Note 54 — XXI. AN INQUIRY INTO THE NATURE OF THE RITES CONNECTED WITH THE WORSHIP OF BEL-PHEGOR.
Reading edition
Bel-Peor. “Very little is really known of the nature of his worship, but it is an almost universal opinion, which appears to be sustained by Numbers xxv., that it was licentious in its character. Human sacrifice appears to have been offered to him; and it is conjectured, from Psalms cvi. 28, that the worshippers ate of the victims that had been offered to him.”—(“Dictionary of Religious Knowledge,” Abbott and Conant, New York, 1875, article “Baal and Baal-Peor.”)
“In a story of Armagnac, Joan lou Pec runs after a man whom he believes to be a sage, and asks him when he will die. The man answers: ‘Joan lou Pec mouriras au troisième pet de toun ase,’—The ass breaks wind twice, and the fool endeavors to prevent the third flatus. ‘Cop sec s’en angone cerca un pau (stake) bien pounchut et l’enfouncee das un martet dans lou cou de l’ase. Mes l’ase s’enflee tant, e hasconc tant gran effort que lou pau sourtisconc commo no balo e tuec lou praube Joan lou Pec.’”—(“Contes et Proverbes Populaires,” recueillis en Armagnac, par J. F. Bladé, Paris, quoted by Angelo de Gubernatis, “Zoöl. Mythol.,” vol. i. pp. 397, 398.)
The reader will please look under the heading of “Myths” in this volume, and will there see a similar adventure related of the Eskimo, or rather the Kamtchatkan, god Kutka.
“Wherefore my bowels shall sound like a harp for Moab, and mine inward parts for Kir-haresh.”—(Isaiah xvi. 11.)