Personal religion: a productive category for the study of ancient Greek religion?

2015 ◽  
Vol 135 ◽  
pp. 35-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Kindt
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek Religion ◽  
Scholarly Research ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Beliefs And Practices ◽  
Additional Dimension

Abstract:This article investigates the scope and meaning of ancient Greek personal religion as an additional dimension - besides official (polis) religion - in which the ancient Greek religious experience articulates itself. I show how ‘personal religion’ is a rather broad and amorphous scholarly category for a number of religious beliefs and practices that, in reflecting individual engagement with the supernatural, do not fit into our conception of polis religion. At the same time, I argue that personal religion should not be seen simply as that which is not official Greek religion. Nor is personal religion simply ‘private’ religion, oikos religion or the religion of those who had no voice in the sphere of politics (metics, women). Rather, ‘personal religion’ combines aspects of public and private. It is a productive category of scholarly research insofar as it helps us to appreciate the whole spectrum of ways individuals in the ancient Greek city received and (if necessary) altered culturally given religious beliefs and practices. Indeed, the examples discussed in this paper reveal a very Greek conversation about the question of what should count as a religious sign and who was to determine its meaning.

Persönliche Frömmigkeit und religiöses Erlebnis Wesenszüge der griechischen Religion am Beispiel von Heilkulten

Numen ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
pp. 447-472
Author(s):  
Alexander Rubel
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Direct Contact ◽  
The Other ◽  
Complete Picture ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek Religion ◽  
Roman Religion ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Personal Relation ◽  
City State

Abstract Ancient Greek healing cults can be studied in the context of “personal piety.” This article emphasizes personal aspects of the Greek religion. It shows that the concept of “polis religion” does not embrace major aspects of ancient Greek piety. I analyze the direct and personal relation of worshippers in healing cults, especially that of Apollo, with the deity. By doing so, I put forward a new reading of Greek religion in the context of the concept of “personal piety” developed in Egyptology. The well-known “embeddedness” of religion in the structures of the Ancient Greek city-state led to a one-sided view of ancient Greek religion, as well as to aspects of ritual and “cult” predominating in research. Simultaneously, aspects of “belief ” are often labelled as inadequate in describing Greek (and Roman) religion. Religion as ritual and cult is simply one side of the coin. Personal aspects of religion, and direct contact with the deity, based on “belief,” are thus the other side of the coin. It follows that they are also the fundament of ritual. It is necessary to combine “polis religion” with “personal piety” to display a complete picture of Greek religion. The Isyllos inscription from Epidaurus is presented here as a final and striking example for this view. It reports the foundation of a cult of the polis on behalf of a personal religious experience.

Architectural Expression of Public and Private Water Supply at Morgantina, Corinth, Athens, and Delos

1993 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dora P. Crouch
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Water System ◽  
Equal Weight ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Greek City ◽  
Urban Amenity ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
Local Geology ◽  
The Individual

Water in ancient Greek cities can be considered under several rubrics— aesthetic enrichment of urban spaces, ornamentation of enclosed precincts, nuisance or danger in the form of flood or excessive storm runoff, domestic amenity, public ritual and spectacle, to name a few. This chapter focuses on public fountains, which were both amenity and necessity, contrasting them with the more humble domestic arrangements of the same cities. The appearance, function, and location of fountains cannot be understood as merely visual matters, even though the form and ornamentation of fountains made significant architectural and aesthetic contributions to the cityscape. Rather, understanding the local geology and climate and the principles of hydraulic engineering makes possible a new and clearer understanding of this architectural type. The technological and geological basis of water supply is of equal weight in urban development with the formal presentation of water as an urban amenity. Water management in ancient Greek cities expressed in its physical forms both the simplicity and the sophistication of their hydraulic technology. The physical arrangements were expressed in the same vocabulary of the Greek orders and decorative details that were used for other buildings and fittings, and in the same range of local and imported materials. Placement of the water system elements not only facilitated their use but also indicated the high value placed on water and on its use. The dangers of too much water or not enough were not only solved by Greek technological tradition but also expressed in the physical forms given to the individual parts and to the water system as a whole. Each of the water elements I have studied is simple, fulfilling its function economically, yet each is sophisticated enough that modern day practice is just beginning to catch up with these crafty ancients. For instance, having both the flowing water of fountains and wells, and the stored rainwater of cisterns, meant that the water supply of a Greek city was diversified for greater safety in time of war or shortage, and for ecological soundness. In the late twentieth century we are just beginning to understand the utility of redundancy.

Women in Classical Greek Religion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura McClure
Keyword(s):  
Religious Activity ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek Religion ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Marginal Groups ◽  
Religious System ◽  
Binary Model ◽  
The City ◽  
Prevailing View

As “cultic citizens,” women participated in state festivals at Athens alongside men and celebrated their own rituals apart from them, at shrines within the house and in cults outside the house in the company of other women. Their association with fertility made them indispensable performers of rites connected with the agricultural year. Women also served as priestesses, as dedicators, and as euergetai (benefactors). At home, their rituals accompanied nuptial preparations, the laying out of the dead, and the departure of soldiers for war. Female religious activity was considered so critical to the welfare of the community that it was sanctioned by law and financed by the polis. Religion further allowed women’s widespread movement throughout the city as they left their homes to participate in processions and festivals, visit shrines, sanctuaries, and cemeteries. By performing rituals on behalf of the city, Athenian women distinguished themselves from female foreigners and slaves as rightful citizens of the polis. Women-only festivals further offered opportunities to build and strengthen female social networks, to act autonomously, and perhaps even to subvert social norms. Domestic rituals accomplished by women in turn helped to mark the life stages and strengthen familial identity. The difficulties of reconstructing the ancient Greek religious system are well known, even for the period for which there is the most evidence, classical Athens. Even more challenging is the task of recovering the religious activities of women within this structure, given that men served as the primary religious agents within both the polis and household. The prevailing view that the polis mediated all religious activity, including domestic, encompassed by the concept of “polis religion,” has further obscured our understanding women’s ritual activities. Influenced by feminist and social-network theories, recent research has argued for a more nuanced model of religious activity that takes into account the varieties of individual religious experience, particularly those of members of marginal groups, such as slaves and women. It dismantles the traditional binary model of public and private by showing how polis and household were intricately interconnected and interdependent at all levels. These new approaches allow us to consider the ways in which women’s ritual activities intersected with and reinforced polis ideology, allowing women a significant presence and agency in the civic sphere, despite their exclusion from politics, commerce, and certain public spaces. It can also help us understand their engagement with noncivic celebrations and domestic ritual.

Religion

2009 ◽  
pp. 363-377
Author(s):  
Julia Kindt
Keyword(s):  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
Large Degree ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Greek Religion ◽  
Beliefs And Practices ◽  
Modern Times ◽  
Greek Culture ◽  
Interpretative Framework

Religion as a subject of research is a product of modern times. With monotheistic religions such as Christianity, it is thought of as an autonomous and self-referential system with a large degree of inner coherence and a binding theology. The Greeks, however, had no word for religion as an abstract category. Religion did not exist outside the contexts in which it was lived. Greek religion lacks the defining features of most modern religions. Classical scholars have frequently stressed the ‘alien quality’ of Greek religious beliefs and practices. The study of Greek religion requires its own interpretative framework. Greek religion is the religious outlook and rituals specific to Greek culture. Reservations about the model of Greek religion as ‘polis religion’ concern its value for studying developments beyond the classical period. To be sure, religion during the Hellenistic and Roman periods evolved from archaic and classical Greek religion.

scholarly journals Divination and the ‘Real Presence’ of the Divine in Ancient Greece

2019 ◽  
pp. 203-225
Author(s):  
Michael A. Flower
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek Religion ◽  
The Real ◽  
Real Presence ◽  
Lakota Sioux ◽  
Wounded Knee ◽  
Collective Belief

This chapter applies Robert Orsi’s concepts of ‘real presence’ and ‘abundant history’ to the study of ancient Greek religion, using divination as a case study. It proposes that we should take real presence seriously as something that most Greeks took for granted. Although investigating religious experience is extraordinarily difficult, one of the best places to look is in the ubiquitous practice of divination. For it is in the context of the divinatory ritual that the real presence of the divine was commonly to be experienced. Case studies include the epiphany of Asklepios to Isyllos of Epidauros, the lead oracular tablets from Dodona, and the role of divination in the Athenian expedition to Sicily in 415 BCE. The latter event is compared to the belief of the Lakota Sioux that their ghost shirts would protect them from bullets at the Battle of Wounded Knee in 1890. In both cases, a collective belief in prophecy and in the real presence of supernatural forces instilled an assurance of victory, and this assurance was then followed by a rejection of the religious specialists who had promoted a positive interpretation of the message and the outcome.

scholarly journals The Role of Darkness in Ancient Greek Religion and Religious Practice

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Efrosyni Boutsikas
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Religious Belief ◽  
Rites Of Passage ◽  
Religious Practice ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek Religion ◽  
Architectural Features ◽  
Light Darkness ◽  
Emotional Condition

Aiming at a better understanding of ways through which the ancient Greek religious experience was shaped, this chapter investigates the role and use of darkness in religious belief and practice. The orientation and certain architectural features of Greek temples, Dionysiac and Mystery cults, divination, rites of passage, magic, and other nocturnal rituals are examined here in an investigation of the interplay between light, darkness, and shadow and the aims fulfilled by such associations. It transpires that darkness was a decisive element in the religious experience, one that intensified the emotional condition of the participants, whilst shaping the ritual experience and memory of the event.

Psychology of Religion

1997 ◽  
pp. 51-58
Author(s):  
O. Karagodina
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
Psychology Of Religion ◽  
Sociology Of Religion ◽  
Religious Studies

Psychology of religion as a branch of religious studies, in contrast to the philosophy and sociology of religion, focuses attention mainly on the problems of individual religiosity - the phenomena of religious experience, religious beliefs, mechanisms of the emergence and development of religious experience. The psychology of religion studies the experience of the supernatural person, the psychological roots of this experience and its significance for the subjective. Since a person is formed and operates in a society, the study of religious experience must include its social sources.

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