Worship and the nations

Greek and Roman Deities

Blackwood’s Comprehensive Aids to the Study of the Bible · Vol. I, p. 58

And Religious Systems.

During the ministry of our SAVIOUR His journeys and teachings were confined to the territory of Palestine. He did not therefore come personally into contact with the heathen temples of the Greeks or the Romans, or mingle with the followers and priests of these false systems. His nearest approach to heathenism in a dominant form was at the time of His visit to the coasts of Tyre and Sidon (Matt. xv. 21, 29) and His journey back through the northern districts of the Sea of Galilee. The disciples, however, early came into contact with all the varied forms of the idolatry of the empire. At Antioch, in Cyprus and Crete, in the cities of Asia Minor, in Greece and in Italy, indeed wherever they went in their missionary labors, in all lands around the Mediterranean Sea, they encountered the popular system of the day, just as those who went eastward had to meet the followers of the Persian and Syrian systems. It is important, therefore, that a brief description of the leading deities of Greece and Rome should be given, in order that the character of the religions may be comprehended with which the Gospel had to contend, and over which it so rapidly and signally prevailed. The Romans received their deities and their mythology from the Greeks, but in many respects the people of different provinces modified their beliefs respecting the lives and characters of their gods.

JUPITER, or JOVE, was the supreme Roman deity. He was held to be the eldest son of Saturn and Rhea. He and his brothers Neptune and Pluto divided the world by lot among themselves. The heavens, the air and the clouds constituted his wide domain (Homer, Il. 13: 355). All aerial phenomena were under his control; therefore, lightnings, thunder, storms, rain and snow were exhibitions of his will. These, at times, were warnings, at others, judgments. He is represented as a Grecian prince dwelling in royal state on Mount Olympus with Juno and his household. The poets describe his quarrels with Juno, her rage and the immoralities of which they were all guilty. Though Homer mentions the parents of the gods, he never states the localities in which they had been born. An old tradition made the Isle of Crete the birth-place of the Olympian Jupiter. He was rocked in a golden cradle, fed on honey and the milk of the goat Amalthea, while the Curetes danced around him, clashing their arms to prevent Saturn from hearing his cries. The Arcadians contended that Jupiter first saw the light among their mountains.

He first espoused Metis, but being warned that her child would equal himself in knowledge and strength, he swallowed her, and the goddess Minerva sprang from his head. His second wife, Themis, bore him the Seasons and the Fates. The ocean nymph, Eurynome, produced him the Graces. Ceres became the mother of Proserpina; Mnemosyne, of the Muses, and Latona, of Apollo and Diana. His last spouse was Juno, the mother of Mars, Hebe and the Ilithyiæ. The oak and the eagle were dedicated to him. His celebrated shield (Ægis), which sent forth thunder and lightning, was made by Vulcan, and, according to Homer, Apollo sometimes bore it for him.

The most celebrated of his temples was at Olympia, in Elis, where every fourth year the Olympic games were celebrated. He had a splendid temple also in Ægina, but his greatest oracle was at Dodona. The Greeks represented him as a model of dignity and majesty, with his eagle standing beside his throne, while he grasped his sceptre and thunder.

NEPTUNE, the god of the sea, the brother of Jupiter and Pluto, was one of the most ancient of the Grecian deities. His wife was Amphitrite, and their children were Triton and Rhodos. The latter became the bride of Helius, the sun god. Neptune had a numerous progeny. Beside his residence on Olympus, Neptune had a splendid palace beneath the sea at Ægæ, and Homer gives a glowing description of his passage from this palace on his way to Troy, the chariot-wheels only touching the watery plain as the monsters of the deep gamboled around their king. The most celebrated of his temples were at the Isthmus of Corinth, at Onchestus, Helice, Trœzene and the promontories of Tænarum and Geræstus. Neptune is represented, like Jupiter, as serene and majestic, his form strong and muscular, and hence "the chest of Neptune" is a poetic expression to indicate power. He usually bears in his hand the trident, the three-pronged symbol of his power, and dolphins and other marine animals accompany his images. The animals sacrificed to him were usually black bulls, rams and pigs. In Ionia and the commercial cities of Doris he was extensively worshipped. The horse was sacred to Neptune and the rivers, and was employed as a general symbol of the waters, the idea being, according to some, that Neptune introduced the horse into Greece over the sea.

PLUTO, called also HADES, was the brother of Jupiter and Neptune. He was the lord of the lower world, or the abode of the dead. His rule was inexorable, and as he was deaf to supplication, and permitted no return from his realms, he was an object of aversion to gods and men. His region is represented in the Iliad as being within the earth. Its name was Erebus, a dreary, dark and cheerless scene, where the dead, both good and bad, wandered in a weak, unhappy state, having no strength or power of body and mind. Some suffered more than others, for instance, Sisyphus, Tityus and Tantalus. The whole realm and rule were dreary and to be dreaded. The cypress, the narcissus and the ailanthus were sacred to him, and black animals, as oxen and sheep, were sacrificed to him.

JUNO, a Roman female deity, identical with the Grecian Hera, was the daughter of Saturn and Rhea. She was sister and wife of Jupiter. Their children were Mars, Hebe and the Ilithyiæ, to whom some add the Graces. Vulcan was the son of Juno, without a father, and she was said by some to have originated the monster Typhon. The chief seats of her worship were Argos, Samos and Platæa, but she was generally honored, as at Sparta, Corinth, Corcyra and elsewhere. The willow, the pomegranate, the dittany and the lily were her sacred plants, while the cuckoo and the peacock were appropriated to the Olympian queen.

MARS was the son of Jupiter and Juno, or, as some have said, of Bellona. Ovid, in his Metamorphoses, relates the fables connected with his origin. Mars delighted in war and strife, yet the skill of Minerva defeated his violence. Homer describes his enormous size, his terrible voice and great martial power. Terror and Fear (Deimos and Phobos) were his sons; they and his sister Strife (Eris) accompanied him to battle. Hesiod says that Harmonia was the daughter of Mars and Venus.

SATURN, called by the Greeks KRONOS, was the son of Cœlus or Uranus and Terra, the goddess of the earth. Terra had a mighty progeny, the Titans, six males and six females, the youngest being Saturn. The children were hated by their father, who thrust them into a cavern of Earth. Earth, grieved at such conduct, produced the substance called "steel," with which, in the form of a sickle, having aroused the Titans and Saturn, the latter mutilated his father, and the drops of blood falling on the earth gave birth to Erinnyes, the Giants and the Melian nymphs. After this Saturn obtained his father's kingdom on condition that he should not bring up any male children. Rhea, his wife, concealed the birth of Jupiter, Neptune, Pluto and Juno, and instead of the children gave him large stones, which he swallowed. Saturn was in consequence of this myth confounded with the grim deity Moloch of the Tyrians, the Carthaginians and the Phœnicians. Saturn has been held to be the same with Time, and on this account he is represented as devouring his children and casting them up, as Time devours and produces again. Niebuhr regards Saturn as the earth, and Creuzer considers him as the great god of nature, who suffices for himself, and who is satisfied with his own comprehensive powers. There were no temples of Kronos in Greece, but at Athens there was a chapel dedicated to him and Rhea. Sacrifices were made to him at Olympia, and the Athenians had a festival in his honor. The priests among the Romans offered sacrifices to him bareheaded. He is represented as an old man, bareheaded, holding a scythe in his hand, and a serpent, which bites its own tail—an emblem of time and the revolution of the year. Fetters were hung on his statues in commemoration of his having been imprisoned by Jupiter, and all slaves when freed dedicated their chains to him.

APOLLO, the son of Jupiter and Latona, was the god of archery (Homer), prophecy and music. All sudden deaths were ascribed to him as rewards and punishments. At the banquets of the gods he played on his lyre at Olympus. Bards and prophets received their skill from him and the Muses. The chief seats of his worship were at Delphi in Phocis, Delos, Patara in Lycia, Claros in Ionia, Grinium in Æolis and Didymi in Miletus, where revelations were given. The hawk, swan and cicada were dedicated to him, and the bay tree was sacred under his care. His statues represented him as the perfection of manly beauty, in his hands a bow or a lyre, and a chaplet of bay leaves around his head. The statue "Apollo Belvidere" shows the idea that the ancients entertained of his form.

DIANA, called by the Greeks ARTEMIS, was the daughter of Jupiter and Latona. She was sister to Apollo, and presided over the chase, and the sudden deaths of women were caused by her. She is a virgin speeding over the hills, with a train of nymphs, in pursuit of game. She turned Actæon into a stag for looking at her bathing. Orion perished by her arrows, and with her brother she destroyed the children of Niobe. It is likely that, as a threefold goddess, she was worshipped as Selene, the Moon, as Artemis or Diana, Earth, and as Hecate or Proserpina in Erebus. She was also identified as the goddess of Nature, and adored at Ephesus, where her image (Acts xix. 21-41) was held sacred. It was of great size and of immense value, covered with breasts and heads of animals to denote the fecundity of nature.

MERCURY, called HERMES by the Greeks, was the messenger of the gods, and particularly of Jupiter. He was the god of speech, eloquence (Acts xiv. 8-18), the patron of orators, of merchants, of all dishonest persons, of thieves, of travelers and of shepherds. He presided over highways, cross-roads, and conducted the souls of the dead to the regions below. He was usually represented with a chlamys or cloak, a petasus or winged cap and the talaria or winged sandals. In his hand he bears the caduceus or staff, with two serpents twined around it, with wings at the end of the rod. The older statues were mere posts with a rude head and a beard carved on them, and they were erected on roads, foot-paths and in gardens.

MINERVA, or ATHENE, the daughter of Jupiter, was the goddess of wisdom and skill, and of all the liberal arts and sciences. Every prudent chief was viewed as being under her patronage, and she was the inspirer of all able artists. Thus she inspired Epeus to frame the wooden horse by which Troy was taken, and the celebrated ship Argo. Her favorite plant was the olive, and she was chiefly honored at Athens, the city to which she gave its name, and where the splendid festival Panathenæa was celebrated in her honor.

VENUS, a very celebrated Roman deity, was considered as identical with the Grecian goddess Aphrodite. Hesiod says she sprang from the foam of the sea into which the mutilated portions of Uranus had been thrown by his son Saturn. She landed on the island of Cythera, and thence she went to Cyprus with Love and Desire attending her. She was the patroness of Love, presided over birth and growth in general, and was the goddess of gardens. Her favorite plants were the rose and the myrtle. She was chiefly worshipped at Cythera and Cyprus, where at Paphos, Golgi, Idalium and Amathus she was adored. At Cnidus, Miletus, Coos, Corinth, Athens and Sparta she was worshipped, and the services in her honor were often scenes of great immorality.

The Greeks and Romans possessed an insufficient idea of the omnipresence, omnipotence and unity of the Deity. Their gods had been rulers or heroes, and they were endowed with all the passions and vices of humanity. The powers of nature, the phenomena of the heavens, and natural objects were personified and represented by images, and these became objects of adoration. The testimony of history establishes the fact that the worshipping of impure, wicked and abominable objects conduced to immoralities in those who served them (Rom. i. 21-32). The educated classes perceived the absurdity of such worship, and they became sceptics and utterly reckless. The lower classes groveled in superstition and darkness, without God and without hope. To a people so situated, when the Gospel came in power, it was found to be a message worthy of the great Father of the Universe. To the Roman slave in his thraldom, and the pauper in his field of toil, it brought freedom and opulence. To thoughtful men, who meditated on life, moral evil and eternity, it brought rest and peace; and so in the Apostolic age the missionary of the Cross was recognized as a messenger of mercy, and multitudes hastened to cast their idols aside and to embrace the GREAT DELIVERER who brought peace to their souls.