Greek Religion: key modern scholarship
Paul Cartledge (1947)
"For all Greeks, religion was the lifeblood of their society and polity... no separate word for religion. For the democratic Athenians festivals were their religion's beating heart" "The key religious event was the procession through the Dipylon gate... the point was to display the city of Athens to itself as well as the goddess by giving a role to all citizens" "The Parthenon represents a religious problem... it has no altar to Athene Parthenos... she had to share with Athene Polias... not purely religious function. It stood for imperial Athens in relation to the outside world" "The Erectheion "a massive attempt at religious and political compromise... housing two jealous deities together"
Mary Beard (1955)
"Not all Athenians were impressed with the Parthenon as we are...too extravagant.... Athena "dressed like a *****....jokes about families of mice in the skirts of Athena Parthenos "One of the richest, most colourful and intense scared spaces anywhere...a phantasmagoria of religious images.... feast for the eye and imagination... full of debates among ancient visitors about how gods should be represented"
Susan Woodford (1938)
"Not everybody approved of Pericles' building programme"... however it was "just one part of the amazing intellectual and artistic flowering that blossomed in C.5th Athens" "Pericles...encouraged a building programme cleverly devised to provide employment and glory for the city"
Lousie Bruit Zaidman (1938)
"The Parthenon "an exceptional monument" care of its architecture and richness of its ornamentation" The Acropolis conveyed different messages to different groups of worshippers and other visitors. A sanctuary that the whole of Greece could admire "Difficult to separate out those cults that are specifically and exclusively civic... the constant reference point of every religious attitude was precisely the city"
Chaniotis - families of magistracies
'Although new magistracies were usually open to all citizens, the privileges of hereditary groups in traditional cults and rituals survived' e.g. the Genos (family) of Labyadae (Delphi)
G. Kirk - gods in theatre
'these divine scenes successfully avert the theatre of monotony, because they provide a total change of atmosphere and behaviour ... all sorts of not very heroic qualities are allowed to enter the lives of the Gods - The Gods' involvement affect the plot massively - Gods are imperfect like us - Is it the Gods' place to be heroic/unheroic in our mortal lives
Chaniotis - priests/priestesses
'when priests or priestesses are honoured, they are honoured for their ritual activities' e.g. Athenian priest was praised for making successful sacrifices to Zeus
Katherine Neale - Panathenaic procession
(Panathenaic procession) "the privileged status of the Athenian male citizen" was "clearly visible in this procession"
Richard Allen Tomlinson (1932)
(Quoting Sir John Boardman) "The procession of horseman represents the fallen dead at the Battle of Marathon" supports Sir Mortimer Wheeler's view of it as "the largest war memorial ever" "The Athenians... challenging the Spartans for supremacy... built new temples to commemorate their victory over Persia as well as to glorify the city...splendour worthy of its status"
Gunnel Erkroth
-A hero is someone who has lived and died -A hero attracted public attention after death -Usually had a tomb
Michael Flower (2008)
-If you were an ordinary Athenian citizen, you wouldn't have huge amount of superstition. -Prophecy can be incredibly dangerous -The fear of the consequences was not as large as the fear of the system not working.
Jon Mickaelson
-Links to reciprocal relationships This honour is that which a subject owes his king and that which a good subject owes to a good king
What does Richard Seaford believe was involved in the initiation ceremony for the Eleusinian Mysteries and what is this belief based on?
A near-death experience based on Plutarch where he compares the soul at death to the Mysteries
T. Webster
Abnormal behaviour was linked to him being helped or harmed by a god, not psychology
R.G.Frey - Socrates
Argues that Socrates choosing to drink the hemlock and not fleeing shows that he committed suicide - not executed
William Allan - gods and immorality
Argues that gods aren't amoral, but instead offer divine justice
Jasper Griffin - Homer's gods
Claims the gods in Homer's epics are impressive and deserve the worship they receive
Antony Andrews
Every Greek activity was linked with the cult of some god
T. Webster
Festivals were simply a holiday
Vernant - sacrifice
Fundamentally, sacrifice was killing for eating
J. Redfield - Homer's gods
Gods in Homer are 'a chief source of comedy' Relief from the mortals' issues Circe turning the men into pigs Immortality lowers the stakes as there is no danger of death, takes away any tension Poseidon is so grumpy that it can be comedic Gods always follow the mortals around
Antony Andrews
Gods were concerned, like heroes, with their own honour and rarely human mortality.
Mikalson
Greeks were surrounded by religious symbols but we do not know what it meant in daily life
Robert Garland - Greek worship
Greeks worshipped the gods not because they "upheld justice or were supremely good beings" but out of fear of their power
What does Tom Harrison say about Greek explanations about why an oracle may not be fulfilled?
He says that they could be misinterpreted, corrupt, the person asking the question may have been at fault in some way or the oracle was a dud but underlying all of these explanations was a willingness to believe in the truth and fulfilment of prophecy
Seaford
Hero Cult grew out of standard Greek death rituals - related to important individuals
Zaidman-Bruit
Heroes linked to the formation of the polis and the appropriation of territories
Jon Mikalson - Homer and Hesiod
Homer and Hesiod created the anthropomorphised version of the gods, in essence a "divine royal family."
What does Emma Aston say about Homer's contribution to Greek understanding of the nature of the Gods?
Homer makes the greatest contribution to understanding the nature of the Gods due to his Panhellenic appeal, especially at a time when Greece was divided into poleis, Homer was a powerful source of cohesion when it came to religion and ideas about the gods
Kirk
Homeric gods relieve monotony by allowing non-heroic action
Snodgrass
Homeric heroes pass to underworld - unlike hero-cult; heroised dead linked to rise of polis; brought 2 types of heroisation together
What does Louise Bruit Zaidman say about the role of religion in the Greek's lives?
It did more than just put a divine gloss on civic life as it impregnated each and every civic activity and was therefore inseparable from the very definition of Greek civic life
What does Fritz Graff say about the validity of healing stories?
It is pointless to try and filter out the imaginary healing stories from the reality as what counts is the almost limitless faith in the power of the Gods
Alcibiades' imitation of the Eleusinian Mysteries was not inherently mocking and instead was condemned for its contempt against Athens, not the sanctity of the mysteries
James McGlew
"because they share the same names, many naturally assume that the familiar gods of Greek literature, with their interesting personalities and all too human vices, were the gods actually worshipped by the Greeks, but this leads to a very mistaken conception of the gods to whom real Greeks prayed, sacrificed, and offered their dedications."
Jon D. Mikalson
piety "was not the expression of a sentiment of intimacy between man and god" and we cannot seek to understand the practises of the Greeks through a modern or Christian lens
Louise Bruit Zaidman
"of all the reasons for which pilgrims undertook pilgrimage, one of the most popular was the pilgrimage in search of a cure."
Matthew Dillon
Robert Garland (1995)
Panathenaia "an instrument of Imperliast propaganda... each ally had to contribute a cow and a suit of armour as an offering" The Parthenon "one of the most perfect buildings ever constructed... but not much better than a "vanity box" to show off the chryselephantine statute of Athena"
Robert Garland - piety
Piety was doing the right thing for the right god at the right time
Furley
Reciprocity: Gods didn't need offerings from mortals, but they did enjoy them
Pulleyn
Reciprocity: Greeks viewed religion in the same way as a mortal relationship - one good turn deserves another
Chaniotis - religious authority
Religious authority lay in the hands of the state only, magistrates could perform religious activities without priests but it was much less common for priests to conduct religious activities without a secular authority present
"whenever Greeks came together as a group ... they invariably formed a religious association."
Robert Garland
the Greeks worshipped the gods not because they "upheld justice or were supremely good beings" but out of fear of their power
Robert Garland
Fred Naiden - sacrifice
Sacrifice served to maintain and stabilise the relationship between mortals and gods
Herrmann - Socrates
Socrates' questioning of common concepts shown in Plato's dialogues forms the trend which questions traditional beliefs
Bukert - sacrifice
Suggested that the aggressive killing of a sacrificial animal led to the founding of a community and civilisation
J. Hurwit - Acropolis
The Acropolis was 'the central repository of the Athenians' very lofty conceptions of themselves'
What does Robert Fowler say in response to the many different versions of the same God and conflicting ideas?
The Gods overflowed like clothes from an over-filled drawer which no-one felt obliged to tidy
T. Webster
The Greeks thought of their gods as human
T. Webster
The Greeks wouldn't undertake any important public or private enterprise without consulting an oracle or taking the omens
What does Kevin Clinton believe the Ninnion Tablet shows?
The beginning and end of the ceremony, with Demeter and Persephone reunited again at the end
Velentza - Athena and justice
The figures of Athena depicted in the Athena Nike Temple's frieze were there 'to oversee and justify the battles of the Athenians'
What does David Stuttard believe of the link between the Gods' section of the Parthenon frieze and the Panathenaic procession?
The journey from light to darkness with the Gods associated with the Underworld on the left which mirrors the Panathenaic procession that starts in the Kerameikos cemetery and ends on the Athenian acropolis
What do David Stuttard and Susan Woodford believe the main scene of the Parthenon frieze shows?
The presentation of the new peplos for the wooden statue of Athene Polias
J.W. Roberts
The questions raised were practical ones of survival, not of metaphysical
Zaidman - festivals and civic life
There is an inseparability of festivals from Greek civic life
What does James Redfield argue about the Gods in the Iliad?
They are a chief source of comedy
What does Richard Seaford state about hero cults?
They are an expansion of normal death rituals for a family member with the key difference being the number of people performing the rituals and the fact the person receiving the sacrifices/libations died a long time ago
What does William Allan argue about the Gods?
They are not presented as amoral, but instead offer divine justice
What does Geoffrey Kirk claim about divine scenes in Homeric epics?
They avert the theatre of monotony as they provide a total change of atmosphere and behaviour as all sorts of not very heroic qualities are allowed to enter the lives of the Gods
What does Richard Seaford say is important about hero cults?
They create a sense of community and identity amongst a group
What does Judith Kindt warn of the dangers of thinking of private and public worship at separate entities?
They were not thought of as separate as the Greeks didn't have corresponding words for public and private and they didn't see their personal religious practices as any different from those of society since both involved the same rituals and the only thing that could separate they would be through participation (who was involved), religious outlook (for whose benefit were the rituals being performed) and administration (who organised and paid for the event)
What does Jon Mikalson say about polis religious participation?
Within polis religious participation, the state was just recognising nationally the importance of family deities
Jones
gods are blind forces that are to be acknowleged once they are on cliff edges
Mikalson
personalities of the gods in literature are different to the ones the Greeks worshipped