Fetishism

The animistic belief that certain material objects can be charged with a

divine potency or spirit gives rise to fetishism, a term which properly

denotes the worshipful or superstitious use of objects made by art and

invested with mysterious power, so as to be used like amulets for the

purposes of protective magic or for higher purposes of communion with

the divinity. From the earliest discoverable period down to the present

day fetishism has been a powerful factor in the religion of the

Graeco-Roman world. The importance of the sacred stone and pillar in the

"Mycenaean" or "Minoan" period which preceded Homer has been

impressively shown by Dr Arthur Evans, and the same fetishistic worship

continued throughout the historic ages of classic paganism, the rude

aniconic emblem of pillar or tree-trunk surviving often by the side of

the iconic masterpiece. It is a reasonable conjecture that the earliest

anthropomorphic images of divinities, which were beginning to make their

appearance by the time of Homer, were themselves evolved by slow

transformation from the upright sacred column. And the altar itself may

have arisen as another form of this; the simple heap of stones, such as

those erected to Hermes by the way-side and called [Greek: Hermaioi

lophoi], may have served both as a place of worship and as an _agalma_

that could attract and absorb a divine potency into itself. Hence the

fetishistic power of the altar was fully recognized in Greek ritual, and

hence also in the cult of Apollo Agyieus the god and the altar are

called by the same name.

It has been supposed that the ancestors of the historic Greeks, before

they were habituated to conceive of their divinities as in human form,

may have been accustomed to invest them with animal attributes and

traits. We must not indeed suppose it to be a general law of religious

evolution that "theriomorphism" must always precede anthropomorphism and

that the latter transcends and obliterates the former. The two systems

can exist side by side, and savages of low religious development can

conceive of their deities as assuming at one time human, at another

bestial, shape. Now the developed Greek religion was devotedly

anthropomorphic, and herein lay its strength and its weakness;

nevertheless, the advanced Hellene could imagine his Dionysus entering

temporarily into the body of the sacrificial bull or goat, and the men

of Phigalia in Arcadia were attached to their horse-headed Demeter, and

the primitive Laconians possibly to a ram-headed Apollo. Theriolatry in

itself, i.e. the worship of certain animals as of divine power in their

own right, apart from any association with higher divinities, can

scarcely be traced among the Greek communities at any period. They are

not found to have paid reverence to any species, though individual

animals could acquire temporarily a divine character through communion

with the altar or with the god. The wolf might at one time have been

regarded as the incarnation of Apollo, the wolf-god, and here and there

we find faint traces of a wolf-sacrifice and of offerings laid out for

wolves. But the occasional propitiation of wild beasts may fall short of

actual worship. The Athenian who slew a wolf might give it a sumptuous

funeral, probably to avoid a blood-feud with the wolf's relatives, yet

the Athenian state offered rewards for a wolf's head. Nor did any Greek

individual or state worship flies as a class, although a small oblation

might be thrown to the flies before the great sacrifice to Apollo on the

Leucadian rock, to please them and to persuade them not to worry the

worshippers at the great solemnity, where the reek of roast flesh would

be likely to attract them.

Totemism.

Theriolatry suggests totemism; and though we now know that the former

can arise and exist quite independently of the latter, recent

anthropologists have interpreted the apparent sanctity or prestige of

certain animals in parts of Greek mythology and religion as the deposit

of an earlier totemistic system. But this interpretation, originated and

maintained with great acumen by Andrew Lang and W. Robertson Smith,

appears now somewhat hazardous; and as a scientific hypothesis there are

many flaws in it. The more observant study of existing totem-tribes has

weakened our impression of the importance of totemism as a primitive

religious phenomenon. It is in reality more important as a social than

as a religious factor. If indeed we choose to regard totemism as a mere

system of nomenclature, by which a tribe names itself after some animal

or plant, then we might quote a few examples of Hellenic tribes

totemistic in this sense. But totemism is a fact of importance only when

it affects the tribal marriage laws or the tribal religion. And the

tribal marriage laws of ancient Greece, so far as they are known, betray

no clear mark of totemistic arrangements; nor does the totemism of

contemporary savages appear to affect their religion in any such way as

to suggest a natural explanation for any of the peculiar phenomena of

early Hellenic polytheism. Here and there we have traces of a

snake-tribe in Greece, the [Greek: Ophieis] in Aetolia, the [Greek:

Ophiogeneis] in Cyprus and Parium, but we are not told that these

worshipped the snake, though the latter clan were on terms of intimacy

with it. Where the snake was actually worshipped in Hellenic cult--the

cases are few and doubtful--it may have been regarded as the incarnation

of the ancestor or as the _avatar_ of the under-world divinity.

Human sacrifice.

Finally, among the primitive or savage phenomena the practice of human

sacrifice looms large. Encouraged at one time by the Delphic oracle, it

was becoming rare and repellent to the conscience by the 6th century

B.C.; but it was not wholly extinct in the Greek world even by the time

of Porphyry. The facts are very complex and need critical handling, and

a satisfying scientific explanation of them all is still to be sought.

We can now observe the higher aspects of the advanced polytheism. And at

the outset we must distinguish between mythology and religion strictly

understood, between the stories about the divinities and the private or

public religious service. No doubt the former are often a reflection of

the latter, in many cases being suggested by the ritual which they may

have been invented to interpret, and often envisaging important

cult-ideas. Such for example are the myths about the purification and

trial of Orestes, Theseus, Ixion, the story of Demeter's sorrow, of the

sufferings and triumph of Dionysus, and those about the abolition of

human sacrifice. Yet Greek mythology as a whole was irresponsible,

without reserve, and unchecked by dogma or sacerdotal prohibition; and

frequently it sank below the level of the current religion, which was

almost free from the impurities which shock the modern reader of

Hellenic myths. Nor again did any one feel himself called upon to

believe any particular myth; in fact, faith, understood in the sense in

which the term is used in Christian theology, as the will to believe

certain dogmatic statements about the nature and action of divinity, is

a concept which was neither named nor recognized in Hellenic ethics or

religious doctrine; only, if a man proclaimed his disbelief in the

existence of the gods and refused to join in the ritual of the

community, he would become "suspect," and might at times be persecuted

by his fellows. Greek religion was not so much an affair of doctrine as

of ritual, religious formulae of which the cult-titles of the divinities

were an important component, and prayer; and the most illuminative

sources of our knowledge of it are the ritual-inscriptions and other

state-documents, the private dedications, the monuments of religious art

and certain passages in the literature, philology and archaeology being

equally necessary to the equipment of the student.

Religion in Homer.

We are tempted to turn to Homer as the earliest authority. And though

Homer is not primitive and does not present even an approximately

complete account of Greek religion, we can gather from his poems a

picture of an advanced polytheism which in form and structure at least

is that which was presented to the world of Aeschylus. We discern a

pantheon already to some extent systematized, a certain hierarchy and

family of divinities in which the supremacy of Zeus is established as

incontestable. And the anthropomorphic impulse, the strongest trend in

the Greek religious imagination, which filled the later world with

fictitious personages, generating transparent shams such as an

Ampidromus for the ritual of the Ampidromia, Amphiction for the

Amphictiones, a hero [Greek: Keramos] for the gild of potters, is

already at its height in the Homeric poems. The deities are already

clear-cut, individual personalities of distinct ethos, plastically

shaped figures such as the later sculpture and painting could work upon,

not vaguely conceived _numina_ like the forms of the old Roman religion.

Nor can we call them for the most part nature-deities like the

personages of the Vedic system, thinly disguised "personifications" of

natural phenomena. Athena is not the blue sky nor Apollo the sun; they

are simply Athena and Apollo, divine personages with certain powers and

character, as real for their people as Christ and the Virgin for

Christendom. By the side of these, though generally in a subordinate

position, we find that Homer recognized certain divinities that we may

properly call nature-powers, such as Helios, Gaia and the river-deities,

forms descending probably from a remote animistic period, but

maintaining themselves within the popular religion till the end of

Paganism. Again, though Homer may talk and think at times with levity

and _banalite_ about his deities, his deeper utterances impute an

advanced morality to the supreme God. His Zeus is on the whole a power

of righteousness, dealing with men by a righteous law of nemesis, never

being himself the author of evil--an idea revealed in the opening

passage of the _Odyssey_--but protecting the good and punishing the

wicked. Vengeance, indeed, was one of the attributes of divinity both

for Homer and the average Greek of the later period, as it is in Judaic

and Christian theology, though Plato and Euripides protested strongly

against such a view. But the Homeric Zeus is equally a god of pity and

mercy, and the man who neglects the prayers of the sorrowful and

afflicted, who violates the sanctity of the suppliant and guest, or

oppresses the poor or the wanderer, may look for divine punishment.

Though not regarded as the physical author of the universe or the

Creator, he is in a moral sense the father of gods and men. And though

the sense of sin and the need of piacular sacrifice are expressed in the

Homeric poems, the relations between gods and men that they reveal are

on the whole genial and social; the deity sits unseen at the good man's

festal sacrifice, and there is a simple apprehension of the idea of

divine communion. There is also indeed a glimmering of the dark

background of the nether world, and the chthonian powers that might send

up the Erinys to fulfil the curse of the wronged. Yet on the whole the

religious atmosphere is generally cheerful and bright; freer than that

of the later ages from the taint of magic and superstition; nor is Homer

troubled much about the life after death; he scarcely recognizes the

cult of the dead,[3] and is not oppressed by fear of the ghost-world.

The post-Homeric period.

If we look now broadly over the salient facts of the Greek public and

private worship of the historic period we find much in it that agrees

with Homeric theology. His "Olympian" system retains a certain life

almost to the end of Paganism, and it is a serious mistake to suppose

that it had lost its hold upon the people of the 5th and 4th century

B.C. We find it, indeed, enriched in the post-Homeric period with new

figures of prestige and power; Dionysus, of whom Homer had only faintly

heard, becomes a high god with a worship full of promise for the future.

Demeter and Kore, the mother and the girl, whom Homer knew well enough

but could not use for his epic purposes, attract the ardent affections

and hopes of the people; and Asclepius, whom the old poet did not

recognize as a god, wins a conspicuous place in the later shrines. But

much that has been said of the Homeric may be said of the later

classical theology. The deities remain anthropomorphic, and appear as

clearly defined individuals. A certain hierarchy is recognized; Zeus is

supreme, even in the city of Athena, but each of the higher divinities

played many parts, and local enthusiasm could frustrate the departmental

system of divine functions; certain members of the pantheon had a

preference for the life of the fields, but as the _polis_ emerged from

the village communities, Demeter, Hermes, Artemis and others, the gods

and goddesses of the husbandmen and shepherds, become powers of the

council-chamber and the market-place. The moral ideas that we find in

the Homeric religion are amply attested by cult-records of the later

period. The deities are regarded on the whole as beneficent, though

revengeful if wronged or neglected; the cult-titles used in prayer,

which more than any other witnesses reveal the thought and wish of the

worshipper, are nearly always euphemistic, the doubtful title of Demeter

Erinys being possibly an exception. The important cults of Zeus [Greek:

Hikesios] and [Greek: Prostropaios], the suppliant's protecting deity,

embody the ideas of pity and mercy that mark advanced religion; and many

momentous steps in the development of morality and law were either

suggested or assisted by the state-religion. For example, the sanctity

of the oath, the main source of the secular virtue of truthfulness, was

originally a religious sanction, and though the Greek may have been

prone to perjury, yet the Hellenic like the Hebraic religious ethics

regarded it as a heinous sin. The sanctity of family duties, the

sacredness of the life of the kinsman, were ideas fostered by early

Hellenic religion before they generated principles of secular ethics. In

the post-Homeric period, the development of the doctrine of purity,

which was associated with the Apolline religion, combining with a

growing dread of the ghost-world, stimulated and influenced in many

important ways the evolution of the Greek law concerning homicide.[4]

And the beginnings of international law and morality were rooted in

religious sanctions and taboo. In fact, Greek state-life was indebted in

manifold ways to Greek religion, and the study of the Greek oracles

would alone supply sufficient testimony of this. In many cases the very

origin of the state was religious, the earliest _polis_ sometimes having

arisen under the shadow of the temple.

Yet as Greek religion was always in the service of the state, and the

priest a state-official, society was the reverse of theocratic. Secular

advance, moral progress and the march of science, could never long be

thwarted by religious tradition; on the contrary, speculative thought

and artistic creation were considered as attributes of divinity. We may

say that the religion of Hellas penetrated the whole life of the people,

but rather as a servant than as a master.

Distinct and apart from these public worships and those of the clan and

family were the mystic cults of Eleusis, Andania and Samothrace, and the

private services of the mystic brotherhoods. The latter were scattered

broadcast over Hellas, and the influence of the former was strengthened

and their significance intensified by the wave of mysticism that spread

at first from the north from the beginning of the 7th century onwards,

and derived its strength from the power of Dionysus and the Orphic

brotherhoods. New ideals and hopes began to stir in the religious

consciousness, and we find a strong Salvationist tendency, the promise

of salvation relying on mystic communion with the deity. Also a new and

vital principle is at work; Orphism is the only force in Greek religion

of a clear apostolic purpose, for it broke the barriers of the old

tribal and civic cults, and preached its message to bond and free,

Hellene and barbarian.

The later history of Greek paganism is mainly concerned with its gradual

penetration by Oriental ideas and worships, and the results of this

[Greek: theokrasia] are discerned in an ever increasing mysticism and a

tendency towards monotheism. Obliterated as the old Hellenic religion

appeared to be by Christianity, it nevertheless retained a certain life,

though transformed, under the new creed to which it lent much of its

hieratic organization and religious terminology. The indebtedness of

Christianity to Hellenism is one of the most interesting problems of

comparative religion; and for an adequate estimate a minute knowledge of

the ritual and the mystic cults of Hellas is one of the essential

conditions.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Older Authorities: A. Maury, _Histoire des religions de

la Grece antique_ (3 vols., 1857-1859); Welcker, _Griechische

Gotterlehre_ (3 vols., 1857-1863); Preller, _Griechische Mythologie_,

2 vols. (4th edition by C. Robert, 1887), all antiquated in regard to

theory, but still of some value for collection of materials. Recent

Literature--(a) General Treatises: O. Gruppe, "Griechische Mythologie

und Religionsgeschichte" in Iwan von Muller's _Handbuch der

klassischen Altertumswissenschaft_, v. 2. 2 (1902-1906); L. R.

Farnell's _Cults of the Greek States_, 4 vols. (1896-1906, vol. 5,

1908); Miss Jane Harrison's _Prolegomena to the Study of Greek

Religion_ (ed. 1908); Chantepie de la Saussaye's _Lehrbuch der

Religionsgeschichte_ (Greek section, 1904); (b) Special Works or

Dissertations: articles in Roscher's _Ausfuhrliches Lexikon der

griechischen und romischen Mythologie_, and Pauly-Wissowa

_Encyklopadie_ (1894- ); Immerwahr, _Kulte und Mythen Arkadiens_

(1891); Wide, _Lakonische Kulte_ (1893); de Visser, _De Graecorum diis

non referentibus speciem humanam_ (Leiden, 1900). Greek Ritual and

Festivals--A. Mommsen, _Feste der Stadt Athen_ (1898); P. Stengel,

"Die griechischen Sacralaltertumer" in Iwan von Muller's _Handbuch_,

v. 3 (1898); W. H. D. Rouse, _Greek Votive Offerings_ (1902). Greek

Religious Thought and Speculation--L. Campbell's _Religion in Greek

Literature_ (1898); Ducharme, _La Critique des traditions religieuses

chez les Grecs des origines au temps de Plutarque_ (Paris, 1904). See

also articles on individual deities, and cf. ROMAN RELIGION;

MYSTERIES; MITHRAS. (L. R. F.)