PRIAPUS, a false God of the ancient Pagans, whom the Gentiles pretended to be the Son of Bacchus and Venus. Venus brought him into the World at Lampsacus upon the Hellespont, where he was in great Honour. They sacrificed to him an Ass; and he was honoured as the God of Gardens and Orchards. He was represented with his obscene Parts of a monstrous Bigness. In some Places of Scripture there is mention made of the God Priapus; and ‘tis said that the Ladies of Jerusalem offer’d Sacrifices to him, and that Maachah the Mother of Asa King of Judah was his High -Priestess. But this Prince caus’d his Temple to be demolish’d, or the Cave wherein Abominations were committed in Honour of Priapus; he burnt the Statue of this infamous Deity, and oblig’d the Queen his Mother to renounce his Worship.
1 Kings xv. 13. 1 Chron. xvi. 16. מפלצת .לאשרהThe Hebrew says, that Maachah had made a Miphlezeth for Asherah; that he destroy’d her Miphlezeth, and burnt it by the Brook Kidron; that he took away from his Mother the Sovereign Authority, because she had done this. It is not agreed on, that Miphlezeth signifies the God Priapus. Several Moderns translate this Word by a Scare -crow; and, perhaps, ‘tis this that St. Jerom understands by the Word Priapus, which served as a Scare-crow to defend the Gardens.
Hor. l. i. Sat. 8.——— Inde ego furum aviumque Maxima formido.
Vide Seld. de Diis Syris. Syntag. 2. c. 5.But there is still more Likelihood, that she made some of those obscene Figures that the Pagans call’d Phallus, and Ithyphallus, in Honour of Adonis the Spouse of Venus, or of Astarta. Phallus is plainly deriv’d from the Hebrew Word Phalaz, which is the Root of Miphlezeth; and Asherah, in Honour of whom Maachah made the Miphlezeths, was the same as Astarta, or Venus.