POST-REFORMATION CULMINATION OF
THE DEAD SEA LEGENDS.—BEGINNINGS OF A HEALTHFUL SCEPTICISM.
The first effect of the Protestant Reformation was to popularize
the older Dead Sea legends, and to make the public mind still more
receptive for the newer ones.
Luther's great pictorial Bible, so powerful in fixing the ideas of
the German people, showed by very striking engravings all three of
these earlier myths—the destruction of the cities by fire from
heaven, the transformation of Lot's wife, and the vile origin of
the hated Moabites and Ammonites; and we find the salt statue,
especially, in this and other pictorial Bibles, during generation
after generation.
Catholic peoples also held their own in this display of faith.
About 1517 Francois Regnault published at Paris a compilation on
Palestine enriched with woodcuts: in this the old Dead Sea legend
of the "serpent Tyrus" reappears embellished, and with it various
other new versions of old stories. Five years later Bartholomew de
Salignac travels in the Holy Land, vouches for the continued
existence of the Lot's wife statue, and gives new life to an old
marvel by insisting that the sacred waters of the Jordan are not
really poured into the infernal basin of the Dead Sea, but that
they are miraculously absorbed by the earth.
These ideas were not confined to the people at large; we trace
them among scholars.
In 1581, Bunting, a North German professor and theologian,
published his Itinerary of Holy Scripture, and in this the Dead
Sea and Lot legends continue to increase. He tells us that the
water of the sea "changes three times every day"; that it "spits
forth fire" that it throws up "on high" great foul masses which
"burn like pitch" and "swim about like huge oxen"; that the statue
of Lot's wife is still there, and that it shines like salt.
In 1590, Christian Adrichom, a Dutch theologian, published his
famous work on sacred geography. He does not insist upon the Dead
Sea legends generally, but declares that the statue of Lot's wife
is still in existence, and on his map he gives a picture of her
standing at Usdum.
Nor was it altogether safe to dissent from such beliefs. Just as,
under the papal sway, men of science were severely punished for
wrong views of the physical geography of the earth in general, so,
when Calvin decided to burn Servetus, he included in his indictment
for heresy a charge that Servetus, in his edition of Ptolemy, had
made unorthodox statements regarding the physical geography of
Palestine.
Protestants and Catholics vied with each other in the making of new
myths. Thus, in his Most Devout Journey, published in 1608, Jean
Zvallart, Mayor of Ath in Hainault, confesses himself troubled by
conflicting stories about the salt statue, but declares himself
sound in the faith that "some vestige of it still remains," and
makes up for his bit of freethinking by adding a new mythical horror
to the region—"crocodiles," which, with the serpents and the "foul
odour of the sea," prevented his visit to the salt mountains.
In 1615 Father Jean Boucher publishes the first of many editions of
his Sacred Bouquet of the Holy Land. He depicts the horrors of the
Dead Sea in a number of striking antitheses, and among these is the
statement that it is made of mud rather than of water, that it
soils whatever is put into it, and so corrupts the land about it
that not a blade of grass grows in all that region.
In the same spirit, thirteen years later, the Protestant
Christopher Heidmann publishes his Palaestina, in which he speaks
of a fluid resembling blood oozing from the rocks about the Dead
Sea, and cites authorities to prove that the statue of Lot's wife
still exists and gives signs of life.
Yet, as we near the end of the sixteenth century, some evidences of
a healthful and fruitful scepticism begin to appear.
The old stream of travellers, commentators, and preachers,
accepting tradition and repeating what they have been told, flows
on; but here and there we are refreshed by the sight of a man who
really begins to think and look for himself.
First among these is the French naturalist Pierre Belon. As regards
the ordinary wonders, he had the simple faith of his time. Among a
multitude of similar things, he believed that he saw the stones on
which the disciples were sleeping during the prayer of Christ; the
stone on which the Lord sat when he raised Lazarus from the dead;
the Lord's footprints on the stone from which he ascended into
heaven; and, most curious of all, "the stone which the builders
rejected." Yet he makes some advance on his predecessors, since he
shows in one passage that he had thought out the process by which
the simpler myths of Palestine were made. For, between Bethlehem
and Jerusalem, he sees a field covered with small pebbles, and of
these he says: "The common people tell you that a man was once
sowing peas there, when Our Lady passed that way and asked him what
he was doing; the man answered "I am sowing pebbles" and
straightway all the peas were changed into these little stones."
His ascribing belief in this explanatory transformation myth to
the "common people" marks the faint dawn of a new epoch.
Typical also of this new class is the German botanist Leonhard
Rauwolf. He travels through Palestine in 1575, and, though devout
and at times credulous, notes comparatively few of the old wonders,
while he makes thoughtful and careful mention of things in nature
that he really saw; he declines to use the eyes of the monks, and
steadily uses his own to good purpose.
As we go on in the seventeenth century, this current of new thought
is yet more evident; a habit of observing more carefully and of
comparing observations had set in; the great voyages of discovery
by Columbus, Vasco da Gama, Magellan, and others were producing
their effect; and this effect was increased by the inductive
philosophy of Bacon, the reasonings of Descartes, and the
suggestions of Montaigne.
So evident was this current that, as far back as the early days of
the century, a great theologian, Quaresmio of Lodi, had made up his
mind to stop it forever. In 1616, therefore, he began his ponderous
work entitled The Historical, Theological, and Moral Explanation
of the Holy Land. He laboured upon it for nine years, gave nine
years more to perfecting it, and then put it into the hands of the
great publishing house of Plantin at Antwerp: they were four years
in printing and correcting it, and when it at last appeared it
seemed certain to establish the theological view of the Holy Land
for all time. While taking abundant care of other myths which he
believed sanctified by Holy Scripture, Quaresmio devoted himself at
great length to the Dead Sea, but above all to the salt statue; and
he divides his chapter on it into three parts, each headed by a
question: First, "How was Lot's wife changed into a statue of
salt?" secondly, "Where was she thus transformed?" and, thirdly,
"Does that statue still exist?" Through each of these divisions he
fights to the end all who are inclined to swerve in the slightest
degree from the orthodox opinion. He utterly refuses to compromise
with any modern theorists. To all such he says, "The narration of
Moses is historical and is to be received in its natural sense, and
no right-thinking man will deny this." To those who favoured the
figurative interpretation he says, "With such reasonings any
passage of Scripture can be denied."
As to the spot where the miracle occurred, he discusses four
places, but settles upon the point where the picture of the statue
is given in Adrichom's map. As to the continued existence of the
statue, he plays with the opposing view as a cat fondles a mouse;
and then shows that the most revered ancient authorities, venerable
men still living, and the Bedouins, all agree that it is still in
being. Throughout the whole chapter his thoroughness in scriptural
knowledge and his profundity in logic are only excelled by his scorn
for those theologians who were willing to yield anything to rationalism.
So powerful was this argument that it seemed to carry everything
before it, not merely throughout the Roman obedience, but among the
most eminent theologians of Protestantism.
As regards the Roman Church, we may take as a type the missionary
priest Eugene Roger, who, shortly after the appearance of
Quaresmio's book, published his own travels in Palestine. He was an
observant man, and his work counts among those of real value; but
the spirit of Quaresmio had taken possession of him fully. His work
is prefaced with a map showing the points of most importance in
scriptural history, and among these he identifies the place where
Samson slew the thousand Philistines with the jawbone of an ass,
and where he hid the gates of Gaza; the cavern which Adam and Eve
inhabited after their expulsion from paradise; the spot where
Balaam's ass spoke; the tree on which Absalom was hanged; the place
where Jacob wrestled with the angel; the steep place where the
swine possessed of devils plunged into the sea; the spot where the
prophet Elijah was taken up in a chariot of fire; and, of course,
the position of the salt statue which was once Lot's wife. He not
only indicates places on land, but places in the sea; thus he
shows where Jonah was swallowed by the whale, and "where St. Peter
caught one hundred and fifty-three fishes."
As to the Dead Sea miracles generally, he does not dwell on them at
great length; he evidently felt that Quaresmio had exhausted the
subject; but he shows largely the fruits of Quaresmio's teaching in
other matters.
So, too, we find the thoughts and words of Quaresmio echoing afar
through the German universities, in public disquisitions,
dissertations, and sermons. The great Bible commentators, both
Catholic and Protestant, generally agreed in accepting them.
But, strong as this theological theory was, we find that, as time
went on, it required to be braced somewhat, and in 1692 Wedelius,
Professor of Medicine at Jena, chose as the subject of his
inaugural address The Physiology of the Destruction of Sodom and
of the Statue of Salt.
It is a masterly example of "sanctified science." At great length
he dwells on the characteristics of sulphur, salt, and
thunderbolts; mixes up scriptural texts, theology, and chemistry
after a most bewildering fashion; and finally comes to the
conclusion that a thunderbolt, flung by the Almighty, calcined the
body of Lot's wife, and at the same time vitrified its particles
into a glassy mass looking like salt.
Not only were these views demonstrated, so far as
theologico-scientific reasoning could demonstrate anything, but it
was clearly shown, by a continuous chain of testimony from the
earliest ages, that the salt statue at Usdum had been recognised as
the body of Lot's wife by Jews, Mohammedans, and the universal
Christian Church, "always, everywhere, and by all."
Under the influence of teachings like these—and of the winter
rains—new wonders began to appear at the salt pillar. In 1661 the
Franciscan monk Zwinner published his travels in Palestine, and
gave not only most of the old myths regarding the salt statue, but
a new one, in some respects more striking than any of the old—for
he had heard that a dog, also transformed into salt, was standing
by the side of Lot's wife.
Even the more solid Benedictine scholars were carried away, and we
find in the Sacred History by Prof. Mezger, of the order of St.
Benedict, published in 1700, a renewal of the declaration that the
salt statue must be a "perpetual memorial."
But it was soon evident that the scientific current was still
working beneath this ponderous mass of theological authority. A
typical evidence of this we find in 1666 in the travels of Doubdan,
a canon of St. Denis. As to the Dead Sea, he says that he saw no
smoke, no clouds, and no "black, sticky water"; as to the statue of
Lot's wife, he says, "The moderns do not believe so easily that she
has lasted so long"; then, as if alarmed at his own boldness, he
concedes that the sea may be black and sticky in the
middle; and
from Lot's wife he escapes under cover of some pious generalities.
Four years later another French ecclesiastic, Jacques Goujon,
referring in his published travels to the legends of the salt
pillar, says: "People may believe these stories as much as they
choose; I did not see it, nor did I go there." So, too, in 1697,
Morison, a dignitary of the French Church, having travelled in
Palestine, confesses that, as to the story of the pillar of salt,
he has difficulty in believing it.
The same current is observed working still more strongly in the
travels of the Rev. Henry Maundrell, an English chaplain at Aleppo,
who travelled through Palestine during the same year. He pours
contempt over the legends of the Dead Sea in general: as to the
story that birds could not fly over it, he says that he saw them
flying there; as to the utter absence of life in the sea, he saw
small shells in it; he saw no traces of any buried cities; and as
to the stories regarding the statue of Lot's wife and the proposal
to visit it, he says, "Nor could we give faith enough to these
reports to induce us to go on such an errand."
The influence of the Baconian philosophy on his mind is very clear;
for, in expressing his disbelief in the Dead Sea apples, with their
contents of ashes, he says that he saw none, and he cites Lord
Bacon in support of scepticism on this and similar points.
But the strongest effect of this growing scepticism is seen near
the end of that century, when the eminent Dutch commentator
Clericus (Le Clerc) published his commentary on the Pentateuch and
his Dissertation on the Statue of Salt.
At great length he brings all his shrewdness and learning to bear
against the whole legend of the actual transformation of Lot's wife
and the existence of the salt pillar, and ends by saying that "the
whole story is due to the vanity of some and the credulity of more."
In the beginning of the eighteenth century we find new tributaries
to this rivulet of scientific thought. In 1701 Father Felix
Beaugrand dismisses the Dead Sea legends and the salt statue very
curtly and dryly—expressing not his belief in it, but a
conventional wish to believe.
In 1709 a scholar appeared in another part of Europe and of
different faith, who did far more than any of his predecessors to
envelop the Dead Sea legends in an atmosphere of truth—Adrian
Reland, professor at the University of Utrecht. His work on
Palestine is a monument of patient scholarship, having as its
nucleus a love of truth as truth: there is no irreverence in him,
but he quietly brushes away a great mass of myths and legends: as
to the statue of Lot's wife, he treats it warily, but applies the
comparative method to it with killing effect, by showing that the
story of its miraculous renewal is but one among many of its kind.
Yet to superficial observers the old current of myth and marvel
seemed to flow into the eighteenth century as strong as ever, and
of this we may take two typical evidences. The first of these is
the Pious Pilgrimage of Vincent Briemle. His journey was made
about 171O; and his work, brought out under the auspices of a high
papal functionary some years later, in a heavy quarto, gave new
life to the stories of the hellish character of the Dead Sea, and
especially to the miraculous renewal of the salt statue.
In 172O came a still more striking effort to maintain the old
belief in the north of Europe, for in that year the eminent
theologian Masius published his great treatise on The Conversion of
Lot's Wife into a Statue of Salt.
Evidently intending that this work should be the last word on this
subject in Germany, as Quaresmio had imagined that his work would
be the last in Italy, he develops his subject after the high
scholastic and theologic manner. Calling attention first to the
divine command in the New Testament, "Remember Lot's wife," he
argues through a long series of chapters. In the ninth of these he
discusses "the impelling cause" of her looking back, and
introduces us to the question, formerly so often treated by
theologians, whether the soul of Lot's wife was finally saved. Here
we are glad to learn that the big, warm heart of Luther lifted him
above the common herd of theologians, and led him to declare that
she was "a faithful and saintly woman," and that she certainly was
not eternally damned. In justice to the Roman Church also it should
be said that several of her most eminent commentators took a similar
view, and insisted that the sin of Lot's wife was venial, and therefore,
at the worst, could only subject her to the fires of purgatory.
The eleventh chapter discusses at length the question how she was
converted into salt, and, mentioning many theological opinions,
dwells especially upon the view of Rivetus, that a thunderbolt,
made up apparently of fire, sulphur, and salt, wrought her
transformation at the same time that it blasted the land; and he
bases this opinion upon the twenty-ninth chapter of Deuteronomy and
the one hundred and seventh Psalm.
Later, Masius presents a sacred scientific theory that "saline
particles entered into her until her whole body was infected"; and
with this he connects another piece of sanctified science, to the
effect that "stagnant bile" may have rendered the surface of her
body "entirely shining, bitter, dry, and deformed."
Finally, he comes to the great question whether the salt pillar is
still in existence. On this he is full and fair. On one hand he
allows that Luther thought that it was involved in the general
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and he cites various travellers
who had failed to find it; but, on the other hand, he gives a long
chain of evidence to show that it continued to exist: very wisely
he reminds the reader that the positive testimony of those who have
seen it must outweigh the negative testimony of those who have not,
and he finally decides that the salt statue is still in being.
No doubt a work like this produced a considerable effect in
Protestant countries; indeed, this effect seems evident as far off
as England, for, in 172O, we find in Dean Prideaux's Old and New
Testament connected a map on which the statue of salt is carefully
indicated. So, too, in Holland, in the Sacred Geography published
at Utrecht in 1758 by the theologian Bachiene, we find him, while
showing many signs of rationalism, evidently inclined to the old
views as to the existence of the salt pillar; but just here comes
a curious evidence of the real direction of the current of thought
through the century, for, nine years later, in the German
translation of Bachiene's work we find copious notes by the
translator in a far more rationalistic spirit; indeed, we see the
dawn of the inevitable day of compromise, for we now have, instead
of the old argument that the divine power by one miraculous act
changed Lot's wife into a salt pillar, the suggestion that she was
caught in a shower of sulphur and saltpetre, covered by it, and
that the result was a lump, which in a general way is called in our
sacred books "a pillar of salt."
But, from the middle of the eighteenth century, the new current
sets through Christendom with ever-increasing strength. Very
interesting is it to compare the great scriptural commentaries of
the middle of this century with those published a century earlier.
Of the earlier ones we may take Matthew Poole's Synopsis as a
type: as authorized by royal decree in 1667 it contains very
substantial arguments for the pious belief in the statue. Of the
later ones we may take the edition of the noted commentary of the
Jesuit Tirinus seventy years later: while he feels bound to present
the authorities, he evidently endeavours to get rid of the subject
as speedily as possible under cover of conventionalities; of the
spirit of Quaresmio he shows no trace.
About 1760 came a striking evidence of the strength of this new
current. The Abate Mariti then published his book upon the Holy
Land; and of this book, by an Italian ecclesiastic, the most
eminent of German bibliographers in this field says that it first
broke a path for critical study of the Holy Land. Mariti is
entirely sceptical as to the sinking of the valley of Siddim and
the overwhelming of the cities. He speaks kindly of a Capuchin
Father who saw everywhere at the Dead Sea traces of the divine
malediction, while he himself could not see them, and says, "It is
because a Capuchin carries everywhere the five senses of faith,
while I only carry those of nature." He speaks of "the lies of
Josephus," and makes merry over "the rude and shapeless block"
which the guide assured him was the statue of Lot's wife,
explaining the want of human form in the salt pillar by telling
him that this complete metamorphosis was part of her punishment.
About twenty years later, another remarkable man, Volney, broaches
the subject in what was then known as the "philosophic" spirit.
Between the years 1783 and 1785 he made an extensive journey
through the Holy Land and published a volume of travels which by
acuteness of thought and vigour of style secured general attention.
In these, myth and legend were thrown aside, and we have an account
simply dictated by the love of truth as truth. He, too, keeps the
torch of science burning by applying his geological knowledge to
the regions which he traverses.
As we look back over the eighteenth century we see mingled with the
new current of thought, and strengthening it, a constantly increasing
stream of more strictly scientific observation and reflection.
To review it briefly: in the very first years of the century
Maraldi showed the Paris Academy of Sciences fossil fishes found in
the Lebanon region; a little later, Cornelius Bruyn, in the French
edition of his Eastern travels, gave well-drawn representations of
fossil fishes and shells, some of them from the region of the Dead
Sea; about the middle of the century Richard Pococke, Bishop of
Meath, and Korte of Altona made more statements of the same sort;
and toward the close of the century, as we have seen, Volney gave
still more of these researches, with philosophical deductions from them.
The result of all this was that there gradually dawned upon
thinking men the conviction that, for ages before the appearance of
man on the planet, and during all the period since his appearance,
natural laws have been steadily in force in Palestine as elsewhere;
this conviction obliged men to consider other than supernatural
causes for the phenomena of the Dead Sea, and myth and marvel
steadily shrank in value.
But at the very threshold of the nineteenth century Chateaubriand
came into the field, and he seemed to banish the scientific spirit,
though what he really did was to conceal it temporarily behind the
vapours of his rhetoric. The time was propitious for him. It was
the period of reaction after the French Revolution, when what was
called religion was again in fashion, and when even atheists
supported it as a good thing for common people: of such an epoch
Chateaubriand, with his superficial information, thin sentiment,
and showy verbiage, was the foreordained prophet. His enemies were
wont to deny that he ever saw the Holy Land; whether he did or not,
he added nothing to real knowledge, but simply threw a momentary
glamour over the regions he described, and especially over the Dead
Sea. The legend of Lot's wife he carefully avoided, for he knew too
well the danger of ridicule in France.
As long as the Napoleonic and Bourbon reigns lasted, and indeed for
some time afterward, this kind of dealing with the Holy Land was
fashionable, and we have a long series of men, especially of
Frenchmen, who evidently received their impulse from Chateaubriand.
About 1831 De Geramb, Abbot of La Trappe, evidently a very noble
and devout spirit, sees vapour above the Dead Sea, but stretches
the truth a little—speaking of it as "vapour or smoke." He could
not find the salt statue, and complains of the "diversity of
stories regarding it." The simple physical cause of this
diversity—the washing out of different statues in different
years—never occurs to him; but he comforts himself with the
scriptural warrant for the metamorphosis.
But to the honour of scientific men and scientific truth it should
be said that even under Napoleon and the Bourbons there were men
who continued to explore, observe, and describe with the simple
love of truth as truth, and in spite of the probability that their
researches would be received during their lifetime with contempt
and even hostility, both in church and state.
The pioneer in this work of the nineteenth century was the German
naturalist Ulrich Seetzen. He began his main investigation in 1806,
and soon his learning, courage, and honesty threw a flood of new
light into the Dead Sea questions.
In this light, myth and legend faded more rapidly than ever.
Typical of his method is his examination of the Dead Sea fruit. He
found, on reaching Palestine, that Josephus's story regarding it,
which had been accepted for nearly two thousand years, was
believed on all sides; more than this, he found that the original
myth had so grown that a multitude of respectable people at
Bethlehem and elsewhere assured him that not only apples, but
pears, pomegranates, figs, lemons, and many other fruits which grow
upon the shores of the Dead Sea, though beautiful to look upon,
were filled with ashes. These good people declared to Seetzen that
they had seen these fruits, and that, not long before, a basketful of
them which had been sent to a merchant of Jaffa had turned to ashes.
Seetzen was evidently perplexed by this mass of testimony and
naturally anxious to examine these fruits. On arriving at the sea
he began to look for them, and the guide soon showed him the
"apples." These he found to be simply an asclepia, which had been
described by Linnaeus, and which is found in the East Indies,
Arabia, Egypt, Jamaica, and elsewhere—the "ashes" being simply
seeds. He looked next for the other fruits, and the guide soon
found for him the "lemons": these he discovered to be a species of
solanum found in other parts of Palestine and elsewhere, and the
seeds in these were the famous "cinders." He looked next for the
pears, figs, and other accursed fruits; but, instead of finding
them filled with ashes and cinders, he found them like the same
fruits in other lands, and he tells us that he ate the figs with
much pleasure.
So perished a myth which had been kept alive two thousand
years,—partly by modes of thought natural to theologians, partly
by the self-interest of guides, and partly by the love of
marvel-mongering among travellers.
The other myths fared no better. As to the appearance of the sea,
he found its waters not "black and sticky," but blue and
transparent; he found no smoke rising from the abyss, but tells us
that sunlight and cloud and shore were pleasantly reflected from
the surface. As to Lot's wife, he found no salt pillar which had
been a careless woman, but the Arabs showed him many boulders which
had once been wicked men.
His work was worthily continued by a long succession of true
investigators,—among them such travellers or geographers as
Burckhardt, Irby, Mangles, Fallmerayer, and Carl von Raumer: by
men like these the atmosphere of myth and legend was steadily
cleared away; as a rule, they simply forgot Lot's wife altogether.
In this noble succession should be mentioned an American
theologian, Dr. Edward Robinson, professor at New York. Beginning
about 1826, he devoted himself for thirty years to the thorough
study of the geography of Palestine, and he found a worthy
coadjutor in another American divine, Dr. Eli Smith. Neither of
these men departed openly from the old traditions: that would have
cost a heart-breaking price—the loss of all further opportunity to
carry on their researches. Robinson did not even think it best to
call attention to the mythical character of much on which his
predecessors had insisted; he simply brought in, more and more, the
dry, clear atmosphere of the love of truth for truth's sake, and,
in this, myths and legends steadily disappeared. By doing this he
rendered a far greater service to real Christianity than any other
theologian had ever done in this field.
Very characteristic is his dealing with the myth of Lot's wife.
Though more than once at Usdum,—though giving valuable information
regarding the sea, shore, and mountains there, he carefully avoids
all mention of the salt pillar and of the legend which arose from
it. In this he set an example followed by most of the more
thoughtful religious travellers since his time. Very significant is
it to see the New Testament injunction, "Remember Lot's wife," so
utterly forgotten. These later investigators seem never to have
heard of it; and this constant forgetfulness shows the change which
had taken place in the enlightened thinking of the world.
But in the year 1848 came an episode very striking in its character
and effect.
At that time, the war between the United States and Mexico having
closed, Lieutenant Lynch, of the United States Navy, found himself
in the port of Vera Cruz, commanding an old hulk, the Supply.
Looking about for somnething to do, it occurred to him to write to
the Secretary of the Navy asking permission to explore the Dead
Sea. Under ordinary circumstances the proposal would doubtless have
been strangled with red tape; but, fortunately, the Secretary at
that time was Mr. John Y. Mason, of Virginia. Mr. Mason was famous
for his good nature. Both at Washington and at Paris, where he was
afterward minister, this predominant trait has left a multitude of
amusing traditions; it was of him that Senator Benton said, "To be
supremely happy he must have his paunch full of oysters and his
hands full of cards."
The Secretary granted permission, but evidently gave the matter not
another thought. As a result, came an expedition the most comical
and one of the most rich in results to be found in American annals.
Never was anything so happy-go-lucky. Lieutenant Lynch started with
his hulk, with hardly an instrument save those ordinarily found on
shipboard, and with a body of men probably the most unfit for
anything like scientific investigation ever sent on such an errand;
fortunately, he picked up a young instructor in mathematics, Mr.
Anderson, and added to his apparatus two strong iron boats.
Arriving, after a tedious voyage, on the coast of Asia Minor, he
set to work. He had no adequate preparation in general history,
archaeology, or the physical sciences; but he had his American
patriotism, energy, pluck, pride, and devotion to duty, and these
qualities stood him in good stead. With great labour he got the
iron boats across the country. Then the tug of war began. First of
all investigators, he forced his way through the whole length of
the river Jordan and from end to end of the Dead Sea. There were
constant difficulties—geographical, climatic, and personal; but
Lynch cut through them all. He was brave or shrewd, as there was
need. Anderson proved an admirable helper, and together they made
surveys of distances, altitudes, depths, and sundry simple
investigations in a geological, mineralogical, and chemical way.
Much was poorly done, much was left undone, but the general result
was most honourable both to Lynch and Anderson; and Secretary Mason
found that his easy-going patronage of the enterprise was the best
act of his official life.
The results of this expedition on public opinion were most curious.
Lynch was no scholar in any sense; he had travelled little, and
thought less on the real questions underlying the whole
investigation; as to the difference in depth of the two parts of
the lake, he jumped—with a sailor's disregard of logic—to the
conclusion that it somehow proved the mythical account of the
overwhelming of the cities, and he indulged in reflections of a
sort probably suggested by his recollections of American
Sunday-schools.
Especially noteworthy is his treatment of the legend of Lot's wife.
He found the pillar of salt. It happened to be at that period a
circular column of friable salt rock, about forty feet high; yet,
while he accepts every other old myth, he treats the belief that
this was once the wife of Lot as "a superstition."
One little circumstance added enormously to the influence of this
book, for, as a frontispiece, he inserted a picture of the salt
column. It was delineated in rather a poetic manner: light streamed
upon it, heavy clouds hung above it, and, as a background, were
ranged buttresses of salt rock furrowed and channelled out by the
winter rains: this salt statue picture was spread far and wide, and
in thousands of country pulpits and Sunday-schools it was shown as
a tribute of science to Scripture.
Nor was this influence confined to American Sunday-school children:
Lynch had innocently set a trap into which several European
theologians stumbled. One of these was Dr. Lorenz Gratz,
Vicar-General of Augsburg, a theological professor. In the second
edition of his Theatre of the Holy Scriptures, published in 1858,
he hails Lynch's discovery of the salt pillar with joy, forgets his
allusion to the old theory regarding it as a superstition, and does
not stop to learn that this was one of a succession of statues
washed out yearly by the rains, but accepts it as the originaL
Lot's wife.
The French churchmen suffered most. About two years after Lynch, De
Saulcy visited the Dead Sea to explore it thoroughly, evidently in
the interest of sacred science—and of his own promotion. Of the
modest thoroughness of Robinson there is no trace in his writings.
He promptly discovered the overwhelmed cities, which no one before
or since has ever found, poured contempt on other investigators,
and threw over his whole work an air of piety. But, unfortunately,
having a Frenchman's dread of ridicule, he attempted to give a
rationalistic explanation of what he calls "the enormous needles
of salt washed out by the winter rain," and their connection with
the Lot's wife myth, and declared his firm belief that she, "being
delayed by curiosity or terror, was crushed by a rock which rolled
down from the mountain, and when Lot and his children turned about
they saw at the place where she had been only the rock of salt
which covered her body."
But this would not do at all, and an eminent ecclesiastic privately
and publicly expostulated with De Saulcy—very naturally declaring
that "it was not Lot who wrote the book of Genesis."
The result was that another edition of De Saulcy's work was
published by a Church Book Society, with the offending passage
omitted; but a passage was retained really far more suggestive of
heterodoxy, and this was an Arab legend accounting for the origin
of certain rocks near the Dead Sea curiously resembling salt
formations. This in effect ran as follows:
"Abraham, the friend of God, having come here one day with his mule
to buy salt, the salt-workers impudently told him that they had no
salt to sell, whereupon the patriarch said: `Your words are, true.
you have no salt to sell,' and instantly the salt of this whole
region was transformed into stone, or rather into a salt which has
lost its savour."
Nothing could be more sure than this story to throw light into the
mental and moral process by which the salt pillar myth was
originally created.
In the years 1864 and 1865 came an expedition on a much more
imposing scale: that of the Duc de Luynes. His knowledge of
archaeology and his wealth were freely devoted to working the mine
which Lynch had opened, and, taking with him an iron vessel and
several savants, he devoted himself especially to finding the
cities of the Dead Sea, and to giving less vague accounts of them
than those of De Saulcy. But he was disappointed, and honest enough
to confess his disappointment. So vanished one of the most
cherished parts of the legend.
But worse remained behind. In the orthodox duke's company was an
acute geologist, Monsieur Lartet, who in due time made an elaborate
report, which let a flood of light into the whole region.
The Abbe Richard had been rejoicing the orthodox heart of France by
exhibiting some prehistoric flint implements as the knives which
Joshua had made for circumcision. By a truthful statement Monsieur
Lartet set all France laughing at the Abbe, and then turned to the
geology of the Dead Sea basin. While he conceded that man may have
seen some volcanic crisis there, and may have preserved a vivid
remembrance of the vapour then rising, his whole argument showed
irresistibly that all the phenomena of the region are due to
natural causes, and that, so far from a sudden rising of the lake
above the valley within historic times, it has been for ages
steadily subsiding.
Since Balaam was called by Balak to curse his enemies, and "blessed them
altogether," there has never been a more unexpected tribute to truth.
Even the salt pillar at Usdum, as depicted in Lynch's book, aided
to undermine the myth among thinking men; for the background of the
picture showed other pillars of salt in process of formation; and
the ultimate result of all these expeditions was to spread an
atmosphere in which myth and legend became more and more attenuated.
To sum up the main points in this work of the nineteenth century:
Seetzen, Robinson, and others had found that a human being could
traverse the lake without being killed by hellish smoke; that the
waters gave forth no odours; that the fruits of the region were not
created full of cinders to match the desolation of the Dead Sea,
but were growths not uncommon in Asia Minor and elsewhere; in fact,
that all the phenomena were due to natural causes.
Ritter and others had shown that all noted features of the Dead Sea
and the surrounding country were to be found in various other lakes
and regions, to which no supernatural cause was ascribed among
enlightened men. Lynch, Van de Velde, Osborne, and others had
revealed the fact that the "pillar of salt" was frequently formed
anew by the rains; and Lartet and other geologists had given a
final blow to the myths by making it clear from the markings on the
neighbouring rocks that, instead of a sudden upheaval of the sea
above the valley of Siddim, there had been a gradual subsidence for
ages.
Even before all this evidence was in, a judicial decision had been
pronounced upon the whole question by an authority both Christian
and scientific, from whom there could be no appeal. During the
second quarter of the century Prof. Carl Ritter, of the University
of Berlin, began giving to the world those researches which have
placed him at the head of all geographers ancient or modern, and
finally he brought together those relating to the geography of the
Holy Land, publishing them as part of his great work on the
physical geography of the earth. He was a Christian, and nothing
could be more reverent than his treatment of the whole subject; but
his German honesty did not permit him to conceal the truth, and he
simply classed together all the stories of the Dead Sea—old and
new—no matter where found, whether in the sacred books of Jews,
Christians, or Mohammedans, whether in lives of saints or accounts
of travellers, as "myths" and "sagas."
From this decision there has never been among intelligent men any appeal.
The recent adjustment of orthodox thought to the scientific view of
the Dead Sea legends presents some curious features. As typical we
may take the travels of two German theologians between 1860 and
1870—John Kranzel, pastor in Munich, and Peter Schegg, lately
professor in the university of that city.
The archdiocese of Munich-Freising is one of those in which the
attempt to suppress modern scientific thought has been most
steadily carried on. Its archbishops have constantly shown
themselves assiduous in securing cardinals' hats by thwarting
science and by stupefying education. The twin towers of the old
cathedral of Munich have seemed to throw a killing shadow over
intellectual development in that region. Naturally, then, these two
clerical travellers from that diocese did not commit themselves to
clearing away any of the Dead Sea myths; but it is significant that
neither of them follows the example of so many of their clerical
predecessors in defending the salt-pillar legend: they steadily
avoid it altogether.
The more recent history of the salt pillar, since Lynch, deserves
mention. It appears that the travellers immediately after him found
it shaped by the storms into a spire; that a year or two later it
had utterly disappeared; and about the year 1870 Prof. Palmer, on
visiting the place, found at some distance from the main salt bed,
as he says, "a tall, isolated needle of rock, which does really bear
a curious resemblance to an Arab woman with a child upon her shoulders."
And, finally, Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, the standard work of
reference for English-speaking scholars, makes its concession to
the old belief regarding Sodom and Gomorrah as slight as possible,
and the myth of Lot's wife entirely disappears.