Introduction to Ancient Greek Religion

For the 'Ancient Greek Religion' module I will use the god Apollo as a base around to look at the weekly lecture topics. I chose Apollo as my favourite god a few years ago because I was practising archery at the time I was studying mythology at college. Walter Burkert says 'Apollo has often been described, not without reason, as the 'most Greek of the gods'... That the youth, the kouros, was raised to its ideal, gives Greek culture as a whole its peculiar character, purified and elevated, this ideal is manifest in the divine; the god of this culture is Apollo'. (Greek Religion,1987:143). This apparent importance given to Apollo also helped my decision. 

This week's blog post will be more of a discussion about the ancient Greek religion in broader terms.

Roman copy inspired by Greek ivory and gold statue of Zeus at Olympia by Pheidias

Zaidman says that cultural estrangement is a 'necessity' (Religion in the Ancient Greek City, 1992:3) when discussing Greek religion, and that we need to have a 'mental readjustment’ (1992:3) to be able to have such an estrangement from our own culture. When I think of the ancient Greek religion I tend to look it as the collection of all the mythological gods and heroes with rituals and festivals added. While this may not be the best or correct way of viewing it, it does allow me to view the "religion" of the ancient Greeks with a sense of estrangement from the modern day definitions of religion. This is useful to me considering that the "western world" as it were has been influenced fairly heavily since the change to Christianity by the Roman Emperor Constantine. As Greece became part of the Roman Empire, Constantine's Christianisation affected it as well. The Greeks went from worshipping Zeus (see above image) and the rest of the pantheon, to being Christian, then during the time of the Ottoman Empire; Islamic, and has since reverted back to having Christianity as its primary religion. These religious changes can be seen in the history of the Acropolis and the Parthenon. However this group are attempting to reclaim their country's religious heritage. In the lecture today we discussed if there was such a thing as Greek religion. Religion to the Greeks was not religion as we know it today. The ancient Greeks had something religious intertwined in everything they did, from politics and law to sporting events, examples are the Areopagus in Athens and the Olympic Games site at Olympia respectively. In the world today, aside from some theocracies, most of the world is fairly secular or keeps politics and religion separate. Price says 'there is no religious sphere separate from that of politics and warfare or private life; instead, religion is embedded in all aspects of life, public and private.' (Religions of the Ancient Greeks:1999). This quote accurately contrasts the difference between religion in society today and religion in society over 2000 years ago. Even though we can see that Price's statement is correct about ancient Greek religion, as we see it everywhere, no matter what topic of the ancient Greek world we study, it is not religion as we know it. Garland points out how it was different to religion today: ‘I can see no better way to begin than by providing a kind of negative catechism of everything that mainstream Greek religion wasn’t, in order to demonstrate how it differed from the religious systems with which we are probably most familiar: There was no dogma There was no set of beliefs to which everyone had to subscribe There was no ‘official’ interpretation of religious observance There was nothing resembling a church with a centralised hierarchy There was no concept of conversion There was no absolute distinction between the sacred and profane There was little notion of sin or redemption There was no rule of life There was no denial of worldly pleasures There was little fear of eternal damnation There was no barrier between religion and ordinary life.’ Religion and the Greeks (Bristol Classical Press: 1994) Due to what Garland points out here, we see the need for Zaidman's cultural estrangement. Some of the things in this list, while not surprising, are interesting.  So in our lecture, we came to conclusion that there was such a thing as Greek religion but only if we detached ourselves from the Christianised society we live in today. To tie this in with Apollo, he is occasionally described as giving off a glowing light (see Anthropomorphism post), could this have influenced the way in which Mary and Jesus are portrayed in Christian art? They tend to both have a glowing light coming from around their heads. It's possibly a connection. Secondary Sources: Burkert, W., Greek Religion, 1987, Page 143 Garland, R., Religion and the Greeks, 1994 Price., Religions of the Ancient Greeks, 1999, Page 3. Zaidman, B. Pantel, P. S., Religion in the Ancient Greek City, 1989, Page 3 Image: Jupiter - http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/S1.1.html