Religious organization
- Related Topics:
- mystery religion
- Roman religion
- Greek religion
- gnosticism
- thiasoi
The temples and cult institutions of the various Hellenistic religions were repositories of the knowledge and techniques necessary for salvation and were the agents of the public worship of a particular deity. In addition, they served an important sociological role. In the new, cosmopolitan ideology that followed Alexander’s conquests, the old nationalistic and ethnic boundaries had broken down and the problem of religious and social identity had become acute. The Hellenistic Age was characterized by the rapid growth of private religious societies (thiasoi). Though some were organized according to national origin or trade, the majority were dedicated to the worship of a particular deity. In many instances these groups began as immigrant associations (e.g., an Egyptian association of devotees of Amon was chartered in Athens at the beginning of the 3rd century bc); but they often transcended these origins and became a new form of religious organization in which citizens of various countries, freemen and slaves, could be united by their common devotion and share in a common religious heritage. Admission to such groups was voluntary (in contradistinction to the archaic national or familial religious organizations) and demanded the payment of dues, submission to collective authority, and the acceptance of strict codes of morality. Most of these groups had regular meetings for a communal meal that served the dual role of sacramental participation (referring to the use of material elements believed to convey spiritual benefits among the members and with their deity) and the social function of fellowship; i.e., the security of membership in a group and a shared sense of identity.
The influence of Hellenistic religions
The archaic gods worshiped during the Hellenistic period possessed a remarkable longevity. The Eleusinian Mysteries, founded in the 15th century bc, ceased in the 4th century ad; Dionysus, whose name first appears on tablets dated to c. 1400 bc, was last celebrated in the beginning of the 6th century ad; the last temple of Isis, whose cult extended back to the 2nd millennium bc in Egypt, was closed in ad 560. Yet even after these ceased as objects of devotion in the post-Constantinian period, they continued to exercise their influence. Hellenistic philosophy (Stoicism, Cynicism, Neo-Aristotelianism, Neo-Pythagoreanism, and Neoplatonism) provided key formulations for Jewish, Christian, and Muslim philosophy, theology, and mysticism through the 18th century. Hellenistic magic, theurgy, astrology, and alchemy remained influential until modern times in both East and West. Theosophy and other forms of the occult, especially since the Renaissance, drew their inspiration from the Hellenistic mystery cults, Hermeticism (Greco-Egyptian astrological, magical, and occultic movement), and Gnosticism. Various Jewish, Christian, and Muslim sectarian groups continued the theologies of many of the Hellenistic religions (especially dualistic modes of thought). Hellenistic sacred art and architecture has remained a basis of Christian and Jewish iconography and architecture to the present day. Figures such as Alexander the Great inspired a vast body of religious literature, especially in the Middle Ages. Many of the symbols and legends associated with Hellenistic deities persisted in folk literature and hagiography (stories of saints and “holy” persons). The basic forms of worship of both the Jewish and Christian communities were heavily influenced in their formative period by Hellenistic practices, and this remains fundamentally unchanged to the present time. Finally, the central religious literature of both traditions—the Jewish Talmud (an authoritative compendium of law, lore, and interpretation), the New Testament, and the later patristic literature of the early Church Fathers—are characteristic Hellenistic documents both in form and content.
Jonathan Z. Smith