igoS.] IN BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 661 



accordingly entered as unfavorable in the collections, and when the 

 same conditions again took place, the fact was reported to the king 

 who would thus be warned either against undertaking an expedition 

 or at least would be prepared for some disaster or discomfiture. 



To even partially enumerate the phenomena noted in the astro- 

 logical collections would carry us too far, and it will easily be seen 

 how in the course of time the collections would grow to huge pro- 

 portions.^* Halos around the moon or sun, moon and sun eclipses, 

 thunder in certain months or on certain days, one planet or the 

 other standing within the halo around the moon, the appearance of 

 Venus or some other planet at the heliacal rising or at some other 

 point in its course, the appearance of the moon's horns or crescent, 

 the position or appearance of a certain planet or of a certain star 

 are among the phenomena entered and here the prognostications vary 

 according to the season of the year, according to the month or day 

 of the mionth.^^ 



Without losing sight of the purely artificial character of the 

 system of interpretation devised by the Babylonian theologians, one 

 should not withhold one's meed of praise for the consistency with 

 which the elaborate system was carried out for a long stretch of 

 centuries, as well as for the patience displayed in the compilation of 

 the extensive collections of omens of which only portions have come 

 down to us. Moreover, the Babylonian-Assyrian astrology shows 

 that even a superstition can harbor an exalted idea, for the result of 

 the continuous observation of the movements and aspects of planets 

 and stars must have been to impress at all events the priests with the 

 realization of the reign of law in the universe; and it is, assuredly, 

 a decided gain to realize that even the activity of the gods is under 

 the sway of a fixed order. In striking contrast to hepatoscopy 

 which rests upon the arbitrary nature of the gods and merely aims 

 to fathom their caprice, astrology starts with the recognition of the 



^*The best known of such astrological collections in Ashurbanapal's 

 famous library is a series known from the opening words as " When Anu and 

 Enlil " and comprising more than seventy tablets. See Jastrow, o. c, II., 

 p. 424, notes 3 and 4, and copious examples beginning p. 458. 



^ In their ambition to make the collections- as complete as possible, the 

 ftorji-priests even enter phenomena that never occurred, and some that never 

 could have occurred. 



