The Lord’s call to Israel, through the prophets, was: “Establish judgment in the gate,”[173] and “Execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates.”[174] A reference to a just and righteous man is to “him that reproveth in the gate.”[175]
Lazarus in his need is laid daily at the gate of the rich Dives, seeking help.[176] So, again, the poor man who was a cripple from his birth was “laid daily at the door of the temple ... called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered into the temple.”[177]
It is written in the Mosaic law, that, when a bondman would bind himself and his family in permanent servitude to his loved master, “his master shall bring him unto God [or to the place of judgment and of covenant], and shall bring him to the door, or unto the door-post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall [thenceforward] serve him forever;”[178] or, as it is elsewhere said, the master shall thrust the awl “through his ear, unto [or into] the door.”[179] Here, apparently, the master and servant appeal together at the household altar, in witness of their sacred covenant.
The high court of Turkey is still called the “Sublime Porte,” the “Exalted Gateway;” and the subjects of the Sultan seek imperial favor at his palace door. He, or his representative, administers justice there, to those who are waiting at his gate.
A promise to Abraham was: “Thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies.”[180] And again Jesus says of his Church, that “the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.”[181] In both these cases “gates” are obviously equivalent to the power of those who are within the gates. Thus, also, when the overthrow of a city is foretold in prophecy, it is said, that “the gate is smitten with destruction.”[182]
Because the threshold of the doorway is the primitive altar of the household, the doorway itself is, as it were, a framework above the altar; and the side-posts and lintel of the doorway fittingly bear tokens or inscriptions in testimony to the sacredness of the passage into the home sanctuary. It would seem that originally the blood poured out in sacrifice on the threshold was made use of for marking the door-posts and lintel with proofs of the covenant entered into between the in-comer and the host; and that afterwards other symbols of life, and appropriate inscriptions, were substituted for the blood itself.
There are survivals in the East, at the present time, of the original method of blood-marking the frame of the doorway; and there are traces of its practice in ancient times in both the East and the West. President Washburn, of Robert College, Constantinople, says:[183] “I remember, after the great fire in Stamboul, in 1865, going over the ruins, and coming to a house that the fire had spared; a sheep had been sacrificed on the threshold, and a hand dipped in the blood and struck upon the two door-posts.”
This appears, also, in the installing of a Chief Rabbi in modern Jerusalem. In the welcome to the Hakham Bâshi, or the “First in Zion,”[184] “the multitude of those gathered together accompany him to his house, but before he sets the sole of his foot upon the threshold of the outer gate [or court] one of the shokheteem [or official slaughterers] slays a perfect beast, and pronounces the sacrificial blessing, and all those present answer, Amen. Then the rabbi, the Hakham Bâshi, steps over the beast which has been slain, and the shokhet dips the two palms of his hands into the blood, and marks first the vessels of the rabbi’s house. And, with his hands stained with blood, he forms the semblance of a hand above the lintel of the door;–in their trust that this thing is good [the proper thing] for the evil eye;–and the flesh of the beast they distribute to the poor.”[185]
A custom in this same line is noted among the Jews in Morocco, in connection with wedding observances. “Whilst the bullock, or other animal, is being slaughtered for the evening’s festivities, a number of boys dip their hands in the blood, and make an impression of an outspread hand on the door-posts and walls of the bride’s house;” supposedly “for the purpose of keeping off the ‘evil eye,’ and thus ensuring good luck to the newly married couple.”[186]
There are indications of such a custom in ancient times. Layard says of his researches in Assyria: “On all the slabs forming entrances in the oldest palaces of Nimroud, were marks of a black fluid resembling blood, which appeared to be daubed on the stone. I have not been able to ascertain the nature of this fluid; but its appearance cannot fail to call to mind the Jewish ceremony of placing the blood of the sacrifice on the lintel of the doorway.”[187]
In ancient Egypt there were inscriptions, together with the name of the owner, on the side-posts and lintels of the dwellings. “Besides the owner’s name,” says Wilkinson,[188] “they sometimes wrote a lucky sentence over the entrance of the house, for a favorable omen, as ‘The Good Abode,’ the múnzel mobárak of the modern Arabs, or something similar; and the lintels and imposts of the doors in the royal mansions were frequently covered with hieroglyphics, containing the ovals and titles of the monarch. It was, perhaps, at the dedication of the house, that these sentences were affixed; and we may infer, from the early mention of this custom among the Jews, that it was derived from Egypt.”[189]
When it is understood that the inscribing, on the doorways, of dedications to protecting deities, was common among primitive peoples, it would seem to be in accordance with that custom that the Hebrews were commanded to dedicate their doorways to the one living God. It is said of the words of the covenant of God with his people, as recorded in Deuteronomy 6 : 4–9 and 11 : 13–21, “Thou shalt write them upon the door posts of thy house, and upon thy gates.” To this day, among stricter Jews, these covenant words inscribed on parchment, and enclosed in a cylinder of glass, or a case of metal or of wood, are affixed to the side-posts of every principal door in the house. This case and inscription are called the “mezuza.” On the outside of the written scroll, the divine name, Shaddai,–“the Almighty,”–is so inscribed that it may be in sight through an opening in the case or cylinder. This name stands for “the Guardian of the dwellings of Israel,” whose protection is thus invoked above the primitive altar of the household on the threshold of the entrance way.[190]
“Every pious Jew, as often as he passes the mezuza, touches the divine name with the finger of his right hand, puts it to his mouth and kisses it, saying in Hebrew, ‘The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in, from this time forth, and for evermore;’[191] and when leaving on a business expedition he says, after touching it, ‘In thy name, kuzu bemuchsaz kuzu (=God), I go out and shall prosper.’”[192] In some cases the covenant words are inscribed directly upon the door-posts, instead of being written on parchment and enclosed in a case.
On the lintels of the ancient synagogues in Palestine there were sculptured symbolic figures, such as the paschal lamb, a pot of manna, a vine, or a bunch of grapes, together with inscriptions; and the door-posts were ornamented more or less richly.[193] Evidences of this are still abundant.
Speaking of the writing over the door and all round the room at the office of the consul in Sidon, Dr. Thomson says that Muhammadans “never set up a gate, cover a fountain, build a bridge, or erect a house, without writing on it choice sentences from the Koran, or from their best poets. Christians also do the same.”[194] These writings are deemed a protection against harm from evil spirits.
In Persia, both the Muhammadans and the Armenians inscribe passages from their sacred books above their doorways, with ornamental adornings, in “strange, fantastic patterns.”[195] The palace doorways in ancient Persia were inscribed and ornamented in a high degree.[196]
At the present time, in China, coins are put under the door-sill at the time of its laying, and charms are fastened above the door;[197] the gods of the threshold are invoked at the doorway by shrines and inscriptions, while sentences, as in ancient Egypt, are written on the side-posts and lintel.[198] At the festival of the fifth month of the Chinese year, “charms, consisting of yellow paper of various sizes, on which are printed images of idols, or of animals, or Chinese characters, are pasted upon the doors and door-posts of houses, in order to expel evil spirits.” In times of pestilence, sentences written in human blood are fastened on the door-posts for protection from disease.[199]
Describing a ceremony on a large Chinese junk when starting out on a long voyage, an observer tells of the sacrifice of a fowl in honor of the divinity called Loong-moo, or the Dragon’s Mother. A temporary altar was erected at the bow of the vessel, as its beginning, or threshold, and the blood of the sacrificed fowl was shed there. Pieces of silver paper were “sprinkled with the blood [of the fowl], and then fastened to the door-posts and lintels of the cabin.”[200] The cabin door is the home door of the voyager.
Above the house door of almost every home, in large portions of Japan, there is suspended the shimenawa, or a thin rope of rice straw, which is one of the sacred symbols of ancient Shintoism. Above the doors of high Shinto officials, this symbol is of great size and prominence. Its presence is as a sign of a covenant with the gods.[201]
The Greeks certainly recognized the entrance of the house as the place for an altar to the protecting deity. “Before each house stood, usually, its own peculiar altar of Apollo Agyieus, or an obelisk rudely representing the god himself;” and that over the house door, “for good luck,” or as a talisman, “an inscription was often placed.”[202] And on occasions, as when a bride entered her husband’s house, the doorway was “ornamented with festive garlands.”[203] Theocritus refers to a Greek custom of smearing the side-posts of the gateway with the juice of magic herbs, as a method of appeal to the guardian deity to influence the heart of the dweller within toward the suppliant at the door.[204]
Roman householders affixed to the lintels and side-posts of their doors the spoils and trophies taken by them in battle. Branches, and wreaths of bay and laurel, were hung by them in the doorway on a marriage occasion; and lamps and torches were displayed at their doors at other times of rejoicing; while cypresses were shown there at the time of a death.[205]
Texts of Scripture, and other inscriptions, as a means of invoking a blessing at the doorway, are frequently found at the present time above the entrance of houses in South Germany.
In Central America and in South America the blood of sacrificial offerings was smeared on the doorways of houses as well as of temples, as a means of covenanting with the local deities. Illustrations of this are found in the records and remains of Peru[206] and Guatemala.[207]
In both Europe and America, the practice of nailing horseshoes on the side-posts of a doorway, for “good luck,” or as a means of guarding the inmates of the house from evil, is very common. So lately as the seventeenth century it was said: “Most houses of the West End of London have the horseshoe on the threshold.”[208] Even at the threshold of Christian churches, in recent years, the symbol of the horseshoe was to be found as a means of protection.[209] The horseshoe is often to be found on a ship’s mast. At the present time, horseshoes of various sizes, for use as doorway guards against evil, are found on sale in Philadelphia, and other centers of civilization.
It would seem that, in primitive practice, the hand of the covenanter dipped in the sacrificial blood on the threshold, and stamped on the door-posts and lintel, was the sign-manual of the covenant between the contracting party or parties, and God, or the gods, invoked in the sacrifice. Illustrations of this custom, as still surviving in the East, have been given, from Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Morocco.[210] Naturally, therefore, the sign-manual by itself came to stand for, or to symbolize, the covenant of the threshold altar; and the stamp of the red hand became a token of trust in God or the gods covenanted with in sacrifice, and of power or might resulting from this covenant relation. Wherever the red hand was shown, or found, it was a symbol of covenant favor with Deity, and it came to be known, accordingly, as the “hand of might.”
In the region of ancient Babylonia, also, the red-hand stamp is still to be seen on houses and on animals, apparently as the symbol of their covenant consecration by their owner. Dr. Hilprecht says: “Over all the doors of the rooms in the large khan of Hillah, on the Euphrates, partly built upon the ruins of ancient Babylon, I noticed the red impression of an outspread hand, when I was there in January, 1889. Several white horses in our caravan from Bagdâd to Nippur had the stamp of a red hand on their haunches.”
This symbol is much used in Jerusalem. Referring to its frequency, Major Conder says: “The ‘hand of might’ is another Jewish belief which may be supposed to have an Aryan origin. This hand is drawn on the lintel or above the arch of the door. Sometimes it is carved in relief, and before one house in the Jews’ quarter, in Jerusalem, there is an elaborate specimen, carefully sculptured and colored with vermilion. Small glass charms, in the form of the hand, are also worn, and the symbol is supposed to bring good luck. The Jewish and Arab masons paint the same mark on houses in course of construction; and, next to the seven-branched candlestick, it is probably the commonest house-mark in Jerusalem.”[211]
A Jerusalem Jew thus tells of its use among a portion of his co-religionists in that city: “Our brethren the Sephardeem [the Spanish Jews], like all the remnant of the sons of the East, consider the semblance of a hand as good against the power of the evil eye in a man. And they draw this shape upon the doors of their houses with a red finger. So, too, they place upon the heads of their children a hand wrought in silver, saying that this hand–or this picture of the five fingers–is noxious to the man who delights to bring the evil upon the child, or upon those dwelling in the house. So, again, when men quarrel, the one sets his five fingers before the other’s evil eye, saying that this sign neutralizes the evil.”[212]
This sign of the hand is “found on the houses of Jews, Muslims, and Christians, in various parts of Palestine.” It is generally painted on or above the door, often in blue; but frequently, especially when a Jew or a Muhammadan enters a new house, a lamb is sacrificed at the door, and the stamp of the hand in the fresh blood is affixed to the post or to the walls.[213] No one claims to know the origin of this symbol, but all recognize its importance.
In its ruder form the figure of the hand is much like a five-branched candlestick. Indeed, it has sometimes been mistaken for that symbol. This was the case when such a figure was noticed, not long ago, by Dr. Noetling, on Jewish houses in Safed, and reported to a European journal. This symbol is sometimes called the “Hand of Moses.” A similar figure on Muslim houses is said to represent the “Hand of the Prophet;” while in Syria, among Christians, it is called the Kef Miryam, the “Virgin Mary’s Hand.”[214] Obviously these terms suggest the idea of power through divinely derived strength.
One of the sights in the Mosk of St. Sophia, in Constantinople, is the stamp of a red hand. It is said that when Sultan Muhammad II. entered this sanctuary as a conqueror, he dipped his right hand in the blood of the slaughtered Christians, and stamped it on the wall, as if to seal his victory, and to pledge his covenant devotion to his God.[215] Whether this story be fact or legend, it is a witness to the idea of such a custom in the minds of Oriental peoples.
An open hand is, or was, a common symbol on a banner, as also on a prayer-rug, in both Turkey[216] and Persia. At the annual festival in Persia in commemoration of the death of Hossein, son of Alee, two large banners, each surmounted with an open hand, are borne in front of the representation of the tomb of Hossein; and the same symbol appears in various ways during the celebration.[217]
“In the East Indies, to this day, the figure of a hand is the emblem of power and governmental sway. When the Nabob of Arcot was the viceroy of five provinces, if he appeared in public there were carried before him certain little banners, each with a hand painted on it, and a larger banner with five hands.”[218]
Siva, the destroyer, in the Hindoo triad, is also the re-creator; since death is only the entrance into a new life. One of Siva’s well-known symbols is a hand, which is a token of might and life.
The uplifted open hand was prominent on or above the doors in ancient Carthage.[219] And a traveler in Northern Africa, writing of the Jews in Tunis, near the site of Carthage, says: “What struck me most in all the houses was the impression of an open bleeding hand on every wall of each floor. However white the walls, this repulsive sign was to be seen everywhere. A Jewess never goes out here without taking with her a hand carved in coral or ivory–she thinks it a talisman against the ‘evil eye,’ or ‘mal occhio.’... When his children’s pictures or horses are praised, the Tunisian Jew extends his five fingers, or pronounces the number ‘five;’ he tries by this means to prevent the praise doing damage.”[220]
This symbol of the open hand is frequently found above the graves in the vicinity of Tunis. It is also seen in old Jewish cemeteries in Europe, as, for instance, in Prague.[221]
An open hand, in stone, or metal, or enamel, or bone, used as a talisman or an amulet, to guard the wearer against evil, was in common use in ancient Egypt. Specimens of these can be seen in museums in Europe and America to-day.
It is a noteworthy fact that the uplifted hand is prominent in the representation of the deities of Babylonia, Assyria, Phenicia, and Egypt, especially of the gods of life, or of fertility, who have covenant relations with men. And the same is true of the representations of sovereigns, in the ancient East, who are supposed to be in peculiar covenant relations with the gods.
Thus, on the seal of Ur-Gur, the earliest ruler of “Ur of the Chaldees,”[222] the ruler and his attendants appear with uplifted hands before the moon-god Sin, who in turn is represented with his hand uplifted, as if he were making covenant with them.[223] It is the same with the sun-god Shamash and his worshipers.[224]
When a king of ancient Babylon was recognized as having a right to the throne, he must lift up his hand and clasp the hand of the image of Bel-Merodach, in order to show that he had “become the adopted son of the true ruler of the city.” This giving and taking of the hand was a symbol of covenanting in Babylonia. In this way a child was adopted into a family, and a husband and a wife covenanted to become one.[225]
The god Asshur, and his worshipers, kings or princes, are similarly represented in Assyria with the hand uplifted. And it is the same there with other deities and their worshipers.[226] In Phenicia, and its colonies, the same idea has prominence.[227]
Deities of ancient Egypt are frequently represented with the uplifted hand, and their accepted worshipers appear before them with the right hand uplifted.[228] As showing that this is not the attitude of supplication or of adoration, like the bowed form, the crossed arms, or the upturned palms, it is to be noted that in the representation of Amenophis IV., or Khuen-aten, with his family, before the aten-ra or the solar disk, the worshipers stand with their right hands uplifted, while the sun-god reaches down a series of open hands, as if in covenant proffer to the uplifted hands below.[229]
In the county of Roscommon, in Ireland, there is a stone known as “a druidical altar,” which the common people say was thrown there by the giant Fin-mac-Coole, “the print of whose five fingers, they say, is to be seen on it.” The hand-print is pointed to confidently as the proof of authenticity, as if it were the veritable signature of the giant.[230]
Among the ruins in Central America, there were found at the doorways and on the walls of many of the ruined buildings of Yucatan the stamp of a red hand on the plaster or on the stone. “They were the prints of a red hand, with the thumb and fingers extended, not drawn or painted, but stamped by the living hand, the pressure of the palm upon the stone. He who made it had stood before it alive, ... and pressed his hand, moistened with red paint, hard against the stone. The seams and creases of the palm were clear and distinct in the impression.” As showing the idea prevalent among the natives of that region with reference to the source and meaning of these signs-manual, the Indians of Yucatan said that the stamp was of “the hand of the owner of the building,” as if he had affixed it to his dwelling in token of his covenant with its guardian deity; and, again, it was thought that “these impressions were placed there in a formal act of consecration to the gods.”[231]
There is a clear recognition of this idea in many Bible references to the lifting up of the hands unto God, as if in covenant relations with him. Thus, Abraham says to the king of Sodom, “I have lift up my hand unto the Lord;”[232] as if he would say, I have pledged myself to him. I have given him my hand. And the Psalmist says: “I will lift up my hands in thy name.”[233] God himself says, by his prophet: “I will lift up mine hand to the nations;”[234] that is, I will covenant with them.[235] And so in many another case. Indeed, the Assyrian word for swearing (nish) is literally “lifting up the hand;”[236] and the Hebrew word nasa means to lift up the hand or to swear.[237] The uplifted hand in a judicial oath seems to be a survival of the same thought, that an appeal is thus made to God, as one’s covenant God.
Again, there may be a reference to the “hand of might” in a covenant relation, in those passages where God is spoken of as bringing his people out of Egypt by “a strong hand,” or “a mighty hand,” and as dealing with them afterwards in the same way.[238]
An uplifted hand is a symbol found also on the stepped pyramid temples of Polynesia.[239]
This sign of the red hand is still a familiar one among the aborigines of America. It is stamped on robes and skins, and on Indian tents.[240] Schoolcraft says of it: “The figure of the human hand is used by the North American Indians to denote supplication to the Deity or Great Spirit, and it stands in the system of picture-writing as the symbol for strength, power, or mastery, thus derived [through a covenant relation]. In a great number of instances which I have met with of its being employed, both in the ceremonial of their dances and in their pictorial records, I do not recollect a single one in which this sacred character is not assigned to it.”[241]
A frequent use of the hand-print among the American Indians is as “a symbol applied to the naked body after its preparation and decoration for sacred and festive dances.” These preparations are “generally made in the arcanum of the medicine, or secret lodge, or some private place, and with all the skill of the priest’s, the medicine-man’s, or the juggler’s art. The mode of applying it in these cases is by smearing the hand of the operator with white or colored clay, and impressing it on the breast, the shoulder, or other part of the body. The idea is thus conveyed that a secret influence, a charm, a mystic power, is given to the dancer, arising from his sanctity, or his proficiency in the occult arts.” Schoolcraft, speaking of this custom, says: “The use of the hand is not confined to a single tribe or people. I have noticed it alike among the Dacotah, the Winnebagoes, and other Western tribes, as among the numerous branches of the red race still located east of the Mississippi River, above the latitude of 42°, who speak dialects of the Algonquin language.”[242]
Is there possibly any connection with this idea in the custom of “the laying on of hands,” as a symbol of imparting virtue or power to one newly in covenant relations with those who are God’s representatives, so frequently referred to in the Bible?[243] This would seem to be indicated by the power imparted to an Egyptian king by the touch of the uplifted hand of the deity, as shown in the representations on the monuments of Egypt. It was known as “the imposition of the Sa,” or increased vitality.[244]
A remarkable illustration of the use of the red-hand print among American Indians is given in the story of a famous Omaha chief, who, when dying, enjoined it upon his followers to carry his body to a prominent look-out bluff above the Missouri River, and bury him there, full armed, on the back of his favorite war-horse, who was to be buried alive, that he might watch from that place the passing of the whites up and down the river. It would seem as if he wanted to be known as dying in the faith of his covenant relations with the Great Spirit, for himself and for his people.
Because of this request, in the presence of his assembled tribe “he was placed astride his horse’s back, with his bow in his hand, and his shield and quiver slung; with his pipe and his medicine bag; with his supply of dried meat, and his tobacco pouch replenished; ... with his flint and steel, and his tinder, to light his pipe by the way. The scalps that he had taken ... were hung to the bridle of his horse. He was in full dress and equipped; and on his head waved ... his beautiful head-dress of the war-eagle’s plumes.” As he stood thus on the threshold of the life beyond, when the last funeral honors were performed by the medicine-men, “every warrior of his band painted the palm and fingers of his right hand with vermilion, which was stamped and perfectly impressed on the milk-white sides of his devoted horse,”–as if in covenant pledge of fidelity to their chief in the sight of the Great Spirit.[245]
There is another phase of the red-hand symbolism among the American Indians, which has been noted by Frank H. Cushing, who is so experienced and careful an observer of their customs and ceremonies. This phase connects the symbol directly with the idea of life and its transmission. Mr. Cushing says:[246]
“By reference to the paintings (and writings, to some extent) of such men as Catlin and Stanley, and to the works of Schoolcraft, Matthews, Bourke, and others, you will find that the red-hand symbol was painted on the lodges, sometimes on the clothing and person, and sometimes on the shields of various of the hunter tribes of the plains,–as, for example, of the Ioways, Sauks and Foxes, Sioux, Arickarees, Cheyennes, Arapahos, and Comanches. Precisely what the significance of the symbol was, with these peoples and others like them, I am not able to say, save that in some cases it was connected with war, in others with treaties, and in yet others as expressive of power. There were yet other meanings attached to the sign; but neither the former significances nor these latter were, I take it, as definite or fixed [with the hunter tribes] as with the more advanced and settled tribes of the farther south.
“Of these tribes, the typical Pueblos and the peoples more or less directly influenced by them–such as the Jicarillas on the north and east, and the Apaches to the south and west[247]–made frequent use of not only the red-hand symbol, but also of the black-hand symbol. I have seen both, not only in the modern but also in the very ancient pueblos–as those of the Pecos, and those of the great cliff-dweller towns in the Chelly and other canyons. In the Pecos ruins, to give a special example, I copied beautiful hand-paintings and prints from the rafters, as well as from the walls of ordinary dwelling-rooms. Sometimes these paintings were in red, but more often in black. They invariably represented the hands of women, as could be seen by their delicacy and smallness of outline and by their shapeliness. There was, I think, a reason for this, which the following facts will explain.
“It was my good fortune to witness, early in the eighties, a ceremonial celebrating the attainment to puberty, or womanhood, of a young girl of the Jicarilla Apaches. The latter people are not to be confounded with the Apaches proper. They are a mixed people, descended not only from the Apaches, but also the Comanches, and in large part also from the Pueblos of the north, the so-called Tañoans of whom the Pecos people were a branch. It was clear from the character of the masks and other paraphernalia used in the ceremonials I witnessed, that the latter were almost, if not quite, wholly derived from the pueblo, rather than from the wilder, ancestry of the Jicarillas who performed them.
“The ceremonial in question was performed by four medicine-men, or priests, as one might call them, within and around a rectangular enclosure of evergreen boughs set in the plain near to the village. Inside of this enclosure, which was designed to screen from view the more secret operations of the priest dancers in question, stood a little conical skin lodge, the snow-white top of which appeared above the screen of evergreen, and within which the young girl, over whom these rites were being enacted, was ensconced, together with one or two old women of the tribe. As I have said before, each of the priests, on appearing (and this they did successively; that is, the first on the first day, the second on the second day, and so on), wore a conical mask or helmet, which entirely concealed, not only the face, but also the head. This mask was painted black or red, and upon the face of it appeared one of these hand symbols. Unfortunately, I did not see the mask as worn by the first priest, but, as worn by the second priest on the morning of the second day, it bore upon its face the symbol of the red hand; and as worn upon the third day, this symbol recurred, but, if I remember aright, was surrounded by an outline of another color, either black or yellow, whilst the hand painted on the mask as worn on the fourth day was black surrounded by white, that it might stand out more conspicuously; and in turn, below it, were two or more dots alternating with dotted circles.
“My means of communicating with these people were but limited, but on learning that the ceremonials they were performing were designed to celebrate the attainment to maturity, or womanhood, of a virgin, I had little difficulty in understanding the significance of the succession of these various hand symbols. I recognized in the ceremonial as a whole the dramatic epitomization, to state it briefly, of the four ages of a woman’s life. Thus the white hand (which I was told had been painted on the mask of the first day) symbolized her infancy and girlhood, the consummation of which was effected by the first day’s ceremonial performed by the medicine-man of the white hand.
“The red hand was obviously significant of this girl’s attainment to young womanhood, the color in this case symbolizing the blood of her perfected life. I imagine that the black hand painted on the mask as worn during the third day’s ceremonial was significant of not only the betrothal of the girl, which was said to have taken place during that day of the ceremonial, but also of her prospective maternity; the change of color, in the hand, from red to black, being naturally a symbolic representation of the change from red to black in blood that has been exposed to the sunlight and dried, and has thus become black, and is no longer virgin. Likewise the hand painted on the mask as worn during the fourth day’s ceremonial, which was wholly black, doubtless represented the fuller life of not only a matron but a grandmother. From this I would infer that the signs of the red and black hands found in the ruined pueblos like those of Pecos, and on the cliffs at the mouths of caves, or in the houses of the cliff villages, symbolized respectively virginity, and maternity or betrothal.
“What would seem to indicate the correctness of this conclusion is the fact that, as I have mentioned before, there were below the signs of the black hand of the last day’s ceremonial of the Jicarillas dots and dotted circles. It is well known that these dots and dotted circles represent, primarily, grains of corn, male and female; and, secondarily, children, male and female. Their occurrence, then, below the painted black hand or symbol of maternity, would indicate that in this case they represented the children and perhaps grandchildren, male and female, of the matron it was hoped this young girl might become.
“The hand symbol as occurring amongst the Zuñi, with whom, of course, I am much more familiar, has not only some such significances as these, but also many others,–the significance of a given symbol depending upon the ceremonial with which it is associated, and particularly upon the coloring which is given to it, the colors being as various as are the well-known seven sacramental colors employed to symbolize the seven regions of the world by the priesthood of these people.
“I will only add, that the hand symbol painted upon the walls of the estufas, or Kiva temples, or upon the little sacred sand mounds, which are made to symbolize mythic mountains of the six regions during the ceremonials of initiation performed once every four years over the new children of the pueblo, are designed to signify the various ritualistic precepts which are taught to the children according as they are held to pertain to one or another of these little sand mounds or so-called mountains of generation.
“In the case above described I was told, although I did not myself see it, that the symbol of the red hand was painted by the side of the entrance to the little tent in which the girl sat through the ceremonials, and that later the same symbol in black was added to the other side of the entrance to this tent. In the case of the Pueblos the position of the hand symbols depends, as, no doubt, you have already inferred, upon the sort of ceremonial which is being performed in connection with them.
“It would seem, however, that the placing of these symbols at the entrance of the cave villages would correspond to such usages as I have above described as pertaining to the Jicarilla ceremonial, and that the painting of them on the rafters of rooms in ancient pueblos had a like connection; for it must be remembered that in the older pueblos there were no doorways proper [hence no thresholds]. The rooms were entered by means of ladders through scuttles in the roof.”[248]
A hand-print is a signature. A hand-print in blood is a pledge of life in a sacred covenant. A hand-print in the blood of life is symbolic of a covenant of life with a view to the transmission of life. When a woman of Korea is married, she affixes her sign manual to the covenanting contract by placing her hand on the paper and having “the outline drawn round the fingers and wrist with a fine brush dipped in Chinese ink,” or again she employs “the simpler process of smearing her hand with black paint, and hitting the document with it.[249]
Formal documents have often been signed by a hand stamp, or a finger stamp, in blood or in ink. The monks of the convent of St. Catharine at Mt. Sinai, for instance, show a copy of the certificate of protection given to them by the Prophet of Islam, the signature to which is an impression of Muhammad’s open hand. A letter to Muhammad Issoof, from the king of Mysore, in 1754, was sealed with the king’s seal, “and on the back was stamped the print of a hand, a form equivalent, with the Mysoreans, to an oath.”[250]
The very term “sign manual,” employed for a veritable signature, may point to an origin in this custom. Indeed, may it not be that the large red seal attached to important documents, at the present time, is a survival of the signature and seal of the bloody hand?
Originally the covenant sacrifice at the threshold was with the one God of life. But as monotheism degenerated into polytheism, the idea came to prevail of different deities in different portions of the door, or of different deities in different districts of country or in different offices of life.
Each gate of an Assyrian city was dedicated to a special god, and named after it,–as the gate of Bel, the gate of Beltis, the gate of Anu, the gate of Ishtar. At the entrance-way of every gate gigantic winged bulls with human heads stood on guard, accompanied by winged genii.[251] And the central doorway to the king’s palace was similarly guarded.[252] In every house a special deity was appealed to at different portions of the doorway; Nergal on the top of the wall and beneath the threshold; Ea and Merodach in the passage to the right and left of the gate.[253]
The idea of an offering, or of a dedication, to the local divinity, at the time the threshold is laid, is of wide acceptance. In India, “the god Vāttu, or Vāttuma [a son of Vishnoo], is said to recline and live in the threshold, changing his position every month.... On the day when the door-frame and threshold of a new house or temple are fixed, the Vāttuma santhe [the tribute to Vāttuma] is offered.”[254]
In China, “Shintu and Yuhlui are named as two tutelar gods to whom the guardianship of the house is entrusted; and either the names or grotesque representations of these ‘gods of the threshold’ are at the gate of the house, with shrines to them upon the left of the entrance way.”[255]
It is said of these “Chinese gods of the threshold,” that “in full stature, and presumably in primeval strength, they flank the doors of monasteries and the entrances to the halls of justice. Much reduced in size and perched high on shelves, they face each other in the vestibules of the Chinese home; and in their most diminutive aspect they become little images, occasionally two-headed, which are carried about the person as charms, or hang from the eaves of Chinese houses.”[256]
Over the doors of almost all the houses of Japan are to be seen small prints of the “gigantic Ni-o, the Booddhist Gog and Magog,” who are supposed to guard the entrance way of the holy places.[257] Private buildings as well as public need this spiritual protection.
The inscriptions at the doorways of the houses of ancient Egypt showed that every building was “placed under the protection of a tutelary deity.” This custom “is retained by the modern Egyptians in the protecting genius said to preside over the different quarters of Cairo.”[258]
Tertullian, a Christian Father who wrote before the close of the second century, in warning believers against the seducements of idolatry, emphasized the clustering of deities at the doors and gates in the religions of Greece and Rome.[259] He says that “among the Greeks ... we read of Apollo Thyræus (that is, of the door), and the Antelii (or, Anthelii) demons, as presiders over entrances;” while among the Romans there are other “gods of entrances; Cardea (Hinge-goddess), called after hinges; and Forculus (Door-god) after doors; and Limentinus (Threshold-god) after the threshold; and Janus (Gate-god) himself after the gate.”
Although a Christian might not recognize these gods as gods, he is told to beware lest he seem to give them honor by adorning his gates with lamps or wreaths. “Indeed, a Christian will not even dishonor his own gate with laurel crowns,” says Tertullian, “if so be he knows how many gods the devil has attached to doors.” And his words of warning are: “Since there are beings who are adored in entrances [doorways], it is to them that both the lamps and laurels will pertain. To an idol you will have done whatever you shall have done to an entrance [or doorway].” “If you have renounced [heathen] temples, make not your own gate a [heathen] temple.” Yet, in proof of the prevalence of this heathen custom among Christians, Tertullian testifies: “‘Let your works shine,’ says He; but now all our shops and gates shine! You will now-a-days find more doors of heathens without lamps and laurel-wreaths than of Christians.”
In Guatemala, in Central America, “the god of houses” is called Chahalka; and the blood of sacrifices to him is sprinkled on the door of the houses as an assurance of his protection.[260]
It was much the same in the Old World as in the New. In ancient and in modern times, and in widely different portions of the world, there are indications that the threshold of the home was the primitive altar; and that the side-posts and lintel of the doorway above the threshold bore symbols or inscriptions in proof of the sacredness of the entrance to the family home, and in token of an accomplished covenant with its guardian God, or gods.