AND
MYTHOLOGICAL SYMBOL
Long before it became a
research subject for men of science or a source of inspiration for painters,
musicians or poets and writers, water had been a religious and mythological
symbol. People have always benefited from it, but it was also transfigured into
myths and legends.
In the orthodox religion, water is the symbol
of being purified from sins, and also of death and Resurrection. During the
baptism ceremony, while being three times sunk into holy water and through
prayers, the newly-born child gets forgiveness for his ancestors’ sins and it
is spiritually re-born through Jesus Christ.
Water has the same purifying power during
other moments of the religious ritual, being known as "holy water” (in
Romanian "agheasma mare” and,"agheasma mica”). The word
"agheasma” comes from Greek and means "being hallowed”. The main part
of the ritual is the prayer for getting water hallowed. During the ceremony,
the priest sinks three fingers of his right hand into water (symbolizing the
Holy Cross) and pronounces some sacred words.
Then, using a bunch of basil, the believers
are sprinkled with holy water, just as things and places in the house, in order
to get purified and to be shared divine faith. This is the way to remake the
bundle between human and divine. A special moment in the orthodox rituals is hallowing
water on Epiphany Eve and Day, which sends us back to the time when John the
Baptizer baptized Jesus Christ in the
Water hallowed this way is used in different
ways: to baptize believers, to bless their houses, to be sprinkled over the
things and people that have to be exorcised, purified or blessed. The water
hallowed on Epiphany has curative powers, mentioned in the special prayer
pronounced then.
Believers take a sip of it in the morning,
before eating anything, on Lent days or on holidays, in fact, wherever they
want to get rid of some heart pressure or they need to have their body cured.
If it gets too old, it will be thrown away in clean places where it can’t be
defiled.
The above mentioned ideas are just some of
the significances water has as related to different stages of the orthodox
rituals. A comparative study of the symbol of water in different religious
cults would be of great interest. There are a lot of changes in the world,
generations succeed one another as time passes, but these symbols will not
perish. They will last as long as there are people living on this planet.
Beyond being a religious symbol, water has
become an element of spirituality, as it is present, both as a motive and as an
element, in the customs and traditions that people obey and celebrate from
birth till death.
As for us, the Romanians, our customs and
traditions, deeply rooted in our conscience, define us and, at the same time,
differentiate us from other peoples.
Water is a magical element in the Romanian
fairy-tales which one can find having two forms: living water and dead water.
Through water, the fairy-tale heroes experience the miracle of death and
resurrection. As such, faith is prolonged into myth.
At drought time, Romanian peasants invoke
beneficial rain through a special ritual which might have its origin in an
antique faith in a mighty goddess of waters. The participants to the ritual
dress up a nine or ten-year-old girl in clothes made of leaves, branches and
weeds. Dressed that way, the ,,nymph” walks through the village, followed by a
group of children who sing, dance and invoke beneficial rain, while pronouncing
ritual words, meant to make the sky open its gates and send the rain down on
Earth. Villagers stand by the gates of their houses in order to welcome the
procession and pour water over the head of the girl dressed in leaves and
branches. This very old ritual is called "Paparuda”.
There are other customs which make people use
water in a symbolic way.
For instance, the day after Easter Day, young
men, dressed in their finest clothes, join together in small groups and wander
all over the village roads, get into the houses where there are young girls and
women and sprinkle water over their heads. Before doing that, they respectfully
ask for permission to get in and, usually, they recite a short poem in which
the hostess is compared to a flower which has to be watered in order not to
fade.
Another popular belief says that, if a girl
wants to find out who her husband will be, she has to look, at
Fountains usually symbolize life, creation
and continuity. A fine legend says that an artist, called Manole, was asked to
build a matchless monastery. But what he and his men built during the day,
crumbled at nighttime. Manole had a terrible dream: he was told he would have
to sacrifice a human being if he wanted to finish his monastery. The first
human being to come was Ana, Manole’s wife. He had to wall her in.
Consequently, he was able to finish the building. The prince who had ordered
the monastery to be built asked him if he could build another one, equally
beautiful. With the vanity typical to any gifted artist aspiring to perfection,
Manole answered he could. His vanity lost him, as the prince ordered the
scaffolding to be removed, so Manole and his men remained on the roof. They
made themselves wings and tried to fly down, but, obviously, they crashed and
died. On the place where Manole fell down, there arose a fountain, symbol of
life and of the perpetuation of creative spirit.
Romanian popular mediaeval culture has a
series of mythological themes related to water and the beings that populate it.
For instance "stima apelor”, some kind of local nymph that lives in every
water, either a pond, a river or a lake. She would be a beautiful white
silky-skinned woman, slim and good-looking. She should wear a popular costume.
When she gets into the water she turns into a being half-woman, half-fish. When
she gets angry, she arises the waters and floods the land. The man, who is
bewitched by her, leaves everything and everybody and throws himself into the
water. He will be devoured by this nymph (we can easily identify resemblances
with the mermaids in the Greek mythology).
The popular traditions also refer to water
spirits populating the depth of water, where there would be a rich underwater
life, quite similar to terrestrial life, with people, animals and plants. Those
underwater people can’t speak, are not unkind and never harm others.
Water has a special significance in
exorcising. For doing proper exorcism, water should be taken from special
places: clean untouched water for a beneficial effect and foul nasty smelling
water for doing harm.
For instance, for curing headaches, one
should take some small pieces of burning coal, put them into holy water and
pronounce the magic words suitable to the situation. The spell is said to be
effective when the "patient”, after drinking the water in small sips, will
start yawning and being sleepy.
The possible interpretations and significance which
popular mentality confers to water are almost uncountable. In the present
essay, we have approached to only some of them.
The importance of water in the Romanians’
lives is also obvious at the language level. There are a lot of phrases and
phraseological constructions containing the word "apa" (=water). Here
are some of them:
·
a fi o apa si-un pamant = to be alike
·
apa de
ploaie =nonsense
·
a bate apa in
piua = to draw
water in a sieve
·
a intra la
apa = to
shrink (proper sense)
§
= to get into
hot water
(figurative sense)
·
a baga (pe
cineva la apa) = to trick
somebody into trouble
·
a nu avea nici
dupa ce bea apa = to be starving, to be as poor as a
church-mouse
·
ca pe apa =
fluently, by heart
·
a lasa (pe
cineva) in apele lui = to leave
somebody alone/in peace,
not to trouble somebody
·
a nu fi in apele
lui = to be in a
bad mood
·
a-i veni cuiva apa la moara
= to find it convenient
·
a-i lua cuiva
apa de la moara = to cut the ground
from somebody’s
feet
·
a-i lasa (cuiva)
gura apa = to make one’s mouth water