VENUS, supposed to be from Vana, SANSE., the fair one, but the etymology of the word is also given from Banu or lienu of Eastern Asia ; Hebrew, Benoth ; Syrian, Benos ; and the Greek and Latin forming Venus. Venus is the analogue of Bhawani. Venus in Sanskrit is also called Aaphujit (Appoatra); Maghabhava, son of Magha; Shodasansa, having 16 rays; and Sweta, the white.
In Assyria and Babylonia, Baaltis was the ana logue of Venus an active and independent power ; Istar was the gtiddess of love and war, the patron ess of the moon ; and the planet Venus, the equal, and sometimes the rival of the male deities.
In the temple of Venus at Cyprus, the presiding divinity was placed in the porch, as in a. kind of shrine or enclosure. The second book of Kings (xvii. 30), when recounting the idolatrous prac tices of the people transported by the Assyrian monarch into the Samaritan cities, observes that the men of Babylon made Succoth-Benoth,) which is literally rendered by Parkhurst, the tabernacle of the daughters, or the young women. Calmet, however, supposes that we are to under stand Benoth as denoting a female idol, the Benos of the Syrians, and the Venus of the Greeks aud Latins. The heathen strangers there made booths or tents in honour of the deity whom they wor shipped, and representations of pavilions con secrated to Venus may. be seen on many ancient medals: These tents of Venus, the Succoth Benoth' of the Babylonians, the tabernacle of Moloch, and the silver shrines of Diana, mutually illustrate each other. The procession of idols was of frequent occurrence in antiquity. The gods were carried in chariots, niches, or miniature temples, analogous to the shrines of the Ephesian idols. The image being in a small temple of
wood, gilt, was carried out the day before to another building. Among the Egyptians, the shrine of Jupiter was annually transported over the river (Nile) into Libya, and after some days returned, as if the god himself were come from Ethiopia. The sacred procession of idols was also common among the Gauls, who, according to Sulpitius Severus, carried their gods into the fields, protected from the profanation of vulgar eyes by a white veil. Examples of the portable &trine are common in Russia, and in all the countries of the Greek Church. The ttpct of the Greeks, sap Dr. Clarke, as well as the tabentaclea of the eaatern nations, were sometimes not only portable, but they were so small, that the zurraietnet used for enclosing them could also be carried. The idols of the Hindus aro generally kept in the interior of temples, but during festivals the idol is placed in a car with or without wheels, or in a palanquin, and is carried out dressed up with all the jewellery of the temple, preceded by the deva-dasa and the Brahmans. When outside the temple, the worshippers burn camphor and present cocoanuts as offerings, and the dancing girls sing and dance before the god, and the Brahmans chant passages from the Puranas. If at night, fireworks are also exhibited. Some of the cars or rath are of great size, with large wheels. The village gods at stated periods are carried round the village boundaries. The Venus of the Hiudus is Rati.—ilfilner's Seven Churches of Asia, p. 132.