Greek Religion

Walter Burkert

    Preface to the English Edition

    Introduction

    1. A Survey of Scholarship

    2. The Sources

    3. The Scope of the Study

    I Prehistory and the Minoan-Mycenaean Age

    1. The Neolithic and Early Bronze Age

    2. Indo-European

    3. The Minoan-Mycenaean Religion

    3.1 A Historical Survey

    3.2 The State of the Sources

    3.3 The Cult Places

    Caves

    Peak Sanctuaries

    Tree Sanctuaries

    House Sanctuaries

    Temples

    Graves

    3.4 Rituals and Symbols

    3.5 The Minoan Deities

    3.6 The Mycenaean Gods and Linear B

    4. The 'Dark Age' and the Problem of Continuity

    II Ritual and Sanctuary

    1. 'Working Sacred Things': Animal Sacrifice

    1.1 Description and Interpretation

    1.2 Blood Rituals

    1.3 Fire Rituals

    1.4 Animal and God

    2. Gift Offerings and Libation

    2.1 First Fruit Offerings

    2.2 Votive Offerings

    2.3 Libation

    3. Prayer

    4. Purification

    4.1 Function and Methods

    4.2 The Sacred and the Pure

    4.3 Death, Illness, and Madness

    4.4 Purification by Blood

    4.5 Pharmakos

    5. The Sanctuary

    5.1 Temenos

    5.2 Altar

    5.3 Temple and Cult Image

    5.4 Anathemata

    6. Priests

    7. The Festival

    7.1 Pompe

    7.2 Agermos

    7.3 Dancing and Hymns

    7.4 Masks, Phalloi, Aischrologia

    7.5 Agon

    7.6 The Banquet of the Gods

    7.7 Sacred Marriage

    8. Ecstasy and Divination

    8.1 Enthousiasmos

    8.2 The Art of the Seer

    8.3 Oracles

    III The Gods

    1. The Spell of Homer

    2. Individual Gods

    2.1 Zeus

    2.2 Hera

    2.3 Poseidon

    2.4 Athena

    2.5 Apollo

    2.6 Artemis

    2.7 Aphrodite

    2.8 Hermes

    2.9 Demeter

    2.10 Dionysos

    2.11 Hephaistos

    2.12 Ares

    3. The Remainder of the Pantheon

    3.1 Lesser Gods

    3.2 Societies of Gods

    3.3 Nature Deities

    3.4 Foreign Gods

    3.5 Daimon

    4. The Special Character of Greek Anthropomorphism

    IV The Dead, Heroes, and Chthonic Gods

    1. Burial and the Cult of the Dead

    2. Afterlife Mythology

    3. Olympian and Chthonic

    4. The Heroes

    5. Figures who cross the Chthonic-Olympian Boundary

    5.1 Heracles

    5.2 The Dioskouroi

    5.3 Asklepios

    V Polis and Polytheism

    1. Thought Patterns in Greek Polytheism

    General Considerations

    The Family of the Gods

    Pairs of Gods

    Old and Young

    Dionysos

    2. The Rhythm of the Festivals

    2.1 Festival Calendars

    2.2 Year Ending and New Year

    2.3 Karneia

    2.4 Anthesteria

    2.5 Thesmophoria

    3. Social Functions of Cult

    3.1 Gods between Amorality and Law

    3.2 The Oath

    3.3 The Creation of Solidarity in the Playing and the Interplay of Roles

    3.4 Initiation

    3.5 Crisis Management

    4. Piety in the Mirror of Greek Language

    4.1 Sacred'

    4.2 Theos

    4.3 Eusebeia

    VI Mysteries and Asceticism

    1. Mystery Sanctuaries

    1.1 General Considerations

    1.2 Clan and Family Mysteries

    1.3 The Kabeiroi and Samothrace

    1.4 Eleusis

    2. Bacchica and Orphica

    2.1 Bacchic Mysteries

    2.2 Bacchic Hopes for an Afterlife

    2.3 Orpheus and Pythagoras

    3. Bios

    VII Philosophical Religion

    1. The New Foundation: Being and the Divine

    2. The Crisis: Sophists and Atheists

    3. The Deliverance: Cosmic Religion and Metaphysics

    3.1 Pre-Socratic Outlines

    3.2 Plato: The Good and the Soul

    3.3 Plato: Cosmos and Visible Gods

    3.4 Aristotle and Xenocrates: Spirit, God, and Demons

    4. Philosophical Religion and Polis Religion: Plato's Laws

    Notes

    Bibliography

    Index of Greek Words

    Index

  • Cover: Greek Religion
  • A photo of the author

Walter Burkert is Professor Emeritus of Classics, University of Zurich.