More about goats: the innocent babies and the lustful adults; Zeus, Aphrodite, Pan and the ever popular scapegoat...
As can be seen by a careful reading...the Bible has nothing to do with the struggle of ancient man to understand his world in the absence of science. Rather, the creature storied in the Hebrew tales is truly a complex Deity who certainly understood how to make a goat serve myriad functions!
They really can see almost everything when they climb climb climb...
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THE DAMNED
"The goat is a popular symbol in Christian art for the damned. This symbolism is based upon Christ's depiction of Himself at the Last Judgment as a shepherd dividing his sheep from the goats. In this parable, the goats are set at Christ's left hand and sent away into everlasting fire because they had no compassion upon Christ's followers or, as Mother Teresa would say, "Christ in His distressing disguises." On His right hand, the merciful sheep are invited into the kingdom of God to enjoy the rewards of the righteous (Mt 25:31-46). A similar illustration is used in the Old Testament when the Lord announces that the day is coming when He will "judge between sheep and sheep, between rams and goats" (Ezek 34:17). The male goat is usually used to represent sinners and unbelievers and may be pictured at the head of a flock of female goats to symbolize the spiritual or worldly leader who has led others astray. Female goats may be used to represent prostitutes or loose women.
During the Middle Ages, the Devil was portrayed in the form of a male goat or with various goat-like traits either because of the animal's supposed lechery or its association with various pagan deities and images such as the Goat of Mendes, Pan, and Baphomet. (At this time "Baphomet" was wrongly used as a name for Satan.) During the European witch trials, witches were accused of keeping goats as their familiars, riding through the air on their backs, kissing their buttocks, and combing their beards each day in return for supernatural favors.
The young goat is an image of purity but it undergoes a shocking loss of innocence when it becomes sexually mature. At this time it begins to give off a repugnant odor said to be similar to that of the Devil, and to represent the baser instincts. According to folk belief, his blood then starts to boil with lust and becomes hot enough to melt diamonds. The adult male is the symbol of lust and the lecherous man whose craving for sex cannot be controlled or satisfied; 240 women are not enough for his needs! Early Christians were warned that they would undergo the same smelly physical metamorphosis as the goat if they gave into their sinful desires; their loss of innocence could not be hidden since even the pagan Greeks knew that lecherous people were "goatish" and smelled like goats. These animals were also fertility symbols in some cultures and ritual couplings between women and goats were reported in the ancient world.
The most notable of the goat-gods was the Greek Pan who, like Dionysos, rode a goat, wore goat skins, and had various goat-like parts. He had a goatish, but often playful temperament and could inspire panic in humans and animals. Dionysos discovered his temples while fleeing in the guise of a goat from Typhon. Legend, reported by Plutarch, states that during the reign of Tiberius (14-37 A.D.), about the time of the birth of Christ, a voice was heard on the seas saying, "Tell them that great Pan is dead" (On the Cessation of Oracles, 17). Other lusty creatures such as satyrs and fauns were part man and part goat.
Deities associated with goats include Aphrodite who rode goats, Artemis to whom goats were sacrificed, and Agni the Vedic fire-god who rides a goat. The baby Zeus was hidden in a cave and suckled by a female goat named Amalthea. One of her horns became the cornucopia, a familiar symbol of the abundant harvest.
Goats were associated with thunder and lightning. Thor, the Norse god of thunder, lightning, and fertility rode in a chariot drawn by goats. In some countries, people placed goat's horns or pieces of goats' skin in their upper floors to keep lightning from striking their homes. Alchemists used the goat's head to represent sulfur - the supposed odor of lightning and of Satan.
The tabernacle of the Lord was covered with a tent of "eleven curtains of goats' hair" in addition to a layer each of fine linen, rams' skins, and badgers' skins (Ex 25:4; 26:7; 35:6; 35:23-26; 36:14). Some believe that this goat-tent was to remind the Israelites that their God had visited them on Mt. Sinai in the form of thunder and lightning (Ex 19:16; 20:18; Ps 77:18-20; see also Rev 4:5; 2 Sam 22:13-15; Ps 18:12-15; 29:7).
The Greek word "tragedy" means "goat-song." It comes from a sacred hymn sung during goat sacrifices to the fertility and wine god Dionysos whose rites were known for the frenzy and ecstasy of his followers. Greek actors and athletes were sometimes rewarded with a goat for their performances. So actors became known as tragodos.
In various ancient cults, the initiate was described as a young goat which has fallen or thrown itself into its mother's milk. The milk thereby, standing for the secret doctrines, mysteries, or "food" of the cult. The Mosaic injunction against boiling a kid in his mother's milk may stem from this practice (Ex 23:19; 34:26; Deu 14:21).
When St. John the Baptist pointed at Jesus and announced to the crowd, "Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world," he was referring to the Jewish scapegoat ritual (John 1:29; Lev 16:1-34; see also Lev 14:1-7) Each year on the Day of Atonement, two young goats were taken to the priests to make atonement for the Israel's sins. One was sacrificed by the priests as a sin offering and the other, known as the scapegoat, had the sins of the people placed upon its head and was driven off into the wilderness. These goats were symbolic of two aspects of Christ's Crucifixion. The slain goat prefigured the death of Christ upon the cross to make atonement for sins. The scapegoat represented His taking the guilt of the sins of the world upon His own head and carrying it away from His people into the wilderness of Hades.
Since Mosaic times the term "scapegoat" has been used to refer to someone upon whom all the blame in a situation is placed. French peasants once put a type of scapegoat in their barns, believing that this goat would absorb all the barnyard germs, thus, keeping disease away from the better animals. In Mediterranean areas, a village scapegoat was kept to absorb all the diseases, disasters, and bad luck lurking in the area, thus, freeing its inhabitants to live long and happy lives. It was believed that the smellier the scapegoat, the better it was working.
Goats past seven days old were offered in so many sacrifices in the Mosaic tradition that the innocent young kid became a symbol of the virginal sacrifice of Christ (Lev 22:27). They were acceptable as sin offerings for individuals and communities during which repentant sinners or their representatives were required to place their hand upon the head of the victim as it was slain (Lev 4:24-28; 5:6; 9:3; 9:15; 10:16; 23:19; Num 7:16-87; 15:24-27; 28:15-30; 29:5-25, 38; 2 Chr 29:21-23; Ezra 6:17; 8:35; Ezek 43:22-25). Moses became angry with Aaron and his sons when they failed to eat the goat of the sin offering (Lev 10:16).
Goats were given as peace offerings, burnt offerings, and freewill offerings (Num 7:17-23, 29-88; Lev 3:12; Num 15:11; Lev 1:10; 22:19). Kids could also be used as substitutes for the Passover Lamb when the sight of their blood upon the doorposts and lintels of houses would turn aside the angel of death as a prefiguration of the saving power of Christ's blood (Exo 12:5-7).
The firstborn male of each female goat had to be sacrificed along with the firstborn of all other clean animals (Num 18:17). During their journey through the wilderness, the Israelites were required to bring every goat they wished to kill for meat to the door of the tabernacle as a peace offering (Lev 17:3-9) This was to prevent the people from sacrificing to idols in the fields under the guise of butchering meat for their families. Although the goat was considered a ritually clean animal, Israelites were not permitted to eat the fatty portions of this creature that were normally offered to the Lord in sacrificial animals (Deu 14:4-5; Lev 7:23).
Even though the Lord had no need for the sacrifice of goats or of any other animals, every covenant in the ancient world had to be dedicated with blood as a substitute for the death of the testator so that it would be like a will which came into effect at the death of the one who made it. It was also necessary for the Israelites and the objects of the tabernacle to be cleansed by the sprinkling of blood (Psa 50:9, 13; Isa 1:11; Heb 9:16-22). Abraham cut a three-year-old female goat in half and made a path which had the right halves of various sacrificial animals on one side and the left halves on another so that the Lord might pass between the halves in the form of a smoking oven and a burning torch. In this way, God "cut" the covenant He made with Abraham. Many people believe that the reason for this practice was to demonstrate that the makers of the covenant wished to be cut in half like the sacrificial animals if they did not fulfill the promises so made (Gen 15:7-21).
Several times the Lord gave indications of the insufficiency of animal sacrifices to appease His anger. He warned that He would descend upon the land of Edom with a sword filled with the blood of lambs and goats, but His wrath would not be spent until He made Himself a sacrifice of the enemies of Israel (Isa 34:6). He also threatened to bring the people of Babylon down "like lambs to the slaughter, like rams with male goats" (Jer 51:40). Paul writes that "it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins" (Heb 10:4). Therefore the Lord had to enter the Most Holy Place with the sacrifice of His own blood (Heb 9:12-14).
During biblical times goats were raised for milk, meat, cheese, ropes, wineskins, sacrifices, and clothing. They were frequently given as gifts and tributes. Jesse sent the gift of a young goat with the future King David to Saul (1 Sam 16:20). The Arabians gave Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, seven thousand seven hundred male goats (2 Chr 17:11). Samson, desiring to enjoy his "sadiqa" bride, brought a young goat with him to offer in return for her favors (Judg 15:1). (A "sadiqa" marriage is one in which the bride remains with her parents and is visited by her husband.) A "young goat from the flock" was the price of a harlot in patriarchal times (Gen 38:13-23). Both Gideon and Manoah, the father-to-be of Samson, offered meals featuring the flesh of young goats to their heavenly visitors who consumed the meat with fire (Judg 6:19; Judg 13:15-19). The good brother of the prodigal son, seeing that his father had prepared the fatted calf to celebrate his brother's return, complained, "Lo, these many years I have been serving you; I never transgressed your commandment at any time; and yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might make merry with my friends" (Luke 15:29).
Rebekah covered Jacob's hands and neck with goats' fur in order to trick her blind husband Isaac into giving him the blessing meant for Esau, her hairy firstborn (Gen 27:9-16). Afterwards, Jacob had to flee from the wrath of his brother and became a keeper of goats and sheep for his father-in-law Laban. After working many years to purchase his wives, Jacob struck a deal with Laban to take all the "spotted and speckled" goats and sheep as payment for his services (Gen 30:32-35; Gen 31:38). When he finally decided to risk the wrath of Esau and return home, he sent ahead of him a present including "two hundred female goats and twenty male goats" (Gen 32:14). In his old age, his sons, jealous of the attentions he paid to Joseph, would sell his favorite child into slavery and dip the coveted coat of many colors into goats' blood in order to convince Jacob that he was dead (Gen 37:31).
The goat's love of heights make it (usually the female goat) a symbol of courage, spiritual longings, religious seekers, Christ, and the faithful. It is counted as one of the creatures that are "majestic in pace" because it is constantly climbing higher (Prov 30:29-31). While praising God's providence for His creatures, the psalmist claims that the high hills were created for the wild goats (Psa 104:18). The Lord is also said to take note of the births of wild goats (Job 39:1). It was on the Rocks of the Wild Goats that David cut off a corner of Saul's robe while the king was attending to his needs in a cave, instead of killing the man who unjustly sought his life (1 Sam 24:2-4).
Young goats were considered quite helpless creatures just as lambs were. The vastly outnumbered children of Israel were once compared to "two little flocks of goats" preparing to do battle with the armies of the Syrians (1 Ki 20:27). In the Millennial kingdom, "the leopard shall lie down with the young goat" (Isa 11:6).
In ancient times, the goat was believed to have a certain telescopic vision. It was said that the higher it climbed, the farther and clearer it saw. Distance not only widened its field of vision, it increased its visual acuity. This imagined trait made the female goat a symbol of the all-seeing Christ and His ability to foresee and/or observe all things and to correctly reward both sinners and saints for the smallest of deeds. In some areas, both Christian and pagan, the female goat became the symbol of the initiate or the seeker whose spiritual vision and understanding is increased as she rises through various stages of mysticism or mysteries." |
