Perfume

Perfume in scripture is at once an article of worship, a medium of trade, an ornament of the body, and a figure for prayer. The same aromatic substances — frankincense, myrrh, cassia, cinnamon, calamus, stacte, onycha, galbanum — move between the altar of incense, the caravan of merchants, the bed of the lover, the dressing-room of the queen, and the tomb. Their fragrance is read theologically: a sweet odor rising before Yahweh is the form in which both sacrifice and intercession ascend.

The Tabernacle Compound

Perfume in Israel's worship is not improvised. The aromatic compound is specified in detail. Yahweh tells Moses, "Take to you sweet spices, stacte, and onycha, and galbanum; sweet spices with pure frankincense: of each there will be a like weight" (Ex 30:34). The chief spices for the anointing oil are listed alongside: "of flowing myrrh five hundred [shekels], and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even two hundred and fifty, and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty" (Ex 30:23). When Israel brings its offerings for the tabernacle, the inventory includes "the spice, and the oil; for the light, and for the anointing oil, and for the sweet incense" (Ex 35:28).

A dedicated altar receives this compound: "And you will make an altar to burn incense on: of acacia wood you will make it" (Ex 30:1). Aaron's daily charge follows: "Aaron will burn on it incense of sweet spices: every morning, when he dresses the lamps, he will burn it" (Ex 30:7). On the table of the bread of presence, "you will put pure frankincense on each row, that it may be to the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire to Yahweh" (Le 24:7).

Frankincense Withheld

Frankincense is also defined by where it is not used. The poor man's sin-offering of fine flour is brought without it: "he will put no oil on it, neither will he put any frankincense on it; for it is a sin-offering" (Le 5:11). The same exclusion governs the meal-offering of jealousy, "a meal-offering of memorial, bringing iniquity to remembrance" (Nu 5:15) — its function is accusation, not pleasure. Conversely, when Israel's worship is perfunctory the prophet hears Yahweh's complaint: "You haven't brought me of your sheep for burnt-offerings; neither have you honored me with your sacrifices. I haven't burdened you with offerings, nor wearied you with frankincense" (Isa 43:23).

Sirach picks up the imagery as praise of wisdom and of the upright: "as frankincense give forth a sweet odor, And put forth flowers as a lily; Spread forth a sweet smell, and sing a song of praise" (Sir 39:14).

The Trade in Spices

Long before perfume reaches the altar, it crosses the trade routes. Joseph is carried into Egypt by "a caravan of Ishmaelites … from Gilead, with their camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt" (Gen 37:25). Years later, Jacob sends the same goods back as a diplomatic gift: "a little balm, and a little honey, spicery and myrrh, nuts, and almonds" (Gen 43:11).

The royal court trades on the same scale. The queen of Sheba arrives at Solomon's court "with camels that bore spices, and very much gold, and precious stones" (1Ki 10:2). Hezekiah's fatal display before the Babylonian envoys catalogs the same wealth: "the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious oil, and the house of his armor, and all that was found in his treasures" (2Ki 20:13). The lover in the Song appears against this same background of caravans: "Who is this that comes up from the wilderness Like pillars of smoke, Perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, With all powders of the merchant?" (SS 3:6).

Perfume on the Body and in the Home

Perfume is also intimate. Proverbs makes the link between fragrance and friendship explicit: "Oil and perfume rejoice the heart; So does the sweetness of a man's companion [that comes] from the counsel of the soul" (Pr 27:9). The royal bridegroom of Psalm 45 is described in the same register: "All your garments [smell of] myrrh, and aloes, [and] cassia; Out of ivory palaces stringed instruments have made you glad" (Ps 45:8).

The same vocabulary turns dark in Proverbs 7. The strange woman lures the simple with the boast, "I have perfumed my bed With myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon" (Pr 7:17). And in Isaiah's catalog of the daughters of Zion, perfume is listed among the ornaments under judgment: "the headtires, and the ankle chains, and the sashes, and the houses of the soul, and the amulets" (Isa 3:20) — "houses of the soul" being, by the UPDV's note, the literal idiom for perfume boxes.

Esther's preparation for the Persian court formalizes the cosmetic side: "six months with oil of myrrh, and six months with sweet odors and with the things for the purifying of the women" (Es 2:12).

Perfume and the Body of Christ

The same substances appear at the cross and the tomb. Before the crucifixion, Mark notes that "they offered him wine mingled with myrrh: but he did not receive it" (Mark 15:23). After the Sabbath, "Mary Magdalene, and Mary the [mother] of James, and Salome, bought spices, that they might come and anoint him" (Mark 16:1).

Perfume as Indictment

Perfume can be turned against its owner. Isaiah's oracle against Israel's foreign-policy compromise reads as a perfumed bribe: "And you went to the king with oil, and increased your perfumes, and sent your ambassadors far off, and debased yourself even to Sheol" (Isa 57:9). Inside the temple itself Ezekiel sees a counterfeit version of the true incense ritual: "in the midst of them stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan, every man with his censer in his hand; and the odor of the cloud of incense went up" (Eze 8:11). The cloud is the same cloud; the worship is not.

The hardest case is at the altar itself. Nadab and Abihu "each of them took his censer, and put fire in it, and laid incense on it, and offered strange fire before Yahweh, which he had not commanded them" (Le 10:1). Korah's company likewise: "fire came forth from Yahweh, and devoured the two hundred and fifty men who offered the incense" (Nu 16:35). Yet on the same day Aaron is told, "Take your censer, and put fire in it from off the altar, and lay incense on it, and carry it quickly to the congregation, and make atonement for them" (Nu 16:46). The same instrument — the censer — kills when it is presumed and shields when it is commanded.

Restoration and Continuance

When the temple is purified after its desecration, perfume is part of the restoration: "they made new holy vessels, and brought in the lampstand, and the altar of incense, and the table into the temple" (1Ma 4:49), "and they put incense on the altar, and lit up the lamps that were on the lampstand, and they gave light in the temple" (1Ma 4:50). Even the persecution that preceded that purification had been described in the same idiom — incense burned at the wrong doors: "they burned incense at the doors of the houses, and in the streets" (1Ma 1:55).

Sirach pictures the high priest in the same fragrance: "as the fire of incense in the censer; Like a golden vessel beautifully wrought, Adorned with all manner of precious stones" (Sir 50:9). Wisdom herself speaks of her ministry in the tabernacle in the same language: "As cassia and camel's thorn I have given a scent of perfumes, And as choice myrrh I spread abroad a pleasant odor; As galbanum, and onyx, and stacte; [I was] as the smoke of incense in the Tabernacle" (Sir 24:15).

The honored dead receive the same treatment. Asa is laid in the bed "which was filled with sweet odors and diverse kinds [of spices] prepared by the perfumers' art" (2Ch 16:14).

Incense as Prayer

The trajectory ends with perfume read as prayer. Malachi sees the worship of Yahweh extended beyond Israel in exactly this idiom: "from the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same my name [will be] great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense [will be] offered to my name, and a pure offering" (Mal 1:11). The Apocalypse makes the figure explicit: "another angel came and was standing over the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given to him much incense, that he should add it to the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar which was before the throne" (Rev 8:3).

The same compound that Aaron burned every morning, that the merchants of Sheba carried on camels, that the lover hid in the folds of her garment, and that the women bought to anoint a buried body, finally ascends — translated into the prayers of the saints — before the throne.