Bibliography

Primary Literature

Homer’s Iliad

Homeric Hymn 23: To the Son of Kronos, Most High

The Theogony of Hesiod translated by Hugh G. Evelyn-White

Secondary Literature

Zaidman, L.B. and Schmitt Pantel, P. (1992) ‘Religion in the Ancient Greek City’, Cambridge:

Bremmer, J. (1994) ‘Greek Religion’ , Oxford: Oxford University Press

Larson, J. (2007) ‘Ancient Greek Cults: A Guide’, New York and London: Routledge.

Connor, W.R. (1987) ‘Tribes, Festivals, and Processions: Civic Ceremonial and Political Manipulation in Archaic Greece’, Journal of Hellenic Studies 107: 40-50 (JSTOR, Library Offprints Collection)

Websites

http://www.controverscial.com/Greek%20Mythology.htm

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-anthropomorphism.htm

http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/lit_terms/anthropomorphism.html

http://www.theoi.com/Olympios/Zeus.html

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu

Greek religious festivals and politics

This was a time for celebrating your religion by means of sacrifice, Athletic games and generally socializing on what was a holiday for many Greeks. This was a time of the most extreme piety heightened by the large scale involvement of the community mixed with excessive amounts of food and wine. The fact that these festivals were repeated annually caused a sense of tradition as the centuries past and may have been the reason why the religion continued to be so successful on retaining loyalty.

There is a theory held by scholars such as Thomas Figueira which suggests that the great religious festivals were linked to the periods of political disturbances. In the article ‘Tribes, Festivals, and Processions: Civic Ceremonial and Political Manipulation in Archaic Greece’ W.R. Connor talks about the theory behind ceremonial and civic life. An example of this is shown in the event of Pisistratus’ arrival in Athens when he returned to power in the 550’s. He entered Athens in a chariot accompanied by a tall woman dressed as Athena. This is obviously a statement of some sort and there have been many insightful attempts at interpreting this event recorded by Herodotus. John Boardman suggests that Pisistratus was comparing himself to Heracles and was implying that his procession to the Acropolis was an analogue to Heracles’ elevation to Olympus”. Gerald Else continues this theme of the comparison to Greek Heroes when he suggests that Pisistratus was comparing himself to Odysseus who had the strong support of Athena. This is shown when he says “Surely it depends integrally upon the Odyssey being well known to whole population of Athens at the time”. The most accurate comparison in my opinion though was one suggested by Stein in his commentary on Herodotus. He claimed that Pisistratus’ intention was to portray himself as Diomedes who is chosen by Athena in the Iliad as the bravest of the warriors. In the Iliad Athena pushed Sthenelos aside and entered the chariot of Diomedes ‘the dread codes led on the man who was the bravest’.[1] The fact that Pistratus did not dress up like Hercules himself or any of the gods gives the impression that he wanted to be perceived as human. This may have been a clever attempt at showing Athens that even though he is backed by the gods, he is not one of them and is a man of the people. Therefore this attempt at using a religious festival to convey political messages shows how these two aspects of Greek life were closely connected.

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[1] Iliad book 5

Dionysus

It seems wrong to say that the birth of Dionysus was ‘not normal’ due to the strange ways in which many of the gods in ancient Greek religion come to be. However, Dionysus does seem to have an alternative creation. His father Zeus impregnates Semele but was struck down by Zeus with a thunderbolt. Zeus then rescued the unborn embryo of Dionysus from Semele and sewed it into his thigh. Dionysus was therefore known as ‘twice born’. Dionysus was disguised as a girl in order to hide him from Hera’s persecution. In honour of this, during the October Oskophoria festival, young boys would dress as girls and carry bunches of grapes which were a symbol of Dionysus. Grapes were held because Dionysus was the god of wine, music and entertainment which all represent socialising and fun (this is why I suppose as a student I find him most interesting). The effects of the wine that people drank sent them into an uncontrollable state of mind which they could not explain. Athenian vase paintings present to different images of Dionysus. The masculine, wine drinking, musical side and the ivory crowned, orderly fashioned respectable god.

An interesting aspect of the worship of Dionysus for me is the connection that the god has with madness. Many followers’ of Dionysus were involved in a sort of ritualized social frenzy whilst under the influence of strong wine. There was ecstatic worship of Dionysus on the high slopes of Mount Parnassos. According to Plutarch who served as a priest at Delphi during the turn of the first century who witnessed the woman known as Thyiads (raving ones), scaling the mountain above the Korykian cave and wetting the rocks with sacrificial blood. This condition of madness is shown in Euripedes’ Bacchae when Dionysus says “These sisters, all three, I’ve stung into a frenzy and steered them from their homes into the mountains where I left them raving. Complete of course with orgiastic trappings”. Dionysus is referring to the Cyclian woman which he has sent into a wild frenzy of ritualistic sexual madness. This seems almost like a social event where they collectively let loose and run free in the mountains. The more severe mental condition that was said to be associated with Dionysus is shown in the story of the Miniyades, royal princesses of Orkhamenos in Boiota who refused to involve themselves in the ritual of assuming the guise of Maenads. The princess’ chose to stay in the palace and weave. This caused the princesses to stop what they were doing and fall into a murderous frenzy, resulting in them tearing to pieces and devouring one of their own children. This story was told to warn the followers of Dionysus that disrespecting the god will lead to a murderous rage overtaking your body.

Dionysus was the god that introduced the grape vine to the people of Attica but before some people could get used to the effects of wine, there were serious consequences for misusing the gift that he had bestowed upon these people. An example of this is when Ikaros and some shepherds drank the mysterious wine and in their drunken state ended up murdering Ikaros, causing his daughter to hanged herself due to grief. This was told a story of negative consequences of over indulging in Dionysus’ divine gift to the people of Attica. This aspect of ancient Greek religion can be compared to Christianity today. This is because the consumption of wine as part of the Eucharist is only a small amount. This may be in order to refrain from losing control and not participating fully in the worship of God.

Zeus

The character of Zeus may seem to be one dimensional as simply just the king of the gods. However he is a much more complex deity. The simple description of Zeus in the Homeric Hymns shows just how basically he was portrayed:

‘It is Zeus whom I shall sing, The most powerful and the greatest of the Gods, All seeing, mighty, who in all things accomplishes his will. Oft-times he converses with Thetis by his side. Be gracious to u, o all-seeing son of Kronos, O most glorious and most great one!’[1]

Zeus earned his place as the supreme ruler of the gods and therefore is the most famous and widely known of the Ancient Greek gods. The story of how he did this was told by Hesiod in the ‘Theogony’. This tells the story of the mating of the goddess Gaia (earth) with Uranus (heavens) and the castration of Uranus by their son Cronos. From the severed genitals of Uranus came Aphrodite goddess of Love. To the ancient Greeks this story was a matter of faith and helped explain how and why the world works as it does. This came to be known as the origins of Greek mythology. The story continues with the freeing of his siblings from Gaia’s womb and these were known as the Titans. Cronos married Rhea but did not want children and ate every baby that was born due to his fear of being overthrown by them. Rhea hid one baby Zeus before he could be killed by his father. The image depicts Rhea presenting a rock wrapped in a blanket disguised as their baby Zeus in order to trick Cronos into swallowing it. When Zeus had grown up he returned and killed his father cutting open his stomach.

All of the children emerged from Cronos and this was the birth of the Olympian Gods. This theme of conflict between father and son was one that was very apparent in the lives of the Greeks. This is due to the close family life style many of them lead with a great concern over succession and the father and son fighting over power.

This resulted in Zeus being very popular when it came to being worshipped. Due to Zeus’ omnipotence he generally presided over all of Greece and was rarely the patron of specific cities. Zeus was mainly worshipped for as said by Jennifer Larson “being father of the gods and men”, but his main cults were about upholding; authority, standards of behaviour and family values. However these are just some of the cults that praised Zeus.

Zeus was seen as not only being the ruler of the weather but as the weather itself. Zeus’ true form was the lightning bolt which was given to him by the Cyclopes after the defeat of the Titans as a symbol of victory. I feel this is a fitting symbol for Zeus as it is the most spectacular of all types of weather. It is something that should be feared and if it is not respected (being out in a thunderstorm) it can strike you at any moment just like Zeus.

The ancient Greeks interpreted the apparent formation of clouds on mountain tops as the work of Zeus. One of the many examples in Greek literature linking Zeus to mountains and his famous thunderbolt can be found in Homer's Iliad. ‘As when from the high peak of a great mountain lightening gatherer Zeus stirs a dense cloud’.[2] The place closest to the heavens was therefore seen as a fitting place to worship him from. An example of sacrifices that occurred on mountain tops are the cult of Zeus Hellanious or Panhellenious in Aigina, where the pious King Aiakos sacrificed to Zeus on the highest peak known as Oros and ended a drought that threatened all of Greece.

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[1] Homeric Hymn 23: To the Son of Kronos, Most High

[2] Iliad 16.297-299

Anthropomorphism

Unlike the mortal humans the gods which the Greeks called athanotoi (immortals) did not die. They had human appearances but they did not have blood coursing through their veins but an ethereal juice called iktor. This is mentioned in the Iliad when Aphrodite is wounded by Diomedes and ‘her immortal blood gushed out, ichor such as flows through the veins of the blessed immortals’. The Ancient Greeks were visually able to represent each deity individually by their unique attributes or objects. Zeus was most famously known by his symbol of a thunderbolt, which he was instantly recognisable from. Poseidon was known for his trident, Dionysus by his wine goblet, Apollo by his lyre, Athene by her aegis, Artemis by her bow, Demeter by her ear of wheat, Hephaistos by his axe etc.

The ancient Greeks did not just use the image of humanity to represent the image of the gods. There were many different forms of representation that were used by the ancient Greeks harmoniously throughout any period of time. One form of divine representation was the ‘bretes’ and ‘yeranon’, the figures were sometimes used in cults and were bathed or clothed. Another form was a ‘herm’ which was a rectangular pillar with a phallus and a head that was meant to represent Hermes. They were placed practically everywhere and were meant to structure space. The damage of these herms usually by mutilating the genitals was regarded as a great religious offense. A ‘Kouroi’ was a life sizes stature of a youth in the nude. They were often sculpted for a funeral but were not meant to be made in the likeness of the deceased person. The statues were a symbol of the gifts bestowed by the gods on a victor at the games like speed or strength. The classic representation of the gods is the anthropomorphic statues that depict a god in human form. JP Vernant claimed that “To pose the problem of the body of the gods is not to ask how the Greeks could have equipped their gods with human bodies. It is rather an investigation of how this symbolic system functions, how the corporeal code permits one to think of the relations between man and god…”[1] It seems to me that the thinking behind not only the ancient Greek religion but also all religions that depict their god/gods in human form may be that order to describe the unknown you have to use the known for example in the Hebrew bible it says that God came down and walking in the Garden of Eden. This is impossible to describe unless God has taken some sort of form.

The Greeks chose the human form to depict their gods not because they thought that the gods had human bodies and that they functioned in the same way as mortals. They chose physically fit and beautiful bodies to depict the gods because they marvelled at the human form and believed that that human body in its perfected form had divine qualities.  A lesser known method of representing the divine was the mask. Masks were frequently used in worshipping a god. The god Dionysus was especially worshipped in this way. An example of this is in the cult of Orthia at Sparta. In the Dionysus rituals the masks that were worn represented the ceasing of being ones self and the person was incarnating the power of the divine.

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[1] Vernant 1991[42]:31

Polytheism

The Ancient Greeks had many different types of gods. Our definition of that type of religion is a polytheistic one. However, the ancient Greeks did not define themselves as polytheistic. The ancient Greeks view on religion was that the diversity of the gods was still a united religion and that all of the different individual gods were part of a whole idea of the divine. The gods were superior to the humans in many ways, they not only had overall super natural powers but each had their own individual powers, limitations and roles in the religion. The ancient Greeks formed cults for each of the gods and each cult devoted their lives to worshiping their specific deity. The duties of each cult included sacrifices, offerings and festivals repeated on a regular basis in order to gain favourability with the god. Another aspect of ancient Greek religion was Heroes. A Hero was a deceased mortal or demi god that was worshipped for their glorious deeds and their duty to a community. The worship of Heroes was a large part of the cults and the Heroes burial place was usually the point of worship. Certain Heroes were less famous and had smaller cult followings; some Heroes such as Theseus were internationally known which caused the festival of Theseus in Athens to be on the same level of greatness the spectacle of the festival in honour of the goddess Athena.

The twelve main gods that appear on the Parthanon frieze are Zeus, Posiedon, Demeter, Hera, Ares, Aphrodite, Artemis, Apollo, Athene, Hermes, Dionysus and Hephaistos. However the ancient Greeks invented separate hierarchies of divinities. The works of Geoges Dumeriul explain that we should concentrate on the structure of the Parthenon and not the isolated divinities. He basically said that in order to achieve greater understanding of the gods, we should study them in relation to each other. The god’s relationships are portrayed in Homer as often comprising of many mortal issues. At times the gods seem to act more like humans towards each other. One stark contrast between ancient Greek religion and todays religions are the moral teachings in society. The gods of Ancient Greece did not love humanity in general. They did therefore not impose the concept of morality on the ancient Greek public. The gods only did something for the humans if they did something for them and lived their lives helping their friends and harming their enemies. This aspect of Greek religion gives the feeling that the Ancient Greeks could relate more with their deities compared with today’s Christian relationship with God.

Approaching Greek Religion

It is hard to get into the mind-set of the Ancient Greeks. Unlike the minority of people in today’s western civilisation that devote themselves to their religion, the ancient Greeks constantly had religion in the back of their minds. Always wondering if they were living a pious life or not. Unlike the modern Christian religions that the majority of people claim to follow in our western society, the Ancient Greeks did not have any evidence of scriptural creed. This forced them to judge their own fortune on how well or unwell they were worshipping their gods, resulting in religion becoming their lives. The main aspects of Greek religion are foreign to our understanding of religion, this is summarized by L. B. Zaidman and P.S. Pantel in their book ‘Religion in the Ancient Greek City’ (1992: p3) when they say that ‘Greek society was fundamentally different from our own, and the concepts that we employ to describe contemporary religious phenomena are necessarily ill adapted to the analysis of what the Greeks regarded as a divine sphere’. Therefore in order to begin to understand the deeper meanings of terms like sacred, purity, pollution, piety and impiety we have to set aside our preconceptions of contemporary religious belief.