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The traditional grand narrative correlating the decline of Graeco-Roman religion with the rise of Christianity has been under pressure for three decades. This book argues that the alternative accounts now emerging significantly underestimate the role of three major cults, of Cybele and Attis, Isis and Serapis, and Mithras. Although their differences are plain, these cults present sufficient common features to justify their being taken typologically as a group. All were selective adaptations of much older cults of the Fertile Crescent. It was their relative sophistication, their combination of the imaginative power of unfamiliar myth with distinctive ritual performance and ethical seriousness, that enabled them both to focus and to articulate a sense of the autonomy of religion from the socio-political order, a sense they shared with Early Christianity. The notion of 'mystery' was central to their ability to navigate the Weberian shift from ritualist to ethical salvation.
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Romanising Oriental Gods
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Religions in the Graeco-Roman World Editors
H.S. Versnel D. Frankfurter J. Hahn
VOLUME 165
Romanising Oriental Gods Myth, Salvation and Ethics in the Cults of Cybele, Isis and Mithras
by
Jaime Alvar Translator and editor
Richard Gordon
LEIDEN • BOSTON 2008
The publication of this work has been made possible through a subsidy received from the Directorate General for Books, Archives and Libraries of the Spanish Ministry of Culture. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Alvar, Jaime. Romanising oriental Gods : myth, salvation, and ethics in the cults of Cybele, Isis, and Mithras / by Jaime Alvar ; translator and editor Richard Gordon. p. cm. — (Religions in the Graeco-Roman world ; 165) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-13293-1 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Cybele (Goddess)—Cult. 2. Attis (God)—Cult. 3. Isis (Egyptian deity)—Cult. 4. Serapis (Egyptian deity)—Cult. 5. Mithras (Zoroastrian deity)—Cult. 6. Rome—Religion. I. Alvar Ezquerra, Jaime. I. Title. II. Series. BL820.C8R66 2008 200.937—dc22
2008015353
ISSN 0927-7633 ISBN 978 90 04 13293 1 Copyright 2008 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands
Φθέγξοµαι οἷς θέµις ἐστί, θύρας δὲ ἐπίθεσθε βέβηλοι.
‘Orpheus’ as cited by Aristobulus ap. Eusebius, Praeparatio evangelica 13.12.5 (vol. XII–XIII p. 312 des Places) = 247 Kern = 378 F Bernabé Quippe cum transactis vitae temporibus iam in ipso finitae lucis limine constitutos, quis tamen tuto possint magna religionis committi silentia, numen deae soleat elicere et sua providentia quodam modo renatos ad novae reponere rursus salutis curricula. The chief priest, in Apuleius, Met. 11.21 I will not say that the tragic world-view was everywhere completely destroyed by this intruding unDionysian spirit: we only know that it had to flee from art into the underworld as it were, in the degenerate form of a secret cult. Fr. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy (1884) §17
To Pablo and Irene Alv