Romanising Oriental Gods ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd i 7/31/2008 1:20:12 PM Religions in the Graeco-Roman World Editors H.S. Versnel D. Frankfurter J. Hahn VOLUME 165 ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd ii 7/31/2008 1:20:14 PM Romanising Oriental Gods Myth, Salvation and Ethics in the Cults of Cybele, Isis and Mithras by Jaime Alvar Translator and editor Richard Gordon LEIDEN • BOSTON 2008 ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd iii 8/1/2008 6:02:39 PM The publication of this work has been made possible through a subsidy received from the Directorate General for Books, Archives and Libraries of the Spanish Ministry of Culture. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Alvar, Jaime. Romanising oriental Gods : myth, salvation, and ethics in the cults of Cybele, Isis, and Mithras / by Jaime Alvar ; translator and editor Richard Gordon. p. cm. — (Religions in the Graeco-Roman world ; 165) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-13293-1 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Cybele (Goddess)—Cult. 2. Attis (God)—Cult. 3. Isis (Egyptian deity)—Cult. 4. Serapis (Egyptian deity)—Cult. 5. Mithras (Zoroastrian deity)—Cult. 6. Rome—Religion. I. Alvar Ezquerra, Jaime. I. Title. II. Series. BL820.C8R66 2008 200.937—dc22 2008015353 ISSN 0927-7633 ISBN 978 90 04 13293 1 Copyright 2008 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd iv 8/1/2008 6:02:40 PM Φθέγξοµαι οἷς θέµις ἐστί, θύρας δὲ ἐπίθεσθε βέβηλοι. ‘Orpheus’ as cited by Aristobulus ap. Eusebius, Prae paratio evangelica 13.12.5 (vol. XII–XIII p. 312 des Places) = 247 Kern = 378 F Bernabé Quippe cum transactis vitae temporibus iam in ipso fi nitae lucis limine constitutos, quis tamen tuto possint magna religionis committi silentia, numen deae soleat elicere et sua providentia quodam modo renatos ad novae reponere rursus salutis curricula. The chief priest, in Apuleius, Met. 11.21 I will not say that the tragic world-view was every- where completely destroyed by this intruding un- Dionysian spirit: we only know that it had to fl ee from art into the underworld as it were, in the degenerate form of a secret cult. Fr. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy (1884) §17 To Pablo and Irene Alvar Rozas, whose lives have given mine a new dimension ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd v 7/31/2008 1:20:15 PM ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd vi 7/31/2008 1:20:15 PM CONTENTS Foreword ..................................................................................... ix Translator’s Note ........................................................................ xi Abbreviations .............................................................................. xiii List of Texts-Figures and Plates ................................................. xvii Introduction ................................................................................ 1 Chapter One Religion, Cult and Mystery .............................. 17 Chapter Two Systems of Belief .............................................. 25 1. Cosmic Order and the Nature of the Divine .................. 33 a. The Egyptian Cults ...................................................... 39 i. The Myth of Isis and Osiris ................................... 39 ii. Serapis ...................................................................... 52 b. The Myth of Cybele and Attis .................................... 63 c. Mithras .......................................................................... 74 2. Humankind in the World .................................................. 106 3. The World Beyond ............................................................ 122 Chapter Three Systems of Value ............................................ 143 1. Between Utopia and Reality ............................................. 154 2. Ethics in the Phrygian Cults ............................................. 165 3. Isiac Ethics ......................................................................... 177 4. Moral Values in Mithraism ............................................... 192 Chapter Four The Ritual Systems .......................................... 205 1. Religion and Ritual ........................................................... 206 2. Rituals in the Mysteries ..................................................... 211 a. Initiation ........................................................................ 217 b. Sacrifi ce ......................................................................... 221 c. Commensality ............................................................... 227 d. Prayer ............................................................................ 231 3. Rituals in the Phrygian Cults ............................................ 240 a. Introduction .................................................................. 240 b. Emasculation ................................................................. 246 ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd vii 7/31/2008 1:20:15 PM viii contents c. The taurobolium/criobolium .............................................. 261 d. Initiation ........................................................................ 276 e. The Megalensia and the March Festival of Attis ........... 282 4. Rituals in the Egyptian Cults ............................................ 293 a. Festivals .......................................................................... 296 b. Cultic Practice ............................................................... 305 i. Sacrifi ce and Votives ................................................ 313 ii. Prayer, Healing and Incubation .............................. 318 c. Initiation ........................................................................ 336 5. Cultic Practice in Mithraism ............................................. 344 a. The Ritual Function of the Mithraeum ..................... 349 b. Initiation and the Initiatory Grades ............................. 364 Chapter Five The Oriental Cults and Christianity ................ 383 1. The Problems ..................................................................... 384 2. The Sub-system of Belief .................................................. 393 3. The Sub-system of Ethics ................................................. 401 4. The Sub-system of Ritual ................................................. 405 5. From Reverse Borrowing to ‘Commensality’ .................... 417 Bibliography ................................................................................ 423 Plates ........................................................................................... 445 General Index ............................................................................. 461 Index of Inscriptions, Papyri and Monuments .......................... 474 Index of Passages ........................................................................ 481 ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd viii 7/31/2008 1:20:15 PM FOREWORD This book has been a long while in the making. During that time I have been the benefi ciary of generous support, for which it is an inadequate repayment. The Dirección General de Investigación Científi ca y Técnica has supported my group of researchers with grants for specifi c projects continuously since 1990. This assistance has been essential both in the process of actually writing the book and for the doctoral theses that grew up around it. Other institutions have also contributed fi nancial help towards its completion. The CSIC gave me one of its bursaries as part of a programme of exchanges with the British Academy. A grant from the Comunidad Autónoma de Madrid allowed me to spend several months at the Institute of Classical Studies in London and in Cambridge in 1992. Thanks to the generosity of the Universidad Complutense and the Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia I was able to spend time at the Centre d’Histoire Ancienne at Besançon in 1993, and at the École Normale Supérieure in the rue d’Ulm in 1994. The Junta de Andalucía fi nanced my visits to the Faculty of Classics in Cambridge over the years I was a professor in Andalusia. However the decisive impulse to fi nish the book was given by a sabbatical granted by the University of Huelva for the academic year 1999–2000, which I was able to spend at the Classics Faculty in Cambridge. I have been made very welcome at the Library of the DAI in Madrid, and two excellent libraries of the Universidad Complutense, the well-stocked Biblioteca de Clásicas and the amazing Biblioteca de Humanidades, have likewise been of great help. Thanks to all this institutional generosity I have been lucky enough to make friends with a number of fi ne historians. I must mention here the unforgettable Pierre Lévêque, and Monique Clavel-Lévêque, at Besançon, and Marguerite Garrido-Hory, Jacques Annequin and Antonio Gonzales, whom I am proud to call my friends. At Cambridge Keith Hopkins opened many doors to me; his death in 2004 has caused me great sadness. It was there too that I met Richard Gordon, who helped to re-direct me when I was at a loss and who has been a source of constant stimulation thereafter. Not only did he patiently correct the manuscript of the fi rst edition in Spanish, but he agreed to write a Foreword to that version; and has now compounded his help ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd ix 7/31/2008 1:20:15 PM x foreword by undertaking to translate the entire book into English and subject it to critical scrutiny. His generous updating of the discussion of many topics and addition of much new bibliography have made this English version not a mere translation of the old book, but a truly new edition. He knows how very grateful I am to him. I would also like to express my gratitude to Henk Versnel and his colleagues on the editorial board of the series Religions in the Graeco-Roman World for kindly agreeing to publish the English version as the fi rst contribution to that series on the central topic of its predecessor, M.J. Vermaseren’s EPROER. I am glad here also to be able to acknowledge my debts to all the colleagues at my various universities, the Universidad Complutense in Madrid, at Huelva, Pablo de Olavide (Seville) and Carlos III, again in Madrid, who have contributed so much to the formation of my think- ing and to the arguments of this book. My fi nal thanks go to Pilar Rozas, who made it possible for me over many years to devote so much of my time to research. December 2007 Universidad Carlos III de Madrid ALVAR_f1_i-xx.indd x 7/31/2008 1:20:15 PM