In this world suffused with divine presences, where gods had the power to control even the unpredictable forces of nature, any human success was regarded as being influenced by the gods (cf. Cic. Nat. D. 2.60). Nowhere is the evidence on this point more explicit than in terms of the good fortunes of the state; but here we confront an aspect of ancient religion that apparently supports the view that it was cynically manipulated by political elites. How else are we to interpret evidence, such as a letter from Brutus to Cicero in which the latter is canvassed for his support for the candidature of one of Brutus’s friends in an election to a college of priests (Cic. Ad Brut. 1.7)? The point seems to be underscored by the later concentration at Rome of supreme political power together with the chief priesthood of the state (pontifex maximus) in the hands of emperors from Augustus onwards. But to regard such phenomena as the crude manipulation of religion by elites represents an inability to engage sympathetically with the character of ancient religion.
It is clear, for instance, that at classical Athens elite domination of religion was impracticable. Not only did the Athenian citizenry (demos) play a key role via the assembly (ekklesia) in financing religious activities, but also it would have been difficult for the elite to exercise influence over the diffuse conglomeration of priesthoods and other religious personnel (Garland 1990). At Rome, the situation was rather different. There was certainly often an overlap between the holding of priesthoods and magistracies, but the Romans themselves did not regard this as problematic. Rather, they saw divine support for (elite) politicians, and the consequent involvement of such politicians in religious life, as wholly natural. As Cicero put it:
Among the many things that our ancestors created and established under divine inspiration, nothing is more renowned than their decision to entrust the worship of the gods and the highest interests of the state to the same men. In this way, the most eminent and illustrious citizens might ensure the maintenance of the state by the prudent interpretation of religion. (Dom. 1.1)
If we regard the situation as anomalous, then that represents our failure to penetrate Roman mentalites (Beard 1990).
Religion punctuated the life of the state in other ways. In cities throughout the Greco-Roman world, official calendars calibrated what time was to be given over to the festivals in honor of the gods, when all other public business would cease. Such festivals were important not only for venerating the gods, but also for articulating community identities, which in many cases were associated with a particular god. At classical Athens, for instance, detailed arrangements were set out in law for the celebration of the Pananthenaia, the main festival in honor of Athena, in such a way as to emphasize “the inseparability of festivals from the very definition of Greek civic life” (Bruit Zaidmann and Schmitt Pantel 1992: 110). A second-century ad decree from Ephesos in Asia Minor makes the point emphatically. It describes how, for an entire month, public business would cease for the festival in honor of the city’s patron goddess Artemis: “in this way,” the decree concluded, “with the god honored more highly, our city will remain from time to time more famous and more blessed” (S/G3 867; S. Price 1999: 181).
Religious ritual also attended political action. Formal business at the Athenian assembly began with sacrifices, offerings, and prayers to purify the Pnyx where the citizens met (Hansen 1987: 90-91). Meetings of similar bodies in the Roman world, such as the senate at Rome or town councils throughout the empire, also began with prayers and the swearing of oaths (Ando 2000: 359-62; Talbert 1984: 224-25). Military action, given its risky nature, also involved religious rituals performed by generals on campaign. Xenophon’s celebrated account of the retreat of the 10,000 Greek mercenaries through Persian territory in 402 BC contains frequent references to sacrifices and the interpretation of dreams and omens. The Romans were no less assiduous. Before he captured the Etruscan city of Veii in 396 bc, the Roman commander Camillus performed the ceremony of evocatio, calling out the city’s tutelary deity Juno Regina and promising her a new temple in Rome, all in order to avert her wrath (Livy 5.21; cf. Macrob. Sat. 3.9). Other generals vowed temples to gods in return for success on the battlefield (Orlin 1997). Indeed, the traditional Roman procedure for declaring war was bound up with religious rituals performed by a priest, the fetialis, who also served as an envoy (Livy 1.32). If such rites were followed scrupulously, then the Romans could be sure of waging a just war, blessed by the gods (Brunt 1978).
Such intersections between religion and politics reached their most apparently eccentric manifestation in the divine honors awarded to individuals, particularly Hellenistic kings and Roman emperors. Such cults have traditionally been dismissed, either as the most egregious example of the cynical manipulation of religion for political ends, or as examples of the degenerate character of traditional paganism under pernicious “oriental” influences (S. Price 1984: 17-19). There can be little doubt that ruler-cult helped to articulate power relationships between rulers and their subjects: an early, and spectacular, example is provided by the extraordinary festivities for the Macedonian king Demetrios Poliorketes at Athens in the late fourth century bc (A. Bell 2004: 99-107). Such honors, however, were often the willing reactions of subjects to their rulers, rather than impositions from above. The old model that portrays Roman emperor worship as an import from the East, for instance, is confounded by evidence from as early as the reigns of Augustus (27 bc to AD 14) and Tiberius (ad 14-37) for spontaneous cults in their honor in Italy and Spain (Suet. Aug. 59; Tac. Ann. 4.37-8). Furthermore, recent scholarship has suggested that ruler-worship may have been a straightforwardly organic development from within Greek and Roman religious systems. In the Greek world, the sharp distinctions between humans and gods were blurred by the existence of quasi-divine heroes, many of whom received cult honors: this included not only those, such as Herakles, who are known from mythology, but also those who founded communities such as the demes of Attica or the various colonial cities (Polignac 1995: 128-49; cf. Lefkowitz 2003: 30-41 on gods as ancestors). Meanwhile at Rome, the established tradition of worshipping the genius (divine essence) of the paterfamilias (head of the household) could easily be transferred to the potent figure of the emperor (Gradel 2002).
World History
