#AtoZChallenge: Berith Melach

Today’s very belated post is about Berith Melach. This started off because of this line about a Covenant of Salt in the Bible… and I took it and ran with it.
The ritual itself appears in Absolution, but the goal is that much of Rahsia's work in Secretkeeper will revolve around discovering what the Berith Melach actually entails.

Here's an excerpt of some "lost writings" around the ritual:

Intricately tied to the Blood Sacrifice, it refers to the addition of salt to the covenant, thereby binding the supplicant to God for eternity. Salt is only added to a sacrifice when it involves the life of a man … To renege on the covenant (turn away from God, or leave the priesthood) will result in death. This is often obscured in the Scriptures due to its imprecise and archaic wording, leaving it open to much misinterpretation.
All High Priests and King Priests have gone through the Blood Sacrifice. It is not required of a normal priest or a king/leader. Thus the ceremony is only held at very long intervals, usually fifty years or more.
The Berith Melach is also used in the covenant between man and wife, where the seal of the covenant is when the man places a pinch of salt on his wife’s tongue and she returns the same. If either of them spits out the salt, that is a rejection of the union. A man may perform his side of the ceremony, but if she does not return the act, the marriage is not yet binding until she does. If she does not seal it within the month, his act is considered void and they are not bound legally.