Religion, which had bided its time and nourished its roots through all the learned or ribald skepticism of the Periclean and Hellenistic periods, now in the second century resumed its immemorial sway as philosophy, baffled by infinity and human hope, confessed its limitations and abdicated its authority. The people themselves had never lost their faith; most of them accepted in outline the Homeric description of the afterlife,82 sacrificed religiously before undertaking a voyage, and still placed an obol in the mouth of the dead to pay his passage across the Styx. Roman statecraft welcomed the aid of established priesthoods and sought popular support by building costly temples to local gods. Throughout Palestine, Syria, and Asia Minor, the wealth of the clergy continued to grow. Hadad and Atargatis were still worshiped by the Syrians and had an awesome shrine at Hierapolis; the resurrection of the god Tammuz was still hailed in the towns of Syria with the cry, “Adonis [i.e., the Lord] is risen,” and his ascension into heaven was celebrated in the closing scenes of his festival.83 Similar ceremonies commemorated in Greek ritual the agony, death, and resurrection of Dionysus. From Cappadocia the worship of the goddess Ma had spread into Ionia and Italy; her priests (called fanatici as belonging to the fanum, or temple) danced dizzily to the sound of trumpets and drums, slashed themselves with knives, and sprinkled the goddess and her devotees with their blood.84 The making of new deities went on assiduously; Caesar and the emperors, Antinoüs and many local worthies, were deified (i.e., canonized) in life or death. Cross-fertilized by trade and war, pantheons were everywhere in flower, and prayers rose hopefully in a thousand tongues to a thousand gods. Paganism was not one religion; it was a jungle of rival creeds, often merging in eclectic confusion.
The worship of Cybele held its ground in Lydia and Phrygia, Italy and Africa and elsewhere, and its priests, as before, emasculated themselves in imitation of her beloved Attis. At her spring festival her worshipers fasted, prayed, and mourned the death of Attis; her priests cut their arms and drank their own blood; and a solemn procession bore the young god to his grave. But on the morrow the streets rang with exultant shouts as the people celebrated the resurrection of Attis and the renewal of the earth. “Take courage, O mystics,” cried the priests, “the god is saved; and for you also will come salvation.”85 On the last day of the feast the image of the Great Mother was carried in triumph through crowds that hailed her, at Rome, as Nostra Domina, “Our Lady.”86
Even more widely honored than Cybele was the Egyptian goddess Isis, the sorrowing mother, the loving comforter, the bearer of the gift of eternal life. All the Mediterranean peoples knew how her great spouse Osiris had died and had risen from the dead; in nearly every great city on that historic sea this happy resurrection was commemorated with gorgeous pageantry, and jubilant worshipers sang, “We have found Osiris again.”87 Isis was represented in pictures and statues as holding her divine child Horus in her arms, and devout litanies hailed her as “Queen of Heaven,” “Star of the Sea,” and “Mother of God.”88 Of all pagan cults this came nearest to Christianity in the tenderness of its story, the refinement of its ritual, the solemnity and yet joyful atmosphere of its chapels, the moving music of its vespers, the conscientious ministry of its white-robed and tonsured priests,89 the honors and opportunities with which it charmed and comforted women, the universal welcome it gave to every nationality and every class. The religion of Isis spread from Egypt to Greece in the fourth century B.C., to Sicily in the third, to Italy in the second, and then to all parts of the Empire; her icons have been found on the Danube, the Rhine, and the Seine, and a temple to her has been unearthed in London.90 The Mediterranean soul has never ceased to worship the divine creativeness and maternal solicitude of woman.
Meanwhile the masculine cult of Mithras was passing from Persia to the most distant Roman frontiers. In the later Zoroastrian theology Mithras was the son of Ahura-Mazda, the God of Light. He, too, was the god of light, of truth, purity, and honor; sometimes he was identified with the sun and led the cosmic war against the powers of darkness, always he mediated between his father and his followers, protecting and encouraging them in life’s struggle with evil, lies, uncleanliness, and the other works of Ahriman, Prince of Darkness. When Pompey’s soldiers brought this religion from Cappadocia to Europe a Greek artist pictured Mithras as kneeling on the back of a bull and plunging a poniard into its neck; this representation became the universal symbol of the faith. The seventh day of each week was held sacred to the sun-god; and towards the end of December his followers celebrated the birthday of Mithras “the Invincible Sun,” who, at the winter solstice, had won his annual victory over the forces of darkness, and day by day would now give longer light.91 Tertullian speaks of a Mithraic priesthood with a “high pontiff,” and of celibates and virgins serving the god; daily sacrifice was offered at his altar, worshipers partook of consecrated bread and wine, and the climax of the ceremony was signaled by the sounding of a bell.92 A flame was kept ever burning before the crypt in which the young god was represented felling the bull. Mithraism preached a high morality and pledged its “soldiers” to a lifelong war against evil in every form. After death, said its priests, all men must appear before the judgment seat of Mithras; then unclean souls would be handed over to Ahriman for eternal torment, while the pure would rise through seven spheres, shedding some mortal element at each stage, until they would be received into the full radiance of heaven by Ahura-Mazda himself.93 This invigorating mythology spread in the second and third centuries of our era through western Asia and Europe (skipping Greece), and built its chapels as far north as Hadrian’s Wall. Christian Fathers were shocked to find so many parallels between their own religion and Mithraism; they argued that these were thefts from Christianity, or confusing stratagems of Satan (a form of Ahriman). It is difficult to say which faith borrowed from the other; perhaps both absorbed ideas current in the religious air of the East.
Each of the great cults of the Mediterranean region had “mysteries,” which were usually ceremonies of purification, sacrifice, initiation, revelation, and regeneration, centering about the death and resurrection of the god. New members were admitted into the worship of Cybele by being placed naked in a pit over which a bull was slain; the blood of the sacrificed animal, falling upon the candidate, purified him of sin and gave him a new spiritual and eternal life. The genitals of the bull, representing his sacred fertility, were placed in a consecrated vessel and were dedicated to the goddess.94 Mithraism had a similar rite, known to the classic world as the taurobolium, or throwing of the bull. Apuleius described in ecstatic terms the degrees of initiation into the service of Isis—the long novitiate of fasting, continence, and prayer, the purifying submersion in holy water, and at last the mystic vision of the goddess offering everlasting bliss. At Eleusis the candidate was required to confess his sins (which discouraged Nero), abstain for a time from certain foods, bathe in the bay for spiritual as well as physical cleansing, and then offer sacrifice, usually of a pig. For three days, at the Feast of Demeter, the initiates mourned with her the snatching of her daughter into Hades, and meanwhile lived on consecrated cakes and a mystic mixture of flour, water, and mint. On the third night a religious drama represented the resurrection of Persephone, and the officiating priest promised a like rebirth to every purified soul.95 Varying the theme under Hindu or Pythagorean influence, the Orphic sect throughout Greek lands taught that the soul is imprisoned in a succession of sinful bodies and can be released from this degrading reincarnation by rising to ecstatic union with Dionysus. At their gatherings the members of the Orphic brotherhood drank the blood of a bull sacrificed to—and identified with—the dying and atoning savior. Communal partaking of sacred food or drink was a frequent feature of these Mediterranean faiths. Often the food was thought to take on, by sanctification, the powers of the god, which were then magically conveyed to the communicant.96
All sects assumed the possibility of magic. The Magi had disseminated their art through the East and had given a new name to old jugglery. The Mediterranean world was rich in magicians, miracleworkers, oracles, astrologers, ascetic saints, and scientific interpreters of dreams. Every unusual occurrence was widely hailed as a divine portent of future events. Askesis, which the Greeks had used to denote the athletic training of the body, came now to mean the spiritual taming of the flesh; men scourged themselves, mutilated themselves, starved themselves, or bound themselves to one place with chains; some of them died through self-torture or self-denial.97 In the Egyptian desert near Lake Mareotis a group of Jews and non-Jews, male and female, lived in solitary cells, avoided sexual relations, met on the Sabbath for common prayer, and called themselves Therapeutae, healers of the soul.98 Millions believed that the writings ascribed to Orpheus, Hermes, Pythagoras, the sibyls, etc., had been dictated or inspired by a god. Preachers claiming divine inspiration traveled from city to city, performing apparently miraculous cures. Alexander of Abonoteichus trained a serpent to hide its head under his arm and allow a half-human mask to be affixed to its tail; he announced that the serpent was the god Asclepius come to earth to serve as an oracle; and he amassed a fortune by interpreting the sounds made by reeds inserted in the false head.99
Beside such charlatans there were probably thousands of sincere preachers of the pagan faiths. Early in the third century Philostratus painted an idealized picture of such a man in his Life of Apollonius of Tyana. At sixteen Apollonius adopted the strict rule of the Pythagorean brotherhood, renouncing marriage, meat, and wine, never shaving his beard, and keeping silence for five years.100 He distributed his patrimony among his relatives and wandered as a penniless monk through Persia, India, Egypt, western Asia, Greece, and Italy. He imbibed the lore of the Magi, the Brahmans, and the Egyptian ascetics. He visited temples of any creed, implored the priests to abandon the sacrifice of animals, worshiped the sun, accepted the gods, and taught that behind them there was one supreme unknowable deity. His life of abnegation and piety led his followers to claim that he was the son of a god, but he described himself simply as the son of Apollonius. Tradition credited him with many miracles: he walked through closed doors, understood all languages, cast out demons, and raised a girl from the dead.101 But he was a philosopher rather than a magician. He knew and loved Greek literature and expounded a simple but exacting morality. “Grant me,” he prayed the gods, “to have little and to desire nothing.” Asked by a king to choose a gift, he answered, “Dried fruit and bread.”102 Preaching reincarnation, he bade his followers injure no living creature and eat no flesh. He exhorted them to shun enmity, slander, jealousy, and hatred; “if we are philosophers,” he told them, “we cannot hate our fellow men.”103 “Sometimes,” says Philostratus, “he discussed communism and taught that men ought to support one another.”104 He was accused of sedition and witchcraft, came of his own accord to Rome to answer these charges before Domitian, was imprisoned, and escaped. He died about A.D. 98, at an advanced age. His followers claimed that he had appeared to them after his death and had then ascended bodily into heaven.105
What were the qualities that won half of Rome, half the Empire, to these new faiths? Partly their classless, raceless character; they accepted all nationalities, all freemen, and all slaves, and rode with consoling indifference over inequalities of pedigree and wealth. Their temples were made spacious to welcome the people as well as to enshrine the god. Cybele and Isis were mother-goddesses acquainted with grief, who mourned like millions of bereaved women; they could understand what the Roman deities seldom knew—the emptied hearts of the defeated. The desire to return to the mother is stronger than the impulse to depend upon the father; it is the mother name that comes spontaneously to the lips in great joy or distress; therefore men as well as women found comfort and refuge in Isis and Cybele. Even today the Mediterranean worshiper appeals more often to Mary than to the Father or the Son; and the lovely prayer that he most frequently repeats is addressed not to the Virgin but to the Mother, blessed in the fruit of her womb.
The new faiths not only entered more deeply into the heart; they appealed more colorfully to the imagination and the senses with processions and chants alternating between sorrow and rejoicing, and a ritual of impressive symbolism that brought fresh courage to spirits heavy with the prose of life. The new priesthoods were filled not by politicians occasionally donning sacerdotal garb, but by men and women of all ranks, graduating through an ascetic novitiate to continual ministration. By their help the soul conscious of wrongdoing could be purified; sometimes the body racked with illness could be healed by an inspiring word or ritual; and the mysteries at which they officiated symbolized the hope that even death might be overcome.
Once men had sublimated their longing for grandeur and continuance in the glory and survival of their family and their clan, and then of a state that was their creation and collective self. Now the old clan lines were melting away in the new mobility of peace; and the imperial state was the spiritual embodiment only of the master class, not of the powerless multitude of men. Monarchy at the top, frustrating the participation and merger of the citizen in the state, produced individualism at the bottom and through the mass. The promise of personal immortality, of an endless happiness after a life of subjection, poverty, tribulation, or toil, was the final and irresistible attraction of the Oriental faiths and of the Christianity that summarized, absorbed, and conquered them. All the world seemed conspiring to prepare the way for Christ.
I His date is disputed. Pauly–Wissowa place him about 50 B.C.; Heiberg, Diels, and Heath about A.D. 225.23
II Cf. the emphasis of current medicine on glandular secretions.
III Meleager’s Stephanos was combined in our sixth century with the Musa Paidiké, a homosexual anthology compiled by Strabo of Sardis (50 B.C.). Subsequent additions were made, chiefly of Christian verse; and the Anthology was given its present form at Constantinople about A.D. 920.