Readings: Walbank, p.60-78; p. 209-226.
· Greek culture spreads throughout the eastern Mediterranean world.
· Plutarch: Alexander’ cities in the Middle East = linchpin of his achievement.
· According to him, Alexander wanted to spread Greek civilization throughout his realm.
· His conquest opened the countries of the Middle East to Greek immigration.
· Many colonies set up in Asia Minor and Syria by the Seleucids.
· Major immigration of Greeks to Egypt.
· Alexander’s colonies were more military colonies than real cities.
· But under his successors they quickly evolved into real Greek cities.
· They were the ones who develop the most this colonization policy;
· Many Greek colonies on any part of their large territory:
· in Babylonia (Seleuceia),
· in Syria (Antioch, Apamea),
· Asia Minor (Laodicea),
· Central Asia (Ai Khanoum).
· All received a Greek and/or Macedonian population (well shown by onomastic evidence).
· Seleucids’ aim: to strengthen their hold on all regions.
· Greek populations = more loyal (common origin with their sovereign, isolated in native population).
· Even the most distant foundations remained in direct contact with their Aegean counterparts (exemple: Austin, text # 192).
· These Greeks lost their parochial identity and adopted a new dialect (the koine or "common" dialect, based on Attic).
· Eventually this dialect drove out almost all the local dialects in Greece.
· Modern Greek is derived from the koine (used in the New Testament).
· The colonies: new poleis, often named after the monarch who set them up (Alexandria, Seleuceia, Antioch).
· Royal origin: of a different nature than those of Greece proper.
· Now polis = the center of Greek cultural life, not so much political.
· Change for the Greeks: perception of a larger and civilized world (oikoumene).
· Walbank: homogeneous culture in all the Hellenistic kingdoms.
· The Greek colonists more unified.
· Greek identity now more important than the local differences of their former rival cities.
o Walbank: they used different ways to preserve their Greek identities:
o Gymnasium, a place of exercise for the citizens, and education for the ephebes [Austin # 137].
· “Social clubs” (less exclusive).
· But the Greeks remained the ruling class.
· Not much possibilities for the natives to join their rank.
· Austin # 307 & 311: shows us contemptuousness of the Greeks toward the native population.
· Usually the Greeks considered other cultures as inferior.
· The concept of “homogeneous culture” its limits (concerns the Greek minority).
· The rise of the Hellenistic kingdoms favored the spread of the Greek culture.
· Kingdoms politically separated, but unified through the common Greek culture of their ruling class.
· King’s need of Greek immigrants: their kingship was new (not based on tradition) and fragile.
· They needed Greek elements to rely upon.
· Categories of immigrating people:
o Mercenaries (the most common)
o Emissaries & ambassadors,
o Actors & artists,
o Merchants,
o Teachers, doctors, philosophers & scholars.
· Factor of social ascension and mobility for the Aegean population.
· Hellenistic kingdoms will bring some changes.
· First, at the end of the Classic period and at the beginning of the Hellenistic age, Greek religion seems to evolve.
· Walbank: so-called "decline" of traditional religion.
· Caution: in the Ancient world, atheists were a tiny minority; the great majority of the people, believed in their gods.
· However, people were less satisfied with the traditional cults, which:
o were essentially collective
o and didn’t bring much comfort to individual souls.
· Traditional cults were there to preserve the community, not the individual (religion & politic closely intermingled).
· Decline of the city-states & rise of monarchy: citizens excluded from political life
· They feel the same about the state religion.
· New kind of worship: the ruler-cult, used by the Hellenistic kings to consolidate their power.
· Also, with Alexander’s conquests, Greeks and Macedonians now in contact with eastern religions.
· They discover new cults offering personal salvation.
· Legitimacy of the Hellenistic kings
· Hellenistic kings: only generals, without any royal ancestors.
· Their so-called kingdoms: only former provinces.
· Their royal power had no legitimate roots (usurpers).
· They had to rely on their armies.
· Also needed to legitimate their position.
· One way: ruler-cult (to justify authority by divine ascendancy).
· Greek ruler-worship: the rendering, as to a god or hero, of honors to individuals deemed superior to other people because of their achievements, position or power.
· The roots of this lie in Greece (heroes, city-founders).
· In Classic Greece, not possible for a person to receive worship.
· The first case of divine honors: Lysander, a Spartan general (Peloponesian War), received divine cult on Samos.
· Other similar local examples in the fourth century.
· First developed form with Alexander the Great.
· Directly inspired by his conquests, his personality and his undisputed power.
· Much important: his encounter with the priest of Ammon at Siwa in 331 BC (was called son of Amon-Ra, like a Pharaoh).
· It had a decisive effect on the Greeks and on the king himself (cf. Austin # 9).
· In 324, restoration of political exiles (pressure on Greek cities to offer him divine cult, cf. Austin # 19).
· Heroic honors for his dead intimate Hephaestion.
· After his death, he received divine cult in different places (especially in Egypt, where he was inhumed).
· Ptolemy set up a cult of Alexander in Egypt (290-285 BC).
· Ptolemy adopted a patron god, Dionysus, to emphasize the divine protection over him and his family.
· Seleucus did the same with Apollo.
· Antigonids: pretended blood links with Philip II (thus descendants of Heracles).
· Use of divine epithets (Ptolemy: Soter, "saviour").
· After Ptolemy I Soter death, his son Ptolemy II will proclaim his divinity and will institute a cult in his honor.
· Ptolemy II Philadelphus ("sister-loving"), will also establish a divine cult for himself and for his sister Arsinoe he previously married.
· Lagids (Ptolemies): heirs to the pharaohs.
· Process slower within the Seleucid dynasty.
· Their large empire was not homogenous (distinct countries).
· Ruler-cult: useful way to integrate them into a single cultural identity.
· Antiochus I will proclaim the divinity of his father Seleucus I.
· But for a long time, no official cult of the living ruler.
· Only local cults in Greeks cities:
o Austin # 162: priest of Seleucos in Ilium.
o Austin # 191: Antiochus II at Teos.
o Austin # 207: priests of the Seleucids in Pieria.
o Austin # 190: priests of the the Seleucids in Antioch in Persis.
· Antiochus III the Great (223-187 BC) the first who dared to establish an official cult for himself (Austin # 200).
· Those cities did not hesitate to grant the divine honors asked by the kings (Austin # 200):
o Austin # 42: Antigonus and Demetrius considered as "saviour gods" in Athens.
o Austin # 39: Antigonus honored in Scepcis.
o Austin # 49: Demetrius honored in Sicyon.
· Ruler-cult helped to consolidate a king’s power and legitimacy.
· It also helped them to establish good relationship with the cities.
· But this levity of conduct will contribute to develop, at least among the elite, a kind of skepticism toward religion (doctrine of Euhemerus about the mortal origin of gods: Austin # 46).
· Citizens become less implicated in politics.
· Politic & religion closely related, thus their role in official religion become less satisfying.
· People will become more introverted.
· Classical art portrayed people as exemplars of human excellence rather than individuals.
· Classical philosophers: theoretical justification to life in the polis,
· Hellenistic period: more personal, subjective examination of human life in the broader perspective.
· Hellenistic art: individuals in a personal setting.
· Hellenistic philosophy: how the individual should live his own life.
· Insufficiencies of the Greek traditional religion
· Greeks continued to uphold traditional cults because they were essential to their common identity.
· But the new eastern cults offered something for their personal sense of identity.
· Greek religion was insufficient for the needs of the soul:
· Practical and material religion.
· Public religion is there for the well being of the collectivity
· The after life is not well defined
· Mystery cults offered their adherents:
o a very specific vision of the nature of the world,
o access to a personal relationship with the divine,
o a transcendent peace in their human existence
o and very often the prospect of a life that transcended death.
· Typically, the gods of mystery cults had died and been resurrected (Osiris, Attis, Melqart).
· They offered their followers the same possibility of resurrection.
· They shared similar structural features
o Initiation.
o Ceremonies including hymns and ritual feasts.
o Yearly celebrations preceded by periods of ritual preparation (e.g., fasting).
o Diversity; theology not always consistent.
· Some were quite loose and easy going.
· Others were very hierarchical (e.g. priestly caste in Egypt).
· Many cults were highly democratic in their membership:
· women and men of different ethnic and social origin.
· Originally Phrygian (Asia Minor).
· Cybele: goddess of caverns, of the Earth in its primitive state.
· She ruled over wild beasts.
· Along with her consort (Attis), Cybele was worshipped in
· wild, emotional, bloody, orgiastic, cathartic ceremonies.
· Goddess of nature and fertility.
· Her cult was directed by eunuch priests (orgiastic rites).
· Annual spring festival celebrated the death and resurrection of Attis.
· One of the most popular goddesses in Egypt.
· In the Osiris myths she searched for her husband's body, who was killed by her brother Seth.
· She retrieved and reassembled the body (goddess of the dead and of the funeral rights).
· She gave birth to Horus in the swamps in the Nile Delta.
· Horus later defeated Seth and became the first ruler of a united Egypt.
· Thus, Isis regarded as the mother and protector of the pharaoh's.
· Wide appeal of her cult:
o Its demands were not heavy.
o All her worshippers actually took part in the cult.
· Hellenistic-Egyptian god, created by Ptolemy I to integrate Egyptian religion with that of their hellenic rulers (cf. Austin # 300)
· Many of his attributes were borrowed from Osiris: named Aser-hapi (i.e. Osiris-Apis), which became Serapis.
· His statue: figure resembling Hades or Pluto (kings of the Greek underworld).
· Enthroned with the modius (basket/grain-measure, Greek symbol for the land of the dead).