A Mystery Drama of Ancient Babylon

(A Passion Drama of Old Mesopotamia corresponding to

the trial, death and resurrection of Jesus.)

A series of two lectures and a symposium

MBM   December, 1937

The story found on two tablets from excavations at Ashur.  Translation by Sayce.  It gives the steps that belong to the last days of Jesus.  One (of the tablets) is the so-called Hymn of the Sorrowful Man, and this other, which is in the form of a miracle play.

Great teachings appear and reappear.  Their cyclical nature.  The story of the last three days of Jesus fully achieved, as recorded in the Christian Gospels.  It is particularly interesting at this time because this miracle play was presented just before the New Year.  (The tablets) are listed as copies, their date about 900 B.C. but the story is at least two or three thousand years earlier.

The steps begin with the Being taken to the palace, at Pilate.  It puts the teaching of Jesus into the place where it belongs, as part of an eternal Wisdom lore.

Bel (Baal) meant to these people what God means to us now.  His representative is also called Bel, with his own name added.  As in the Lord Jesus.

There is the concept of a great Creator God.  Who had his messengers. Watching over the world.  The unmanifest Logos, Nebu.  But Nebu also had those who manifested for him as his messengers enfleshed.  Marduk.  That is, God incarnate.  He symbolizes the power enfleshed.  And, as the Lord Jesus was God in the struggles of the lower world, so in this mystery play was Marduk, the Bel Enfleshed.

Conceive this extraordinary preparation for the New Year.  It was celebrated for eleven days before the New Year.  And undoubtedly this mystery plan, miracle play, was scattered throughout that period of time.  (The New Year) began at the first of Nisan, corresponding to our about the middle of March.  For the New Year began then.  That is the Jewish calendar, which is derived from the Babylonian.  Time of the vernal equinox.  The mystery play was presented in various parts of the town.

Marduk was the main character.  But he is a symbol for all men, as Jesus is.  At the same time he is the symbol for the god in all men, as well as the godly one who has reached the Christos stage.  As the Lord spoke to Jesus so Nebu comes to see how Marduk is faring.

We are going to celebrate the incarnating struggle and victory of the godly man.  Either the seed in all men which goes through these processes, and does not know it; or else the wise, anointed one, like Jesus, or Marduk, who went through these various steps as an illustrative, or dramatic, setting forth of that which belongs to all souls.  But not all souls in their present state.

The counterpart of Marduk is Sarpanitu, which means Silver Queen.  Indicates that the drama concerns soul and spirit, and a little later, flesh.  The marriage between soul and spirit – the bride and the groom.  So as the drama proceeds we will meet Marduk, Sarpanitu and Nebu, who is the non-incarnate Logos, – never enfleshed, but who watches over the enfleshed messengers.

Temple, the:  A great symbol.  Ensagila.  Means Lofty House.  Set at Babylon, but does not belong to Babylon.  There is a tower.  Which we have also to understand, – in its real meaning, – a ziggurat.  In its real meaning it is the Foundation of Heaven and Earth.  Its top touches heaven, and its base earth.  Its old name was Etemenanki, the Foundation of All Things.

We are taken immediately to the capture of the god.  You remember where Jesus was taken. He had gone out to a particular hill where his disciples were often to be found.  Literally true and symbolically true.  In a higher state is found the god who is taken captive.  And imprisoning him in the house of the mount.  That is our Temple.

     Then, just as in reference to Jesus, the tidings went around.  Scattered.  The followers began to wonder: Who is going to rescue him.  So a herald, as it were, calls out, in this mystery play: Who will rescue Marduk?

     Take it on a third level, the household of the self: Who will rescue the germ of spirit, as incarnated, and as held in that lowly state until you have emancipated it.

     In the drama several rescuers appear.

There is a description of how the god disappeared from the light of day.  That is like the story of the shepherds.  Like again, in a still more intensive way, he was put out and captured from the light of day, – functioning in earth, by those who came to get him at the foot of that mountain, and carried him away to Pilate’s house.  The same takes place here.  So Marduk arrives in the court of this house, and here he is to be tried. As Jesus was tried first in the house of Pilate.

Think of that tower as a shaft.  The god is now imprisoned.  And that lower room is earth.  The god — whether Jesus or the nous in you – is abused.  And the world begins to try it.  As the world is trying you.  The earth calling you — the things of the earth, – and mocking you in trying anything else.  So Marduk is mocked in the base of this tower, as was Jesus.

There is excitement around that place.  Bitter.  Much talking here too.  Struggle.

Now it is that Nebu comes upon the scene: the Logos.  So there were those who comforted Jesus during that stress.  It is said that Nebu came to give homage to Marduk.  As the Larger is always ready to give homage to the smaller who are doing their part.

Struggle, as part of the part Jesus played in the Godhead.  Often our text refers to Marduk as the great Bel.  And again, to the great Bel in earth, to whom Nebu sends his messenger.  Seemed a problem (or somewhat of a problem.)  But it is answered by that other saying of Jesus.  The circuit works either way.  But it is a circle that is closed, if there is a true servant.  The messenger came, as when that signal came, when those who were able to hear, – the dove.  (It was) clothed in that symbol because the bird lived under the same roof.

Nebu gives homage!  But lo, the god is imprisoned in the dark place.  So now, when this occurs, more than ever the followers of Marduk gathered in the street outside the house.  They are filled with excitement, fear and wrath.  Just as the followers of Jesus.  It is enacted right in the street, and in the sacred buildings.

When our tablet was overwritten the people belonged to the Semitic race, of which race the later Jews are a part.  It is therefore interesting that an old custom, which we think of as old with the Jews, is antedated here by thousands of years.  Because the symbol of the pig now appears — the symbol of the life which is close to earth.  The wild pig digs up roots.  Therefore, the digger.  The Semitic race did not leave it at that.  They said that that which sticks its nose continually into the earth is unclean.  Because its nose and all its senses are pointed down.  So the pig became the symbol of the earth man.  Wonder (?) whether (or where) the pig is a substitute for an earlier human sacrifice.

The lady Sarpanitu (Belit, Beltu, Belit-Babili, the Lady of Babylon), this goddess who, you remember, is the soul, now begins to mourn.  And of course it is the soul that must mourn if the spirit is blotted out—the nous in you.  Spirit and soul suffer.  The Lady Belit goes to one of the gates of the temple and there she seeks, where she should, the god Marduk.  And we know that this is becoming the tomb.  Guards watch it, as the soldiers watch the tomb of Jesus.

The lower chamber, inside the great shaft connecting heaven and earth.  The Lord Jesus lay in a dark tomb.  It is at once the prison and the house of death.  He has been stripped of all his garments (that is, Marduk) that indicate his royal nature — spirit losing the power of its higher garments and senses in the flesh.  Again, that in us which holds to that state is also in the dark place, and in prison.  And so is the God, or a representative, who from time to time illustrates these dramas on earth, because of the ignorance, the bigotry and the stupidity of people – those are after the Leader who is teaching them the truth.  They do not want it; do not want to take it.  As with Jesus.  So the god now lies in a darkened tomb.

But a pledge is now laid over him.  And that pledge is a kind of garment, made of wheat ears.  It symbolizes the work of man, – the effort by which man, the God enmeshed, will resurrect himself.  That part of it is his work – the making of bread.  It is a nature myth, say the scholars!

So Bel-Marduk, stripped of his garments of royalty.  And now the wheat ears sprout from his wounds.  A goddess who watches over him.  Those who watched over Jesus.  Some saw them at the tomb.

A reference to Malefactors captured at the same time with Jesus.  We are further told that one of these malefactors was released because the judgment was that he should be released.  Another, who is imprisoned and experiences death with the guiltless god.  In this mystery drama, one is to accompany Marduk to the underworld; the other is released.  This takes place in the same room where Marduk and the other malefactor are condemned.

Overwriting.  Can be observed and detached.  (Even?) before the Assyrian supremacy.  The Assyrian overwriters.  So some of the Assyrians re-wrote this text and filled it in at this point with an Assyrian character: the second malefactor is sent as a guard, in addition to the other guards already mentioned. . . . If you will recall what it is that is victorious you will understand.  This is the dark hour, when the things of flesh are victorious.  Therefore it is proper that that which is a malefactor. . . . Because the world is victorious for a time over the guiltless one.

There are many stories of a slave becoming the king, and some prisoner released for it, etc.  And then, at the end of the three days, he is slain as a sacrifice to the god.

It is at this point that the pig is slain — and rightly so — as a symbol of the nature that should be slain.  And that nature, slain, has its head taken to the place where the god is.  In fact, in part of the ceremonial line one of the     along which this series of episodes was dramatized; how it was done symbolically.  A special pig’s head was fixed to the door of the temple where Belit had gone.  The particular pig’s head carried to this place symbolized the animal nature of that particular spirit who is dramatizing this episode.

Then a processional.  Conceive it like the movement to the mount of Gesthemane, – or the procession coming from it.  Because the motive of that procession is the death of the god.  And that leads right into another scene, in which some important figure, a magus, a great one, announces publicly the death of the god.  And does it before Belit, the soul symbol, who then laments her husband and brother.

Again a story more explicit than that of Jesus.  Like Isis mourning for Osiris, her brother and husband.  Because spirit, or nous, is the brother and husband of the soul, – symbolically speaking.

There was a conditioning of the hearts and minds of those who participated — and they were many — getting themselves conditioned for the great climax, the birth of the New Year.  So that they should have, before they entered that new order, a reminder of what it is about.  Something like Lent.  But that is emotional, – fasting.  Here the people were excited, stimulated, to bring on a new realization.

Belit, – Mary — Mary, the earthly embodiment of the Holy Spirit.  Ishtar, the Mother-goddess of all.  Belit, the soul of the particular one enfleshed.

 

 

Lecture II

MBM   December 17, 1937

 

The tablets were found in 1903-4.  The drama belongs to the primary secret teachings; fundamental.  The passion drama of old Mesopotamia.  A likeness to the passion drama as indicated by Jesus.

The role of cyclical recurrence.  The play was attended as a religious service.  There were eleven days of preparation.  Marduk, the creator and the savior God, both.  Behind Marduk-Bel are other gods.  Enlil, who belongs to the first Trinity.

The story as in the Book of Esther.

There was a time when this old ceremonial was still a mystery play.  At the New Year.  During this year a prisoner was released and pronounced king.  During that time he might do anything he chose.  Sometimes one day, sometimes three days.  It was often called the period of misrule.  At the end of that period the pseudo-king was killed and the true king came back.  In the old custom, the king yielded his place voluntarily.  Shows the higher temporarily subdued by the lower.

The King of Misrule is the fleshly judgments — the attachments that belong to earth.  By and by they are put in their place.  At no time does it imply that the activities of the flesh are given up.  The activities of the flesh are made sane and constructive by the understanding of what this mystery play is.

This story is disguised, as most of the Jewish literature is.  It is really this old story of the Mesopotamian Valley, put into their language.  The feast of Purim is a derivative from old Mesopotamia.  As is the Jewish calendar.  (The Jewish story) is on the folklore level.  The mystery play we are following is of a profounder character.

The nearby god is Bel.  But they have not forgotten the other, greater gods.  This Bel is taken prisoner, – this god in the flesh.  Like Osiris-Asar, in the Egyptian.  Like any other avatar coming down into earth.  This god lives happily for a time in earth.  Then, sooner or later, the forces of earth overpower and capture that god.  In the mystery play we see the last three days of this drama.

The robe in this place on the hill.  There is the taking away of the robe of the god.  As with Jesus.  Here, a robe of wheat ears (placed over him.)  Symbolic of the work done in earth.  It is therefore the means of going to the higher states.  It is his work in earth and water, or in all that belongs to the lower planes.  So that the god is at the point of transformation.

The fighting in the city is also the fighting among the people who are on the outside of the tomb.

As Bel is taken away from the world of light, instruction is given.  A woman, representing the angel in the Christian version, is ordered to withdraw a spear, or sharp weapon, from the body of the god, and whips off that spear head.  From that developed the whole legend of the Holy Grail in the Christian.  A secret play on the role of this Being.  Bel is now taken down into the dark and disappears from life.  He is in the tomb.  There are now guards who are watching over this Being.

Again the symbol of pig killing.  Man, who is man and nothing else, the lower nature.  No Wisdom-teaching belittles the carrying on of man in the world.  What it belittles is the attachment to the things of earth – never the doing of them.  The only development is to learn to carry on your daily responsibility, – and add.  If you don’t do that you are substituting.

While the god is now in the dark place the people make offerings of milk.  Because that is, from time immemorial, the symbol of food to the growing soul.  The cow, whose udders feed the world.  The breast of the mother, of all mammals, that feeds first, milk.  So the god who is nourished.  Presumably awakened, life on another plane must be fed milk.  Also, the people give sign, by the offering of milk, that they understand the ritual.  Bel is now dead.  This milk serves the double purpose that the people understand the play for what it is, and what is to be accomplished; and also are giving sign that that is what the goddess, the Holy Spirit, is giving — that which will bring back life to the dead god.  Because the dead god is the dead spirit in men and women.

Then a conversation between the guardians of this house of the dead and Belit, – Babyla, the goddess of Babylon, the symbol of the soul.  These two are talking; the queen of the dead, the forces watching over these processes.

Reference to a Flood (I Peter, III, 19.).  Also told about Jesus going into the underworld and that those in the underworld were glad to receive him.  When the body is dead you pass over, for a time, into the world where all souls go for a time.  Most of them stay there.  The greater ones pass on.  That is where Jesus was.  Sheol, Purgatory, Limbo, Summerland.  With the soul went that power, stature, like Jesus, or Marduk.

Then the description of a foot race.  Speed, competition, to deliver that soul which is held prisoner.  ?  means spook, the etheric body.  It means that thousands are coming to see what is taking place.  The word goes out: Tell the great gods what has occurred! The result was that the lower gods rejoiced: We have gotten him where we want him!  Others were sad.  Priests chanting statements, hymns, records about what those who were slayers of Bel had done.  As a result of this, now comes another messenger.

Now comes a god who represents the greater god, Enlil.  And this god, because he is supreme, is therefore the healing power.  The healing power is to the One who is bigger than that which has taken place.  He can heal the disorder, or the pain, friction, sorrow.  So now comes a messenger from this Being.  And the one who has prevailed upon Enlil is the feminine counterpart of Enlil.  Again, the Holy Spirit, but more differentiated.

This Great Spirit, who later was referred to as Ishtar.  They used the name to describe that.  Therefore, not the soul of a particular being.  That is what Belit is.  But now the greater world, which is akin to that, the Larger.

And so the garments of the dead god are brought to the Lady Belit.  Belit of the individual soul.  The god is spirit, nous, that which is far beyond soul.

Garments:  If the spirit is to grow to full stature we can see why the garments should be delivered to soul.  Because that type of garments will no longer be necessary.  So the soul bodies return unto that from which they came — “dust unto dust.”  Our god is going higher.  And, sure enough, the next bit of the text when the garments of the dead god are brought to the Lady Belit.  Then a great car approaches with speed into the prison house — like a boat.  The Hymn of the Robe of Glory has a parallel to this bit in the old Mesopotamian tablet.  There, too, a great car approaches with speed.  The Robe of Glory is this car.  “Swing low, sweet chariot” (echo) on a lower level.  This is the higher body.  This great body, which is going to be the carrier of the seed of the god — now in full stature – is rushing toward it.  An experience that everyone should have.  In higher planes is sure to have.

But the god is not yet free, though the car comes.  He is still in the cocoon of the lower world.  Boring holes that separates you from yourself in the transliminal.  In the beginning you look through.  Like the glass bottom boat.  Then you go into that world.  But this is on a higher level.  You make for porosity first, before you can move through.

They (in the higher planes) aid it to put on the garments of the higher state.  Here the gods enter and make the final battle with the gods of the underworld — that which would tie this god.  They cut the strings, – umbilical cord.  Then the god Bel — Nous — is delivered to the world from which it came.  There is great joy.  For now Bel is in the world of Light.

(from discussion or answers to questions after the lecture)

The eleven days of preparation.  With the New Year came the preparation of the individual person — a reminder and a perception that, with the return of the sun in its northern path — what occurs immediately after December 21, we have an upward movement of the sun, – the idea written in symbol by the Planetary Spirit, of man in his higher nature rising again out of the prison house.  Just as plants come out of their prison and grow green again.

These are not nature myths.  Nature is only the humblest illustration of the meaning of these stories.  What a fine preparation this was!

The Savior is the one who shows the way.  There is no vicarious saving.  But by teaching, dramatizing, their god already showed these processes.  There must have been an earlier teaching of these stories.  Descent of the light spark, the struggle in the earth, – which is a struggle bound to be enacted by every Teacher who runs counter to the will, and wish, and interest of the world.  The world’s interest is in reference to the world and worldly things.  The interest of the Teacher is to show the whole story.  And bye and bye the world will resent that, and do what it has done with so many of its Teachers.  Lock them up.

Four objects of this Wisdom series:

(1)  to understand the role of the earth in man’s evolution.  There may be some who have gotten the lessons of earth and have gone on.  Others, who have not yet gotten that lesson, are here.  Maybe those who have understood it better are further along than you, what may be the earth’s role in man’s evolution.  Others may be advanced, who got it seven thousand years ago.

    What are angels?  Etherians.  They may be very advanced, coming back to help the earth.

(2)  to remove crucially false ideas of human needs and purposes.  The things we need are the things that will help us accomplish the process.  Those are our needs.  If we can take on other things, fine.  But that is our major purpose.  What are your human needs?

(3)  to demonstrate the cyclical nature of civilizations.

(4)  to make the beautiful lore of Mesopotamia accessible for present spiritual service.

Old Mesopotamia has served you with the story that concerns all light sparks.  Just as potent as the Christian teachings.  In some ways it supplements it.

One who has developed gets the knowledge from the Reservoir, which is in higher space.  (This was in answer to a question as to whether India or Egypt was the source of knowledge of this kind. GB.)

 

 

Symposium on the Babylonian Ritual,

held after the second lecture.

 

The tablets date from about 900 B.C. but are copies of much older material

Article by Mead (G.R.S.) in the Quest Magazine, June or July, 1922.

Manetho, Plutarch, Herodotus.

Gods higher than Marduk: Oannes.  Enlil.  Nebu.

Trinity: Anu, Enlil, Ea.  Ea the Logos.

Another trinity: Sin, Shamash, Adad; also three stages: Absu, Tiamat, Mumu, the primordial state of substance.

Tiamat, the primordial waters.  The giant who was set up.  Separation, differentiation.  On the Cosmic scale.  From that came Anu, Enlil, Ea, the great Creator God.

Marduk descended from Ea.  Because Ea is the Logos, the great Father of Mind in manifestation.  Marduk a manifestation of the will of God.  Therefore Ea is said to be his father.  Marduk is therefore the spiritual man, or spirit in man.  Therefore he is the one who conquers Tiamat.  If you conquer the raw stuff in you, the lower life, the animal life.  To that extent you are the former, or the conqueror of Tiamat.

Sarpanitu — Silver Gleam, moon, soul.  Soul in the individual

Bel-it, the Lady.

Ensagila, the Great H©use on the hill; the lofty house.

Etemenanki the name of the tower.  It means: Foundation of heaven and earth.  Because it is the joining of the two that makes the foundation.  Moreover, if they were not separated by anything they could not be.  To have anything that is familiar in our dimension we must have separation.  But in that is also a linking.  So the Tower is that which links heaven and earth.

Why is a pig substituted for a human victim?  Actual pigs not used.

Psychenergy is devoted to other purposes today.  Things are not kept from men.  They are too lazy.  It is always there for those who seek.  If you knock correctly.  Everyone can accomplish the next step.