Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1905-04-19


W IN man was struggling to express
his jog over the revival of nature from
her long, wintry trance, but no single
| tradition of this Christian jubilee
dates further back into the childhood
of the world than the use Of sacred
bread and cakes at Easter. How many
of the London vendors VINO cry "hot
cross buns ON good Friday, or of the
bakers in all Christian lands, who
have the cross-maI <ed loaf for sale at
this holy period, have the faintest
notion of the antiquity Of these sacred
cakes?
The good Friday bun dates back
thousands of years. Hislop tells us
I in his Two Babylons that bouns,
buns or bread offered to the gods
from the most ancient times, were
similar to our hotcross buns and that
buns, known by that self-same name,
We're used in the worship of Ishtar, or
Is tarte, the queen of heasc ca as early
as the days of Cecrops the founder OF
Athens, in 1900 B. c."
Manifold were the virtues ascribed
10 these sacred cakes. In the direct
services of ancient ido.atry. they were
u3ei from time immem oIial as safe
guards against disease and danger,
: and they bore the same significance
aong families of the earliest Christian
period in England we are told by
one authority that in several Eng
1iSh pnnnfinC r., fhiC q II
loaf Of bread is annually bak ed on
good Friday morning and carefully
D.. we'd until the same anniversary
comes again. This is no! meant to
be eaten. but used as a sovereign
remedy a small portion being grated
into water and made into sort of
panada. It is considered a positive
cure for many disorders
In Brands antiquities. a writer in
ne Gentleman's magazine is quoted
who says that these little loaves were
formerly unleavened and always
marked with the cross. II is a most
venerable belief that eating buns on
good Friday protects the house from
fire during the year. In his quaint
History of Northumberland. Hutchin-
son derives the good Friday bun from
the sacred cakes offered at the Arkite
temples every seventh day. ar1 called
Douns.
Again there are some authorities
who date the hot cross bun from a
plague-stricken time of the middle
ages when the church. on the urgent
request of many pl rsicians. agreed
10 relax the very rigid diet prescribed
for the faithful on good Friday, and
allowed them to eat bread or buns,
hut only with the stipulation that they
should all be marked with the sign of
the cross, and this custom, applied
chiefly to loaves of bread. still pre-
walls in the northern portion of Italy
and parts of Spain.
BE that as it may, we 90 know that
from the earliest times of which any
records are preserved. sacred cakes
and bread had a prominent place in
the crude forms of woship of the hui
man race. And for the best of rea-
sons. This simple food was the
great staple or staff of life. then as
now, and it naturally took on a sacred
character. 1t was believed to be a
sacred gift from the heavenly powers,
and what more appropriate offering
could be placed upon a shine at festal
| occasions?
In the book of jeremiah we read
that the old prophet had trouble
enough with the idolatrous customs of
the Jews to make him gray before his
time. They worshiped the queen OF
heaven with all sorts of oblations and
ritual. and when he rebuked them in
the name of the Lord, they answered
| him. men and women alike: I'VE
will certainly do whatsoever thing
! goeth forth out of our own mouth to
| burn incense unto the queen OF
heaven and to pour out drink offerings
TO her. and make her cakes to worship
| her. we and our fathers and our kings
i and our princes, in the cities of Judah
and in the streets of Jerusalem. 70.
then had we plenty of victuals. and
were well and saw no evil
prominent in the ido1atrous ritual are
doubtless the oldest sacrel cakes in
history. and figured, We may be
lieve. in all the heather festivals
most certainly in the great festival OF
| TammuZ when the rebirth of nature
| in springtime was celebrated univer
/ sally among ancient peoples. These
cakes symboliZed the sustaining prin-
! ciple of life.
Behold says the prophet Ezekiel.
at the gate of the Lords house
which was toward the north, there sat
women weeping for Tammuz." Now
| this Tammuz. was a most important
parsonage in the mythologies of the
elder world and no clearer account OF
him can be found than in Ayers
learned book on the history of the
Doctrine of a Future life. We see
him as the chief hero of the Syrian
mysteries. Then he was adopted Dy
the Jews. Later still he appears as
Adonis in the self-same legend OF
Greece. He is the beateous youth
who was beloved by the queen OF
heaven, but was untimely killed by a
wild boar and spirited away to the
land of shades where Perception
reigned.
In her deep grief. Venus made such
/ aIT inc