If frankincense is the resin of light and ascent, myrrh is the resin of depth. Its scent is warm, earthy and slightly bitter, and its symbolic history runs through love, death and kingship. For the ancients the two resins often travelled together, on the same caravans and into the same temples, yet they told two different stories. In this article we follow myrrh through its most significant appearances.
The plant and the harvest
Myrrh is the gum resin produced by thorny shrubs of the genus Commiphora, found in southern Arabia and the Horn of Africa, in regions close to those of frankincense. As with incense, the resin is obtained by cutting the bark: the liquid that seeps out hardens into irregular reddish-brown grains, darker and more opaque than frankincense tears.
The name itself preserves the memory of its character. It derives from a Semitic root meaning "bitter", found in the Hebrew mor and the Arabic murr. The Greek myrrha and the Latin murra took up this word, which has come down to the modern languages.
The myth of Myrrha and the birth of Adonis
The most famous story linked to this resin is found in the tenth book of Ovid's Metamorphoses. Myrrha is the daughter of King Cinyras, overwhelmed by a forbidden love for her own father. When her guilt is discovered she flees for a long time and, at the end of her strength, prays to the gods that she may belong neither to the world of the living nor to that of the dead. The gods turn her into a tree. The drops of resin that drip from the bark are her tears which, the poet writes, keep the girl's name.
From the trunk of the tree Adonis is then born, the youth of extraordinary beauty loved by Venus, destined to die young and to be mourned every year in the cults dedicated to him. The myth thus unites in myrrh three themes that will remain attached to this substance: weeping, transformation, and a close bond with death and rebirth.
Myrrh and the care of the dead in Egypt
The Greek historian Herodotus, in the second book of his Histories, describes the most expensive method of embalming practised by the Egyptians. After emptying the body, the embalmers filled the cavity with pure crushed myrrh, cassia and other spices, explicitly excluding frankincense, before sewing it up and treating it with natron.
This account reveals an important aspect of myrrh's symbolism: it is a substance that accompanies the body through the passage, preserving it and preparing it for another condition. It is no accident that in later traditions myrrh would keep appearing alongside burial rites.
In the Bible: love, kingship and death
In the Hebrew Scriptures myrrh appears in very different contexts:
- In Exodus it is the first ingredient of the holy anointing oil, used to consecrate the Tabernacle and the priests.
- In the Song of Songs it is the scent of love: the beloved compares her lover to a "bundle of myrrh" resting on her breast.
- In the Book of Esther we are told that the young women destined for the king underwent six months of preparation with oil of myrrh.
In the New Testament myrrh marks the two ends of Jesus's life. It is among the gifts of the Magi at his birth, and it returns at the end: the Gospel of Mark recalls that on Calvary he was offered wine mixed with myrrh, which he refused, and the Gospel of John tells how Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes of about a hundred pounds for the burial.
The symbolism in the Christian tradition
Early Christian writers read the three gifts of the Magi as signs of Christ's nature: gold for the king, incense for God and myrrh for the man destined to die. This interpretation fixed for centuries the value of myrrh as a symbol of accepted mortality and of sacrifice.
In the Orthodox tradition myrrh gives its name to the holy chrism, the myron, and to the "myrrh-bearers", the women who at dawn on Sunday went to the tomb with spices and found it empty. Thus the resin of burial also becomes the sign of the first announcement of the resurrection.
Myrrh and frankincense: two polarities
Setting the two resins side by side helps to grasp their complementary meaning.
| Frankincense | Myrrh | |
|---|---|---|
| Colour | Pale, almost white | Reddish brown |
| Meaning of the name | "White" | "Bitter" |
| Symbolic movement | Ascent, prayer | Descent, depth |
| Ritual sphere | Worship, divine presence | Burial, anointing, love |
In a Hermetic reading, the pair can be seen as the union of two principles: what rises and what descends, spirit and matter, heaven and earth. Inner work also consists in holding these two directions together.
In short
- Myrrh is the resin of Commiphora shrubs, and its name means "bitter" in the Semitic languages.
- Ovid tells that it was born from the tears of Myrrha, mother of Adonis, turned into a tree.
- Herodotus records it as the main ingredient of the most expensive Egyptian embalming.
- In the Bible it accompanies love, consecration, and the birth and burial of Jesus.
- Symbolically it stands for depth, transformation and passage.
