Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday - The rabbins supposed that the empire of death was under two demons, one of which ruled by day, the other by night. The Vulgate and Septuagint have - the noonday devil. The ancients thought that there were some demons who had the power to injure particularly at noonday. To this Theocritus refers, Id. 1: ver. 15: -
Ου θεμις, ω ποιμαν, το μεσαμβρινον, ου θεμις αμμιν
Συρισδεν· τον Πανα δεδοικαμες· η γαρ απ' αγρας
Τανικα κεκμακως αμπαυεται, εντι γε πικρος,
Και οἱ αει δριμεια χολα ποτι ῥινι καθηται.
"It is not lawful, it is not lawful, O shepherd, to play on the flute at noonday: we fear Pan, who at that hour goes to sleep in order to rest himself after the fatigues of the chase; then he is dangerous, and his wrath easily kindled."
Lucan, in the horrible account he gives us of a grove sacred to some barbarous power, worshipped with the most horrid rites, refers to the same superstition: -
Lucus erat longo nunquam violatus ab aevo,
Non illum cultu populi propiore frequentant,
Sed cessere deis: medio cum Phoebus in axe est.
Aut coelum nox atra tenet, pavet ipse sacerdos
Accessus, dominumque timet deprendere luci.
Lucan, lib. iii., ver. 399.
"Not far away, for ages past, had stood
An old inviolated sacred wood:
The pious worshippers approach not near,
But shun their gods, and kneel with distant fear:
The priest himself, when, or the day or night
Rolling have reached their full meridian height,
Refrains the gloomy paths with wary feet,
Dreading the demon of the grove to meet;
Who, terrible to sight, at that fixed hour
Still treads the round about this dreary bower."
Rowe.
It has been stated among the heathens that the gods should be worshipped at all times, but the demons should be worshipped at midday: probably because these demons, having been employed during the night, required rest at noonday and that was the most proper time to appease them. See Calmet on this place. Both the Vulgate and Septuagint seem to have reference to this superstition.
The Syriac understands the passage of a pestilential wind, that blows at noonday. Aquila translates, of the bite of the noonday demon.