Two of the most distinguished British scholars of Roman Religion have successfully brought together a collection of papers that does justice to the enormously ambitious title of the work. Of the seventeen contributions, several of which do not appear in L'année philologique and thus might well have escaped the knowledge of most classicists, seven were specially translated into English for this book. The editors make available important papers that show how scholarship on the religious history of the Roman Empire underwent dramatic changes in the late-twentieth century, what the editors call ‘a revolution’ (p. 3). Most papers have useful afterwords in which the authors reflect on scholarly developments since the original dissemination of their chapter. Greekless and Latinless readers are accommodated by the translation or glossing of the original languages to make this book fully usable by students of various disciplines.
The editors highlight as the most striking ideas of recent scholarship (i) the vigour of the pagan religious tradition across the Empire; (ii) an appreciation of the different ways in which there was interaction between Roman religion and local forms of cult, and evolution of new forms of cult; (iii) the variety of so-called ‘elective cults’; (iv) the recognition that there were many varieties of Christianity in coexistence; and (v) the notion that ‘pagan-ism’ developed only slowly. The papers are grouped under four headings: ‘Changes in Religious Life: Roman and Civic Cults’, ‘Elective Cults’, ‘Co-existence of Religions, Old and New’ and ‘Late Antiquity’.
In Part 1, the longest section, J. Rüpke offers a critique of influential nineteenth-century ideas on the religion of empire and proposes a model based on the notion of religion as symbolic communication. Crucial is ‘the historical notion of a new understanding and type of religion shaped in and by the Roman Empire’ (p. 32). In a very useful paper R. Gordon argues convincingly that a more transcendental conception of power is needed for understanding imperial cult, and demonstrates the complex role played by imperial images under such a conception. J. Rives argues ‘magic’ should be retained as an important ‘etic, heuristic category’ (p. 100) and that from the second century a.d., because of changing social concerns, magic became criminalised as a form of religious deviance rather than as the kind of harmful actions covered by the Lex Cornelia de sicariis et veneficiis, and it appeared as a crime per se from Paulus' Sententiae onwards. W. Van Andringa examines the Pillar of the Boatmen from Lutetia in Gaul as a monument that ratifies the supremacy of Jupiter and the emperor, but reveals a kind of new combination of gods that was possible in a provincial community and in religious systems that were historical constructions. N. Belayche argues that the epithet ὕψιστος in combination with the impersonal θεός metaphorically highlights the greatness of the divinity concerned within a specifically polytheistic context, i.e. it is not an indication of ‘pagan monotheism’. A. Bendlin shows how divination and the closely related concepts of providence and fate were live topics in the second and third centuries a.d. in the milieu of the Second Sophistic, as seen from epigraphic as well as literary evidence, and how argumentative strategies developed. He argues against the historicity of Alexander of Abunoteichos.
In Part 2 P. examines the degree to which elective cults were actually homogeneous and exclusive, even if their individual cosmologies were inclusive. He shows that boundaries could be flexible; individuals could be members of more than one cult and even cult sanctuaries of electives deities could house dedications to other deities. G. Sfameni Gasparro presents a useful conspectus of scholarship on mysteries (Eleusinian, Samothracian and Isiac) and Oriental cults (Cybele and Attis), in a study of key mythic–cultic systems that circulated in the Mediterranean world. Her discussion of the terms μυστήρια and μυεῖν is particularly good. A problem, however, is the English translation which appears to be insufficiently liberated from the original Italian in many places and results in sentences that need to be read repeatedly before they can be understood. R. Gordon's second contribution looks at hierarchy and patronage within Mithraic cult. He reasserts the view that the seven grades of initiate did not apply only to priests and that Mithraism transformed the secular model of the patron–client relationship into an ideal form that was in some sense acted out in the initiation rituals. J. Scheid looks at associations (thiasoi) in Roman Egypt, showing that no distinctions can be made between professional and religious associations and suggesting that early Christians organised themselves like thiasoi. Associations enjoyed a turbulent history and were frequently the first target of the authorities in times of social unrest.
In Part 3 P. Harland uses the evidence of Jewish grave inscriptions at Hierapolis to explore cultural interactions between Jews and pagans, for example Glykon's bequest to local guilds of purple-dyers and carpet-weavers for them to perform ceremonies at his family grave on Jewish and Roman holidays. Because it is not clear whether Glykon was a Jew or a gentile sympathiser (or even a Judaising Christian), it is impossible to classify the behaviour as assimilation or acculturation on the local level, but is clear evidence of significant integration. M. Goodman uses the writings of Josephus, which offer a partial picture only, to argue that there was great diversity in late Second Temple Judaism: the hakhamim are not to be identified with the Pharisees, although they were very similar in their acceptance of ancestral custom. J. Lieu uses the late-second century a.d. Letter to Diognetus to illuminate one Christian approach to creating an identity through the notions of ‘citizenship’ and a ‘new race’ not distinguished by land, language or customs. G. Stroumsa examines the rejection by Mani, who grew up among the Jewish-Christian Elkasaites, of their central rite of repeated ablutions (baptisms) and food-washing: purification comes through gnosis not washing. Against the usual view that Mani's rejection of baptisms derives from a particular understanding of Jesus' teaching, Stroumsa suggests a possible Buddhist influence picked up during Mani's time in northern India. N. rounds off this section with an appropriately broad reflection on trends in modern scholarship in relation to Greco-Roman religion of the third century a.d., centred on the modern analytical categories of monotheism and polytheism. He starts with the contested terms pagan and paganism, and surveys key examples of evolutionary meta-narrative that saw monotheism as superior to polytheism before concluding that the monotheistic element was ‘an essential part of the way pagans of all periods thought and acted’ (p. 489) and in fact demonstrates the strength and flexibility of ancient polytheism.
In the fourth, and shortest, section A. Cameron examines the prominence of the issue of the position of women in early Christian consciousness and how, as asceticism became a powerful force, the ideal of virginity was promoted with overtly erotic language. By contrast with the dangers presented by women in general, the Virgin Mary became an archetype of women who could save. Lastly P. Brown examines the attitude to the Christian martyrs of two leading figures of Christian thought: Augustine strove to show that the martyrs were imitable by ordinary Christians, as recipients of divine grace; Gregory of Tours reveals more how such imitation could develop.
The editors are to be congratulated on an excellent selection of papers which show clearly how scholarly approaches to the religions of antiquity have changed and continue to do so: a complex world of developing, competing and co-existing ideas emerges to challenge our (pre-)conceptions.
