Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name
Speaker 2: is Robert Lamb.
Speaker 3: And I am Joe McCormick, and we're back with part
Speaker 3: two in our discussion of the mystery religions or mystery
Speaker 3: cults of the Ancient Mediterranean. Mystery cult is a category
Speaker 3: used by scholars to refer to worship systems in the
Speaker 3: ancient Greco Roman world that were centered around powerful, intense
Speaker 3: experiences of secretive mystic rights revealed only to the cult's initiates. Now,
Speaker 3: in part one of the series, we talked mainly about
Speaker 3: the historical context of these rights and some about how
Speaker 3: they overlapped with and differed from the most common religious
Speaker 3: practices of Greek and Roman polytheism. We also talked about
Speaker 3: a book that is going to be one of our
Speaker 3: major background sources in these episodes. That is a book
Speaker 3: called Mystery Cults in the Ancient World by Hugh Bowden,
Speaker 3: who is an ancient historian at King's College, London. This
Speaker 3: book was published by Thamson Hudson. The edition both Rob
Speaker 3: and I were reading is the one from twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3: There was an older edition before that, and today we
Speaker 3: wanted to come back and get a little bit deeper
Speaker 3: into the mysteries by going beyond the general and looking
Speaker 3: at a couple of specific examples.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I feel like one of the really interesting
Speaker 2: things about these various mystery cults is that a lot
Speaker 2: of the mysteries really do remain, in part because any
Speaker 2: knowledge that we have of the ancient world is incomplete,
Speaker 2: at least to some degree. But also these guys were
Speaker 2: just really good at keeping their mysteries intact in some cases,
Speaker 2: and what went on behind closed doors remained behind closed doors,
Speaker 2: and we just have to speculate regarding that details of
Speaker 2: what say, initiation rights consisted of and what they meant,
Speaker 2: both in terms of like personal meaning to the initiate,
Speaker 2: but also within like the sort of the larger like
Speaker 2: worldview of the particular cult.
Speaker 3: That's right, and we do know a lot of things,
Speaker 3: especially about the more public aspects of the mystery religions,
Speaker 3: because they often had a kind of you know, public
Speaker 3: facing elements and then the hidden elements. And it's particularly
Speaker 3: those those secretive hidden elements that you know they are.
Speaker 3: There are many cases where we still don't really know
Speaker 3: today what they were about We may have some claims
Speaker 3: from the ancient world, we may have some pieces of evidence,
Speaker 3: but yeah, a lot of mysteries remain.
Speaker 4: Though.
Speaker 3: One thing I do want to mention, it's something we
Speaker 3: got into in the last episode, is a bit of
Speaker 3: clarification on the role of mystery in mystery religion, because
Speaker 3: that can be somewhat misleading and could maybe cause people
Speaker 3: to think about the idea of a mystery cult as
Speaker 3: a religion where the the main goal is to solve
Speaker 3: a kind of information puzzle. It's like to get the
Speaker 3: hidden answer to a question, and that really doesn't seem
Speaker 3: to be what these mystery religions were primarily about. They
Speaker 3: had very elements that we could absolutely call mysterious. There
Speaker 3: were secret rights, there were secret sacred objects that were
Speaker 3: hidden from view, and all you know, you could only
Speaker 3: see what they were if you were initiated. But the
Speaker 3: main goal of these religions was, especially as argued by
Speaker 3: Bowden in this book, we've been talking about, not primarily
Speaker 3: to solve an information puzzle and like learn the secret,
Speaker 3: but instead it was to have a profound experience to
Speaker 3: take part in these mystic rights, these secret rights that
Speaker 3: would cause some kind of experience or encounter directly with
Speaker 3: the power of the gods.
Speaker 2: So mystery very much in the sense of the Beatles
Speaker 2: album from sixty seven, The Magical Mystery Tour.
Speaker 4: I don't know what sense that would be.
Speaker 2: Well, I don't think it really revolves around the particular
Speaker 2: puzzle or a particular mystery is there, But it's more,
Speaker 2: you know, versed in psychedelic weirdness and yeah, yeah, and
Speaker 2: perhaps cryptic meaning. I mean, I am the Walrus, right,
Speaker 2: What are we to make of this song? What are
Speaker 2: we to make of the imagery associated with it?
Speaker 3: I remember way back when I first heard that, I
Speaker 3: was much younger, and the line about the like yellow
Speaker 3: custard dripping from a dead dog's eye seemed especially unbeatlesy
Speaker 3: to me.
Speaker 2: They get pretty weird, they get pretty weird. There's kind
Speaker 2: of the Beatles that you think you know and associate with,
Speaker 2: sort of the mainstream understanding of the Beatles, But then
Speaker 2: you can really dig into.
Speaker 3: Some weird stuff in there as well, no doubt.
Speaker 2: But setting aside the mysteries of the Beatles, I would
Speaker 2: like to turn our attention now to the mysteries of mithraism.
Speaker 2: We mentioned, you know, in the last episode, we're talking
Speaker 2: very much about the Greco Roman world, and this is
Speaker 2: definitely one from the Roman world.
Speaker 3: Right, this is one coming later on the scene than
Speaker 3: most of the other examples will we'll end up talking.
Speaker 2: About right, Right, we're talking the first through the fourth
Speaker 2: century CE, so it's taking off alongside another brand new religion,
Speaker 2: that of the way, centered around the teachings of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2: This would of course come to be known as Christianity
Speaker 2: at least by like one hundred CE. But this is
Speaker 2: where I should I should throw out that we have
Speaker 2: of course mentioned Mithraism in passing or in a few
Speaker 2: details on the show. In the past. We mentioned mithra
Speaker 2: in our Hogs of Hell episode as well as in
Speaker 2: our episodes on Whistling. As I mentioned then, fans of
Speaker 2: the Ridley Scott produced sci fi series Raised by Wolves,
Speaker 2: which ran twenty twenty through twenty twenty two, we'll also
Speaker 2: remember the name as in the fictional future of this series,
Speaker 2: it is the predominant religion that is practiced by one
Speaker 2: of the key factions in that show. So sort of
Speaker 2: like an alternate future where instead of perhaps Christianity taking
Speaker 2: off as this influential human religion, what if Mithraism is
Speaker 2: the religion that took off and ended up defining a civilization.
Speaker 3: Rob, would it be fair to say, based on what
Speaker 3: you've read that it's kind of shocking how little we
Speaker 3: know about Mythraism with certainty, given how popular it was
Speaker 3: during its heyday in the Roman Empire.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that is something that impressed me as well,
Speaker 2: because we're not talking about something that was just practiced
Speaker 2: by say like a few elites, you know, in the
Speaker 2: basement of a palace here and there, or something to
Speaker 2: that effect, or a few deranged cultists to sort of
Speaker 2: imagine the again the sort of Kolakuthulu dungeons and dragons
Speaker 2: treatment of cults. Now, this was this was widely practiced
Speaker 2: during this time period again, first through fourth century CE,
Speaker 2: and it was wildly popular, especially in the Roman army.
Speaker 2: H And wherever the Roman army went, so too traveled
Speaker 2: the mystery cult of Mithra, with its temples popping up
Speaker 2: just throughout the Roman Empire of the time, as far
Speaker 2: north as the British Isles. And we have a surviving
Speaker 2: archaeological evidence all these special temples, which we'll get back
Speaker 2: to in a bit, and we can piece together some
Speaker 2: of what went on. Now. One of the interesting things
Speaker 2: here that we're going to dig into here is, of course,
Speaker 2: the idea that we have a religion, a cult an
Speaker 2: organization here, and its ideas are based on pre existing
Speaker 2: religious ideas. And for a while, the way historians interpreted
Speaker 2: it was to go back to some of the myths
Speaker 2: that informed Roman mythraism and use that to try and
Speaker 2: piece together what Roman mythraism was all about. So I
Speaker 2: want you to keep that in mind as I read
Speaker 2: a quote here from an older source. This is from
Speaker 2: will Durant Caesar and Christ from nineteen forty four, in
Speaker 2: which he writes that during the period of roughly thirty
Speaker 2: CE through ninety six CE, one sees a great influx
Speaker 2: of foreign faiths and to Rome and Roman life, and
Speaker 2: these faiths, he writes, enter into Rome via returning soldiers,
Speaker 2: war captives, and also merchants. A lot of people are
Speaker 2: coming in and out of Rome. People brought their traditional
Speaker 2: gods with them, and he writes that quote. The Roman
Speaker 2: government treated these alien faiths for the most part with toleration.
Speaker 2: Since it would not permit foreigners to its own worship,
Speaker 2: it preferred that they should practice their imported rights rather
Speaker 2: than have no religion at all. In return, it required
Speaker 2: that each new faith should exercise a similar tolerance towards
Speaker 2: other creeds, and should include in its ritual sum obsessence
Speaker 2: to the Emperor's genius and the goddess Roma as an
Speaker 2: expression of loyalty to the state. So we touched on
Speaker 2: this before that. Generally the Romans were like, fine, you
Speaker 2: practice whatever faith you already had or have or have
Speaker 2: brought with you. Just make sure that it's you know,
Speaker 2: checking off the right boxes and you know, not messing
Speaker 2: up anything we have going on at the top.
Speaker 3: Not questioning our authority. I don't think that the Roman
Speaker 3: rule on this should be seen as generally merciful, because
Speaker 3: the Roman Empire for the large part, was not very merciful.
Speaker 4: It was more like they didn't really care about this.
Speaker 3: Their idea of religion was not an evangelical one, and
Speaker 3: they were not trying to convince other people to follow it. Instead,
Speaker 3: it was just like, you need to obey us and
Speaker 3: not cause problems otherwise, practice whatever you want.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I think that's a fair way of understanding it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And we don't need to lean into some idea that
Speaker 2: the Roman the Roman authorities were just in general super tolerant.
Speaker 2: But in this respect, you know, you can make an
Speaker 2: argument that, okay, they kind of were, but only because
Speaker 2: they didn't care what you're doing, as long as you
Speaker 2: didn't upset the order of things. And in this section
Speaker 2: of the book by Durant, he does mention Mithra. In Mithraism,
Speaker 2: he writes, from hostile Parthia came the cult of another
Speaker 2: sudden god, Mithras. Its devotees were enlisted as soldiers in
Speaker 2: the great cosmic war of light against darkness, of good
Speaker 2: against evil. It was a virile faith that won men
Speaker 2: rather than women, and pleased the Roman legions stationed on
Speaker 2: distant frontiers where they could hardly hear the voices of
Speaker 2: their native gods. So already that's a lot to unpack.
Speaker 2: We have this again, this the nineteen forty four text.
Speaker 2: But the interpretation that Durant here seems to be making
Speaker 2: is that of a foreign mystery cult taken up almost
Speaker 2: exclusively by male Roman soldiers, and worshiped in every far
Speaker 2: flung corner of the Roman controlled territory. Perhaps some deity
Speaker 2: and faith that cast the role of the enlisted not
Speaker 2: as mere protectors of Rome, but perhaps his warriors and
Speaker 2: some sort of epic struggle against the darkness. All right,
Speaker 2: So that was nineteen forty four's interpretation. But where are
Speaker 2: we at now, So into Hugh Bowden's mystery Cults in
Speaker 2: the Ancient World, which we've been looking at here, the
Speaker 2: author does have a lot to say about Mithraism, but
Speaker 2: as is often the case with some of these mystery cults,
Speaker 2: there's a lot we don't know and we'll never know
Speaker 2: concerning the details of the faith. And it seems like
Speaker 2: the trend he says, for a while was to try
Speaker 2: and use information regarding ancient worship of Mithra in ancient
Speaker 2: Iran in the interpretations of this Indo Iranian faith as
Speaker 2: a way to try and figure out what Roman Mythraism
Speaker 2: was about. Because, to be clear, there was worship of
Speaker 2: a deity known as Mithra in ancient Iran and accounts
Speaker 2: date back to at least fourteen hundred bcee. And then
Speaker 2: eventually Mithra becomes the central figure of these Roman mystery
Speaker 2: cults of Mithraism, the details of which again are not
Speaker 2: all that forthcoming, but we do have some literary references,
Speaker 2: we have archaeological evidence, some of it fairly recent, you know,
Speaker 2: and we also have some artistic imagery that has survived,
Speaker 2: and from this a fair number of conclusions can be drawn.
Speaker 2: But the current predominant interpretation, according to Bowden, is that
Speaker 2: the cult of Mithra in the Roman Empire was something
Speaker 2: mostly new. It was for the most part for Romans
Speaker 2: and by Romans, despite these Persian motifs that were applied
Speaker 2: to it. So in previous decades, again, it was common
Speaker 2: for historians to try and piece together the details of Mithraism,
Speaker 2: based in part on aspects of the ancient Indo Iranian
Speaker 2: religion centered around Mithra, but current trends tend to dismiss this.
Speaker 2: So in Bowden's chapter on Mithraism, he doesn't mention anything
Speaker 2: about soldiers of light against darkness. I'm to assume that
Speaker 2: perhaps that's something that previously historians drug in from the
Speaker 2: more ancient model of Mithra's worship.
Speaker 3: You know, you can very much see the appeal of
Speaker 3: that older interpretive lens, which tries to figure out what
Speaker 3: a religion means by searching out the earliest versions of it.
Speaker 3: Because we tend to think about the primacy of originals
Speaker 3: like originals in time, you know, we've talked about this
Speaker 3: coming up before on the podcast when we were talking
Speaker 3: about Greek myths. We're trying to find, like, what's the
Speaker 3: earliest written version of this so that we can know
Speaker 3: what the real version of the myth is, you know,
Speaker 3: but that's not actually the real version of the myth.
Speaker 3: And finding maybe the earliest version that was written down
Speaker 3: that we still have access to and does not tell
Speaker 3: you how people hundreds of years later, in a different
Speaker 3: time in place understood the story or what it meant.
Speaker 3: It just you know that, I mean, it is worth
Speaker 3: knowing that tells you one thing, but it doesn't necessarily
Speaker 3: tell you that thing. And so searching out what myth,
Speaker 3: what a god or a religious figure mint in one
Speaker 3: time and place, even though it came earlier, that doesn't
Speaker 3: necessarily tell you what it meant to people in a
Speaker 3: different time in a different place. And I think this
Speaker 3: is still true today. I think actually, say, if you
Speaker 3: just went to the New Testament and read the Gospels
Speaker 3: and then tried to read from those and predict what
Speaker 3: form Christianity would take as practiced, say in the United
Speaker 3: States in the twenty first century, you'd be so far off.
Speaker 3: You have no idea what to predict from that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and I think we can point to examples
Speaker 2: of this and other major religions as well, and also elsewhere.
Speaker 2: I instantly thought to Dracula, perhaps because I had Dracula
Speaker 2: on the mind a lot recently. But it's like, imagine
Speaker 2: you were to examine the text known as Dracula three thousand.
Speaker 2: Let's see what year did Dracula three thousand come out?
Speaker 4: You think I know off the top of my head.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I expect you to two thousand and four.
Speaker 4: Okay, okay, okay, that sounds right.
Speaker 2: So imagine you watch a Dracula three thousand and then
Speaker 2: you were like, I wish to understand what this film
Speaker 2: is trying to say. I am going to read this
Speaker 2: book by brim Stoker Dracula, and that shall answer all
Speaker 2: my questions. I can take everything is in that book
Speaker 2: and apply it to this movie and me, Yeah, to
Speaker 2: a certain extent, there might be some useful connections to
Speaker 2: be made there, But Dracula. Dracula movies are all built
Speaker 2: around the central figure of Dracula, but the textual Dracula
Speaker 2: in brim Stoker's original novel might not prove all that
Speaker 2: useful and understanding. Some depictions of Dracula in other media,
Speaker 2: including Bella Lugosi's Dracula, which we discussed in Weird Hoalse
Speaker 2: Cinema recently, or say Marvel Comics Dracula, The Dracula and
Speaker 2: Dracula three thousand, or whatever Dracula update you're looking at. Sometimes,
Speaker 2: you know, a Dracula movie may just take Dracula out
Speaker 2: of it and they're just ignoring everything else thematically, plot wise,
Speaker 2: time period and so forth. Like the Dracula in Monster
Speaker 2: Squad is only loosely related to the original novel.
Speaker 4: That's right.
Speaker 3: So it may in fact be a very interest exercise
Speaker 3: to see which elements from the older version are poured
Speaker 3: it into the newer version and which are left behind.
Speaker 3: So it's not like it is useless to compare the versions,
Speaker 3: but it is not necessary. But understanding the earlier version
Speaker 3: does not necessarily tell you what to expect in the
Speaker 3: newer version. Say, if we had pages missing from the
Speaker 3: you know, all we had was like an incomplete script
Speaker 3: of Dracula three thousand. We didn't have the movie, and
Speaker 3: we were trying to figure out what was still in there.
Speaker 3: Going back to the novel Dracula would not tell us.
Speaker 2: Right, and that would be again assuming that all all
Speaker 2: adaptations of Dracula and all Dracula media still holds the
Speaker 2: original novel in some regard or looks to it in
Speaker 2: some fashion. You know, you can look at all various
Speaker 2: examples though, of religions where there is some sort of
Speaker 2: old text that remains important and the particular like model
Speaker 2: of that religion may still be unrecognizable across time even
Speaker 2: though it's based on the book. And in the case
Speaker 2: of Roman mythraism, I'm not it's my understanding that we're
Speaker 2: not really dealing with any kind of like central texts
Speaker 2: that would have been the authority. The main authority would
Speaker 2: have been perhaps some collection of myths, but also a
Speaker 2: modern understanding of astrology. And so it really sounds like
Speaker 2: it takes mithra It takes this Indo Iranian deity and
Speaker 2: then creates a new form out of it, you know,
Speaker 2: almost kind of like propping up some astrological ideas with
Speaker 2: the appeal of this foreign deity and again creating something
Speaker 2: new that is by Romans for Romans, likely with its
Speaker 2: origin according to Bowden, in Italy, if not in Rome itself,
Speaker 2: rather than the frontiers. It was then carried out to
Speaker 2: the frontiers by Roman soldiers.
Speaker 3: Hmm.
Speaker 2: Okay, So, based on what the evidence we do have
Speaker 2: regarding Roman Mythriism, which again involves some texts, some archaeological evidence,
Speaker 2: and also some artistic depictions, the cult would have met
Speaker 2: in special cave like and sometimes partially cave based chambers.
Speaker 2: These were called mithraeum. They were long, windowless rectangles with
Speaker 2: chairs or seating down the long walls of the chamber
Speaker 2: and so again no windows, so you just had to
Speaker 2: depend on torches and or candles, and these would have
Speaker 2: illuminated a strongly astrological decor so based on archaeological evidence,
Speaker 2: the exclusively male devotees of Mithraism would often join together,
Speaker 2: apparently in feasts that included a lot of meat, some wine.
Speaker 2: And I have to note that I'm already getting like
Speaker 2: a very strong Elks club vibe here. You know, it
Speaker 2: sounds just like a men's club where they're all getting
Speaker 2: together to drink and eat meat and maybe observe some rights.
Speaker 3: I mean, if you can experience the power of the
Speaker 3: gods and just drink with your bros at the same time,
Speaker 3: that's a good two for one.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, So the astrological decor here would have included
Speaker 2: depictions of the Sun is vitally important because Mithra is
Speaker 2: even in Roman mythrism, a solar deity or a solar figure.
Speaker 2: You have the Moon, the planets all coming together in
Speaker 2: what we might think of as an astrological model of
Speaker 2: the universe. And Balden argues that in the absence of
Speaker 2: any key surviving text and only a few myths of
Speaker 2: Mithra and his adventures slash live slash mythic existence, modern
Speaker 2: understanding of astrology again like this would have been first
Speaker 2: through third century understanding of the stars and then the
Speaker 2: astrological model of how these stars and planets are impacting
Speaker 2: our lives. This would have likely served as the unifying
Speaker 2: factor of the religion across you know, its various far
Speaker 2: flung forms. You'd see some changes in the way things
Speaker 2: were depicted, but in the absence of any kind of
Speaker 2: like top down doctrine, this is what you had, And
Speaker 2: so a mithraem Again the temple where the Mithra worshipers
Speaker 2: held their ceremonies and their feasts. It likely the building
Speaker 2: itself likely served as a model, perhaps for further indoctrinization
Speaker 2: into the astrological secrets of Mithraism, but also as a
Speaker 2: model of the universe and the initiates place in it,
Speaker 2: which I think that alone is kind of interesting to
Speaker 2: think of in terms of soldiers in the Roman army,
Speaker 2: you know, perhaps very close, if not on the frontiers
Speaker 2: of this, you know, this vast region, and perhaps feeling
Speaker 2: far from home and having some you know, maybe more
Speaker 2: specific thoughts and questions about where I am in time
Speaker 2: and space, but perhaps those are echoing you greater questions,
Speaker 2: and maybe that's where Mithraism comes into their lives with meaning.
Speaker 2: Now again, we have a lot of evidence, archaeological evidence
Speaker 2: about what may have gone on at some of the
Speaker 2: feasts that they had. There's at least one side and
Speaker 2: what is now Belgium from the third century that suggests
Speaker 2: ritual destruction of wine vessels as well as feasting. I
Speaker 2: think they said that perhaps feasting exclusively on male animals,
Speaker 2: but also some eels. That Bouten points out they might
Speaker 2: not have been able to sex the eels. Maybe they
Speaker 2: meant it meat eat only male eels as well, but
Speaker 2: at any rate, they ate a lot of meat, they
Speaker 2: drank and or ritually destroyed wine vessels. And then he
Speaker 2: also says that there's evidence at this one side and
Speaker 2: no other side of a wine vessel with a snake
Speaker 2: motif that, when heated, would have resulted in steam escaping
Speaker 2: from the serpent's mouth. Oh cool, Yeah, pretty cool. But
Speaker 2: we don't know what that may or may not mean.
Speaker 2: Maybe it was just cool.
Speaker 4: Well.
Speaker 3: I don't want to comment on mythraism specifically, but with
Speaker 3: respect to many of the mystery religions, I think cool
Speaker 3: on its own may have.
Speaker 4: Been reason enough.
Speaker 3: Again, a lot of these cults I think you could
Speaker 3: you could think of as being oriented towards producing profound, exciting,
Speaker 3: dazzling sensory experiences.
Speaker 4: And so I don't know, a.
Speaker 3: Snake breathing out wine steam that seems like that. Could
Speaker 3: that could be one of those things?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, definitely. I should also point out that I
Speaker 2: believe the Belgium site indicates potentially potentially a large feast
Speaker 2: like something like hundreds of individuals, But for the most part,
Speaker 2: the mithraum were understood to be, you know, smaller places
Speaker 2: where you would have a more intimate gathering. And if
Speaker 2: there were, and you might have like more than one
Speaker 2: mithraeum in a given area so that you could keep
Speaker 2: the number small, so that that might also stack up
Speaker 2: with some of how we're interpreting what the these spaces
Speaker 2: and these meetings could have meant to these individuals. You know,
Speaker 2: it would have perhaps been a smaller, comfortable meeting and
Speaker 2: not necessarily like a grand feast, all right, so about see.
Speaker 2: But obviously it can't all be cozy feasts, right because
Speaker 2: as we've been discussing, mystery cults also involved at times
Speaker 2: harrowing rights of initiation, sites and sounds that were unique
Speaker 2: in life that gave you some insight into the inner
Speaker 2: workings of the universe or the afterlife or what have you.
Speaker 2: And as Bowden points out, there were apparently some rights
Speaker 2: involved here. So there were like seven grades of mythraism,
Speaker 2: and it's likely that each initiate that each grade of
Speaker 2: mythraism involved a different ritual. But we do know a
Speaker 2: little bit about the rituals that were involved, most notably
Speaker 2: one that involves a sword and crown. For instance, Christian
Speaker 2: writer Tertullian, who lived roughly one through two twenty ce
Speaker 2: mentions a mithra in right by which the initiatet is
Speaker 2: taken into a dark space. Obviously, the mithram and offered
Speaker 2: a crown at sword point, and then he is expected
Speaker 2: to strike the crown from their own head onto their
Speaker 2: own shoulders and proclaim that no Mithra is my crown.
Speaker 2: I do not need any other crown but Mithra. And
Speaker 2: based on surviving frescoes and some evidence from some pottery,
Speaker 2: we also have some vague ideas that the initiate would
Speaker 2: have been brought into this ritual space bound and naked,
Speaker 2: or at least blindfolded and naked, and then made kneel
Speaker 2: for the placement of the crown, and then eventually made
Speaker 2: to lay upon the ground or the floor of the mithram,
Speaker 2: perhaps held down even And the general interpretation is indeed
Speaker 2: that this, at least this grades initial would have been
Speaker 2: rather terrifying. You know, you're at sword point, You're naked,
Speaker 2: brought in blindfolded again, into a space that is either
Speaker 2: a cave or partially a cave, or at least designed
Speaker 2: to be as lightless as a cave and lit only
Speaker 2: by torches, with also these added astrological signs around you.
Speaker 3: It's funny, especially in this version, thinking about the comparisons
Speaker 3: we have two more recent things in our own culture
Speaker 3: like this strikes me as part religious ritual but also
Speaker 3: just part fraternity initiation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it reminds me. I can't help but think of
Speaker 2: the episode of The Simpsons with it. What are there
Speaker 2: the stonecutters stonecutters skin? Yeah, yeah, with the very all
Speaker 2: the different initiation rights that were all essentially just ritually
Speaker 2: spanking each other.
Speaker 3: I mean in our culture, when that is depicted in
Speaker 3: media and storytelling, it's usually played for comedy. Now, it's
Speaker 3: kind of mocking the silliness of this, but I think
Speaker 3: there are some pretty profound psychological reasons why, you know,
Speaker 3: why a lot of brotherhoods or groups that are encouraging
Speaker 3: people to form a deep bond and commit to secrecy
Speaker 3: and things like that, why they involve painful and confusing
Speaker 3: initiation processes. And we'll talk about that more as we
Speaker 3: go on and discuss some of these other mystery religions.
Speaker 3: But it seems like not an accident to me, Like
Speaker 3: there's a kind of psychological triggering mechanism involved where when
Speaker 3: you've been through some kind of pain and suffering, it
Speaker 3: for some reason triggers you to commit more deeply.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like we just pretended to threaten to kill
Speaker 2: you with the sword, but now we're all bros. And
Speaker 2: we can have some wines and meat that sort of thing.
Speaker 2: That's again oversimplification of what's going on here, but we
Speaker 2: can't help withdraw those comparisons. So at the center of
Speaker 2: all this we still have this solar deity of sorts,
Speaker 2: this Mithra at once the Sun itself and also seemingly
Speaker 2: a servant of a greater Sun god, perhaps born out
Speaker 2: of an egg. I think a little unsure in some
Speaker 2: of these depictions, like if Mithra is supposed to be
Speaker 2: emerging from an egg or maybe it's the sun. And
Speaker 2: then Mithra rises to chase the lunar bull with a
Speaker 2: sword and eventually slay it, and that's where we get
Speaker 2: to that symbol.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is one of the main motifs I was
Speaker 3: familiar with, not really knowing that much about Mithraism, but
Speaker 3: I knew that there were artistic motifs that involved a
Speaker 3: sort of fight or struggle with a giant bull or
Speaker 3: maybe being killed by a bull or killing the bull.
Speaker 2: Yes, this is the Taroktini, and it is this recurring
Speaker 2: visual motif of Mithraism. In it, we see the unconquered
Speaker 2: sun god Mithra dressed in a cloak and what is described.
Speaker 2: I don't think he's wearing this in every depiction, but
Speaker 2: at least it's more prominent in some a Persian style hat,
Speaker 2: and he is grappling a bull and stabbing it through
Speaker 2: the neck with his sword. At the same time, a
Speaker 2: scorpion is stinging the bulls testicles, and a dog and
Speaker 2: a snake are drinking blood from the sword wound. Okay,
Speaker 2: all while a sun watches on a moon watches on.
Speaker 2: There are also two figures that are present that each
Speaker 2: have a torch, and they're sometimes part of this is
Speaker 2: two One is holding the torch high, one holding the
Speaker 2: torch low. Everything is very astrologically charged here, with these
Speaker 2: different symbols having zodiac references entailed. The central idea here, though,
Speaker 2: which may not have been revealed or apparent to all
Speaker 2: adherents to Mithraism, is that it has to do with
Speaker 2: the position of the sun and the constellation Taurus during
Speaker 2: the hottest months of the year late July till late August.
Speaker 2: So Baldn contends that some elements of this faith may
Speaker 2: have originally originated in Eastern Anatolia, but the cult of
Speaker 2: Mithraism is again likely originated itself largely in Italy and
Speaker 2: likely within Rome, and was then taken out to the
Speaker 2: far flung frontiers by Roman soldiers. So and it's also
Speaker 2: telling that apparently, despite its foreign elements and inspirations quite
Speaker 2: clear inspirations, it was likely considered a very Roman thing
Speaker 2: to do, and ultimately it backs up and acknowledges Roman ideals,
Speaker 2: and so it likely attracted initiates who wanted to be
Speaker 2: more Roman, including foreigners in Rome, which is interesting to
Speaker 2: think of. It may have offered some degree of social
Speaker 2: upward mobility, but it also doesn't seem to have offered
Speaker 2: any notion of privileged status in the afterlife, but instead
Speaker 2: likely leaned heavily on an astrology fueled understanding of where
Speaker 2: one stood in the world and maybe in the universe
Speaker 2: in the larger sense. I mean, but this is just
Speaker 2: me spitballing here, but it does like all these elements
Speaker 2: they do they do sound like the things that might
Speaker 2: be created by people who are having a certain crisis
Speaker 2: about like who they are and where they belong in
Speaker 2: the world. That might you know, fit in in an
Speaker 2: empire that is expanding at the same time absorbing different elements,
Speaker 2: you know. And then this this structure of this cult
Speaker 2: is built out to sort of give you some level
Speaker 2: of assurance and say, no, no, no, don't worry. We know
Speaker 2: a lot about the movements of the stars and the planets,
Speaker 2: and no matter how you know crazy, everything else is
Speaker 2: getting out there, like this can tell you exactly where
Speaker 2: you are and who you are in the grand scheme
Speaker 2: of things.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the meaning is written in the sky.
Speaker 2: Yeah. But at the same time, also like, hey, this
Speaker 2: thing's pretty popular. I want to fit in. I should
Speaker 2: probably go to this too. I hear they sometimes have
Speaker 2: meat and wine, So you know, I think you have
Speaker 2: to factor all these different ideas into it. But it
Speaker 2: does sound like the initiation rituals could be very terrifying,
Speaker 2: at least based on the way that I am interpreting it,
Speaker 2: And it seems like Bowden and others have interpreted maybe
Speaker 2: it was played just for giggles, but I doubt it
Speaker 2: based on so based on the comparisons we have in
Speaker 2: other mystery cults.
Speaker 3: Well, speaking of other cults that would interface perfectly with
Speaker 3: things that people in the ancient world wrote about. The
Speaker 3: next example that I want to talk about. I don't
Speaker 3: know if we'll have a chance to explore everything about
Speaker 3: these in today's episode with the time we've got left,
Speaker 3: but we can at least start talking about the Elusinian Mysteries,
Speaker 3: probably the most famous mystery cult of the Greek world. Now,
Speaker 3: we know about the Eleusinian Mysteries from a number of
Speaker 3: sources of information, primarily from what ancient authors wrote about them,
Speaker 3: including from literature that that attempts to describe things about
Speaker 3: them directly, but then also from literature that makes oblique
Speaker 3: or incidental reference to them. And it turns out there's
Speaker 3: a lot of the latter. I mean, there will just
Speaker 3: there will just be little dialogues of Plato where you know,
Speaker 3: Socrates says something that implies a certain understanding of what
Speaker 3: the Elusinian mysteries meant, but is not meaning to talk
Speaker 3: about them directly, not like here, let's have a discourse
Speaker 3: about them.
Speaker 2: That's another thing. I guess it's interesting, too important to
Speaker 2: realize and discussions. It's like, there's there's stuff that is
Speaker 2: forgotten because it was secret, and there's also plenty of
Speaker 2: things that were forgotten because it was just common knowledge.
Speaker 2: Why would you write that down?
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3: Also, apart from the ancient written sources, we have some physical,
Speaker 3: archaeological remains, especially at eleusis the cult center, including artworks
Speaker 3: that depict elements of the associated myth. One example of
Speaker 3: the ladder is a marble fred from the sanctuary of
Speaker 3: Demeter at el Usus, of which there are copies from
Speaker 3: scattered about from the Roman period as well. But rob
Speaker 3: I included an image in our outline for you to
Speaker 3: look at this marble relief. It shows the goddess's Demeter
Speaker 3: and Persephone standing on either side of a nude young man,
Speaker 3: and they are just towering over the guy. They're much
Speaker 3: bigger than he is. The youth is thought to probably
Speaker 3: be a figure named Triptolemus, who is a figure in
Speaker 3: mythology sent by Demeter to teach agriculture to the people,
Speaker 3: sort of a kind of an intermediary Prometheus of grain
Speaker 3: in a way. And one interesting thing about this marble
Speaker 3: relief you're looking at, rob is that the Demeter and
Speaker 3: Persephone here are they're like holding their hands out as
Speaker 3: if they're each holding something out to this naked man,
Speaker 3: and their marble fingers probably originally held some kind of object,
Speaker 3: but that object or those objects are gone.
Speaker 4: And we don't know what they were.
Speaker 3: Oh hell, so some basic facts to ground us about
Speaker 3: the Eleusinian mysteries. They were based out of a city
Speaker 3: called Eleusis, which was located in the region of Attica,
Speaker 3: only about twenty three kilometers west of the city of Athens,
Speaker 3: so pretty close to the city of Athens and also
Speaker 3: close to another important ancient city called Megara. The myth
Speaker 3: associated with the mystic rights of Eleusis is a version
Speaker 3: of the story of Demeter and Persephone. Now, as with
Speaker 3: most of the big Greek myths, there are multiple versions
Speaker 3: of this story in circulation, with lots of differences in
Speaker 3: the narrative. So I am specifically going to be talking
Speaker 3: about the version of the story found in the Greek
Speaker 3: hymn or poem known as the Homeric Hymn to Demeter,
Speaker 3: which was written in dactylic Hexameter, probably sometime between six
Speaker 3: fifty and five fifty BCE, and this is the take
Speaker 3: on the story that seems to directly implicate the city
Speaker 3: of Eleusis. So in this myth, Demeter, the Greek goddess
Speaker 3: of agriculture in the harvest, has a daughter with the
Speaker 3: god Zeus, and in a lot of versions of the
Speaker 3: story the daughter is named Persephone, but in the version
Speaker 3: of the story told at Eleusis, the daughter is referred
Speaker 3: to only as Corey, Corey or Corey Kri, meaning maiden.
Speaker 3: So core and Persephone are basically the same character, but
Speaker 3: I'm going to use core in my telling here because
Speaker 3: of the Eleusinian connection. So the trouble begins in the
Speaker 3: story when Zeus, without the consent of Demeter, allows his
Speaker 3: brother Hades, the god of the underworld and the king
Speaker 3: of the Dead, to kidnap Demeter's daughter, Corey while she
Speaker 3: is out gathering flowers upon a plane, and Hades takes
Speaker 3: her away to his subterranean kingdom of the Dead. When
Speaker 3: Demeter finds out that her daughter is missing, she spends
Speaker 3: nine days scouring the earth, scouring the face of the
Speaker 3: earth in grief, searching for her daughter by torchlight. It's
Speaker 3: mentioned that she carries a torch and eventually a couple
Speaker 3: of other gods, Hecate and Helios, tell Demeter what happened,
Speaker 3: and so here we get to the part involving the
Speaker 3: city of Eleusis. Demeter, disgusted with Zeus and with the
Speaker 3: gods for allowing this to happen to her daughter, she
Speaker 3: leaves Mount Olympus disguises herself as a human and then
Speaker 3: walks all over the world, and eventually she ends up
Speaker 3: in the city of Eleusis, where she meets the family
Speaker 3: of a king named King Celius, and she is hired
Speaker 3: to work for the king's family as a nurse. Now,
Speaker 3: in Bowden's retelling of this myth, there are a number
Speaker 3: of great details here that are very cryptic to the
Speaker 3: modern reader and sort of fascinating.
Speaker 4: For this reason.
Speaker 3: I love little details where it's like, why include that,
Speaker 3: what does that mean? So it says that she is
Speaker 3: invited into the house of the family of King Celius.
Speaker 3: She has offered a chair to sit, but says no, no, no,
Speaker 3: I'll just sit on this stool covered in a fleece instead.
Speaker 3: M And then she has offered a cup of wine,
Speaker 3: but she refuses the wine and instead accepts a type
Speaker 3: of beverage. It's a beverage or perhaps a gruel, the
Speaker 3: name of which in Greek is spelled k y k
Speaker 3: e o n like kai kion, but I have heard
Speaker 3: it pronounced as kukion, so I'm gonna say kukon. It
Speaker 3: is made of water grain and herbs. Bowden specifies that
Speaker 3: the grain is barley, and the herb is mint. So
Speaker 3: think of a kind of beverage or gruel made with
Speaker 3: with barley, water and mint.
Speaker 2: Could be good, could be good, could be could be
Speaker 2: rather refreshing.
Speaker 3: Remember that drink. We may not It may not be
Speaker 3: till the next episode that it comes back, but it
Speaker 3: will factor in. At el usis also in here. It
Speaker 3: says that Demeter smiles at a joke made by a
Speaker 3: woman name I am Bi. Anyway, Demeter in disguise is
Speaker 3: hired to nurse the newborn prince in this household. The
Speaker 3: newborn prince is named Demophoon, but instead of feeding him
Speaker 3: each night in secret, she anoints him with ambrosia and
Speaker 3: then exposes him to the fire in the hearth. And
Speaker 3: there's a reason for this. This is a process she's
Speaker 3: doing to make the boy eventually immortal, so she's sort
Speaker 3: of transforming this baby into a god. However, it doesn't
Speaker 3: work because one night, Demeter in disguise gets caught. She
Speaker 3: gets caught in the middle of doing this by medanaira
Speaker 3: Demophoan's mother, who screams in terror, which you can understand
Speaker 3: why that would happen, but Demeter, Demeter is not happy
Speaker 3: about this, She explains what she was doing, and she says,
Speaker 3: you know now that the spell is broken. Now that
Speaker 3: you've caught me, Demophoon cannot become immortal. And Demeter is
Speaker 3: very angry by this reversal, and she says, Okay, what
Speaker 3: you've got to do now to appease me is build
Speaker 3: me a temple. Build a temple to me in elyusis,
Speaker 3: and I will teach you sacred rights that you need
Speaker 3: to do in my honor in order to keep me
Speaker 3: from getting really mad. Next, and I mentioned this in
Speaker 3: the last episode, Demeter says, all grain on Earth is
Speaker 3: going to stop growing right now. This is bad for
Speaker 3: humans obviously because we need that to eat, but it's
Speaker 3: also bad for the gods because they need to receive
Speaker 3: grain as sacrifices from humans. So it seems like this
Speaker 3: finally gets Zeus to do something about the problem that
Speaker 3: he created. He's like, Demeter, what can I do to
Speaker 3: make you happy? And Demeter says, give me my daughter back,
Speaker 3: and so Zeus agrees. He sends the messenger god Hermes
Speaker 3: to Hades to the underworld to tell him that Corey
Speaker 3: the Maiden must be allowed to return to the world above.
Speaker 3: But Hades has a trick up his sleeve. Before Corey leaves,
Speaker 3: he gives her pomegranate seed, a pomegranate seed from the underworld,
Speaker 3: and she eats it, and now having eaten the food
Speaker 3: of the underworld, she is ensnared. She cannot permanently leave,
Speaker 3: and while she's free to spend two thirds of the
Speaker 3: year up above, she has to return to the land
Speaker 3: of the dead for one third of each year. And
Speaker 3: this myth is often linked to seasonal cycles of growth
Speaker 3: in agriculture, though not necessarily with the seasons you're thinking of.
Speaker 3: I think the natural way that most people would interpret
Speaker 3: it is okay, so the you know, the daughter of
Speaker 3: the grain goddess, she can come up to the upper
Speaker 3: world during the you know, the spring, in the summer
Speaker 3: the warm months, and then in the winter when the
Speaker 3: when the plants die after the harvest, she disappears.
Speaker 4: Into the underworld.
Speaker 3: That may be it, but actually Bowden says it could
Speaker 3: be the other way around, because in Greece, the hottest
Speaker 3: part of the summer was sort of often the least
Speaker 3: productive agricultural seeds because things would be very dry, and
Speaker 3: the winter was actually used as a It was a
Speaker 3: very productive agricultural season, and so maybe sort of that
Speaker 3: way around instead of the way we naturally think. But
Speaker 3: however it actually lines up with the seasonal timeline. It's
Speaker 3: clear to understand why this myth has agricultural significance.
Speaker 4: Anyway.
Speaker 3: At the end of the myth, after being comforted by
Speaker 3: her own mother Raya, who is one of the Titans,
Speaker 3: Demeter allows the grain to grow again. And then Demeter,
Speaker 3: as she promised, comes back to the people of Eleusis
Speaker 3: to teach them the mysteries. She teaches them special rights
Speaker 3: that they would have to do in her honor. And
Speaker 3: then I want to read from What follows is a
Speaker 3: translation of a passage in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter,
Speaker 3: the version that appears in Bowden's book.
Speaker 4: So it goes, so.
Speaker 3: The whole broad earth grew heavy with leafage and bloom,
Speaker 3: and she went to the lawgiver kings Triptolemus and horse Goading, Diocles,
Speaker 3: strong Eumolpus, and Celius, leader of hosts, and showed them
Speaker 3: the conduct of her sacred matters, and taught her solemn rights,
Speaker 3: which one cannot depart from or inquire about, or broadcast
Speaker 3: for great awe of the gods restrains us from speaking.
Speaker 3: Blessed is he of men on earth who has beheld them,
Speaker 3: whereas he that is uninitiated in the rights, or he
Speaker 3: that has no part in them, never enjoys a similar
Speaker 3: lot down in the musty dark when he is dead.
Speaker 2: Oh wow. So first of all, I love that this
Speaker 2: is not for broadcast.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And then but then also, unlike seemingly with our example
Speaker 2: of mythraism, this mystery cult does seem to impart some
Speaker 2: sort of privileged knowledge of and or destination in the afterlife.
Speaker 3: It does, but I want to complicate that with something
Speaker 3: in just a minute here. So yeah, so many interesting
Speaker 3: things going on here. The goddess teaches the people of
Speaker 3: eleusis the secret rituals, says, you cannot depart from these rituals,
Speaker 3: so don't change them, don't give them up. You cannot
Speaker 3: ask questions about them, no talking, no questioning, and you
Speaker 3: cannot talk about them with the uninitiated. You've got to
Speaker 3: keep them a secret only to the people who have
Speaker 3: been initiated.
Speaker 4: To the cult.
Speaker 3: And of course, if you are initiated and you get
Speaker 3: to witness these rights, you are blessed. If you are
Speaker 3: not initiated and know nothing of the mysteries, then you
Speaker 3: are not blessed, and you will apparently have a worse
Speaker 3: fate in Hades, down in the musty dark. And if
Speaker 3: I'm interpreting this right, it does not say that those
Speaker 3: who have been blessed by witnessing the rights will not
Speaker 3: go to Hades. Instead, it just seems like something is
Speaker 3: going to be different from them. You know, it's going
Speaker 3: to be better for you. Now to explore that a
Speaker 3: little more, this last part about the effect of initiation
Speaker 3: to the mystic rights on a person's lot in the afterlife.
Speaker 3: That is a major part of how mystery cults have
Speaker 3: been understood by later scholars. Was, I think once widely
Speaker 3: held that the mystery cults of the reco Roman world
Speaker 3: were mainly about improving a person's lot in the afterlife.
Speaker 3: But Bowden argues that, at least in some cases, the
Speaker 3: evidence is this was not a major focus of the rights,
Speaker 3: and that any belief that you would have a better
Speaker 3: afterlife by having been initiated was more of a side
Speaker 3: effect of having achieved a special closeness or direct encounter
Speaker 3: with the gods through the mysteries. It was not the
Speaker 3: primary goal or function of the mysteries, so we don't
Speaker 3: have evidence that the goal was like to go to
Speaker 3: heaven by doing these rituals. It was just kind of
Speaker 3: like there were blessings and good things about having this
Speaker 3: mystic encounter, about going through the rights, and one of
Speaker 3: the things that came with it in some cases was
Speaker 3: that it's said that something is better for you after
Speaker 3: you die.
Speaker 2: Okay, so again, it's not that you're going to get
Speaker 2: a better treatment in the afterlife. It's something maybe a
Speaker 2: little more sublime. Hear me out. I don't know if
Speaker 2: this is a good a good idea, a good one.
Speaker 2: It may not be a good idea. Maybe it's not
Speaker 2: a good analogy. But imagine you're going to go see
Speaker 2: the Android Lloyd Weber musical Cats, and beforehand, someone who
Speaker 2: is wise and knowledgeable comes to you and says, before
Speaker 2: you go, read this nineteen thirty nine poetry collection Old
Speaker 2: Possum's Book of Practical Cats by T. S. Elliott. Just
Speaker 2: of course, these are the poems that the musical is
Speaker 2: based upon. And you might then ask, oh, if I
Speaker 2: read this, will I have better seats? No, you will
Speaker 2: not have better seats. Based on reading this, but perhaps
Speaker 2: you'll understand the musical more or you'll have some deeper
Speaker 2: connection with the musical, and that will enhance the experience
Speaker 2: of it. Something to that effect, as opposed to like,
Speaker 2: will this secret knowledge actually get me closer to the
Speaker 2: front or give me more.
Speaker 3: Legrom Yeah, that may well be a good analogy, except again,
Speaker 3: it would not be about reading anything in particular here.
Speaker 3: It would be like about having the experience. Maybe instead
Speaker 3: it's like should you go to see the play? Like
Speaker 3: that's really the thing that it's more like, isn't it.
Speaker 3: It's like going to take part in and witness something
Speaker 3: kind of be part of a collaborative theatrical experience. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I think that's a good way of thinking about it,
Speaker 3: because I want to read another thing that an ancient
Speaker 3: source that abouten mentions in the book. So you know,
Speaker 3: many ancient authors, as we talked about last time, are
Speaker 3: unable or unwilling to profane the cult of the Lusinian
Speaker 3: Mysteries by sharing the secrets of its hidden rights. So
Speaker 3: we don't get you know, many ancient sources where people
Speaker 3: are like trying to tell us what happened inside the
Speaker 3: inside the secret chamber, but multiple writers attest to the
Speaker 3: power of the mysteries and the positive effect they had
Speaker 3: on those initiated. One of those passages cited in Bowden
Speaker 3: is from the Greek anthology by Crnagoras published that was
Speaker 3: written in the first century BCE, and what Krnagoras says
Speaker 3: is quote, even if yours has always been a sedentary life,
Speaker 3: and you have never sailed the sea nor walked the
Speaker 3: roads of the land, you should nevertheless go to Attica
Speaker 3: so that you may witness those nights of the festival
Speaker 3: of Great Demeter. For then your heart may be free
Speaker 3: of care while you live, and lighter when you go
Speaker 3: to the land of the dead. Oh wow, yeah, So
Speaker 3: whatever happens, it is said by many to be a
Speaker 3: powerful experience that is perceived as life altering in a
Speaker 3: good way. For a modern comparison, when you read some
Speaker 3: of these ancient passages where people talk like this, it's
Speaker 3: kind of like how some psychedelic evangelists talk about taking
Speaker 3: LSD for the first time you realize your cares and
Speaker 3: anxiety are meaningless, you lose your fear of death. Maybe
Speaker 3: things like that. It's also kind of the way sometimes
Speaker 3: people talk about contemplative practices or experiences that they believe
Speaker 3: are spiritually important, like meditation, though the way the mysteries
Speaker 3: are described it is a much less regular and more
Speaker 3: high intensity experience than meditation usually is, I guess, but
Speaker 3: similar kind of descriptions of like a way of opening
Speaker 3: the mind, of changing your relationship to life. Your heart
Speaker 3: is lighter, and you can be lighter when you go
Speaker 3: to the land of the dead.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, in some ways, I'm reminded of going
Speaker 2: to a haunted attraction here in our modern world. You know,
Speaker 2: go to a haunted house around Halloween, where the various
Speaker 2: actors and various tricks will be utilized to scare you
Speaker 2: and give you a good laugh. I mean, it is
Speaker 2: like a sensory overload experience. And granted it it has
Speaker 2: no religious agenda. Well I take that back. Sometimes it
Speaker 2: does have a religious agenda.
Speaker 4: But yeah, there are those, Yeah, but.
Speaker 2: In general it does. The idea of just scaring you
Speaker 2: doesn't have a religious agenda. But now that I've accidentally
Speaker 2: mentioned it, I am reminded, Yeah, maybe there's a case
Speaker 2: to be made that like church themed or orchestrated haunted
Speaker 2: attractions like small town affairs are kind of in keeping
Speaker 2: with mystery cults to some degree, I guess based on
Speaker 2: my experience of those Christian haunted house haunted attractions, there
Speaker 2: tended to be very little in terms of like supernatural
Speaker 2: content in them. Generally they were depicting like real life
Speaker 2: ours and not so much like here now you are
Speaker 2: witnessing angels, maybe you're witnessing demons, but you know you're
Speaker 2: not going to see you glory from the other side.
Speaker 3: I think the common recipe is you get to see
Speaker 3: people go into hell, yeah, and that the point of
Speaker 3: the hell house also is a persuasive one, like it's
Speaker 3: supposed to make you afraid that, oh, I'm to go
Speaker 3: to hell like the people in the play here, and
Speaker 3: it's going to be scary if I don't say the
Speaker 3: Sinner's prayer and get saved or go to this church here,
Speaker 3: And so it's like a way, it's like a foot
Speaker 3: in the door. It's trying to get you into the
Speaker 3: actually the doctrinal religion, the regular, more low intensity experience
Speaker 3: of going to this church, whereas with the mysteries, it
Speaker 3: seems like the point of the mysteries was the experience
Speaker 3: of the mysteries is like that was what it was about.
Speaker 3: At least in the case of the Elusinian Mysteries. It
Speaker 3: wasn't like a persuasive event to try to get you
Speaker 3: into to show up every week. Instead, it was like,
Speaker 3: this is why you're here, this is what it's all about.
Speaker 2: There there's often the sense that it's not something you
Speaker 2: could even put into words exactly like it was that
Speaker 2: level of an experience, not I'm keeping again, not dissimilar
Speaker 2: from some of the accounts of psychedelic experiences and paranormal experiences.
Speaker 2: Rather different from in that regard compared to a haunted attraction,
Speaker 2: where generally you can describe everything quite well once you
Speaker 2: leave the facilities.
Speaker 3: All right, So we've talked about a written version of
Speaker 3: the myth associating the goddess Demeter with the city of
Speaker 3: l Jusis, and we've talked about how people in the
Speaker 3: ancient world wrote about the personal effect of being initiated
Speaker 3: or attending the mysteries. But what's beyond this, of course,
Speaker 3: is to describe the rituals themselves. I think we do
Speaker 3: not have time left to do that today, so I
Speaker 3: think that should be where we pick up in the
Speaker 3: next episode.
Speaker 2: All right, So we'll meet you back here on Thursday
Speaker 2: for our continued look at the ancient mystery cults of
Speaker 2: the Greco Roman world. In the meantime, we'll remind you
Speaker 2: that Stuff to Blow Your Mind is primarily a science
Speaker 2: and culture podcast, with core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays,
Speaker 2: short form episodes on Wednesdays and on Fridays. We set
Speaker 2: aside most serious concerns to just talk about a weird
Speaker 2: film on Weird House Cinema.
Speaker 3: Huge Things, as always to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway.
Speaker 3: If you would like to get in touch with us
Speaker 3: with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest
Speaker 3: a topic for the future, or just to say hello,
Speaker 3: you can email us at contact, stuff to Blow your
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