Note 173.1 — Chapter IX · Purity a Divine Attribute.

We may profitably compare the Eastern and Western peoples according to their respective conceptions of the divine power. Looking carefully at the Babylonian hymns and liturgies, we cannot say that the idea of divine omnipotence was ever an assured dogma, vividly present to the mind and clearly expressed. Any particular hymn may so exalt the potency of the particular deity to whom it is addressed that, in the ecstasy of prayer and adoration, the worshipper may speak as if he believed him or her to be powerful over all things in heaven and earth. But this faith was temporary and illusive. The power of the deity in the popular creed, and indeed in the hieratic system, was bound up with his temple and altar. When Sanherib laid waste Babylon and the temples, the “gods must flee like birds up to heaven.” In the Babylonian epic the deities themselves are greatly alarmed by the flood. In one of the hymns of lamentation, Ishtar laments her own overthrow in her ruined city, where she “is as a helpless stranger in her streets.”173.1 It is probable that the popular belief of Babylon agreed in this respect with that of all other nations of the same type of religion; for the popular religious mind is incapable of fully realising or logically applying the idea of divine omnipotence. But this at least is clear in the Babylonian system, that the higher divinities acting as a group are stronger than any other alien principle in the Universe, from the period when Marduk, or originally, perhaps Ninib, won his victory over Tiamit.174.1 The evil power embodied in the demons remains indeed active and strong, and much of the divine agency is devoted to combating them. And the demons are impressive beings, impersonating often the immoral principle, but they do not assume the grandeur of an Ahriman, or rise to his position as compeers of the high god. Thus the Babylonian theology escapes the duality of the Zarathustrian; the god can always exorcise and overpower the demon if the demon-ridden man repents and returns to communion with his deity by penance and confession.