"
According to a Chinese philosopher, the reason for thus renewing fire
periodically is that the vital principle grows weaker and weaker in old
fire, whereas in new fire it is young and vigorous. This annual renewal
of fire was a ceremony of very great antiquity in China, since it is
known to have been observed in the time of the first dynasty, about two
thousand years before Christ. Under the Tcheou dynasty a change in the
calendar led to shifting the fire-festival from spring to the summer
solstice, but afterwards it was brought back to its original date.
Although the custom appears to have long fallen into disuse, the
barbarous inhabitants of Hainan, an island to the south of China, still
call a year "a fire," as if in memory of the time when the years were
reckoned by the annually recurring ceremony of rekindling the sacred
fire.[342] "A Japanese book written two centuries ago informs us that
sticks resembling the wands used for offerings at the purification
ceremony were part shaven and set up in bundles at the four corners of
the Gion shrine on the last day of the year. The priests, after prayers
were recited, broke up the bundles and set fire to the sticks, which the
people then carried home to light their household fires with for the New
Year. The object of this ceremony was to avert pestilence."[343]
[The new fire in ancient Greece and Rome.]
In classical antiquity the Greek island of Lemnos was devoted to the
worship of the smith-god Hephaestus, who was said to have fallen on it
when Zeus hurled him from heaven.
Pages:
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257