The Rites Of Adonis.

THE RITES OF ADONIS .

LONDON , SATURDAY , MAT 30 , 1863 .

BY BEO . ROBERT MORRIS , LL . D . Upon my recent visit to Je-bale ( the ancient Byblos and Grebal ) , it was natural that I should give more than ordinary thought to that system of marvellous popularity and duration which hacl , if

not its origin , at least its principal seat near this place . It is the custom of theological writers to refer to the passions of lasciviousness the whole machinery of the worship of Jamniuz , or Adonis . They see nothing in the emblems adopted and the whole drama of those rites but a refined and

horrible system of lust . I am more than doubtful as to the historical justice of this , and would like to see the other side of the question shown up . The River Adonis ( now termed Nahr Ibrahim , or Abraham ' s River ) runs into the sea a short

hour ' s ride south of Je-bale . It is a lively streamwhen I crossed it , about 150 feet wide and 10 or 12 feet deep—fringed with reeds and the ordinary marshy vegetation of this country . It is crossed on the road from Beyrout to Je-bale by a very

handsome and substantial stone-bridge—the best bridge I have yet observed in Syria , except those recently built by the Erench on their turnpike connecting Beyrout with Damascus . Jebale itself—formerly so large and renowned

for its College of Rites and the Applied Sciences —is now but a miserable village , with 500 inhabitants and a small garrison of soldiers ( perhaps

150 ) . The people are chiefly Christians of the Maronite persuasion , with perhaps a score of Moslems who worship in a shabby little mosque . The Maronite church is one of the best preserved edifices of ancient date remaining upon this coast .

Its age of ten centuries is only betrayed by a few dilapidations and discolourations , which merely add to the respect which we naturally pay to antiquity . The town is built upon and surrounded by ruins , but for the most part in a sad condition .

The iconoclastic hammer of the Saracen has defaced every vestige of human or animal forms from the statues , and , if you preserve , as I did , a human figure , a lion , & c ., you must be content with bodies minus heads and limbs . Coins are

exceedingly abundant . These are mostly of casts of Roman and recent times ; but occasionally a handsome " Scander , " as relic-mongers style them ( coins of Alexander the Great ) , comes to

light . I procured from this locality more than 1 , 000 genuine coins ; also a fair collection of scaraboei , tomb-lamps , tear-bottles , and other vestiges of ancient beliefs . So much by way of preface .

It is in the hills , seven miles east of Je-bale and near the source of the Nalir Ibrahim , that the ancient Aphaca , the seat of the worship of Venus and Adonis upon Mount Lebanon , is situated . My authority—Kenrick's " Phoenicia" —does not

attribute the origin of the rite to this locality , but to Assyria , whence , he says , it was brought probably from Hierapolis—first to Lebanon , then to the coast . He refers the word Aphaca ( denoting in Syriac , c to embrace" ) to the history of Yenus and

Adonis , so elegantly wrought out iu ^ Shakespeare ' s poems under that head . The tradition was , that on a certain day of the year a globe or star of fire was supposed to dart from the summit of Lebanon into the river , representing Urania . It was there that Adonis was wounded by the boar , and the stream near which the temple stood was annually

reddened by his blood . Of course every educated reader understands that the actual reddening of the river is occasioned by the reddish soil through which it runs . After every hard rain the stream presents that appearance . It did sO the first day

I crossed it , answering to a hard rain the night before . To lament the mystic death of Adonis , the women of Byblos ( Je-bale ) went to Aphaca ; and as I walked a mile or two upon the ancient road to that place , I endeavoured to reproduce in

my imagination the circumstances connected with those mysterious processions . Without comparing the two ceremonies from a Scriptural point of view , yet' it struck me , while spending one hour , one Saint ' s day , in that old Maronice church , ancl

observing the women of Je-bale secreted in their listless worship , behind a lattice , separated from their lords , andj ' permitted no actual part in the Christian rites , that perhaps no great progress after all hacl been made in their condition since

their mothers journeyed once a yeai-, over these hills , to attend the more attractive rites of JammiiK .

Mr . Kenrick gives the Following as ths Phcenician understanding of this fascinating worship : " The name Adonis , which signifies ' lord , ' was one of those titles of royalty , like Baal ancl Molock , which the Semitic nations gave to the sun as the supreme god , the king of heaven . Being the source of light to the physical world ,