Introduction to the History of Religions Part 61

[1362] Farnell, _Cults of the Greek States_; Roscher, _Lexikon_.

[1363] Thus the Greeks endeavored to embody in divine figures all sides of family life. The division of functions between Hera, Hestia, and Athene is clear.

[1364] As, for example, 'fragile' and 'frail,' 'intension'

and 'intention,' 'providential' and 'prudential,' and many other groups of this sort.

[1365] For the view that she was a native aegean deity see Farnell, _Greece and Babylon_, p. 97. Later Semitic influences, in any case, must be a.s.sumed.

[1366] No satisfactory explanation of the name Aphrodite has as yet been offered.

[1367] See above, -- 762.

[1368] _Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite_; Euripides, _Medea_, 835 ff.; Lucretius. Ishtar also is the mother of all things, but the idea is not developed by the Semites.

[1369] Compare the details given in J. Rosenbaum's _Geschichte der l.u.s.tseuche im Alterume_.

[1370] Aust, _Religion der Romer_; Fowler, _Roman Festivals_; id. _The Religious Experience of the Roman People_; articles in Roscher's _Lexikon_; Mommsen, _History of Rome_ (Eng. tr.), bk. i, chap. xii.

[1371] -- 702 ff.

[1372] Hence a confusion of names that appears even to-day, and in books otherwise careful, as, for example, in the Bohn translations of Greek works, in which the Greek deities are throughout called by Latin names.

[1373] So written in good ma.n.u.scripts. The "piter" probably denotes fatherly protection, though it may have meant originally physical paternity. On this point cf. W. R.

Smith, _Religion of the Semites_, lecture ii, and the various stories of the birth of Jupiter's children.

[1374] On the significance of the doublefaced Ja.n.u.s (Ja.n.u.s Geminus) and of the ancient usage of opening the gates of his temple in time of war and closing them in time of peace, see article "Ja.n.u.s" in Roscher's _Lexikon_, col. 18 ff.

[1375] With his function as door-G.o.d compare the functions of other Roman door-G.o.ds, of Vesta, and of Hindu and other house-deities.

[1376] Varro, _De Lingua Latina_, v, 85; Cato, _De Agri Cultura_, 141.

[1377] So Roscher and others.

[1378] Cf. Fowler, _Roman Festivals_, p. 35.

[1379] The cult of Mars was widely diffused in Italy and, later, elsewhere. His original seat is uncertain. He was, perhaps, the tribal G.o.d of a conquering people.

[1380] Cf. also the Ancillarum Feriae (July 7).

[1381] See above, -- 217 ff.

[1382] Vergil, _Eclogues_, iv, 6. Cf. above, -- 768, note (Kronos).

[1383] Aust, _Religion der Romer_; Farnell, _Cults of the Greek States_; Fowler, _Roman Festivals_; articles in Roscher's _Lexikon_.

[1384] She appears to have been a Greek deity adopted by the Romans.

[1385] See above, -- 43.

[1386] Compare the Greek Hestia and the Hindu house-G.o.ddess (Hopkins, _Religions of India_, pp. 374, 530).

[1387] On the Arician Diana see Frazer, _Golden Bough_, 2d ed., i, 230 f.

[1388] Or, better, from _deia_.

[1389] The prevailing view is that the grove is an opened place into which light enters, and it is thus distinguished from the dark and gloomy forest. The verbs _nitere_, _nitescere_, _virere_, are used by Ovid and other writers to describe this gleaming of leaves, plants, trees, groves, and of the earth.

[1390] An early divine name expressive of intellectual power is not probable.

[1391] On her origin cf. Wissowa, _Religion der Romer_, p.

203 ff.

[1392] Varro, _De Re Rustica_, i, 1.

[1393] See above, -- 803.

[1394] In favor of Ardea, twenty miles south of Rome, as her original seat, cf. Wissowa, _Religion der Romer_, p. 235.

[1395] Her identification with the Greek G.o.ddess was perhaps furthered by a supposed relation between her name and the noun _venustas_, 'grace, beauty,' the special quality of Aphrodite. If that was the original sense of 'Venus,' it could hardly have indicated an aesthetic perception of nature (Wissowa, op. cit.); such a designation would be foreign to early ways of naming deities. Whether the stem _van_ might mean 'general excellence' (here agricultural) is uncertain; on the Greek epithets 'Kallisto,' 'Kalliste,' and so forth, cf. Gruppe, _Griechische Mythologie_, p. 1270 f. The name 'Venus,' if connected with the root of _venerari_, might mean simply 'a revered object,' a deity; cf. Bona Dea and Ceres (creator).

[1396] Roscher's _Lexikon_, s.v. "Fortuna," col. 1518; Fowler, _Roman Festivals_, p. 68. On licentious cults of Venus cf. J. Rosenbaum, _Geschichte der l.u.s.tseuche im Altertume_.

[1397] See above, -- 671.

[1398] Articles in Roscher, _Lexikon_, and in _Orientalische Studien Noldeke gewidmet_.

[1399] Inscriptions of Rammannirari and Nebuchadrezzar (Birs Nimrud); Jastrow, _Religion of Babylonia and a.s.syria_, Index, s.v.; id., _Aspects of Religious Belief and Practice in Babylonia and a.s.syria_, Index, s.v. _Adad_.

[1400] There is no separate G.o.d of Sheol in the Old Testament. On Eve as such a deity see Lidzbarski, _Ephmeris_, i, 26; cf. Cook, _North Semitic Inscriptions_, 135.

[1401] Gen. vi, 4, cf. Ezek. x.x.xii, 27; Philo of Byblos; Harper, _a.s.syrian and Babylonian Literature_.

[1402] Isa. lxiii, 16 ("G.o.d is our father, though Abraham and Israel do not acknowledge us") is regarded by some commentators as pointing to ancestor-wors.h.i.+p. It seems, however, to be nothing more than the complaint of persons who were disowned by the community or by the leaders.

[1403] -- 341 ff.

[1404] Jastrow, _Religions of Babylonia and a.s.syria_, p.

168: "a pantheon of demons."

[1405] Isa. x.x.xiv, 14.

[1406] Satan is one of the Elohim-beings, old G.o.ds subordinated to Yahweh, and Azazel, if his name contains the divine t.i.tle _el_, must be put into this cla.s.s.

[1407] Wisdom of Solomon, ii, 24.

[1408] Harrison, _Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion_, chap. v. On Hindu demons see Hopkins, _Religions of India_, Index, s.v. _Devils_.

[1409] ---- 698 ff., 398 ff.