1893 Blood Covenant Trumbull

## Print Info

* The Blood Covenant A Primitive Rite And Its Bearings On Scripture
* by H. Clay Trumbull
* Publisher John D.Wattles Philadelphia, PA., Second Ed. 1893
* Collection universallibrary
* Contributor Universal Digital Library

## Author Info

Henry Clay Trumbull (June 8, 1830 – December 8, 1903) was an American clergyman and author. He became an editor, author, and is most known for the Sunday School Movement.

Trumbull was ordained a Congregational minister in 1862 and, shortly after, served as chaplain of the 10th Connecticut Infantry Regiment during the American Civil War. Trumbull was captured at the battle of Fort Wagner near Charleston, South Carolina on July 19, 1863. He was held in several Confederate prisons, as a prisoner of war. After being exchanged on November 24, 1863, he rejoined the 10th Connecticut and served with that regiment until it was mustered out of service in August 1865.

In 1869, he became a companion of the Massachusetts Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States (MOLLUS) - a military society composed of officers who served in the Union armed forces during the Civil War. He was assigned MOLLUS insignia number 1001. In 1878 he transferred to the Pennsylvania Commandery where he served as Chaplain from 1878 to 1886 and as Junior Vice Commander from 1886 to 1887. Trumbull was also active in the Grand Army of the Republic and a member of George G. Meade Post 1 of Philadelphia. He gave remarks welcoming former President and General Ulysses S. Grant on December 18, 1879.

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***This file is in the public domain***

1. This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1923.

2. The author died in or before 1940, so this work is also in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 75 years or less. This work may also be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.

BLOOD COVENANT

A PRIMITIVE RITE

AND ITS BEARINGS ON SCRIPTURE

BY H. CLAY TRUMBULL

Author of M Kadesh-Barnea

"Friendship the Master-Passion” etc.

SECOND EDITION, WITH A SUPPLEMENT

PHILADELPHIA

JOHN D. WATTLES

1893

COPYRIGHT, 1885, By H. CLAY TRUMBULL.

COPYRIGHT, 1893, BY H. CLAY TRUMBULL.

### Preface to First Edition

IT was while engaged in the preparation of a book still unfinished on the Sway of Friendship in the World's Forces, 1 that I came upon facts concerning the primitive rite of covenanting by the inter-transfusion of blood, which induced me to turn aside from my other studies, in order to pursue investigations in this direction.

Having an engagement to deliver a series of lectures before the Summer School of Hebrew, under Professor W. R. Harper, of Chicago, at the buildings of the Episcopal Divinity School, in Philadelphia, I decided to make this rite and its Unkings the theme of that series; and I delivered three lectures, accordingly, June 16-18, 1885.

The interest manifested in the subject by those who heard the Lectures, as well as the importance of the theme itself, has seemed sufficient to warrant its presentation to a larger public. In this publishing, the form of the original Lectures has, for convenience(1) sake, been adhered to although some considerable additions to the text, in the way of illustrative facts, have been made since the delivery of the Lectures; while other similar material is given in an Appendix.

From the very freshness of the subject itself, there was added difficulty in gathering the material for its illustration and exposition. So far as I could learn, no one had gone over the ground before me in this particular line of research; hence the various items essential to a fair statement of the case must be searched for through many diverse volumes of travel and of history and of archaeological compilation, with only here and there an incidental disclosure in return. Yet, each new discovery opened the way for other discoveries beyond and even after the Lectures, in their present form, were already in type, I gained many fresh facts, which I wish had been earlier available to me. Indeed, I may say that no portion of the volume is of more importance than the Appendix; where are added facts and reasoning bearing directly on well-nigh every main point of the original Lectures.

There is cause for just surprise that the chief facts of this entire subject have been so generally overlooked, in the theological discussions, and in the physio-sociological researches, of the earlier and the later times. Yet this only furnishes another illustration of the inevitably cramping influence of a preconceived fixed theory, to which all the ascertained facts must be conformed, in any attempt at thorough and impartial scientific investigation. It would seem to be because of such cramping, that no one of the
modern students of myth and folk-lore, of primitive ideas and customs, and of man's origin and history, has brought into their true prominence, if, indeed, he has even noticed them in passing, the universally dominating primitive convictions: that the blood is the life; that the heart, as the blood-fountain, is the very soul of every personality; that blood-transfer is soul-transfer; that blood-sharing, human, or divine-human, secures an inter-union of natures; and that a union of the human nature with the divine is the highest ultimate attainment reached out after by the most primitive, as well as by the most enlightened, mind of humanity.

Certainly, the collation of facts comprised in this volume grew out of no preconceived theory on the part of its author. Whatever theory shows itself in their present arrangement, is simply that which the facts themselves have seemed to enforce and establish, in their consecutive disclosure.

I should have been glad to take much more time for the study of this theme, and for the rearranging of its material, before its presentation to the public; but, with the pressure of other work upon me, the choice was between hurrying it out in its present shape, and postponing it indefinitely. All things considered, I chose the former alternative.

In the prosecution of my investigations, I acknowledge kindly aid from Professor Dr. Georg Ebers, Principal Sir William Muir, Dr. Yung Wing, Dean E. T. Bartlett, Professors Doctors John P. Peters and J. G. Lansing, the Rev. Dr. M. H. Bixby, Drs. D. G. Brinton and Charles W. Dulles, the Rev. Messrs. R. M. Luther and Chester Holcombe, and Mr. E. A. Barber; in addition to constant and valuable assistance from Mr. John T. Napier, to whom I am particularly indebted for the philological comparisons in the Oriental field, including the Egyptian, the Arabic, and the Hebrew.

At the best, my work in this volume is only tentative and suggestive. Its chief value is likely to be in its stimulating of others to fuller and more satisfactory research in the field here brought to notice. Sufficient, however, is certainly shown, to indicate that the realm of true biblical theology is as yet by no means thoroughly explored.

H. CLAY TRUMBULL.

PHILADELPHIA,

August 4, 1885

(1) Since published, with the title of " Friendship the Master-Passion "

### Preface to Second Edition

 THE first edition of this work was soon exhausted, and a second was called for. But further investigations of mine in the same general field had revealed a new line of facts, which I desired to present in a supplement to a second edition. I wished, also, to give fuller proofs in the direction of specific exceptions taken by eminent critics to certain positions in the original work. Therefore I delayed the issue of a new edition.

Circumstances quite beyond my control have hindered me in the execution of my purpose until the present time. I now send out a new edition, with a Supplement containing important facts in the line of the original investigation. But much of the matter that I have discovered in other lines is reserved for a new work in the field of primitive covenants, including the Name Covenant, the Covenant of Salt, and the Threshold Covenant. This new work I hope to have ready at an early day.

The reception accorded to The Blood Covenant by scientists and theologians on both sides of the ocean was gratifying beyond my highest anticipations. From various directions I am hearing of the restatement of religious dogmas by prominent and influential Christian teachers, in the light newly thrown on the terminology of Scripture by the disclosures of this volume, and it is with pleasure that I respond to calls from all sides for a fresh edition of it.

In my careful revision of the work I am indebted for valuable aid to Professor Dr. Hermann V. Hilprecht, the eminent Assyriologist.

H. CLAY TRUMDULL.

PHILADELPHIA,

January 30, 1893.

## Whole Book Citations

**MLA:** Trumbull, Henry Clay. The Blood Covenant A Primitive Rite And Its Bearings On Scripture. 2nd ed., John D.Wattles, 1893, Archive.org, archive.org/details/bloodcovenantapr027440mbp/page/n7.

**APA:** Trumbull, H. C. (1893). The Blood Covenant A Primitive Rite And Its Bearings On Scripture (2nd ed.). John D.Wattles. Retrieved from https://archive.org/details/bloodcovenantapr027440mbp/page/n7

**Chicago:** Trumbull, Henry Clay. The Blood Covenant A Primitive Rite And Its Bearings On Scripture. 2nd ed. John D.Wattles, 1893. April 27, 2004. https://archive.org/details/bloodcovenantapr027440mbp/page/n7.

**Harvard9:** Trumbull, H. C. (1893) The Blood Covenant A Primitive Rite And Its Bearings On Scripture. 2nd edn, Archive.org. 2nd edn. John D.Wattles. Available at: https://archive.org/details/bloodcovenantapr027440mbp/page/n7.

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### EBooks

* First Ed. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/48236
* Second Ed. https://archive.org/details/bloodcovenantapr027440mbp/page/n7
* Second Ed. https://books.google.com/books?id=LPZMAQAAMAAJ

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