OF lUBYLONIAN CONCEPTION'S OX JEWISH THOUGHT. 319 



the influence exerted by one body upon another ? Surely it is to 

 take as many instances as we can find wherein that influence is 

 known, and well established, and from them to argue to more difficult 

 and doubtful cases. Now we have the material for making a 

 definite determination of the character and amount of the Babylonian 

 influence ; and, as it happens, it is with that material that my work 

 has been concerned. First of all, with the cuneiform references to 

 the heavenly bodies, early or late. Next with the works in Greek, 

 written by a contemporary of our Lord, the Great Mage, Teuchros 

 the Babylonian, who exerted a profound influence both on his own 

 countrymen and^on the surrounding nations, and through them on 

 the Middle Ages, and so on even down to our own time. Then — 

 in the order of my study — the astronomical references in the 

 Talmud ; then similar references in the Apocrypha, and lastl}^ in the 

 Bundahi.s', that is to say, the Zoroastrian work on the creation. Now 

 these last are of the'same epoch as the New Testament writings — 

 and the Apostolic writers were Jews, born, brought up like other 

 Jews, subjected, like them, to the Zeitgeist, or Spirit of their Age. 

 Now the spirit of Babylon is the same from the earliest time that 

 has given us any cuneiform inscriptions, right down to Berossos and 

 Teuchros. And also the Spirit of the Old Testament is the Spirit of 

 the New Testament. If then the spirit of Babylonian conceptions 

 inspired the Old Testament, the same spirit should be apparent 

 in the New Testament. But now we can determine what the 

 Babylonian influence should be, for it is not only clear, but paramount 

 in the Jewish and Persian writings contemporary with the Apostolic 

 writings. The Talmud, II Esdras, and the Bundahis, all bear the 

 hall-mark- of Babylon, and this hall-mark is incantation and the' 

 magic power of number. In cuneiform literature, if we put on one 

 side the business contracts and political annals, then the rest mainly 

 pertains to magic ; the very^Epic of Creation itself is but the preamble 

 to an incantation. Nineveh is called by the prophet " the mistress 

 of witchcrafts," and the same is even more true of Babylon in all 

 ages. And this magical element is not incidental to Babylonian 

 conceptions, it is fundamental. In the Creation epic, Marduk 

 himself got his power over Tiamat by the magic spells with which 

 he was equipped by the other gods. And just in the same way, in 

 Zoroastrianism, Ahriman, the evil spirit, is thrown into confusion for 

 3,000 years when Auharmazsd, the supreme deity, recites the 



