage ceremony for a dance, in which the dancers held myrtle-boughs in their hands, to be performed in front of the bridal pair[322]. The perfume of the myrtle is mystically described as dispelling the odour of hell-fire; though why there should be any danger of that odour during the marriage ceremony is not stated. Doubtless we have here an echo of the old-world conception mentioned above. We are reminded of the same thing when we read that among the Jews of Egypt in the Middle Ages during the wedding procession the bride wore a helmet, and, with a sword in her hand, led the procession with a dance[323]. It is possible that the same conception lies behind a custom noted among the Jews of Persia and elsewhere:

An encircling dance had the purpose (one among others, according to circumstances) of keeping off evil influences.

A different purpose lies behind the dance performed among the Jews of the Caucasus, though the dancers are probably not conscious of it: some days before the wedding

This, in all probability, reflects an ancient rite, in the nature of imitative magic, for the purpose of ensuring a fruitful marriage. A similar purpose may be discerned in another custom at Jewish oriental weddings, according to which the newly-married pair leapt thrice over a bowl of water in which a fish was swimming about[326].

Among the Jews of all ages, then, the sacred dance as a wedding ceremony had an important place, and though its purposes may have been entirely forgotten, the rite itself continued.

II

A brief glance at some rites, analogous to those just referred to, as existing among some other peoples will not be without interest. The idea of “royalty” attaching to the bridal pair is seen in Morocco at the present day; the bridegroom is looked upon and treated as a sultan, and his bachelor friends act as his ministers (wazara)[327]. Among the Malays the bride and bridegroom are called Raja sari, “the sovereigns of the day,” and “it is a polite fiction that no command of their’s, during their one day of sovereignty, may be disobeyed[328].” Many similar examples could be given; the underlying idea is that by a change of identity[329],—that it is purely fictitious is no matter—the dangers which are conceived of, however vaguely, as attending those about to be joined in marriage, are mitigated. Westermarck says:

in this class of customs he includes dancing[330]. Why dancing should be supposed to have this effect is another question to which, presumably, different answers will be given. For our own part, we are inclined to believe that at the bottom of it lies a connexion with the original idea and purpose of the sacred dance, viz. the imitation, and therefore the pleasing, of supernatural powers, as already pointed out (see p. 22); not that there was necessarily any consciousness of this; but from the earliest times dancing had had this purpose, and the custom continued without a reason for it being assigned. Not but what the rite as a marriage ceremony may, and doubtless did, have other purposes as well; but these may either have been superimposed, or what is quite possible, a different train of ideas gave rise to them. But behind them all lay, in the first instance, this propitiatory act performed in honour of some supernatural power. All festive dancing at weddings may be regarded as having originated from this. To quote Westermarck again:

Among these ceremonies which have become entirely meaningless, but are continued as a joyful or picturesque performance, was the sword-dance referred to in the Old Testament. This, as we have already noticed, is in all probability the relic of a rite which had the purpose of averting evil influences; it was a more aggressive means of combating these, the change of identity being a passive form serving the same purpose. But as the sword-dance had this combative purpose, any other weapon might have been equally efficacious; indeed, if, as we have reason to suppose, the sword-dance is but the latest form of a very ancient rite, we should expect to find that in its more primitive forms other weapons would be employed, for the sword was, comparatively speaking, a modern weapon. So that while, on the one hand, e.g. among the Druses of Syria, the sword-dance figures as a necessary rite at weddings[332], and among the Moroccans the bridegroom carries a sword as long as the marriage ceremonies continue[333], we find that in the ancient Indian ritual the bride when formally presented to the bridegroom at the wedding ceremony places a whip or an arrow in his hand[334]. That in some cases the carrying or presenting the weapon is unaccompanied by the dance need cause no surprise; they are but exceptions to the general rule, and it is made up for afterwards. An echo of the primitive rite is doubtless to be discerned among the Malayans; at a royal wedding a performance is given by dancing girls and fencers[335]; and at ordinary weddings during the marriage procession there is dancing and fencing to the accompaniment of music and singing[336].

There are various other wedding ceremonies, some accompanied by dancing and some not, which originally had, and often still have, the purpose of counteracting malign influences at the time of marriage; these influences are, or rather were, partly due to the belief in mysterious, vaguely-conceived dangers which the sexes reciprocally ascribed to each other[337], and partly to the strangeness of feeling generated by the knowledge that a new state of life was about to be entered upon which would bring about new experiences as regards oneself, and new relationships as regarded others. As to the former; it is very likely that the “Henna-dance,” which always takes place at weddings among the Malays, had the original purpose of counteracting the dangers alluded to, e.g., the evil eye, possibly; this dance takes its name from the ceremony of dabbing henna on the centre of the palm of the bride. Skeat, in describing the dance, says:

The step is called the “Henna-dance step,” and the tune accompanying it is called the “Henna-staining tune[338].” Doubtless this is an elaboration of the original form of the dance, and a further purpose has been superimposed—the turning of the cup without extinguishing the candles may be differently explained, though it must be a magical rite of some kind—but the henna on the palms certainly seems to point to a means of averting the evil eye.

As to the fears at entering upon a new state, we may be pardoned for quoting Westermarck once more, for he is our foremost authority on the whole subject. He writes:

Here the dance is clearly in the nature of an initiatory ceremony into one class from another, and it has the effect of familiarizing each party with the new status and condition; it may, therefore, be regarded as serving a kind of prophylactic purpose.

This has taken us some way from the sword-dance; but it all really arises from this; for all that has been said points to the belief in the existence of undefined dangers in marriage, and the means to counteract these; and numberless other examples are available. But our main point here is to show how frequently, for whatever reasons, the dance has a part to play in the rites performed.

III

We take now a brief glance at one or two other wedding ceremonies in which the dance figures prominently. We have seen that at Harvest Festivals dances were performed by some peoples for the purpose of making the crops grow. Either by leaping high during the dance, or by the dancers personating the spirits of fertility, or by dances of other kinds, it was believed that the desired effect could be produced. Two ideas often coalesce in such dances: that of a propitiatory act in honour of the god of fertility, and that of an act of imitative magic; but, of course, the two are not always or necessarily combined in the same dance. The purpose of this type of dance, however, is not confined to that of ensuring good crops. We are told, for example, that among the Mandan Indians on the occasion of their great annual festival, a man acts the part of a buffalo bull in the buffalo dance, “the object of which was to ensure a plentiful supply of buffaloes during the ensuing year[340].” To the same circle of ideas belongs that according to which a plentiful supply of fish can be procured by dancing[341]. Instances need not be multiplied. It is evident that the belief was, and probably still is, widespread of dancing being the means of ensuring fertility. Now if this was so in regard to crops and animals, may it not be possible that the same belief existed in regard to human beings? Even though the purpose might have been entirely forgotten the practice might still be continued. It is conceivable that this idea, though forgotten, may underlie the ceremony of “the cleaning of the wheat” to be used at the wedding feast among the Moroccans; this is performed by married women and girls; while some of them are cleaning the wheat others dance and sing, keeping time by clapping their hands; it is so necessary that the dancing should continue during the whole ceremony that when the dancers get tired others take their place[342]. Among the same people the wazara (see p. 184) perform a ceremonial dance in the house of the bride[343]. This may also have been the original purpose of the epithalamium among the Greeks, sung after the wedding feast in the evening before the door of the bridal chamber by a chorus of maidens who danced while they sang; Theocritus refers to this in his eighteenth Idyll (“The Epithalamium of Helen”):

Other instances of a similar character could easily be adduced. The idea is not so fantastic as, at first sight, it may appear to some. When we are dealing with things from the point of view of uncultured man we must not look for the laws of cause and effect to follow the course which would appeal to us. He believes that he can put into motion the working of Nature by means of his own devising; and if he induce or assist the spirits of fertility in producing corn and buffaloes, there is no reason why he should not by the same means assist them in quickening the child-bearing capacity of a woman.

Many other examples could be given of the dance as a marriage rite, but we must content ourselves with the few following references to it among peoples in very different parts of the world:

The Indians of British Columbia, Westermarck, The History of Human Marriage, I. 458 f.; the natives of Central Africa, Miss Alice Werner, The Natives of British Central Africa, p. 131 (1906); the Kayans of Borneo, H. Ling Roth, The Natives of Sarawak and North Borneo, I. 114 f. (1896); the aborigines of Australia, Howitt, The Native Tribes of South Eastern Australia, pp. 233 f., 245 (1904); the natives of Tahiti, Featherman, op. cit. II. 33 f.; the natives of New Britain, George Brown, Melanesians and Polynesians, p. 116 (1910).

SUMMARY AND CONSIDERATIONS

Once only in the Old Testament is there mention of a ceremonial wedding dance, though there are frequent references to other marriage customs. We have to look in other directions for the meaning and purpose of this type of sacred dance. From the custom among the Bedouin Arabs it seems that at their weddings the sword-dance forms one of the most important ceremonies; and from this we may gather that the “dance of Maḥanaim,” mentioned in Canticles, was a similar sword-dance. Various considerations point to the probability of this sword-dance being a relic of the custom of warding off what were conceived to be malign influences at the times of weddings. Traces of the same old-world idea, though, of course, entirely forgotten, are to be discerned in some of the customs among the Jews of the Middle Ages. It is possible that among them certain other ceremonies which were performed on these occasions had the object of ensuring a fruitful marriage.

Very widely spread is the custom of calling the bridegroom and the bride “king” and “queen,” and of treating them as a royal pair during the whole period of the wedding festivities. The reason for this was originally that, by means of change of identity, the bridal pair might avoid the mysterious dangers which were supposed to be present. The idea presumably was that a disguise puzzled the malign visitors so that they did not know on whom to vent their spleen. It is evident that a similar purpose was served by the custom of substituting a mock bride for the real one, or of bride and bridegroom being attended by one or more persons dressed up to resemble her or him; Crawley gives interesting illustrations of both customs[345].

Some other dances in connexion with the marriage ceremony are considered; they have either the purpose of counteracting the evil influences already referred to; or else, as there are some reasons for believing, they were supposed to ensure a fruitful marriage.

It is not to be expected that we should find any trace of these purposes in the Old Testament; but the analogy of Bedouin Arab custom and that of the Jews at later periods offers presumptive evidence that the customs existed among the Israelites, though their original purpose was entirely forgotten.