Mithraism19:52 Aug 25 2006
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Mithraism
Mithraism was a mystery religion prominent in the Roman world from the 1st century BCE to the 5th century CE. It was centered around worship of the saviour god Mithras and derives in part from the Iranian and other Zoroastrian deities, though Zoroastrianism has no element of initiation, no grades, worship under the open sky, has no pantheon of planetary gods, nor any correspondence in iconographic representation. Mithras was known throughout Roman Europe. As no Mithraic scriptures or documents are extant, our analysis of the cult must be based upon fragmentary references and upon sculptures, inscriptions, and basreliefs. All this material has been gathered into a single monumental work (Tests & Monuments, Figures, Reliefs And Mysteres Of Mithra, by Franz Cumont), from which the following reconstruct lion emerges. Although Mithraism does not seem to have made much progress among the Greeks, it spread rapidly among the Romans and the barbarians. We learn from Plutarch (Life of Pompey, 24) that the cult was introduced into the Roman Empire in 67 B.C.E. by pirates.
MITHRAISM... A ZOROASTRIAN SYNTHESIS
The worship of Mithra had been carried to completion under the Arsacids, whose language was Pahlavi, whose religion was Zoroastrian, and who founded the Parthian Empire in 248 B.C.E. Mithraism issued from the heart of Zoroastrianism, but absorbed various Chaldean (Babylonian) characteristics, including much zodiacal and astrological symbolism, and was profoundly influenced by the ubiquitous mystery-cults of Asia Minor, particularly that of Attis-Cybele, which, as we have seen, flourished in Phrygia, a territory in the domain of the Arsacidae. When Christianity arose two centuries later, it did so independently of Mithraism; yet Christianity and Mithraism were astonishingly similar, because they were composed of elements which were the common possession of Asia Minor. Renan declared that had Christianity not conquered, Mithraism would have emerged victorious; our own opinion is that the child of Mithraism known as Manichaeism would have become the faith of the ancient world.
Here then we have the world's second great religious synthesis. Because of its similarity to Christianity, the fathers could only declare that the devil had established Mithraism for the sole purpose of sowing confusion;Justin Martyr declared: "Jesus took bread, and . . . said, 'This do ye in rememhrance of me, this is my body'; and, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, 'This is my blood'; and gave it to them . . . Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithra, commanding the same thing to be done'' (First Apology, LXVI).Tertullian was certain that all rival cults were the devil's handiwork: "Washing is the channel through which they are initiated into the sacred rites of some notorious Isis or Mithras, . . . at the Eleusinia they are baptized to achieve regeneration, and the remission of their sins. Which fact being acknowledged, we recognize here also the zeal of the devil rivalling the things of God, while we find him, too, practicing baptism"(On Baptism, V).
` Tertullian states that Mithra "in the kingdom of Satan, sets his marks on the forehead of his soldiers; celebrates also the oblation of bread, and introduces an image of resurrection.... What also must one say to Satan's limiting his chief priest to a single marriage? He, too, has his virgins; he, too, his proficients in continence.... Satan has shown such emulation in . . . administration of Christ's sacraments" that he has "succeeded in adapting to his profane and rival creed the very documents of divine things and of the Christian saints" (Prescription Against Heretics, XL). And again: "Blush . . . to be condemned by some soldier of Mithras.... Let us take note of the devices of the devil, who is wont to ape some of God's things with no other design than, by the faithfulness of his servants, to put us to shame" (De Corona, 15).
Mithraism elevated the most dynamic deity of the Zoroastrian pantheon into a position of pre-eminence. Mithra was a very ancient deity; and, since he appears in the oldest myths of both Persia and India, we know that he antedated 2000 B.C.E. Although he was not an Ameshaspenta, that is, one of the original seven divine powers, he was one of the greatest creations; and he must have grown progressively with the imperial expansion under Cyrus and the Achaemenides. He was the lord of heavenly light always identified with the sun; he was the god of truth, cattle, agriculture, and the wide pastures; he was also the god of battle, the protector of the good men of Ahuramazda, and one of the judges who met all souls at the Kinvad Bridge. He was, finally, the power or agency by which Ahuramazda created mankind and all other good creatures which live upon the earth; he became the Logos, for he is called "the incarnate Word" (Mihir Yast, VII, 25). Mithra became so great that he was at last substantially equal to Ahuramazda himself; and we read in the sacred scriptures of Zoroaster: "We sacrifice unto Mithra, the lord of all countries, whom Ahuramazda made the most glorious of all the heavenly gods. So may Mithra and Ahura, the two great gods, come and give us help!" (Mihir Nyayis).
Mithra granted every benefit to the righteous and visited the wicked with condign punishment (Mihir Yast, VIII, 29); he was "victory-making, army-possessing, and all-knowing'' (Ibid., ix, 35); he smote all his adversaries, the unbelievers, the creatures of Ahriman (Ibid., XIII, 59); he was the just and merciful god "whom the poor man, who follows the good law, when wronged and deprived of his rights, invokes for help, with hands uplifted" (Ibid., XXII, 84); he was the god who kept and protected his devotees in this world and gave them salvation in the next (Ibid., XXIII, 93); he required sacrifices from the faithful, who must first prepare themselves with lustrations and penitential stripes (Ibid., XXX, 122); he was the god of immortality, who confers everlasting mansions upon the true believers. Such was the Mithra of Zoroaster. The new mystery-cult retained Ormazd and Ahriman, but abandoned the old Ameshaspentas and Yazatas; it accentuated the metaphysical dualism of Zoroastrianism, emphasized and re-oriented its eschatology, and absorbed a variety of foreign elements. Thus panoplied, it set forth to win dominion over the human mind.
In the Mithraic system, as in the Zoroastrian, there is a constant struggle between good and evil, light and darkness, the spiritual and the physical. In this bitter war, man can hope for victory only by the ceaseless aid of Mithra, and by suppressing and mortifying his Ahrimanic nature; he must employ constantly the sacraments of baptism, lustration, and the communion of bread and wine to achieve mystical union with the god. As the slaying of the bull was the central element in the soteriology of the cult, it practiced the taurobolium in the same manner as the cult of Cybele. Initiates were placed under a grating, above which the sacred animal was ceremonially slain; thus incarnadined, the newly-inducted member was drenched and so saved in the blood of the bull.
The eschatology of Mithraism was in part similar to but also in part different from that of Zoroastrianism. Neither had an eternal hell: but Mithraism was not universalist: again, its doctrine in this respect was that of Paul. At death, the elect souls are sent by Mithra direct to heaven; others are consigned to a con. dition of sleep until the final consummation, when Mithra will appear to reawaken them. A great and wonderful bull, like that pristine bovine, will appear; Mithra will separate the good from the bad, judge all according to the deeds they have done, slay the sacrificial bull, serve to the redeemed a final and immortalizing eucharist prepared from this animal, and send these fortunate ones to reside forever with the Elect. The terrestrial universe will then be consumed by a great conflagration in which all the wicked, including Ahriman and his demons, will be annihilated.
Mithraism, therefore, divided the human race into three classes: first, the spiritual, the Elect, the higher initiates into that cult, who were to be admitted to heaven immediately upon death; second, the wicked, the evildoers, the incorrigibly material, who will be destroyed in the final holocaust; and, third, the lesser Mithraists, who strive for the higher things but succeed only in part, and those essentially good members of mankind who have not participated in the communion. The souls of these will sleep during the ages which intervene between death and the final consummation (a doctrine later known as soul-sleeping); their grossness will then be purged away and blessed immortality conferred upon them by the ultimate eucharist.
The Origin and Dissemination of Mithraism
The new mystery-cult retained Ormazd and Ahriman, but abandoned the old Ameshaspentas and Yazatas; it accentuated the metaphysical dualism of Zoroastrianism, emphasized and re-oriented its eschatology, and absorbed a variety of foreign elements. Thus panoplied, it set forth to win dominion over the human mind.The history of Mithraism lies deep in the roots of the past. Documents which belong to the fourteenth century before Christ have been found in the Hittite capital of Boghaz Keui, in which the names of Mithra, Vanuna, Indra, and the Heavenly Twins are recorded. It is also known that they were written long before the separation of the Indian and Iranian races. But to give the exact origin of this cult and to determine exactly where Mithra came from would be merely conjecture. Mithraism retained the basic cosmogony and metaphysics of Zoroastrianism; that is, it conceived of the material world as the domain of Ahriman, which Mithra had invaded to reclaim it for Ormazd. The soul of man comes from the celestial sphere, but his body from darkness. All that is physical is of Ahriman, all that is spiritual of Ormazd. All useful creatures and beneficent forces are the gifts of the latter through the agency of Mithra; all those which bring disaster or destruction are the counter-creations of Ahriman.
Many have held the opinion that Mithra came originally from the high plateuas of the Hindukush; and the differences in his nature, when he is found later in India and Iran, were due to environmental influences in the two distinctly different areas. In the VedasVedas: the four collections of the sacred literature of the Aryans. These hymns, prayers, and liturgical formulas are the foundations of Vedic Hinduism. DOPR. he was associated with Varuna"Varuna is the supreme cosmic deity and guardian of the cosmic order...[he] is the Vedic equivalent of the Avestan Ormuzd. Horse sacrifices and the soma were originally offered to him." DOPR and was invoked together with him as a light god. The Iranians, however, placed Mithra in the position of Archangel. Although Ahura Mazda"Ahura Mazda: In the Zoroastrian religion Ahura Mazda, which means Lord of Knowledge, was the beneficent Spirit of Good, leader of the powers of light, his other name was Ormuzd." DOPR was the supreme god, he created Mithra equal to himself and made him chief among the yazatas."Yazatas: In Zoroastrian religion, the divine powers of lower rank than Ahura-Mazda and the Amisha Pentas." DOPR Evidence of his exalted position lies in the fact that the longest yasht,"Yashts: In Zoroastrian religion, these were Avestan hymns of praise, glorifying the divine Zoroastrian beings. Some of these deities, particularly Tishtrya, Mithra, and Anahita, were ancient Iranian deities." DOPR eight times longer than that in honour of Ahura Mazda, is dedicated to MithraHe possessed many attributes, the most important being his office of defender of truth and all good things. In the Avesta, Mithra is represented as the genius of celestial light. He emerges from the rocky summits of eastern mountains at dawn, and goes through heaven with a team of four white horses; when the night falls he still illumines the surface of the earth "ever walking ever watchful." He is not sun or moon or any star, but a spirit of light, ever wakeful, watching with a hundred eyes. He hears all and sees all: none can deceive himMithra was the god of wide pastures and the giver of gifts. He was worthy of sacrifice and worship and desired the respect and prayer of the faithful, on whom he bestowed bounteous gifts. On the other hand, he was a warrior of violent and bitter nature; the forces of evil were his enemies, and he joined with Sraosha (Obedience) and Rashnu (Justice) in opposing them.
The fame of Mithra spread as the Persian empire expanded, and he became particularly strong in Asia Minor. Many of the Persian Kings grew very fond of Mithra and sponsored worship of him. It was during this time that the worship of Mithra developed into an independent religion. It is interesting to know that as Mithraism was spreading through the Persian empire, it was constantly borrowing ideas from other cultures. When it came in contact with Semitic star worship, it assimilated much of it as well as some of the mythology of ancient Babylon.. CC Also the cult incorporated many local practices and ideas from Asia Minor. Finally it was influenced to a certain extent by Hellenistic culture. After having consolidated its theology and drawing into its ranksxmany converts in Asia Minor and Persia, Mithraism had almost reached its climax. It was, however, the latest religion of its kind to become popular in the Roman empire(Mithraism was not popular in the Roman empire until ca. A.D. 100) The greatest agency of propagation of Mithraism was the army. Under the Roman policy of conscription troops from conquered lands were sent to serve in other parts of the empire. Among the forces which were drawn up in that fashion were soldiers from such places as Cappadocia, Commagene, Pontus and Armenia, where Mithraism was extremely popular. When these men were sent out to foreign outpost to serve in the Roman army they did not forget their religious customs. Converts were quickly gained within the army. Evidences of the diffusion of Mithraism by the army has been found in Scotland, Africa, Spain, Germany, and almost every locality where Roman troops were sent.
A second means of spreading Mithraism in the empire was through slaves who were sent to Italy from Asia Minor. Many of these slaves became public servants in the great bureaus of the government. It was these slaves who were missionaries for Mirtha in Italy and who practiced his mysteries in the very heart of the Roman world. There was a third group which spread the Mithraic religion. This group consisted of Syrian merchants who established trading posts throughout the empire. Cumont is of the opinion that most of these Syrians belonged to the upper classes and were not the true worshippers of Mithra. He argues that it was the slaves and servants of these merchants who were followers of Mithra; and they introduced the religion to the inhabitants of maritime towns where their masters engaged in trading
The great expansion of Mithraism in the ancient world can be traced to these three sources in almost every case. The slaves were forever looking for a better day, and they beleived that through worshipping Mithra that day would eventually come. As for the soldiers they found Mithraism very appealing because it offered them the protection of a deity who they believed would help them to be victorious in combat. After seeing these facts it is very easy to understand why these worshippers were so zealous in spreading their religion. It was a part of their total make-up. To argue that many were drawn into this cult through curiosity alone is certainly an unwarranted assumption. To be sure, the iniatory rites (as we will see later in the paper) were so strenuous that only the sincere and earnest converts would have wished to take part in them.After the cult became popular throughout the Roman Empire, it received many converts from the upper classes. It had been spread by slaves and freedmen for the most part, but it did {not} remain a religion of the lower classes alone. As stated above, even the emperors gave it their approval.
Whether the religion of Mithra gained great influence in Greece is still under discussion by many scholars. There seems to be many conflicting statements about this question. Cumont writes, "It may be said, in a general way, that Mithra remained forever excluded from the Hellenic world. The ancient authors of Greece speak of him only as a foreign god worshipped by the kings of Persia Dhalla says that Mithra "is the only Iranian divinity who won popularity for himself in Greece George Foot Moore says of Mithraism that "it never took root in the lands of Hellenistic culture. The majority of opinions seem to support the fact that Mithraism was excluded from Hellenized countries. It is probable that the name of Mithra was well-known in these lands, but the inhabitants declined to worship him.The worship of Mithra, which had had its very first introduction into the western part of the empire only a short time before the birth of Christ and had not begun to expand until the end of the first century, became widespread and popular in a remarkably short time. It was during the same period, of course, that christianity was beginning to develop and reach out into new territories. The question immediately arises, why did the two religions not conflict? One reason that the two religions did not conflict in the early years of their growth in the Roman Empire is that their activities for a while took place in different geographical areas. Another reason why these religions did not clash with each other was because each thought the other was too insignificant for serious competition. It is apparent, therefore, that geographically and socially these religions did not clash for a while.Principles of Mithraism
The term "Mithraism" is a modern development and was not a term known to the ancient Roman Mithraists. In antiquity, the cult was known as "the mysteries of Mithras", and to its adherents, as "the mysteries of the Persians"[citation needed]. This latter epithet is significant, not for whether (or not) the Mithraists considered the object of their devotion a Persian divinity, but for the fact that the devotees were convinced that their religion was founded by Zoroaster. (Beck, 2002)Mithraism is best documented in the form it had acquired in the Roman Empire. It was an initiatory 'mystery religion,' passed from initiate to initiate, like the Eleusinian Mysteries. It was not based on a supernaturally revealed body of scripture, and hence very little written documentary evidence survives.Soldiers appeared to be the most plentiful followers of Mithraism, and women were apparently not allowed to join.
The mithraeum
The typical mithraeum was a small rectangular subterranean chamber, on the order of 75 feet by 30 feet with a vaulted ceiling. An aisle usually ran lengthwise down the center of the temple, with a stone bench on either side two or three feet high on which the cult's members would recline during their meetings. On average a mithraeum could hold perhaps twenty to thirty people at a time. At the back of the mithraeum at the end of the aisle was always found a representation-- usually a carved relief but sometimes a statue or painting-- of the central icon of Mithraism: the so-called tauroctony or "bull-slaying scene" in which the god of the cult, Mithras, accompanied by a dog, a snake, a raven, and a scorpion, is shown in the act of killing a bull. Other parts of the temple were decorated with various scenes and figures. There were many hundreds-- perhaps thousands-- of Mithraic temples in the Roman empire. The greatest concentrations have been found in the city of Rome itself, and in those places in the empire (often in the most distant frontiers) where Roman soldiers-- who made up a major segment of the cult's membership-- were stationed.
It is difficult for scholars to reconstruct the daily workings and beliefs of Mithraism, as the rituals were highly secret and limited to initiated men. Mithras was little more than a name until the massive documentation of Franz Cumont's Texts and Illustrated Monuments Relating to the Mysteries of Mithra was published in 1894-1900, with the first English translation in 1903.However, it is known that the center of the cult was the mithraeum, either an adapted natural cave or cavern or an artificial building imitating a cavern. Mithraea were dark and windowless, even if they were not actually in a subterranean space or in a natural cave. When possible, the mithraeum was constructed within or below an existing building. The site of a mithraeum may also be identified by its separate entrance or vestibule, its "cave", called the spelaeum or spelunca, with raised benches along the side walls for the ritual meal, and its sanctuary at the far end, often in a recess, before which the pedestal-like altar stood. Many mithraea that follow this basic plan are scattered over much of the Empire's former area, particularly where the legions were stationed along the frontiers. Others may be recognized by their characteristic layout, even though converted as crypts beneath Christian churches.
In every Mithraic temple, the place of honor was occupied by a representation of Mithras killing a sacred bull, called a tauroctony. It has been proposed by David Ulansey that the tauroctony is a symbolic representation of the constellations rather than an originally Iranian animal sacrifice scene with Iranian precedents (Ulansey, 1991). Mithras is associated with Perseus, whose constellation is above that of the bull. A serpent, a scorpion, a dog, and a raven are present, also thought to represent associated constellations.From the structure of the mithraea it is possible to surmise that worshippers would have gathered for a common meal along the reclining couches lining the walls. It is worth noting that most temples could hold only thirty or forty individuals.
The mithraeum itself was arranged so as to be an 'image of the universe'. It is noticed by some researchers that this movement, especially in the context of mithraic soterism, seems to stem from the neoplatonic concept that the 'running' of the sun from solstice to solstice is a parallel for the movement of the soul through the universe, from pre-existence, into the body, and then beyond the physical body into an afterlife.Reliefs on a cup found at Mainz (Beck, 2000), appear to depict a Mithraic initiation. On the cup, the initiate is depicted as led into a location where the cult's 'Pater' would be seated in the guise of Mithras with a drawn bow. Accompanying the Initiate is a 'Mystagogue', who explains the symbology and theology to the initiate. The Rite is thought to re-enact what has come to be called the 'Water Miracle', in which Mithras fires a bolt into a rock, and from the rock now spouts water.
Mithraic ranks and Liturgy
The members of a mithraeum were divided into seven ranks. All members were apparently expected to progress through the first four ranks, while only a few would go on to the three higher ranks. The first four ranks seem to represent spiritual progress—the new initiate became a Corax, while the Leo was an adept—while the other three appear to have been specialized offices. The titles of the first four ranks suggest the possibility that advancement through the ranks was based on introspection and spiritual growth.
The seven ranks were:
* Corax (raven)
* Nymphus (bridegroom)
* Miles (soldier)
* Leo (lion)
* Perses (Persian)
* Heliodromus (sun-courier)
* Pater (father)
The first grade is that of the Raven. We have seen that in the images of the meal between Mithras and the Sun they are sometimes served by men with the heads of ravens. Since it is likely that the meal in the mithraeum was intended to be a copy of that one, it is also likely that the initiates in the grade of Raven served at the ritual meal. Whether they wore raven’s masks, or whether the representations of raven-headed men was meant as a piece of mythical symbolism, is not particularly important. That the Ravens would have served the meal is further indicated by logic; someone had to serve it, the Mithraists would certainly not have allowed non-initiates to be present at so central a meal, and as the low men on the totem pole the Ravens were the obvious choice. There is a transcendent value to service in any religion.. What was the significance of ravens in the Roman world? R. L. With the position of the grade of Raven on the border between the life of the initiate and that of the rest of the world that is certainly one of the possible meanings. I would like, however, to emphasize another element of what ravens were to the Graeco-Romans, one that Gordon himself points out when he writes that the raven "shared with men a rational faculty" (1980, p. 26). Seen this way, the grade of Raven, involving a submission into service, specifically involves submission of one’s rational faculties.
The second grade has an interesting name, "nymphus." What is interesting about it is that there is in fact no such word in Latin. "Nympha" is a bride. "-us" is a masculine ending, so by using it to replace the feminine ending "-a" we obtain a self-contradictory word meaning "male bride."I think that using nuns as an analogy might help us understand the meaning of this grade. Nuns are "the brides of Christ," they are married to him. Mithraists were all men, and couldn’t really be married to Mithras. They could, however, be married to him in a ritual sense.What would that sense mean? In Roman society, wives were subservient to their husbands. To be a wife was to be submissive. A Nymphus, then, was submissive to Mithras in the same way that a wife was to her husband. A particular kind of submission was emphasized here by the grade of Nymphus being associated with the planet, and thus the goddess, Venus, the goddess of romance and sexuality. By becoming a Nymphus, then, the initiate put his emotions and sexuality into the control of Mithras; he gave them up.
The next level of initiation is that of Soldier. Tertullian tells us about the initiation ritual of this grade; the initiate is presented with a crown on a sword, and he has to spurn it, saying, "My crown is Mithras!" (Clauss, pp. 134 - 135). We can see in this once more an aspect of submission; the initiate recognizes in Mithras the glory he himself might wish to attain. As a soldier, however, it is specifically his physical force that he is giving up.
We now turn to the crucial grade of Leo, the Lion. This grade is associated with fire; we find, for instance, painted on the wall of the Santa Prisca mithraeum, the lines, "Receive the incense burners, Father, receive the Lions." Even more clearly, Tertullian tells us that that the Leo is "of a dry and fiery nature," and Porphyry informs us that he is "an initiate of fire." (Both of these quotations may be found in Clauss, p. 134.) Porphyry gives us an interesting detail of Mithraic initiation ritual. He says that since the Lions are fiery, in their initiations they can’t be purified with water. Instead honey is used, since that has a fiery nature. I have personally never been able to understand how one washes oneself with honey; the result would simply be stickiness.With the grade of Lion, then, we reach fire. We have seen the initiate submit his mind, emotions/sexuality, and physical force to Mithras. What is the function of fire?
At this moment of high drama it is time for a digression.
The Mediterranean at the time we are looking at seethed with religious and magical ideas and practices, mixing together to form a variety of syncretistic religions. We’ve already seen this with Mithraism: astrology, Zoroastrianism, mystery traditions, Roman religion, and who knows what else. To this mix I am suggesting we add Gnosticism.Gnosticism gets its name from "gnosis," a secret knowledge. Such knowledge was to be gained through initiation. Although we are most used to associating Gnosticism with Christianity, Gnostic traditions were found as elements of non-Christian religions.
Like Mithraism, Gnosticism was a religion (or philosophy) or salvation. The Gnostics saw the material as evil (or at least inferior), created by a lesser God referred to as the Demiurge. Imprisoned within the material was a divine spark, which came from the true God who dwelt in the spiritual world beyond that created by the Demiurge. The goal of Gnosticism was to purify oneself from the material in order to free one’s spirit. One was to leap over the evil (or deluded) Demiurge into heaven.As creator of the material, the Demiurge was a god of time and space, opposed to that which is beyond them. Remember also that the Demiurge was an evil god.
I must make one more slight digression, and then I will tie both back into my presentation of Mithraism.The Graeco-Roman religious or philosophical system of Stoicism contained a doctrine concerning the end of the world. The entire cosmos was to be destroyed in a great conflagration. Time and space were to be burned up and then reconstituted into a new universe. If such a belief, that of the destruction of the cosmos by fire, were to have been part of Mithraic doctrine, there is no doubt as to where it would belong in the course of initiation; it would be at level of the Lion. That is, after all, the grade of fire. But fire was not just connected with the human lion. It was connected with the divine lion, the leontocephalous. We see, for instance, an illustration of him holding torches and with fire coming from his mouth to light an altar. Some of the statues of him have holes through the back of his head to his open mouth, through which fire might presumably been blown. Now if Mithraism had partaken of the Gnostic view of the cosmos, what would have been the identity of the Demiurge? If one were to devise a Gnostic religion based in part on Zoroastrianism, the obvious choice would be Ahriman, the evil spirit/god of that religion. It is exactly Ahriman whom we see in the mithraea, under the name "Ariomanus," the lion-headed god. This deity is certainly one of time, and I suggest that he was one of space as well. This is illustrated perfectly in the tauroctony from Barberini:Here we see the leontocephalous at the summit of the world cave, serving as both a barrier to those who would ascend out of space and time, and a keystone which, if removed, would destroy them, presumbably into the great conflagration.If we combine all of this, we get an image of the leontocephalous as standing at a crucial juncture between the material world and the divine one. He is a lion, and he is fire. He belongs at the grade of Lion. Based on the large number of dedications by Lions, the grade was clearly important. I am suggesting that it was at the center of the ladder in more ways than one.
In our trip through the grades we have seen the initiate submit more and more of his material, that is, non-divine, life to Mithras. He now arrives at a horrifying point. He must face the Demiurge, Ariomanus who has stared down at him from statues and murals. Ariomanus is the monster who must be passed to reach the realm of the divine. How does the initiate make this crossing? Through fire. Here, then, is one of the mysteries of Mithraism. The Demiurge, the creator of the material and imprisoner of the spiritual, is himself the means by which the soul of the initiate can escape the material. Purified partially by submitting the elements of his personal life to Mithras, the initiate must now be purified completely. He must, like the Stoic universe, be completely burned. And, through this burning, he passes beyond the limitations of the cosmic cave and the zodiac and enters into the divine realm. Ariomanus, who had been seen as a terrible demon, turns out to be a necessary servant of the divine will. Whether he knew himself to be so is something that can’t be determined, but he was nonetheless.
That the interpretation of the grade of Leo as being one of consumption finds confirmation in the Santa Prisca mithraeum, where the full text of what was quoted earlier reads, "Receive the incense-burners, Father, receive the Lions, Holy One, through whom we offer incense, through whom we are ourselves consumed." The Lion is consumed, and, through his ritual role, can consume others, bringing part of salvation to those who have not yet reached his grade.
With this view in mind, we need to look at Mithras Petragenetrix again. It is certainly a representation of the birth of Mithras. But which one? In many he is shown as an infant, but in a number he is shown as an adult. Even in those where he is a child he holds his dagger, and often a torch. The dagger is of course that with which the bull is slain. The torch has, to my knowledge, gone unexplained. It's been compared to that held by Cautes and Cautapotes, but why should Mithras be holding one?My suggestion here is that we consider the possibility common in mystery religions that a symbol might have more than one meaning, with a deeper mystery revealed to higher initiates. Mithras Petragenetrix is indeed Mithras born as a child. But it is also Mithras reborn through the burning down of the cosmos. The dagger he carries is not just the one with which he will kill the bull, but the one with which he did kill the bull, and the rock is the world cave. Look again at the first image of the rock birth I gave above, and you will see that Mithras isn't being born into the zodiacal ring, but out of it. Further, in the second he is breaking open the cosmic egg (Ulansey, p. 122). The torch is thus that of the leontocephalous; the cosmos has been burned down, and Mithras/the initiate has escaped into the divine realm.
This suggestion is close to confirmed by three more images of Mithras petragenetrix. The first includes a hole, like the one in the leontocephalous shown earlier:This time the hole from which flame would have come is in the rock; the world cave is aflame. The point is made even more strongly by another image:It lacks artistry, but the message is clear; again the cosmos is on fire.
According to a text of St. Jerome, there were seven degrees of initiation which the Mithraic convert passed through. At each stage he assumed a different name: (1) Raven, (2) Occult, (3) Soldier, (4) Lion, (5) Persian, (6) Runner of the sun, (7) and Father. It is probable that there were slight variations of names of the grades from East to West. Each grade had its appropriate mask and costume.The taking of the first three degrees did not authorize the status of full participation in the Mysteries. These initiates were called the Servants. Only the Mystic who had received the Leontics could become a "Participant". At the top of this structure were the Fathers, who probably presided over the sacred ceremonies and had command over the lower classes. It was possible to enter the lowest grades at infancy. Whether or not the initiate had to remain in each grade for a fixed length of time is not known. Cumont is of the opinion that the Fathers decided when the initiate was sufficiently prepared to move to the higher grade.One of the prominent features in the ceremony of initiation was the sacrament (sacramentum) or military oath of loyalty to the service of the god and to the fellow members of the brotherhood. In this oath the initiate promised to depart from certain sins and follow a life of moral behavior. Moreover, he promised not to reveal to the uninitiated the rites and knowledge he was about to learn.Halliday, Pagan Background, "the sacramentum of a pagan sect included an oath of secrecy and a promise not to reveal to the uninitiated the rites and knowledge which the neophyte is about to behold and learn."
Although our knowledge of the liturgy of Mithraism is inevitably fragmentary, we know that there was a form of baptism designed to wash away the sins of the initiate. This rite was probably carried out by sprinkling holy water, or in an actual immersion. At another stage in the development the initiated was sealed with a brand in his forehead. It appears that this mark was burned with a red-hot iron. This ineffaceable imprint was always a reminder to the initiate of what he had vowed. In the grade of soldier, the initiate was offered a crown which he caused to fall on his shoulder, saying that Mithra was his only crown. In the grade of Lion, the initiate's tongue and hands were purified with honey. Another important Mithraic ceremony was the celebration of a communion service which was in memory of the last meal which Helios and Mithra partook together upon earth. Here the celebrant took consecrated bread and mingled it with the juice of Haoma. It is quite obvious that only the initiate who had attained the degree of Lions could take this communion.
The worship services were carried on in chapels or Mithraea. These chapels were technically called "caves" spelaea. They were probably called "caves" because they were either constructed in natural caves or in subterranean buildings. In most of the Mithraea there was a portico which led into a second sacristry, where the ritual dresses were probably kept. Beyond the sacristry lay the shrine. It was here that most of the ritual was performed. On each side were benches where the new converts were probably seated. At the end of the building there was an apse, in which stood the relief of Mithra slaying the bull. It is probable that this was veiled with curtains. The walls of the building were very fascinating; they were covered with paintings and mosaics of mystical designs.
The worship period was conducted by the priest, who bore the title of sacerdos. The priest was considered the intermediary between God and man. It was his duty to administer the sacraments. He also presided at the formal dedications. He probably had to see that a perpetual fire burned upon the altars. He addressed a prayer to the sun three times a day, at dawn, at noon, and at dusk. This, in short, gives the overall function of the priest.It was a characteristic of Mithraism to be organized in small and apparently independent communities. In this community the individual had a right to hold property. For the management of the affairs of the community, officers were selected. The officers were masters (magistri) or president, the curators (curatores), the attorneys (defensores), and the patrons (patroni). Mithraism possessed a characteristic that was unique and which for a time may have been an asset but in the end was probably a weakness. It was a cult for men only. In some cases young boys were taken into the lower orders, but under no circumstances were women admitted. Women were compelled to seek salvation in some other cult, for Mithraism excluded them entirely. "It has been surmised that the frequent juxtaposition of Mithraea (places of worship) and temples of the Magna Mater was due to the fact that the wives and daughters of the Mithraists were addicted to the worship of the latterIn the exclusion of women Mithraism missed "that ardent religiosity and fervent proselytism of devout women which had so large a share in pushing the fortunes of Isis and Cybele or in propagating the tenets of Christianity
In the vaulted border of the cave behind Mithras there is often a raven, sometimes perched but more usually flying towards the god. He brings a message to which the god listens; in some representations Mithras is clearly looking back towards the raven. In classical literature the raven is the messanger of Apollo, and in the Mithraic ritual he is evidently associated with the Apollo like Sun-god seen in the top left-hand corner of the relief. During the course of the actual mysteries the duties of those with the grade of Raven vividly recall the bull-slaying scene; they wear raven's masks (Fig. 5) and perform as heralds the same role as the raven performs for Mithras. The bird conveys Sol's orders to Mithras to kill the bull, and the god carries out the order, although with an expression of anguish on his face. It grieves him to slay the magnificent beast, but like a true soldier he obeys in the knowledge that in the end life will be renewed. On several representations one ray of the seven-rayed halo round the head of Sol shines out towards Mithras and so establishes contact with the god. Nevertheless the scene is strange because there is no doubt from the evidence that the Sun-god was considered to be inferior to Mithras. Moreover, Mithras himself was also regarded as Sol invictus. One theory has it that Sol was the mediator who, through the raven, conveyed knowledge from Ahura-Mazda or Zeus-Jupiter. A second view is that Sol was originally the superior of Mithras and both were later incorporated into one mighty sun-figure, as When Mithras and Sol ascended to heaven in their chariot. This is a difficult problem to interpret and is still by no means finally resolved.
The Moon-goddess, as well as Sol, took part in creation. She is sometimes portrayed disappearing in her ox-drawn car at the moment when the sun's fiery chariot is rising. Usually only the upper part of the goddess is visible; she wears a diadem, and the sickle of the moon is displayed behind her head. According to Mithraic teaching the monn had the power to purify the semen of the bull and nurtured the growth of plants and herbs during the dew-laden night.
Two other figures are rarely absent from the bull-slaying. Dressed in Persian clothes similar to those of Mithras, they are placed on either side of the bull and stand perfectly still with one leg in front of the other as if taking no part in the action. In some cases, however, one of them holds the bull's tail, apparently in order to share its magic power or to stimulate the growth of the corn ears sprouting from it. Sometimes these figures are represented as shepherds who were present at the birth of Mithras, (Fig 2) but they differ in character from Attis, for each carries a torch pointing either upward or downward, (Fig. 27) by which they illustrate the ascending or descending path of Sol and Luna, the rising and setting sources of light, life and death. Generally the bearer with the uplifted torch is placed under Luna and his companion under Sol. Their names-Cautes, symbol of the rising morning sun, and Cautopates, the setting evening sun- have not yet been linguistically explained, but their symbolism has been deduced from the various representations. At the feet of Cautes there is sometimes a crowing cock (which the Greek called the Persian bird), whose crowing puts evil spirits to flight. Sometimes Cautopates is shown sitting in a highly expressive attitude with his head resting on one hand, the very soul of sadness, contrasting with the joyful (hilaris) Cautes. In the Santa Prisca Mithraeum this symbolism is also expressed in the colour of the niches in which their images were placed. Cautes stand in an orange-coloured niche while Cautopates' niche is painted dark blue. Some inscriptions even describe them as 'God' (deus) and rightly so, since we know from the writings of pseudo-Dionysius the Aeropagite (fourth century A.D.) that the two torch-bearers form a trinity with Mithras. Consequently Cautes represents the position of the sun in the morning (oriens), Mithras its course at midday and Cautopates its setting (occidens). Mithras may have been worshipped regularly at noon and we know that the sixteenth or middle day of the month was specially dedicated to him. The figure of Mithras symbolises not only the rising sun and the sun at its zenith but also the sinking orb; in this way Mithras's influence and power were made manifest each day.
The teachings of Mithras, which are steeped in astrological theories, paid much attention to the position of the sun in the zodiac. When the sun stood in the sign of the bull-which indicates the beginning of spring-Cautes was portrayed holding the bull's head in his hand, but when Cautopates is seen with the scorpion we know that the sun has passed into that sign and autumn has begun. In a few instances, as at Santa Prisca, the two torch-bearers are placed beside an evergreen pine tree, while at Pettau a row of three cypresses, trees sacred to the Sun-god, indicate the Mithraic trinity. At Dieburg we see a tree with three branches and three heads wearing Phrygian caps (Fig 6). These representations are to be connected with others in which Mithras is found alone and hiding in a tree, a scene which occurs both at Dieburg and Heddernheim (Fig. 7.). Another clear allusion to the same trinity is a large marble triangle in Santa Prisca containing a globe at its centre. In short, the torch-bearers were so important that their images were to be found in almost every sanctuary.
The iconography of Mithraism
Mithraic monuments have a rich and relatively coherent iconography, chronologically and geographically speaking. In each mithraic temple there was a central scene showing Mithras sacrificing a bull (often called a tauroctony). Mithras is clad in a tunic, trousers, cloak, and a pointed cap usually called a Phrygian cap. He faces the viewer while half-straddling the back of a bull, yanks the bull's head back by its nostrils with his left hand, and plunges a dagger into the bull's thoat with his right. Various figures surround this dramatic event. Under the bull a dog laps at the blood dripping from the wound and a scorpion attacks the bull's testicles. Often the bull's tail ends in wheat ears and a raven is perched on the bull's back. On the viewer's left stands a diminutive male figure named Cautes, wearing the same garb as Mithras and holding an upraised and burning torch. Above him, in the upper left corner, is the sun god, Sol, in his chariot. On the viewer's left there is another diminutive male figure, Cautopates, who is also clad as Mithras is and holds a torch that points downards and is sometimes, but not always, burning. Above Cautopates in the upper right corner is the moon, Luna. This group of figures is almost always present, but there are variations, of which the most common is an added line of the signs of the zodiac over the top of the bull-sacrificing scene.
For a long time the meaning of the bull-sacrificing scene and its associated figures was unclear, but a long series of studies beginning with one by K. B. Stark in 1869 and culminating in studies by Roger Beck (1984 and 1988), David Ulansey (1989) and Noel Swerdlow (1991) has revealed a comprehensible astrological symbolism. Each figure and element in the scene correlates to specific constellations, to the seven planets recognized by the ancient Romans, and to the position of these in relation to the celestial equator and the ecliptic, particularly at the time of the equinoxes and the solstices.The bull-sacrificing scene is usually carved in stone relief or painted on stone and placed in mithraea in a visible location. In addition to this central scene there can be numerous smaller scenes which seem to represent episodes from Mithras' life. The most common scenes show Mithras being born from a rock, Mithras dragging the bull to a cave, plants springing from the blood and semen of the sacrificed bull, Mithras and the sun god, Sol, banqueting on the flesh of the bull while sitting on its skin, Sol investing Mithras with the power of the sun, and Mithras and Sol shaking hands over a burning altar, among others. These scenes are the basis for knowledge of mithraic cosmology. There is no supporting textual evidence.
The archaeological evidence for Mithraism, consisting mostly of monuments, inscribed dedications, and the remains of mithraea, indicates that the cult was most popular among the legions stationed in frontier areas. The Danube and Rhine river frontier has the highest concentration of evidence, but a significant quantity of evidence amply demonstrates that Mithraism was also popular among the troops stationed in the province of Numidia in North Africa and along Hadrian's wall in England. The inscriptions on dedications found in all these areas support Cumont's assertion that Mithraism was most popular among legionaries (of all ranks), and the members of the more marginal social groups who were not Roman citizens: freedmen, slaves, and merchants from various provinces (see above).
The area where the concentration of evidence for Mithraism is the most dense is the capital, Rome, and her port city, Ostia. There are eight extant mithraea in Rome of as many as seven hundred (Coarelli 1979) and eighteen in Ostia. In addition to the actual mithraea, there are approximately three hundred other mithraic monuments from Rome and about one hundred from Ostia. This body of evidence reveals that Mithraism in Rome and Ostia originally appealed to the same social strata as it did in the frontier regions. The evidence also indicates that at least some inhabitants knew about Mithraism as early as the late first century CE, but that the cult did not enjoy a wide membership in either location until the middle of the second century CE.
As the cult in Rome became more popular, it seems to have "trickled up" the social ladder, with the result that Mithraism could count several senators from prominent aristocratic families among its adherents by the fourth century CE. Some of these men were initiates in several cults imported from the eastern empire (including those of Magna Mater and Attis, Isis, Serapis, Jupiter Dolichenus, Hecate, and Liber Pater, among others), and most had held priesthoods in official Roman cults. The devotion of these men to Mithraism reflects a fourth-century "resurgence of paganism," when many of these imported cults and even official Roman state religion experienced a surge in popularity although, and perhaps because, their very existence was increasingly threatened by the rapid spread of Christianity after the conversion of the emperor Constantine in 313 CE.
Mithraism had a wide following from the middle of the second century to the late fourth century CE, but the common belief that Mithraism was the prime competitor of Christianity, promulgated by Ernst Renan (Renan 1882 579), is blatantly false. Mithraism was at a serious disadvantage right from the start because it allowed only male initiates. What is more, Mithraism was, as mentioned above, only one of several cults imported from the eastern empire that enjoyed a large membership in Rome and elsewhere. The major competitor to Christianity was thus not Mithraism but the combined group of imported cults and official Roman cults subsumed under the rubric "paganism." Finally, part of Renan's claim rested on an equally common, but almost equally mistaken, belief that Mithraism was officially accepted because it had Roman emperors among its adherents (Nero, Commodus, Septimius Severus, Caracalla, and the Tetrarchs are most commonly cited). Close examination of the evidence for the participation of emperors reveals that some comes from literary sources of dubious quality and that the rest is rather circumstantial. The cult of Magna Mater, the first imported cult to arrive in Rome (204) was the only one ever officially recognized as a Roman cult. The others, including Mithraism, were never officially accepted, and some, particularly the Egyptian cult of Isis, were periodically outlawed and their adherents persecuted.
The grades on a mosaic from a mithraeum in Ostia.
The grades are Corax, Nymphus, Miles, Leo, Perses, Heliodromus, Pater Corresponding to the translations of Raven,
Male Bride, Soldier, Lion, Persian, Courier of the Sun and father. Thus equated to the planets of Mercury, Venus, Mars
Jupiter, Moon, Sun and Saturn. There are quite a few inscriptions in mithraea identifying members by name and grade. The most common grade mentioned was Pater. This is to be expected, since Paters would have been in charge of mithraea. A large percentage of the rest are by Leos. From this we can conclude that there was something important about that grade.
Around the turn between the 19th and 20th centuries, Franz Cumont published a number of books on Mithraism. One, The Mysteries of Mithra, is still in print. Cumont believed that Mithraism must be interpreted in light of Zoroastrianism, the religion of Persia. This is a fairly obvious approach. Mithras is the name of a Zoroastrian "god," Mithras and his torchbearers are dressed like Persians, "Cautes" and "Cautopates" are both likely Persian names, and the Persian words "nama," "hail," and "nabarzes," probably "unconquered," appear in some Mithraic inscriptions.Cumont interpreted the tauroctony as an act of creation. From the bull’s death life entered the world. This idea is supported by the fact that in some of the tauroctonies there is grain springing from the bull’s wound or from his tail. The dog and the snake Cumont explained as good and evil fighting for the sacred blood, while the scorpion was one of the forces of evil trying to attack the divine bull. The lion-headed deity was Zurvan, Infinite Time, a divine figure in a heretical form of Zoroastrianism.
With his works, Cumont established the field of Mithraic studies. He established it with such authority that his work remained essentially unchallenged for seventy years. Then doubts began to appear. The problem hadn’t really been faced that the defining characteristics of Mithraism - the tauroctony, the secrecy and initiations, the masculine exclusivity - have no parallels from Persia. The principle of explaining Mithraism as directly descended from Zoroastrianism have therefore been abandoned. (David Ulansey, pp. 10 - 12, gives a summary of the critique, and gives the references for those wanting to study the question in greater depth.)Reading through Cumont for the purpose of this essay, I was appalled at some of the things he said, and I even wonder why it took so long to see problems. The chapter entitled "The Mithraic Liturgy, Clergy, and Devotees" is particularly egregious. In it he attempts to give a picture of what rituals in a mithraeum would have been like. Unfortunately, most of it comes from his own imagination, rather than from the evidence. He gives a very detailed description of an initiation ritual (pp. 163 - 164), after earlier in the chapter telling us that we don’t know much about Mithraic ritual. On page 166 we learn that "A solemn moment in the service, - one very probably marked by the sounding of a bell, - was that in which the image of the tauroctonous Mithra, hitherto kept veiled, was uncovered before the eyes of the initiates." Where the veil, or the ritual uncovering, has come from I don’t know. Cumont presents his speculative rituals as fact; the "very probably" is as hesitant as he gets. In short, I think that the critics of Cumont let him off easy.
The most promising direction of investigation has come through a recognition of the importance of astrology in Mithraism, especially in the tauroctony. The major elements of that image can be identified with constellations - Taurus, Scorpio, Canis Major, Hydra, and Gemini. Some tauroctonies include a lion (Leo) and a large cup (Crater). Mithras himself would be Perseus. This suggestion was actually made in 1869 by K. B. Stark (Ulansey, pp. 15 - 16), but Cumont’s authority as an expert in both Mithraism and astrology led to Stark’s theory being rejected.Stark’s theory is, however, very reasonable. The question then becomes what the significance of this star map tauroctony is. Why would Mithraists have put a map of part of the sky as the most important part of their temples?The most comprehensive attempt to answer this question is that of David Ulansey. He puts forth the idea that the central secret of Mithraism was the precession of the equinoxes, and that Mithras killing the bull is his bringing about the change of the spring equinox from occurring in Taurus to occurring in Aries. The lion-headed god he explains as a god of time whom Mithras, by being the one who turns the axis of the cosmos, overcame.
The significance of the precession of the equinoxes comes from a belief common in the Graeco-Roman world, that after death souls go up through the planetary spheres to reach the celestial regions. It was the purpose of some of the mystery religions and philosophies to teach initiates how to make this trip safely. Knowing the role of the equinoxes would be crucial to ascending properly, since they indicated the layout of the cosmos.I see a number of problem’s with Ulansey’s theories. First, the precession of the equinoxes wasn’t a secret at the time of Mithraism. It would have been odd for a mystery religion to have developed to bring its members through a series of initiations to learn something that wasn’t a secret. Second, he does not adequately deal with the lion-headed god; under Ulansey’s scheme he is reduced to a fairly insignificant role. I find it hard to imagine that as complex an image as the leontocephalous was devised to play such a role. There are two further facts that argue against this; Mithras is never shown overcoming the leontocephalous, and there are the inscriptions dedicated to him. Why would Mithraists carve inscriptions in honor of a being overcome by Mithras? I do think that Ulansey is partly right here, but that he has missed the significance both of the leontocephalous and of the overcoming. That will become clear later.
There are two further objection to Ulansey’s theory that I think doom it. First, he postulates that the meaning of the tauroctony is that the equinox has changed from Taurus. Nowhere in the mithraea, however, do find an indication of what the equinox has changed to; other than in the ring of the zodiac Aries is absent. Even more deadly is that in Ulansey’s conception Mithras’ sacrifice of the bull is not a salvific act, but a damning one. Before the precession, things had worked out pretty well; it is only the change that requires us now to know the secret of how to be saved. But on the walls of the Santa Prisca mithraeum we find painted a line that might read, "us too you have saved by blood eternally shed." The reading is not certain, and only "by blood shed" is sure (Beck, p. 2029), but if indeed it does say this, we are drawn to the conclusion that the bull-slaying is one of salvation. Roger Beck, while noting the uncertainty of the reading of the Santa Prisca line, says later in his article, "even if we did not have the evidence of the Santa Prisca text ... [that the bull-slaying is an act of salvation] could surely be inferred from the mere fact of tauroctony’s absolute centrality. ... In the context of the religion of the times it is hard to imagine where the relevance might lie if not in salvation." That seems a more than reasonable position to me; I am unaware of a religion of salvation whose primary icon is a symbol of that from which salvation is to be gained. That the tauroctony is a star map is an important observation. Ulansey’s explanation of it doesn’t hold up, however.
The obvious course of explaining Mithraism has been through the ubiquitous tauroctony. The concentration on doing so has neglected, however, an important element of the religion. Mithraism was a religion of salvation. Mithras provided this salvation through his sacrifice of the bull. But how was this salvation to be attained by human beings? That is the question that has been ignored.To express the problem differently, the tauroctony has often been compared, as a result of its omnipresence and evident importance, to the Roman Catholic crucifix. Analogies can be pushed too far, but this one suggests something more than what those who made it considered. The crucifixion is not, in fact, the central mystery of Christianity, the Resurrection is. Yet the latter is rarely represented in churches. This should make us hesitate to see the meaning of the tauroctony as the final answer to Mithraism.
MITHRAIC CONGREGATIONS
The Mithraic congregations were not communal groups like the Pythagorean thiasoi; except that they contained no female communicants, they were quite similar to modern church congregations. Each was small, comprising perhaps a hundred members; as the number of converts increased, new units were established. Since Mithra was born in a cave, the "churches" themselves were built underground, or at least so as to simulate subterranean conditions.The Mithraic mystic passed through seven degrees or orders (Epistle, XVII, 2), which reflect Chaldean influence. They succeeded one another as follows: Corax, or Raven, signifying a messenger; Cryphius, or Hidden, indicating esoteric; Miles, or soldier, symbolizing the warfare of good against evil; Leo, the Lion, representing fire; and then in order, Perses, Heliodromus, and Pater, or Father, which consisted of the order of priesthood. Actual initiation into the order, however, began with the degree of Miles, when the member was branded in the forehead with the figure of a cross. Thereafter, the communicant was inducted into the higher mysteries: he took an oath never to reveal the secrets of the order and he underwent frequent purificatory lustrations. When inducted into the degree of Leo, he was purified with honey, and baptized, not with water, but with fire, as John the Baptist declared that his successor would baptize. After this second baptism, initiate. were considered participants, and they received the sacrament of bread and wine commemorating Mithra's banquet at the conclusion of his labors.
Mithraism, like Platonism, taught that all souls pre-exist in the ethereal regions. At the birth of each new human being, one of these descends into a human body and by this process a portion of Ormazd is imprisoned in the cofl~n-clay of Ahriman. Only the human body, the material prison-house, perishes at death. At birth begins for every human being the great struggle between spirit and matter, light and darkness, good and evil, soul and body, the indwelling Ormazd and Ahriman, which must go on until death. Those members of mankind in whom the lower elements prevail are Children of Darkness; those in whom the higher are victorious, the Children of Light. This is the same metaphysical dualism which permeated Pythagoreanism, Essenism, and the Pauline theology, all of which called for the suppression of material, carnal, or worldly desires; in short, for an asceticism based not upon economic but upon metaphysical imperatives.
Tauroctony
One of the central motifs of Mithraism is the tauroctony, the myth of the slaying of a sacred bull. In the Graeco-Roman myth, the animal is a sacrifice, which Mithra stabs to death in the cave, having been instructed to do so by a crow, sent by Ahura Mazda. This myth is one of the better indications that Graeco-Roman Mithra does not stem from Zoroastrian Mithra, since in later Zoroastrianism texts (Vendidad 21; Rivayat 386) and in Persian mythology it is Angra Mainyu (Ahriman in later Persian) who slays Gavyokdat, the primeval bull created by Ahura Mazda (cf: bas-relief from the Apadana Hall, Persepolis). In the Graeco-Roman myth, from the body of the dying bull spring plants, animals, and all the beneficial things of the earth. In contrast, in the Persian myth, Mah (the moon) rescues the essence of the dying primeval bull, and from it springs all animal creation. It is thought that the bull represents the constellation of Taurus. However, in the period we are considering, the sun at the Vernal Equinox had left Taurus two thousand years before, and was in the process of moving from Aries to Pisces. In light of this interpretation, it has been suggested in recent times that the Mithraic religion is somehow connected to the end of the astrological "age of Taurus," and the beginning of the "age of Aries," which took place about the year 2000 BC. It has even been speculated that the religion may have originated at that time (although there is no record of it until the 2nd century BC).
The ritual has been placed inside a temple, but look at what is at the top of the arch -- a petragenetrix. The symbolism could hardly be more obvious. Just as in the other tauroctony the leontocephalous was plugging the hole out of the world cave, so here Mithras has made his way out, reborn from the rock of the cosmos, into the celestial realm. The initiate has been reborn along with Mithras, and now acquires the grade named after Mithras, the Persian. He would next continue on to that of Heliodromus. If we accept Gordon’s suggestion that rather than the usual “Courier (or Runner) of the Sun,” it should more correctly be seen as “One Who Proceeds Like the Sun” (1994, p. 111),that grade becomes Mithras exalted to the level of, or even higher than, that of the sun, which is exactly what we see on many of the images surrounding the tauroctonies. Mithras has been given the solar crown, and now is even greater than the sun, because he's burned down his own cosmos.With this framework in which to describe Mithraism, we can now return to the tauroctony. If the method of salvation I have suggested, the submission of the material followed by its destruction by the fire of the leontocephalous,is correct, and if it is the slaying of the bull that saved Mithraists, in what way does the slaying contribute to the process of submission and destruction? I would say that it doesn’t. Its job is more important.
It is here that we can resurrect a suggestion by Cumont, that the killing of the bull is a creative act. This is supported by the grain sprouting from the bull’s tail, and fits in well with general Indo-European views on sacrifice as creative (see Lincoln, 1986). The objection to this has always been that in Zoroastrianism there is no sacrifice of a bull at the beginning of time, and that the closest we find is Ahriman killing one. This is indeed true regarding the creation of the world.However, Zoroastrianism has it that at the end of time all evil will be burned away with molten metal, after which Soshyant, the Zoroastrian “savior,” will sacrifice a bull, and form from its fat and other materials a drink of immortality. The good will drink from it and live forever (described in the Greater Bundahisn 34. We see here a doctrine that the sacrifice of a bull (not simply the killing, as was done by Ahriman) is to be the means of final salvation when the world is recreated after the old one has been done away with through fire. It is exactly this sort of destruction by fire, individualized for the initiate, that I am suggesting for Mithraism. If this is true, then it is in keeping with Zoroastrian belief that such a destruction would be followed by an immortality-granting sacrifice of a bull (albeit not by Mithra). And this is again what I am suggesting here. My solution to the bull-slaying mystery, then, is that it is a reinterpretation of a Zoroastrian myth, as filtered through the sort of ideas mixing around classical society in the first century - a little Stoicism here, some Plato there, a bit of astrology for spice. Through the agency of the leontocephalous the world cave is destroyed by fire. Mithras sacrifices the bull, bringing into being a new world, into which he bursts, born from the cave (in at least one case, the world egg). He becomes in that world the preeminent ruler, equal to the sun in ours.
It is pretty common in mystery religions for there to be symbols which have both exoteric and esoteric meanings, and I think that that was the case for Mithraism. Not only the basic level initiate, but the sculptors, painters, and architects who created the mithraea and their furnishings, would have wanted to know the meaning of the imagery. In fact, there is even jewelry with the tauroctony on it; the image itself clearly was no secret. It is here that the obvious meanings would have been presented: Mithras was born from a rock, he brought life into being by killing the bull, and was therefore raised to equality with the Sun. Initiates are even able to feast with the sun like Mithras, the explanation could have gone. The leontocephalous might have been a bit trickier, but perhaps he was just an underworld deity in the exoteric system. It would only have been when the initiate was ready that the true meaning of the images would have been revealed. The significance of the star map nature of the tauroctony remains unsolved in this theory. However, it would not have been the reason for the bull-slaying doctrine itself to have come into existence. Both snake and dog play important roles in Zoroastrianism, and their presence, added to the fascination of the creators of Mithraism with astrology, would have been sufficient to suggest the addition of other “constellations” to the image. The symbolic identification would have had doctrinal implications, of course, and that should be investigated, but I think it misguided to see the astrological meaning as the primary one.The procession of the initiate through the grades represents a coherent system, then, and that progress makes sense when Mithraism is seen as a blend of Roman with Gnostic and Zoroastrian elements. It is likely, however, that the final secrets of Mithraism died with the last initiate. For now, the fellow in the cap still looks out at us, performing his enigmatically salvific act.
Rock-Birth of Mithras
As I mentioned previously, the tauroctony depicts the bull-slaying as taking place inside a cave, and the Mithraic temples were built in imitation of caves. But caves are precisely hollows within the rocky earth, which suggests that the rock from which Mithras is born is meant to represent the Mithraic cave as seen from the outside. Now as we saw earlier, the ancient author Porphyry records the tradition that the Mithraic cave was intended to be "an image of the cosmos." Of course, the hollow cave would have to be an image of the cosmos as seen from the inside, looking out at the enclosing, cave-like sphere of the stars. But if the cave symbolizes the cosmos as seen from the inside, it follows that the rock out of which Mithras is born must ultimately be a symbol for the cosmos as seen from the outside. This idea is not as abstract as might first appear, for artistic representations of the cosmos as seen from the outside were in fact very common in antiquity. A famous example is the "Atlas Farnese" statue, showing Atlas bearing on his shoulder the cosmic globe, on which are depicted the constellations as they would appear from an imaginary vantage point outside of the universe.(Atlas Farnese statue, 2nd century A.D.)
That the rock from which Mithras is born does indeed represent the cosmos is proven by the snake that entwines it: for this image evokes unmistakeably the famous Orphic myth of the snake-entwined "cosmic egg" out of which the universe was formed when the creator-god Phanes emerged from it at the beginning of time. Indeed, the Mithraists themselves explicitly identified Mithras with Phanes, as we know from an inscription found in Rome and from the iconography of a Mithraic monument located in England. The birth of Mithras from the rock, therefore, would appear to represent the idea that he is in some sense greater than the cosmos. Capable of moving the entire universe, he cannot be contained within the cosmic sphere, and is therefore depicted in the rock-birth as bursting out of the enclosing cave of the universe, and establishing his presence in the transcendent space beyond the cosmos. This imaginary "place beyond the universe" had been described vividly by Plato several centuries before the origins of Mithraism. In his dialogue Phaedrus (247B-C) Plato envisions a journey by a soul to the outermost boundary of the cosmos, and then gives us a glimpse of what the soul would see if for a brief moment it were able to "look upon the regions without." "Of that place beyond the heavens," says Plato, none of our earthly poets has yet sung, and none shall sing worthily. But this is the manner of it, for assuredly we must be bold to speak what is true, above all when our discourse is upon truth. It is there that true being dwells, without colour or shape, that cannot be touched; reason alone, the soul's pilot, can behold it, and all true knowledge is knowledge thereof.
Tauroctony encircled by zodiac
My own research over the past decade has been devoted to discovering why these particular constellations might have been seen as especially important, and how an icon representing them could have come to form the core of a powerful religious movement in the Roman Empire. In order to answer these questions, we must first have in mind a few facts about ancient cosmology. Today we know that the earth rotates on its axis once a day, and revolves around the sun once a year. However, Greco-Roman astronomy at the time of the Mithraic mysteries was based on a so-called "geocentric" cosmology, according to which the earth was fixed and immovable at the center of the universe and everything went around it. In this cosmology the universe itself was imagined as being bounded by a great sphere to which the stars, arranged in the various constellations, were attached. So, while we today understand that the earth rotates on its axis once every day, in antiquity it was believed instead that once a day the great sphere of the stars rotated around the earth, spinning on an axis that ran from the sphere's north pole to its south pole. As it spun, the cosmic sphere was believed to carry the sun along with it, resulting in the apparent movment of the sun around the earth once a day.
This diagram shows the daily rotation of the cosmic sphere around the earth according to the "geocentric" cosmology. As shown here, the sun is carried along by the cosmic sphere around the earth once a day. However, as explained below, in the "geocentric" cosmology the sun was also believed to possess a second movement beyond its daily rotation with the cosmic sphere: namely, its yearly revolution along the circle of the "zodiac." In addition to this daily rotation of the cosmic sphere carrying the sun along with it, the ancients also attributed a second, slower motion to the sun. While today we know that the earth revolves around the sun once a year, in antiquity it was believed instead that once a year the sun-- which was understood as being closer to the earth than the sphere of the stars-- traveled around the earth, tracing a great circle in the sky against the background of the constellations. This circle traced by the sun during the course of the year was known as the "zodiac"-- a word meaning "living figures," which was a reference to the fact that as the sun moved along the circle of the zodiac it passed in front of twelve different constellations which were represented as having various animal and human forms.
Zodiac (circle of 12 figures) with sun in Aries. In the "geocentric" cosmology the sun was believed to move along this circle around the earth once a year. The other cosmic circle shown here, parallel to the earth's equator, is called the "celestial equator Because the ancients believed in the real existence of the great sphere of the stars, its various parts-- such as its axis and poles-- played a central role in the cosmology of the time. In particular, one important attribute of the sphere of the stars was much better known in antiquity than it is today: namely, its equator, known as the "celestial equator." Just as the earth's equator is defined as a circle around the earth equidistant from the north and south poles, so the celestial equator was understood as a circle around the sphere of the stars equidistant from the sphere's poles. The circle of the celestial equator was seen as having a particularly special importance because of the two points where it crosses the circle of the zodiac: for these two points are the equinoxes, that is, the places where the sun, in its movement along the zodiac, appears to be on the first day of spring and the first day of autumn. Thus the celestial equator was responsible for defining the seasons, and hence had a very concrete significance in addition to its abstract astronomical meaning.
As a result, the celestial equator was often described in ancient popular literature about the stars. Plato, for example, in his dialogue Timaeus said that when the creator of the universe first formed the cosmos, he shaped its substance in the form of the letter X, representing the intersection of the two celestial circles of the zodiac and the celestial equator. This cross-shaped symbol was often depicted in ancient art to indicate the cosmic sphere. In fact, one of the most famous examples of this motif is a Mithraic stone carving showing the so-called "lion-headed god," whose image is often found in Mithraic temples, standing on a globe that is marked with the cross representing the two circles of the zodiac and the celestial equator.
Lion-headed god standing on globe with crossed circles
One final fact about the celestial equator is crucial: namely, that it does not remain fixed, but rather possesses a slow movement known as the "precession of the equinoxes." This movement, we know today, is caused by a wobble in the earth's rotation on its axis. As a result of this wobble, the celestial equator appears to change its position over the course of thousands of years. This movement is known as the precession of the equinoxes because its most easily observable effect is a change in the positions of the equinoxes, the places where the celestial equator crosses the zodiac. In particular, the precession results in the equinoxes moving slowly backward along the zodiac, passing through one zodiacal constellation every 2,160 years and through the entire zodiac every 25,920 years. Thus, for example, today the spring equinox is in the constellation of Pisces, but in a few hundred years it will be moving into Aquarius (the so-called "dawning of the Age of Aquarius"). More to our point here, in Greco-Roman times the spring equinox was in the constellation Aries, which it had entered around 2,000 B.C.
It is this phenomenon of the precession of the equinoxes that provides the key to unlocking the secret of the astronomical symbolism of the Mithraic tauroctony. For the constellations pictured in the standard tauroctony have one thing in common: namely, they all lay on the celestial equator as it was positioned during the epoch immediately preceeding the Greco-Roman "Age of Aries." During that earlier age, which we may call the "Age of Taurus," lasting from around 4,000 to 2,000 B.C., the celestial equator passed through Taurus the Bull (the spring equinox of that epoch), Canis Minor the Dog, Hydra the Snake, Corvus the Raven, and Scorpio the Scorpion (the autumn equinox): that is, precisely the constellations represented in the Mithraic tauroctony.
In the above diagram the celestial equator intersects the zodiac in Aries. This was the situation during the "Age of Aries." The sun is here pictured (in Aries) as it was located on the day of the spring equinox in that age.Here the cosmic axis has wobbled, so that the celestial equator intersects the zodiac in Taurus-- the situation during the "Age of Taurus." The sun is here pictured (in Taurus) as it was located on the day of the spring equinox in that age. In this "Age of Taurus" the celestial equator passed through Taurus, Canis Minor, Hydra, Corvus, and Scorpio: precisely the constellations pictured in the Mithraic bull-slaying icon.
In fact, we may even go one step further. For during the Age of Taurus, when the equinoxes were in Taurus and Scorpio, the two solstices-- which are also shifted by the precession-- were in Leo the Lion and Aquarius the Waterbearer. (In the above diagram of the "Age of Taurus," Leo and Aquarius are the northernmost and southernmost constellations of the zodiacal circle respectively-- these were the positions of the summer and winter solstices in that age.) It is thus of great interest to note that in certain regions of the Roman empire a pair of symbols was sometimes added to the tauroctony: namely, a lion and a cup. These symbols must represent the constellations Leo and Aquarius, the locations of the solstices during the Age of Taurus. Thus all of the figures found in the tauroctony represent constellations that had a special position in the sky during the Age of Taurus.
The Mithraic tauroctony, then, was apparently designed as a symbolic representation of the astronomical situation that obtained during the Age of Taurus. But what religious significance could this have had, so that the tauroctony could have come to form the central icon of a powerful cult? The answer to this question lies in the fact that the phenomenon of the precession of the equinoxes was unknown throughout most of antiquity: it was discovered for the first time around 128 B.C. by the great Greek astronomer Hipparchus. Today we know that the precession is caused by a wobble in the earth's rotation on its axis. However, for Hipparchus-- because he held to the ancient geocentric cosmology in which the earth was believed to be immovable-- what we today know to be a movement of the earth could only be understood as a movement of the entire cosmic sphere. In other words, Hipparchus's discovery amounted to the discovery that the entire universe was moving in a way that no one had ever been aware of before!
At the time Hipparchus made his discovery, Mediterranean intellectual and religious life was pervaded by astrological beliefs. It was widely believed that the stars and planets were living gods, and that their movements controlled all aspects of human existence. In addition, at this time most people believed in what scholars call "astral immortality": that is, the idea that after death the human soul ascends up through the heavenly spheres to an afterlife in the pure and eternal world of the stars. In time, the celestial ascent of the soul came to be seen as a difficult voyage, requiring secret passwords to be recited at each level of the journey. In such circumstances, Hipparchus's discovery would have had profound religious implications. A new force had been detected capable of shifting the cosmic sphere: was it not likely that this new force was a sign of the activity of a new god, a god so powerful that he was capable of moving the entire universe?
Hipparchus's discovery of the precession made it clear that before the Greco-Roman period, in which the spring equinox was in the constellation of Aries the Ram, the spring equinox had last been in Taurus the Bull. Thus, an obvious symbol for the phenomenon of the precession would have been the death of a bull, symbolizing the end of the "Age of Taurus" brought about by the precession. And if the precession was believed to be caused by a new god, then that god would naturally become the agent of the death of the bull: hence, the "bull-slayer." This, I propose, is the origin and nature of Mithras the cosmic bull-slayer. His killing of the bull symbolizes his supreme power: namely, the power to move the entire universe, which he had demonstrated by shifting the cosmic sphere in such a way that the spring equinox had moved out of Taurus the Bull. Given the pervasive influence in the Greco-Roman period of astrology and "astral immortality," a god possessing such a literally world-shaking power would clearly have been eminently worthy of worship: since he had control over the cosmos, he would automatically have power over the astrological forces determining life on earth, and would also possess the ability to guarantee the soul a safe journey through the celestial spheres after death. That Mithras was believed to possess precisely such a cosmic power is in fact proven by a number of Mithraic artworks depicting Mithras in various ways as having control over the universe. For example, one scene shows a youthful Mithras holding the cosmic sphere in one hand while with his other hand he rotates the circle of the zodiac.(Mithras holding cosmic sphere and rotating zodiac)
Another image shows Mithras in the role of the god Atlas, supporting on his shoulder the great sphere of the universe, as Atlas traditionally does.(Mithras as Atlas)A further example is provided by a number of tauroctonies that symbolize Mithras's cosmic power by showing him with the starry sky contained beneath his flying cape (see illustration at beginning of article). If Mithras was in fact believed to be capable of moving the entire universe, then he must have been understood as in some sense residing outside of the cosmos. This idea may help us to understand another very common Mithraic iconographical motif: namely, the so-called "rock-birth" of Mithras. This scene shows Mithras emerging from the top of a roughly spherical or egg-shaped rock, which is usually depicted with a snake entwined around it.
Tauroctony from temple of Heidelberg-Neuenheim
The invariant element in mithraea was a statue or relief of Mithras killing a bull, called the "tauroctony." This was placed at the end of the mithraeum opposite the door, and was clearly meant to be the focus of the temple. From both its everpresence and the centrality of its location, the tauroctony is obviously an expression of the most important mystery of the cult. We need to look at it closely, then.Some of the details of the tauroctony could vary, and there were regional styles, but there can be said to be a "canonical" tauroctony.The most obvious element is of course Mithras killing a bull. Mithras is shown wearing Persian clothing; he wears a short tunic with pants and boots. He usually has a cape which billows out behind him. On his head is a Persian cap, a soft hat that folds forward at the top.
The bull is lying on the ground. Mithras half-sits on it, with his left knee on the bull’s back and his other leg stretching out to the ground. He pulls back the head of the bull with his left hand while stabbing a dagger or short sword into the bull’s shoulder with his right. Mithras is almost always looking either out at the observer or back over his shoulder.There are other figures in the scene. There are generally a snake and a dog, usually leaping up towards the bull’s wound. There is often a scorpion pinching the bull’s genitals.On either side of the scene are two characters dressed exactly like Mithras, but smaller. The one on the left, whom we know from inscriptions is called "Cautes," carries an upright torch; on the right, "Cautopates" carries one reversed. (The meaning of the names is debated, but they appear Iranian. See Schwarz for a discussion of the different theories.) The position of the two is not invariant, though; there are, in fact, fifty tauroctonies in which Cautes is on the left and Cautopates on the right (Clauss, p. 96). This makes problems for interpretations of their significance, some of which, such as the scene being of the rising and setting of the sun, rely on one arrangement or the other.
This makes up the basic scene. Most tauroctonies also have framing elements.The most important is a cave within which the tauroctony takes places. The underground mithraea were meant to repeat this, so that Mithraic rituals would be seen as occurring in the same cave as the one Mithras killed the bull in. Frequently the cave has a zodiac for a border, showing us that it represents the cosmos.In the upper left hand corner is the sun, and in the upper right the moon. Either a raven or a ray (or a raven on a ray) often extends from the sun to Mithras, as if bringing him a message.There may be other figures, such as a lion or Saturn, and side panels might depict events in Mithras’ career. The ones I have described, however, are the most important ones.The second most common image in the mithraea is of a meal shared by Mithras and the sun. That this takes place after he has killed the bull is certain, because the main part of the meal is the bull’s haunch. The two are sometimes served by men with raven’s heads.This scene reflects the meals shared by the members of each group. Sometimes the feasting scene is on the back of the tauroctony, with the panel on which they are shown turning on a pivot. By simply turning the panel the mithraeum could be turned into a banqueting hall presided over by Mithras and the sun
The third most important image in the mithraea goes by the delightful name of the "leontocephalous," or the "leontocephalic deity." This just means "the lion-headed one," and that’s exactly what he is, a man with the head of a lion. There is usually a snake wrapped around him. The other elements of this image vary, but two sets of wings (that is, four wings) and a set of keys are common. In only one case do we have a name for him, Arimanius. This is found on the base of a statue of him from York in England. There are, however, also a number of inscriptions to "the god Arimanius" without images.There is one more important image we find in the mithraea, that of the birth of Mithras. This has been given the technical name "Mithras Petragenetrix," "Mithras Born from the Rock." And that is exactly what it shows - Mithras rising from a rock as a child. He is a rather precocious child, to be sure, because he is usually already holding his dagger in one hand, with a torch in the other. To make sure we know it is him he is wearing his cap. Often the torchbearers are there on either side, and sometimes we can tell that the birth is taking place inside a cave or surrounded by the zodiac (which come to pretty much the same thing).
There are some minor images found in some of the mithraea that illustrate events in the life of Mithras. We see him hunting with a bow on horseback, accompanied by a snake and a lion. Elsewhere he uses the bow to shoot an arrow against a rock, and water flows forth. We don’t know where the bull comes from, but there are images of him carrying the bull to the cave. Elsewhere we see him being raised to heaven by the sun; the two greet each other, the sun crowns Mithras with a crown like his own, and they sit down to eat together.From the images we can chart out something of the life of Mithras. He is born from a rock, already equipped to perform great deeds. He shoots an arrow into a rock, producing water. He hunts, whether for the bull or something else we don’t know. He carries a bull back to a cave, where he sacrifices it. The sun communicates with him; whether to command the sacrifice or to invite Mithras to heaven afterwards we don’t know. After the sacrifice, the sun raises Mithras to heaven, greets him with a handshake, crowns him, and eats a feast with him. This is what we know of the mythical biography of Mithras.
Congratulations to those who have stuck with me this far. I need to talk about one more thing, and then I’ll get on to the task of answering the question of what Mithraism was about.Mithraism had seven different grades of membership, each of which had its own initiation, arranged in a hierarchy. We know of these from some of the texts, but this information is confirmed by inscriptions and mosaics from the mithraea. The grades were associated with, among other things, the seven classical planets.
Main article: Precession of the equinoxes
The identification of an "age" with a particular zodiac constellation is based on the sun's position during the vernal equinox. Before 2000 BC, the Sun could have been seen against the stars of the constellation of Taurus at the time of vernal equinox [had there been an eclipse]. Due to the precession of the equinoxes, on average every 2,160 years the Sun appears against the stars of a new constellation at vernal equinox. The current astrological age started when the equinox precessed into the constellation of Pisces, in about the year 150 BC, with the "Age of Aquarius" starting in AD 2000. The exact date of the start of the ages is in question. Astrologer Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet holds that the Age of Pisces began in 234 BCE and the age of Aquarius started in 1926. Indeed, the constellations common in the sky from about 4000 BC to 2000 BC were Taurus the Bull, Canis Minor the Dog, Hydra the Snake, Corvus the Raven, and Scorpio the Scorpion, all of which may be identified in the fresco from Marino, a standard Hellenistic iconography (illustration, above right). Further support for this theory is the presence of a lion and a cup in some depictions of the tauroctony: indeed Leo (a lion) and Aquarius ("the cup-bearer") were the constellations seen as the northernmost (summer solstice) and southernmost (winter solstice) positions in the sky during the age of Taurus.
The precession of the equinoxes was discovered, or at least publicized, by the Greek astronomer Hipparchus in the 2nd century BC. (See Discovery of precession for more information.) Whether the phenomenon was known by Mithraists previously is unknown. In any case, Mithras was presumed to be very powerful if he was able to rotate the heavens, and thus 'kill the bull' or displacing Taurus as the reigning image in the heavens.
The Doctrines Of Mithraism
Unfortunately, there is practically no literary evidence for the inner history of Mithraism. A few scattered facts may be gathered from the remains of Christian polemics, a great deal of information about the overall character of the ideas to which they gave expression may be gotten from the writings of Neo-Platonists and a close examination of mystical papyri. Fortunately, these numerous monuments have been synthesized in the scholarly work of Cumont. From this work we are able to get with a degree of certainty the mythological and eschatological teaching of this cult. For the moment let us look into these teachings.First we turn to the cosmogonic views of Mithraism. It is interesting to know how Mithraic preachers sought to explain the origin of the world. They explained it in terms of a series of successive generations. The first principle begot a primordial couple, the Heaven and the Earth; and the Earth, who was impregnated by her brother, gave birth to the vast Ocean. This group formed the supreme triad of the Mithraic Panthean. At times these cosmic divinities were personified in quite different names from their original ones. The Heaven was called Ormazd or Jupiter, the Earth was identified with SpentA-Armaiti or Juno, and the Ocean was called Apam-Napat or Neptune.
As was stated above, Jupiter (Heaven) and Juno (Earth) were the sovereign couple. They gave birth not only to Neptune (Ocean) who became their peer, but to many other immortals. Shahrivar or Mars, Valcun or Atar, Bacchus or Haoma, Silvanus or Drvaspa, Diana or Luna are but a few of the long line of immortals. These innumerable multitude of divinities composed the celestial court.[Footnote:] Cumont, op. cit., pp. 111, 112. This in short sums up the cosmogonic views of the Mithraic religion.The doctrine of the immortality of the soul was another view which was very prominent in Mithraism. Mithraism insisted that the soul was immortal and its temporary sojourn in a body was a period of trial. The worshipper's action determined the posthumous fate of his soul. Of course, he was not alone in his attempt to attain purity and truth; Mithra stood by his side as a divine helper.
The background of Mithraic eschatology was provided by that theory of the relation of the soul to the universe. It was believed that the soul descended at birth {from} the eternal home of light through the gate of Cancer, passing down through the seven planetary spheres to earth. As the soul passed through each stage it accumulated more and more impurity. It was possible for the initiate, while in his trial period on earth, to gain purity through the practice of courage and truth. After death there was judgment of the soul. Mithra, the protector of the truth, presided over the judgment court. If the soul had lived an impure life, it was dragged down to the infernal depths, where it received a thousand tortures. If, on the contrary, its good qualities outweighed the bad, it rises through the gate of caprocorn, passing in reverse order through the planetary sphere. At each stage the impurities which the soul picked up in its downward flow gradually diminished. The end of this great rise was supreme happiness and eternal bliss.
The doctrine of resurrection of the flesh was also a basic belief in the Mithraic circle. It was believed that the long struggle between the principles of good and evil would one day end. At this time a great bull would reappear on earth; and Mithra would redescend and reawaken men to life. All would come forth from the tombs with the same appearance they had on earth. All mankind would unite into a great union, at which time the god of truth would separate the good from the bad. Then the great bull would be sacrificed. The fat of this bull would be mingled with the consecrated wine, and would be offered to the just. From this they would receive immortality. After this great event, Jupiter-Ormazd would cause a great fire to fall from heaven which would destroy all the wicked. The Spirit of Darkness would be completely destroyed. The universe would then enjoy eternal happiness and peace.
There was another doctrine which remained fundamental to Mithraism throughout its history. It was the doctrine of dualism. This doctrine was taken from Zoroastrianism. This doctrine accounted for the problem of evil by supposing that the world was a battleground between the Good Principle, Ahura Mazda, and the Evil Principle, Ahriman. The powers of good were identified with Light or Day, and the powers of evil were identified with Darkness or Night. These two powers were in a state of perpetual war. It was Mithra, the spirit of light and truth who became naturally a celestial warrior on the side of Ahura Mazda.[Footnote:] Halliday, The Pagan Background of Early Christianity, pp. 285, 286.It was many of these doctrines that became very influential in later years to the Christian religion. They molded the thinking of the ancient world.
History of Mithraism
Mithraism in Persia
Relief from Taq-i Bostan, Iran, showing Ardashir II of Sassanid empire at the center receiving his crown from Ahura Mazda. The two stand on a prostrate enemy. At the left is Mithra depicted as a priest, wearing a crown of sun-rays, holding a priest's barsam, and standing on a sacred lotus.Relief from Taq-i Bostan, Iran, showing Ardashir II of Sassanid empire at the center receiving his crown from Ahura Mazda. The two stand on a prostrate enemy. At the left is Mithra depicted as a priest, wearing a crown of sun-rays, holding a priest's barsam, and standing on a sacred lotus.
Although Mithra was worshiped as a deity by proto-Indo-Iranians, there is no evidence to suggest that Mithra was integral to Zoroastrianism before the late Achaemenid era (first Persian Empire, 648–330 BC). 150 years before the fall of the Achaemenid empire, Darius the Great was apparently still stringently monotheistic. No divinity but Ahura Mazda is ever mentioned in any of the numerous surviving inscriptions of his reign (521-485 BC).Nonetheless, as the following inscription from Susa of Artaxerxes II Mnemon (404–358 BC) demonstrates, by the third century BC, Mithra enjoyed official sanction: "Artaxerxes the Great King, [...] says: [...] By the favor of Ahuramazda, Anahita, and Mithra, this palace I built. May Ahuramazda, Anahita, and Mithra protect me from all evil, and that which I have built may they not shatter nor harm."
A connection of Mithra with the proto-Indo-Iranian divinity (or one cognate with it) surmises that such a cult co-existed undocumented alongside Zoroastrianism for several centuries, and that it was not until the late Achaemenid age that attempts were made to integrate Mithra with a position within the Zoroastrian hierarchy of angels. It is unlikely that early Zoroastrianism, which in accordance with the teachings of Zoroaster would have been strictly monotheistic, would have accepted a second deity along the religion's one god Ahura Mazda. This is coherent with the argument that it was probably during the late Achaemenid period that Mithra was integrated into the Zoroastrian hierarchy of angels. The tradition of naming the days and months after divinities, as it was first instituted during that era, includes several dedications to Mithra (See also: Zoroastrian calendar, Zoroastrian angelology), and the Mihr Yasht, the hymn to Mithra in the Avesta, probably dates to this period.
The Hungarian Egyptologist professor László Kákosy in his book Ré fiai (The children of Ra - The general history of ancient Egypt) writes that the tale of the first Achaemenid occupation of Egypt (525-404 BC) as presented in the books of Herodotus reveals some evidence of the early Mithra worshipping in Persia. In the narrative there is the story about the mad tyrant Cambyses II of Persia (King of Egypt: 525-521 BC) who kills the sacred Apis Bull in his fury after his soliders were lost in the Lybian desert. But modern archeological evidence suggests the opposite: in reality Cambyses deeply respected Egypt's native religions, he even buried one Apis Bull according to the proper rituals. So it seems that the narrative of Herodotos shows not the real deeds of Cambyses as the ruler of Egypt, but possibly the Persian myths and rituals of his Zoroastrian-based (or just Zoroastrian-related?) religion, for example the tauroctony of Mithra similar how it is visioned later in the Roman cult.
The putative east to west transfer
Although Roman Mithras is often considered to be of Persian origin, the assumption that Roman Mithras is specifically an outgrowth of Persian Zoroastrian culture probably cannot be sustained. The arguments against Mithra being of Zoroastrian origin are twofold:
* That the fact that the tauroctony, the myth of Mithra's slaying of a sacred bull, which is one of the central motifs of Mithraism, does not occur in either Zoroastrianism or later Persian mythology. A similar legend (see iconography below) does exist in Zoroastrianism, but Mithra does not play a role in it. Also noteworthy is the fact that the slayer is evil, while in Persian lore Mithra is good.
* In Zoroastrian angelology and Persian mythology, Korshed (middle Persian: Khur, Avestan: Hvare-khshaeta), and not Mithra, is the divinity of the sun and solar energy.
Although both arguments can be explained away, the common traits, or the absence thereof, cannot by themselves sustain or refute a connection.Nonetheless, there is no evidence to rule out a general, non-Zoroastrian, influence on Roman Mithras. As Beck suggests, there is no reason to assume that a Persian or other Asian influence must perforce be an outgrowth of Zoroastrian culture: "Mithras — moreover, a Mithras who was identified with the Greek Sun god Helios — was one of the deities of the syncretic Graeco-Iranian royal cult founded by Antiochus I, king of the small but prosperous buffer state of Commagene in the mid first century BCE", and that it is not entirely implausible that such an intermediate form of Mithraism may have played a part in an east-to -west transfer.
That the kingdoms of Parthia and Pontus in Asia Minor may have been the sites for the development of a Roman Mithras is a legitimate assumption. Several of their kings were called Mithradates, meaning "given by Mithra", starting with Mithradates I of Parthia (died 138 BC). It would seem that, in those kingdoms, Mithra was a god whose power lent luster even to a king. And it was at Pergamum, in the 2nd century BC, that Greek sculptors started to produce the highly standardized bas-relief imagery of Mithra Tauroctonos, "Mithra the bull-slayer." Although the cult of Mithras never caught on in the Greek homeland, those sculptures may indicate the route between Persian Mithra and Roman Mithras through the eastern Aegean.
The Greek historian Plutarch wrote[1] about pirates of Cilicia, the coastal province in the southeast of Anatolia, who practiced Mithraic "secret rites" around 67 BC: "They likewise offered strange sacrifices; those of Olympus I mean; and they celebrated certain secret mysteries, among which those of Mithra continue to this day, being originally instituted by them". Plutarch was convinced that the Cilician pirates had originated the Mithraics rituals that were being practiced in Rome by his day.
Another possible connection between a Persian Mithra and the Roman Mithras is a linguistic one, from a Manichean context. According to Sundermann , the Manicheans adopted the name Mithra to designate one of their own deities. Sundermann determined that the Zoroastrian Mithra, which in middle Persian is Mihr, is not a variant of the Parthian and Sogdian Mytr or Mytrg; though a homonym of Mithra, those names denote Maitreya. In Parthian and Sogdian however Mihr was taken as the sun and consequently identified as the Third Messenger. This Third Messenger was the helper and redeemer of mankind, and identified with another Zoroastrian divinity Narisaf (Sundermann, 1979). Citing Boyce [reference], Sundermann remarks, "It was among the Parthian Manicheans that Mithra as a sun god surpassed the importance of Narisaf as the common Iranian image of the Third Messenger; "among the Parthians the dominance of Mithra was such that his identification with the Third Messenger led to cultic emphasis on the Mithraic traits in the Manichaean god" (Sundermann, 2002)
Mithraism in early Rome
Double-faced Mithraic relief. Rome, 2nd-3rd century CE. Louvre Museum. Front:Mithra killing the bull, being looked over by the Sun god and the Moon god. Back: Mithra banquetting with the Sun god, to celebrate his victory over the dark forces of the Universe.
Double-faced Mithraic relief. Rome, 2nd-3rd century CE. Louvre Museum.
Front:Mithra killing the bull, being looked over by the Sun god and the Moon god.
Back: Mithra banquetting with the Sun god, to celebrate his victory over the dark forces of the Universe.
Mithraism arrived fully mature at Rome with the return of the legions from the east in the first century BC. As an action god of armies and the champion of heroes, he appealed to the professional Roman soldiers, who carried his cult to Iberia, Great Britain, the German frontiers and Dacia. The cult of Mithras began to attract attention at Rome about the end of the first century AD. Statius mentions the typical Mithraic relief in his Thebaid (Book i. 719,720), around AD 80.The earliest material evidence for the Roman worship of Mithras dates from that period, in a record of Roman soldiers who came from the military garrison at Carnuntum in the Roman province of Upper Pannonia (near the Danube River in modern Austria, near the Hungarian border). Other legionaries fought the Parthians and were involved in the suppression of the revolts in Jerusalem from 60 A.D. to about 70 A.D. When they returned home, they made Mithraic dedications, probably in the year 71 or 72. By A. D. 200, Mithraism had spread widely through the army, and also among traders and slaves. During festivals all initiates were equals including slaves. The German frontiers have yielded most of the archaeological evidence of its prosperity: small cult objects connected with Mithra turn up in archaeological digs from Romania to Hadrian's Wall.
Mithraism in the Roman Empire
At Rome, the third century emperors encouraged Mithraism, because of the support which it afforded to the divine nature of monarchs. Mithras thus became the giver of authority and victory to the Imperial House. From the time of Commodus, who participated in its mysteries, its supporters were to be found in all classes.Concentrations of Mithraic temples are found on the outskirts of the Roman empire: along Hadrian's wall in northern England three mithraea have been identified, at Housesteads, Carrawburgh and Rudchester. The discoveries are in the University of Newcastle's Museum of Antiquities, where a mithraeum has been recreated. Recent excavations in London have uncovered the remains of a Mithraic temple near to the center of the once walled Roman settlement, on the bank of the Walbrook stream. Mithraea have also been found along the Danube and Rhine river frontier, in the province of Dacia (where in 2003 a temple was found in Alba-Iulia) and as far afield as Numidia in North Africa.
As would be expected, Mithraic ruins are also found in the port city of Ostia, and in Rome the capital, where as many as seven hundred mithraea may have existed (a dozen have been identified). Its importance at Rome may be judged from the abundance of monumental remains: more than 75 pieces of sculpture, 100 Mithraic inscriptions, and ruins of temples and shrines in all parts of the city and its suburbs. A well-preserved late 2nd century mithraeum, with its altar and built-in stone benches, originally built beneath a Roman house (as was a common practice), survives in the crypt over which has been built the Basilica of San Clemente, Rome
Romans encountered worship of the deity Mithras as part of Zoroastrianism in the eastern provinces of the empire, particularly in Asia Minor (now modern Turkey).Mithraism is best documented in the form it had acquired in the later Roman Empire. It was an initiatory 'mystery religion,' passed from initiate to initiate, like the Eleusinian Mysteries. It was not based on a supernaturally revealed body of scripture, and hence very little written documentary evidence survives. Soldiers appeared to be the most plentiful followers of Mithraism, and women were apparently not allowed to join.Roman worship of Mithras began sometime during the early Roman empire, perhaps during the late first century of the Common Era (hereafter CE), and flourished from the second through the fourth century BCE. during which it came under the influence of Greek and Roman mythologies. The Mithraic cult maintained secrecy. Its teaching were only reveled to initiates.
The evidence for this cult is mostly archaeological, consisting of the remains of mithraic temples, dedicatory inscriptions, and iconographic representations of the god and other aspects of the cult in stone sculpture, sculpted stone relief, wall painting, and mosaic. There is very little literary evidence pertaining to the cult. Remains of Mithraic temples can be found throughout the Roman Empire, from Palestine across north of Africa, and across central Europe to northern England.For over three hundred years the rulers of the Roman Empire worshipped the god Mithras. In Rome, more than a hundred inscriptions dedicated to Mithras have been found, in addition to 75 sculpture fragments, and aseries of Mithraic temples situated in all parts of the city. One of the largest Mithraic temples built in Italy now lies under the present site of the Church of St. Clemente, near the Colosseum in Rome.
Those who entered the ranks were sworn to secrecy. Women were denied membership. Few, therefore, could or would have written with an insider’s perspective. Indeed, preserving its tenets in written form was not a priority at all. As Ulansey notes, "[O]wing to the obscurity of Mithraic iconography and the general absence of any ancient explanations of its meaning, the internal aspects of Mithraism (i.e., the beliefs and teachings of the cult) have resisted the attempts of scholars to decipher their secrets." Second, Roman Mithraism, was an evolving system. By no means was it especially guarded against accommodations and adaptations. Many believe that the name "Mithra(s)" is a shared term for very distinct religious systems that, aside from the name, have almost nothing in common. Third and finally, recent popular works on Mithraism are replete with distortions, fabrications, and an overall inattention to detail. Much ancient literature is too late to give a credible account of the early beliefs and practices. The modern understanding of Mithraism has often been reconstructed in the absence of reliable data. There are, however, some items that are agreed upon. Original Mithraism (i.e., Eastern Mithraism) is believed to have had connections in Iran with Zoroastrianism, many hundreds of years before Christ. Some form of Mithraism--we will later examine to what degree it resembled original Mithraism--appeared in Rome. The historian Plutarch records that Cilician pirates first introduced the cult to the Romans at least seventy years before Christ. Mithraism, in its Roman version, was a military cult--although not exclusively so--and its spread was largely due to the Roman military’s vast geographic dispersion. Aspiring Mithraists proceeded through several layers of initiation as a part of membership. Because of its initiations and its secretive nature, it has been referred to as the "Freemasonry of the Roman World." Lending to its mysterious ambiance, the Mithraic place of worship (Mithraeum) was most often a crypt-like underground sanctuary or a place decorated so as to give that appearance. Roman Mithraic art often portrays Mithras appearing out of a rock naked except for a Phrygian cap. He carried a flaming torch in one hand and a knife in the other. Mithras is most known for the depiction of him slaying a bull with his knife. This scene, the famous tauroctony, is represented in numerous ancient icons. After the first century A.D., Mithraism was Christianity’s closest competitor for the predominant religious position in the Roman Empire. After having withstood a last-ditch effort by Julian the Apostate to resuscitate Mithraism, Christianity, for a number of reasons, prevailed once and for all by the end of the fourth century. Mithraism’s broad geographical presence in the Roman empire is confirmed by archaeology. Nearly all dated Mithraic inscriptions and monuments belong to the second through the fourth centuries.
It is the Roman version of Mithraism alone that will concern us when answering the question of what role Mithraism may have had in the formation of Christian beliefs and practices. But because there is a complete absence of early Roman Mithraic doctrinal literature it is necessary for dependency theorists to presuppose a strong continuity between Iranian-Persian Mithraism and Mithraism in Rome for the purpose of interpreting Roman Mithraic art. We will later evaluate the similarity between the Mithraism that significantly predated Christianity (Persian) and that which was contemporary and made contact with Christianity (Roman). John Hinnells remarks, "It has been said, with justice, that the great problem of Mithraic studies is the question of continuity and discontinuity between the Eastern and Western traditions." There are three basic positions on the relationship between Persian-Iranian Mithraism and the later Roman Mithraism which coexisted with Christianity: 1. Strong continuity; 2. Some continuity with diminished elements of commonality as a result of accommodation and evolution; 3. Little or no substantial continuity.
For nearly seventy years the dominant model in Mithraic studies was that of Franz Cumont who, in the 1890s, theorized that early Iranian Mithraism was the logical basis for the Roman Mithraism which vied with Christianity in the early centuries of the Roman Empire. He not only subscribed to strong continuity but popularized it. Ulansey summarizes Cumont’s position: [T]he name of the god of the cult, Mithras, is the Latin (and Greek) form of the name of an ancient Iranian god, Mithra; in addition, the Romans believed that their cult was connected with Persia (as the Romans called Iran); therefore we may assume that Roman Mithraism is nothing other than the Iranian cult of Mithra transplanted into the Roman Empire. Thus, claimed Cumont, the proper way to go about interpreting Roman Mithraism was to refer each aspect of the cult to some element of ancient Iranian religion with which it bore a similarity. Cumont in his assumption of strong continuity even speculated that Roman Mithraism succumbed to Christianity in part because it "retained too much of its Asiatic coloring to be accepted by the Latin spirit without repugnance." Concerning Roman Mithraism, he confidently asserted, "A branch torn from the ancient Mazdean trunk, it has preserved in many respects the characteristics of the ancient worship of the Iranian tribes." But despite his commitment to this premise, Cumont had to admit that the doctrinal explanations of Western Mithraic art rely on guesswork.
While continuity between Iran and Rome is necessary to dependence, it does not prove dependence. Those who follow the Cumont school of thought would still have to sort through the evolutionary shifts. In Iranian religion Mithra began as a subordinate deity. In Rome he appears to be the primary object of veneration. John Ferguson notes, "But somehow, somewhere, he became the central deity as a saviour-god in an almost new religion." In Persia he was associated with peace (as well as agriculture, contracts, and a number of other domains). Centuries later in Rome it is thought that he became associated with courage and war. There is no evidence that early Mithraism was secretive to any significant extent. Later Roman Mithraism was, of course, highly secretive. Everyone would agree that (given the present available data) tracing the exact times and places of these complex evolutionary shifts is impossible. Cumont’s work was built upon by a number of scholars whose findings presupposed strong Iranian-Roman continuity. It became natural to assume that practically all that was known (or thought to be known) of Roman Mithraism derived from Iranian Mithraism. For those who insisted that Christianity borrowed from Roman Mithraism the argument became: 1) Iranian Mithraism is the source of Roman Mithraism, which must therefore must resemble it. Age is thereby added to Roman Mithraism; 2) because certain Iranian beliefs are available to us, Roman Mithraic imagery must be interpreted according to what we know about Iranian Mithraism; 3) any possible similarities between Christianity and supposed Roman Mithraic doctrines--based on Cumont’s admittedly uncertain interpretations of Roman art--prove that Christianity (being relatively new on the scene) must have as its source the secret doctrines of Roman Mithraism. Freke and Gandy represent many who are persuaded by this reasoning to conclude that the Jesus story was "the literal culmination of its many mythical precursors." In light of Cumont’s confession as to the speculative nature of his work this conclusion is problematic.
Mithraeum in Capua, Italy
Our earliest evidence for the Mithraic mysteries places their appearance in the middle of the first century B.C.: the historian Plutarch says that in 67 B.C. a large band of pirates based in Cilicia (a province on the southeastern coast of Asia Minor) were practicing "secret rites" of Mithras. The earliest physical remains of the cult date from around the end of the first century A.D., and Mithraism reached its height of popularity in the third century. In addition to soldiers, the cult's membership included significant numbers of bureaucrats and merchants. Women were excluded. Mithraism declined with the rise to power of Christianity, until the beginning of the fifth century, when Christianity became strong enough to exterminate by force rival religions such as Mithraism.
For most of the twentieth century it has been assumed that Mithraism was imported from Iran, and that Mithraic iconography must therefore represent ideas drawn from ancient Iranian mythology. The reason for this is that the name of the god worshipped in the cult, Mithras, is a Greek and Latin form of the name of an ancient Iranian god, Mithra; in addition, Roman authors themselves expressed a belief that the cult was Iranian in origin. At the end of the nineteenth century Franz Cumont, the great Belgian historian of ancient religion, published a magisterial two- volume work on the Mithraic mysteries based on the assumption of the Iranian origins of the cult. Cumont's work immediately became accepted as the definitive study of the cult, and remained virtually unchallenged for over seventy years.
There were, however, a number of serious problems with Cumont's assumption that the Mithraic mysteries derived from ancient Iranian religion. Most significant among these is that there is no parallel in ancient Iran to the iconography which is the primary fact of the Roman Mithraic cult. For example, as already mentioned, by far the most important icon in the Roman cult was the tauroctony. This scene shows Mithras in the act of killing a bull, accompanied by a dog, a snake, a raven, and a scorpion; the scene is depicted as taking place inside a cave like the mithraeum itself. This icon was located in the most important place in every mithraeum, and therefore must have been an expression of the central myth of the Roman cult. Thus, if the god Mithras of the Roman religion was actually the Iranian god Mithra, we should expect to find in Iranian mythology a story in which Mithra kills a bull. However, the fact is that no such Iranian myth exists: in no known Iranian text does Mithra have anything to do with killing a bull.
The demise of Mithraism
Worship of the sun (Sol) did exist within the indigenous Roman pantheon, as a minor part, and always as a pairing with the moon. However, in the East, there were many solar deities, including the Greek Helios, who was largely displaced by Apollo. By the 3rd century, the popular cults of Apollo and Mithras had started to merge into the syncretic cult known as Sol Invictus, and in 274 AD the emperor Aurelian (whose mother had been a priestess of the sun) made worship of Sol Invictus official. Subsequently Aurelian built a splendid new temple in Rome, and created a new body of priests to support it (pontifex solis invicti), attributing his victories in the East to Sol Invictus. But none of this affected the existing cult of Mithras, which remained a non-official cult. Some senators held positions in both cults. However, this period was also the beginning of the decline of Mithraism, as Dacia was lost to the empire, and invasions of the northern peoples resulted in the destruction of temples along a great stretch of frontier, the main stronghold of the cult. The spread of Christianity through the Empire, boosted by Constantine's tolerance of it from around 310 AD, also took its toll - particularly as Christianity admitted women while Mithraism did not, which obviously limited its potential for rapid growth.
The reign of Julian, who attempted to restore the faith, and suppress Christianity, and the usurpation of Eugenius renewed the hopes of its devotees, but the decree secured by Theodosius I in 394, totally forbidding non-Christian worship, may be considered the end of Mithraism's formal public existence.Mithraism still survived in certain cantons of the Alps into the 5th century, and clung to life with more tenacity in its Eastern homelands. Its eventual successor, as the carrier of Persian religion to the West, was Manichaeism, which competed strenuously with Christianity for the status of world-religion.
THE DECLINE OF PERSIA AND THE HELLENIZATION [GREEK INFLUENCE] UPON ZOROASTRIANISM
Persian power gradually rose and can be considered to have peaked during the reign of Xerxes, from 486 B.C.E to 465 B.C.E. This is the time, also, when the portents of decline occured. When Xerxes' invasion of Greece failed, the military loss was of such calibre that the Persians never again undertook a major military operation against the Greek mainland - also, this signalled the defeatability of the Persian troops that had hitherto been continuously victorious. This was, however, not sufficient to dislodge the Persian Empire just yet. With Darius II Greece finally fell under Persian rule through several clever political and military actions - it was, however, not military superiority that conquered Greece, but exploitation of the Greek inter-city-state strife that allowed Persia to move in successfully. As the reign of Artaxerxes II came to a close during the last years of the 5th century B.C.E. the empire suffered a rise in anarchistic behaviours by small prinicipalities. This was, however, completely surppressed when the vicious reign of Artaxerxes III began. He crushed all rebellions and the empire reached its former glory as it had been under Xerxes little less than a hundred years earlier. This Persian dominance ended with the rise of Alexander who with his superior army of phalanx, following the assassination of his father, Philip of Macedon, began to fulfill his dream for world conquest. With the Macedonian victory at Gaugamela on October 1, 331 B.C.E. the Persian empire essentially ceased to exist. However, the reign of Alexander was short lived, and with his death in Babylon on June 13, 323 B.C.E. another series of wars arose between his generals for dominance, as Alexander had left no heirs. In less than 20 years, Seleucus succeeded in gaining control, beginning the short reign of the Seleucid empire. This, empire, however, did not include all of the Persian empire - the eastern fronteirs west of the Indus were lost, as well as small kingdoms in Media, Armenia (in the southern Caucasus), Pontus and Cappadocia.
For several years, the Seleucid kings attempted to maintain the empire, but, because of its great expanse, enemies had too many points of attack that the Seleucid armies could not maintain at once. However, eventhough constant war plagued the empire, Mazdaism, and what was now the cult of Mithra - that is Mithraism - gained its Hellenistic veneer and through the Greek veins of the empire, was able to spread and properly root itself in centers in Armenia and Cappadocia. If one is to discount the ancient Aryan origins, then indeed, this is the time and place that Mithraism can be said to have it's birthing place. However, as eventhough throughout the following centuries, Mithraims maintained a thick Hellenic and Chaldaean skin, its inner mysteries remained fully Iranian in nature, and as such, the link between the Mithraism of the 4th century B.C.E. can not be severed with that of the ancient Aryan deity worship. One of the most significant Hellenic contributions of this time was that of iconography. The Mithraic preists in step with the traditions of Mazdaism and Zoroastrianism did not utilize symbolic representations of their gods. This radically changed with the advent of Hellenic influences which culminated in a distinct iconography for the Mithraic followers. It can be surmised that at this time the images of the tauroctony, that is, the bull slaying, that form one of the central scenes within the later Roman mithraeums (real or artificial cave structures in which the Roman Mithraists worshipped) were being formed. Unfotunately, as so few documents have survived on Mithraism, save the passages from Porphyry (3rd century Greek historian), Dio Christosom (2nd century Greek philosopher) and the polemics of the early church fathers, the origins and nature of many of the Mithraic images that have survived can only be analyzed in terms of educated speculation. Some images can be traced back to their origins more effectively than others; we have for instance the birthing scene of Mithra. In Armenian legends Mithra was born in a cave of a virgin mother, Anaitis - which earlier legends posited as his sexual partner, although, her personification as Ishtar, could have easily mutated in various fashions throughout the centuries; also, in Mazdian legend, as related to us by Porphyry, Mazdian was to have concecrated a special cave for the worship of Mithra; and it is known, symbollic caves were not uncommon in the ancient world. We also have the scene of the birth of Mithra from a rock or sea of water, the latter of which can be clearly traced back to Mazdian creation mythology.
THE FALL OF THE SELEUCIDS AND THE FIRST ROMAN CONTACT WITH MITHRAISM
By the mid 2nd Century B.C.E. the Seleucid empire was beginning to crumble and a general chaos began to errupt. Various districts bid for independence; the most priminent break away kingdoms was that of the Arsacids. In the east, under the leadership of Mithradates I, they wrested regions of Bactria away and in the west Media was subdued. Also, by the beginning of the first century B.C.E. the Romans began making their bids for regions on Anatolia. In the east Scythian tribes began to cleave territories away. It was not until Mithradates II and Phraates III that the empire was restored to a reasonable order. This was the Parthian Empire. However, even as it maintained the visage of an empire, there were significant structural differences between it and the Achaemenid dynasty of a few centuries before - primarily, it was much weaker, as can be seen its lack of effort in assimilating the various smaller states within the empire into a single fuctional unit, as had been done by the Achaemenids.
What are of primary interest here are four points:
* The donning of Parthian kings of composite names including the root "Mithra" exemplified the significant stature that Mithra bore in the religion. This was not only a phenomena in the east within the Parthian dynasties, but also the West in kingdoms such as that of Pontus, which was established by Mithradates I Ctistes who, during the the wars of the Diadochi (the battles of the Greek generals following Alexander's death) forged his Pontic Kingdom. The region of the Pontic Empire eventually stretched from Cappadocia, its northeastern Anatolian home to include much of Anatolia, the Crimean region, and parts of what is now southern Ukraine under the reign of Mithradates IV Eupator. Skirmishes between the Pontic kingdom and Greece marked different points in its timeline, until it was eventually conquered by Pompey in 66 B.C.E., marking the end of one of Rome's greatest adversaries.
* The Romans in their drives into Asia Minor, for the first time came significantly in contact with Mithraism. One of those contacts is recorded by Plutarch, who explained how during the Mithradatic wars between Rome and the Pontic kingdom, Cilician pirates hired themselves out to the king; some were noted to perform strange rite atop mount Olympus in praise of the god Mithra which, and Plutarch admits, were religious mysteries later preserved by the Romans. This in itself creates a hardy link between the later Romanized Mithraism and the Mithraism begotten from Mazdaism. At any rate, as can be clearly seen from the nature of Mithra himself, or Mithras as the Romans called him, he had a great appeal towards the military from his own spiritually militarisitic nature. In the Avesta he was understood as the god in whom invocation would bring victory in battle, and this without doubt, would be appealing to any soldier weighted by the mortal vicissitudes of war.
* Moreover, by this time Mithraism had reached the status of a mystery cult. Many Romans had become disillusioned by the flagrant hypocrisy and dun coloured nature of their religion and found in Mithraism a spark of eastern mysticism and power that was far more attractive.
* Roman military policy dictated that Roman legionaries not serve in a district that they were born or raised in, and were often stationed in far regions of the empire - also, Roman armies during the first century B.C.E. and the centuries during the Christian era were constantly sent to combat various foes, be it Germanic tribesman in the region of the Danube, or to quell disruption in Asia Minor, and as such often found their officers and legions intermingling. For these reasons Mithraism quickly spread through the Roman occupation armies in Asia Minor, primarily through proselytizing legionaries.
DIFFUSION OF THE FAITH OF MITHRA
As the cult of Mithra bolted throughout the channels of military command and contact it was able to quickly reach the farthest regions of the Roman Empire. Rome itself became a prominent stronghold of the faith by the first century C.E. and mithraeums can be found as far north as Britain. Also with the traffic of oriental slaves, the faith was constantly reinforced by contact with believers from the east, which bolstered the mystery status of the religion; and this also openned up the faith to non-military Roman citizens through contact with their slaves. However, in its early stages within the Roman Empire, Mithraism was primarily a cult of the poor and lower classes - essentially a solder's and slave's religion, and it wasn't until the late second and third centuries C.E. that it had reached a high enough status that imperial interest began to be noticed. But even with the initiation of emperor Commodus (C.E. 180 - 192) it was no more than a passing fancy.
It wasn't until C.E. 274 that Mithraism gained a more prominent status when Aurilian declared the institution of a Roman State Cult of Sol Invictus (The Unconquerable Sun); he erected a magnificent temple to Mithra in Rome and coins of the time reflect the awesome power with which the Mithraic Unconquerable Son bore with the inscription declaring that the Sun is the Lord of the Empire. The Romans naturally associated Mithra with the sun as Mithra had since Zoroastrian times been associated with the rise of the sun - and indeed, the sun in Avestan scriptures was understood as his chariot - and now this symbolic fussion of Mithra and the Sun reflected Mithraism's final dialect - that is, it's Romanization. Finally in c. 307 Mithra's prominence within the Roman Empire was solidified by Diocletian by his public dedication to Sol Invictus Mithras, acclaiming him as "protector of the empire." However, Mithra's reign within the empire was not long - the pagan aristocracy began to fade under furthering Christian conversions and finally in 394 under Theodosius the cult all but disappeared. However, Mithraism's descent from history - eventhough it's tenets survived into the middle ages in other sects such as that of Mani (Manicaenism) would not come without its bearing its final stamp upon the world - its impression upon Christian Doctrine.
Connections
There is much speculation that Christian beliefs were influenced by Mithraic belief. Ernest Renan, in The Origins of Christianity, promoted the idea that Mithraism was the prime competitor to Christianity in the second through the fourth century AD, although some scholars feel the written claims that the emperors Nero, Commodus, Septimius Severus, Caracalla, and the Tetrarchs were initiates are dubious as there is little evidence that Mithraic worship was accorded official status as a Roman cult other than its official form as 'Sol Invictus,' the first universal religion of the Greco Roman world. Bull and cave themes are found in Christian shrines dedicated to the archangel Michael, who, after the legalization of Christianity, became the patron Saint of soldiers. Many of those shrines were converted Mithraea, for instance the sacred cavern at Monte Gargano in Apulia, refounded in 493. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the Mithras cult was transferred to the previously unvenerated archangel.
Bull and crypt are linked in the Catholic saint Saturnin (frequently "Sernin" or "Saturninus") of Toulouse, France. The Mithraeum is retained as a crypt under his earliest church, evocatively named "Notre-Dame du Taur." Some scholars would argue that because the Gospels are thought to have been mostly before 100 and that since very little is known of Roman Mithraism until after 100 that it is implausible to say that Christianity borrowed its doctrines from Mithraism; some have even suggested that Mithraism may have, in fact, borrowed elements from Christianity. Most other scholars disagree with these conclusions, since Mithraism goes way back to 1400 years before Christ. A better determinant of borrowing, is to compare core doctrines between Christianity and Mithraism. The adoption of imagery or icons or festivals is fairly peripheral (such as the adoption by christendom of winter solstice or Saturnalia festivals as Christmas) but seldom reflects basic religious tenets. A further example of this is the various gnostic cults (such as the Marcionites and Valentinians) which adopted the personage of Jesus or the concept of a Savior, yet did not adopt the underlying doctrinal elements. It has been speculated that the ancient Orobouros of Mithraism (the encircling serpent about to bite its own tail) was adapted for a Christian symbol of the limited confines of time and space.
The snake around a rock is also reminscent of the Midgard serpent, Jörmungandr, who was said to surround Midgard (the Earth) according to Norse traditions. Thus similar religious ideas or iconography does not necessarily indicate borrowing in either direction. To justify claims that Christianity borrowed from Roman Mithraism, the following parallels have been alleged Mithras was thought to be born of a virgin. It has believed that at his appearance shepherds came and worshipped him, bringing gifts. Mithras was known as the logos, or Word.He was known as the "Way, the Truth and the Light," "Redeemer," "Savior" and "Messiah. He was believed to have created all good things. He was believed to have provided the Bread of Life. He was thought to have had 12 companions or disciples. It was believed that Mithras sacrificed himself for world peace. It was believed that he was buried in a tomb and after three days rose again. He was believed to have descended into hell. It was believed that Mithras will preside over the Last Judgment. Mithraites celebrated communion. Mithraism taught about rebirth. Clearly, if the claims of proponents of early Christian syncretism are true and a substantial number of these supposed beliefs could be shown to have been well-entrenched in the pre-apostolic Western Mithraic milieu, it would be the first step in damaging the credibility of the assertions Christians have traditionally made regarding the origin of Christian theology. If those who claim dependence could offer persuasive proofs, the New Testament and especially the gospels and Acts would fall under suspicion for concealing Mithraic influence and thereby misrepresenting history. The thoughtful Christian would be forced to reevaluate his commitment or resort to fideism.
Similarities to Christianity
I would suggest that the awe-inspiring quality of Plato's vision of what is beyond the outermost boundary of the cosmos also lies behind the appeal of Mithras as a divine being whose proper domain is outside of the universe. As the text from Plato shows, the establishment by ancient astronomers of the sphere of the stars as the absolute boundary of the cosmos only encouraged the human imagination to project itself beyond that boundary in an exhilarating leap into an infinite mystery. There beyond the cosmos dwelled the ultimate divine forces, and Mithras's ability to move the entire universe made him one with those forces. Here in the end we may sense a profound kinship between Mithraism and Christianity. For early Christianity also contained at its core an ideology of cosmic transcendence. Nowhere is this better expressed than in the opening of the earliest gospel, Mark. There, at the beginning of the foundation story of Christianity, we find Jesus, at the moment of his baptism, having a vision of "the heavens torn open." Just as Mithras is revealed as a being from beyond the universe capable of altering the cosmic spheres, so here we find Jesus linked with a rupture of the heavens, an opening into the numinous realms beyond the furthest cosmic boundaries. Perhaps, then, the figures of Jesus and Mithras are to some extent both manifestations of a single deep longing in the human spirit for a sense of contact with the ultimate mystery.
According to Martin A. Larson, in The Story of Christian Origins (1977), Mithraism and Christianity derived from the same sources, originally from the savior cult of Osiris: a rarely discussed view among Mithraic and Christian scholars but which can account for the similarities without assuming a Christian derivation from Mithraism. He also believes that the Essenes were Jewish Pythagoreans, whose members not only gave birth to Christianity as Essenes, but were directly influenced by Zoroastrian doctrine as Pythagoreans — a view probably shared by Cumont.[1] Mithraism, in Larson's view, was an established but exclusive sect devoted to social justice, and was assimilated by state-sponsored Christianity before being disposed of in name. "The resemblances between the two hostile churches were so striking as to impress even the minds of antiquity" (Cumont, 193). Like Origen (an early Christian writer and in this respect a peculiarity among the other patristic writers), Mithraism held that all souls pre-existed in the ethereal regions with God, and inhabited a body upon birth. Similar to Pythagorean, Jewish, and Pauline theology, life then becomes the great struggle between good and evil, spirit and body, ending in judgment, with the elect being saved. "They both admitted to the existence of a heaven inhabited by beautiful ones. . .and a hell peopled by demons situate in the bowels of earth" (Cumont 191).
Both religions used the rite of baptism, and each participated in an outwardly similar type of sacrament, bread and wine. Both the birth of Mithra and the birth of Christ have been celebrated on December 25th, although nowhere does the New Testament claim that Christ was born on this day. Both Mithra and Christ were supposedly visited by shepherds and Magi. It has been claimed that both Mithraism and Christianity considered Sunday their holy day, though for different reasons, although the evidence that Mithradists practiced weekly worship, any more than any other pagan religion of the time, is lacking. Many have noted that the title of Pope (father) is found in Mithraic doctrine and seemingly prohibited in Christian doctrine. The words Peter (rock) and mass (sacrament) have significance in Mithraism. Mithraism and early Christianity considered abstinence, celibacy, and self-control to be among their highest virtues. Both had similar beliefs about the world, destiny, heaven and hell, and the immortality of the soul. Their conceptions of the battles between good and evil were similar (though Mithraism was more dualistic[2]), including a great and final battle at the end of times. Mithraism's flood at the beginning of history was deemed necessary because what began in water would end in fire, according to Mithraic eschatology. Both religions believed in revelation as key to their doctrine. Both awaited the last judgment and resurrection of the dead. Christ and Mithra were both referred to as the "Logos" (Larson 184), a term meaning the divine "Word" or "Reason" and first used in this sense by the Jewish philosopher Philo in the first-century CE.
When inducted into the degree of Leo, he was purified with honey, and baptised, not with water, but with fire, as John the Baptist declared that his successor would baptise. After this second baptism, initiates were considered "participants," and they received the sacrament of bread and wine commemorating Mithra's banquet at the conclusion of his labors (Larson 190).Although the cult of Mithra rivaled Christianity in Rome, they were among different social classes. Mithra was popular among soldiers and nobles after four centuries of growth. Mithraism had a disadvantage to Christian populism by barring women and emphasizing the elitist nature of the belief (being in the latter respect closer to Gnosticism than Christianity). Under emperors like Julian and Commodus, Mithra became the patron of Roman armies (Cumont 87). Christians, however, referred to themselves as soldiers of Christ. They venerated Jesus by calling him Light of the World or Son of Righteousness. Christians also claimed their savior's death was marked by a solar eclipse. Sunday became the primary day of worship for Christians, despite observing the Jewish Sabbath for centuries.
Mithra's birthday was adopted by Christians in the 4th century A.D. as the birth of Christ (J. Smith 146). Some claimed Mithra's mother was a mortal virgin. Others said Mithra had no mother, but was miraculously born of a female rock, or the petra genetix, conceived by God's lightning (de Riencourt 135). Mithra's birth was witnessed by shepherds and by Magi bearing gifts to his sacred birth-cave of the Rock (J. Smith 146). Mithra's image was buried in a rock tomb, a sacred cave that represented his Mother's womb. This was ritualistically removed each year, and he was said to live again. Mithra's triumph and ascension to heaven were celebrated during the spring equinox, as during Easter, when the sun rises toward its apogee.
Mithra performed miracles of raising the dead, healing the sick, making the blind see, the lame walk, and casting out devils. As a Peter, son of the petra (rock), he carried the "keys" to the kingdom of heaven, as St. Peter is said to have the keys to the gates of Heaven (H. Smith 129). Before returning to heaven, Mithra had his Last Supper with his twelve disciples, who represented the twelve signs of the zodiac. In memory, his worshipers partook of a sacramental meal of bread marked with a cross (Hooke 89, Cumont 160). This was one of seven Mithraic sacraments, alleged to be the models for the Christian seven sacraments (James 250). It was called mized and in Latin missa, meaning "released". This is the word in later ecclesiastical Latin for "Mass".[3]
Mithra's cave-temple on the Vatican Hill was seized by Christians in 376 A.D. (J. Smith 146). Later Christian bishops in Rome pre-empted even the Mithraic high priest's title of Pater Patrum, which became Papa, or Pope (H. Smith 252). Gregory I, in the sixth-century, was the first Christian bishop on record who used the title of himself. Mithraism entered into many doctrines of the Manichean Gnostic sect of Christianity (which was condemned as heretical), and continued to influence its old rival for over a thousand years (Cumont, Oriental 154)). The Mithraic festival of Epiphany, marking the arrival of sun-priests ("Magi") at the Savior's birthplace, was adopted by the Christian church only as late as 813 A.D. (Brewster 55).
It is possible, even likely, that Christianity emphasized common features that attracted Mithra followers, perhaps the crucifix appealed to those Mithra followers who had crosses already branded on their foreheads. In art, the halo was a well-known depiction of Mithra, a true sun-god, but which also depicts Christ in a similar way. However, differences such as prognostication by star gazing were regarded as heretical by Christians according to Halakaic sanctions.Justin Martyr, in a discussion with the Jewish apologist Trypho, wrote: "'And when those who record the mysteries of Mithras say that he was begotten of a rock, and call the place where those who believe in him are initiated a cave, do I not perceive here that the utterance of Daniel, that a stone without hands was cut out of a great mountain, has been imitated by them, and that they have attempted likewise to imitate the whole of Isaiah's words? For they contrived that the words of righteousness be quoted also by them. . . . And when I hear, Trypho,' said I, 'that Perseus was begotten of a virgin, I understand that the deceiving serpent counterfeited also this.'" (Dialogue with Trypho, LXXVIII). Tertullian also demonized Mithraism as a perverted truth planted by the devil.
Mithraism is the worship of Mithra. The original source of the cult is unknown but argued to be of Persian, Indian or Chinese descent. It has been called an offshoot of Zorastrianism but that is also contested and not much literary evidence of the cult has survived. According to Persian legends, Mithra was born of a rock and a virgin mother called the "Mother of God" and was first attended by shepherds. Mithra was called "the Light of the World." They believed in a heaven and hell and the dualism of good and evil, a final day of judgment, the end of the world as we know it and a general resurrection. Long before Jesus, Dec. 25th was celebrated as the date of Mithra's birth. Mithra was also associated with the sun, and his followers marked Sunday as his day of worship, they called it the Lord's Day. A few of the extra-biblical traditions seem to have found its way to Christianity through Roman Mithraism.
Among the milder ceremonies of the followers of Mithra were baptism in holy water and a partaking of a sacred meal of bread and wine. After passing several ordeals the converts were "reborn" as a new man in Mithra. Though Mithra had ascended into heaven he had promised to return and bring life everlasting to his loyal followers. With all the similarities of Mithra to Christ, there are some that say that Christianity came from Mithraism but that is just nonsense. For a time, the two religions co-existed together and even competed with each other but Christianity survived. At the same time, there could be prophetic questions here in prefiguring the true Son of God that would come later. There had been many Messianic types of Christ in the Jewish scriptures (David and Joseph for example) and God may have been telling Gentiles also, but this is merely conjecture and there are other religions with the same similarities. The Wise men from the east who visited Jesus were said to be Zorastrian. The similarities to New Testament Christianity cease upon a closer examination of Mithraism. They were a secret society, they had graded membership, women were excluded, Mithra is one of many gods and they had a separate priesthood called "Fathers."
THE QUESTION OF CONTINUITY BETWEEN IRANIAN AND ROMAN MITHRAISM
While Cumont’s assumption of strong continuity is vital for dependency theorists, it has fallen out of favor with contemporary scholarship. At the First International Congress of Mithraic Studies, held in 1971 at the University of Manchester, Cumont’s edifice began to crumble. Several Mithraic scholars challenged the notion of continuity suggesting that, "Mithraism had in fact been created as a completely new religion somewhere in the Greco-Roman world and that it had merely adopted the name of the Iranian god to give itself an exotic flavor and an aura of antiquity." One Mithraic expert, challenged Cumont’s conventions as, in Ulansey’s words, "virtually useless." In short, practically everything once thought to be known about Mithraism in the West must be jettisoned. The position that the tauroctony was based on new astronomical discoveries (and not a combination of various Iranian beliefs) became the standard explanation. The tauroctony is understood to be an astronomical code. As of the Fourth International Congress of Mithraic Studies in 1990 these findings still stood. Even Roger Beck who currently endorses what appears to be the most generous position regarding continuity concedes,
"For Mithraism, the days are long gone when one could credibly claim that the continuities from its Persian antecedents are more significant than its re-creation as the ‘Persian’ mysteries of the Graeco-Roman world." Freke and Gandy seem to acknowledge the new model when they write, "Scholars now understand that altar-pieces representing Mithras slaying a bull are actually star maps depicting the ending of the Age of Taurus." However, Freke and Gandy do not recognize how devastating Ulansey’s conclusions are to their argument that Mithraism contributed to Christianity’s early theological development. If we have a new religion which was itself in its formative stages, it is hardly in a position to influence Christianity’s development. This certainly appears to be the case as Beck, a Cumontian in many respects, postulates, "Nothing from the Mysteries is extant from [the first century B.C.] because, quite simply, the Mysteries did not then exist." And if one leading Mithraic scholar is correct in contending that Western Mithraism "did not exist until the mid-second century," the criticism that Christianity borrowed from Mithraism is altogether refuted. In order to prove that Christianity was dependent upon Roman Mithraism, the latter needs to have existed in a systematized form by the early part of the first century and we must be deeply acquainted with it in its earliest structure.
But we cannot know anything of early Roman Mithraic doctrines from early Roman Mithraism itself because, as we have seen, it left us no written records from that time. Attempting to ascertain anything doctrinal of early Roman Mithraism from late-first through second-century iconography is futile. Written material belonging to the third and fourth centuries is inadequate because there is no proof that Mithraism was stable enough to resist the mutations of time. In fact, there is good reason to believe it was not. Because of Ulansey’s conclusions and those of the First International Congress of Mithraic Studies, we cannot look to the East. Ulansey and company have closed the door on hopes that Iranian Mithraism might offer some help in knowing just what Mithraism in the West believed and taught. Roman Mithraism is now what it was then-a mystery. R. L. Gordon is not optimistic about prospects for ever achieving certainty on Roman Mithraic doctrines: There is an abyss where Cumont planned to see solid ground. In some areas of classical scholarship, no doubt, speculation is of positive value: but in Mithraic studies there has been very little else for a very long time. In all probability we can never look forward to a time when it will be possible to present a straightforward description of the levels of symbolism of the central cult scene, of the legitimating myths about various deities, of their mutual relationships and their functions in the economy of the cult. Most of the elementary facts about the belief system are not, and probably will never be, available to us.
Conclusion: It was attractive to the emperors and the nobles, because it taught that kingly authority is granted by Ormazd: it counted Nero, Commodus, Aurelian, Diocletian, Galerius, Licinius, Julian, and many senators among its devotees. Since Mithra was the invincible god of battle, soldiers were his particular favorites; and, with Mithra's his cross branded upon their foreheads, they carried his cult to the farthest limits of the Empire. Since Mithra taught the necessity of stable government, civil servants were among his ardent supporters. And, since he thundered against social injustice and preached the brotherhood of man, the poor, the exploited, and the slaves embraced his worship by myriads, prepared to die for the faith. Mithraism, then, encouraged by the state, spread among the poor, through the army, and everywhere in the civil service. Hundreds of Mithraeums were established along the trading routes of Africa, Italy, Gaul, Spain, Germany, Britain, and the Orient. Slaves from the Middle East, transported to Rome and the provinces, sang hymns to Mithra from the Indian Ocean to points beyond the Pillars of Hercules.
The power of Mithraism lay in the 4 areas of It’s syncretism, Its flexibility, Its universality,Its attractiveness to various classes
The weakness of Mithraism were n 3 areas; Mithraism could not point to an historical godman savior as had prior mystery religions, * Mithraism abandoned the Messianic concept, Instead of making any provision for women, it regarded them, since they were the cause of erotic desire, as the instrument of the Evil One.
Each of the above strengths and weaknesses you now have seen in the prior articles as we chronicled the development of pagan mysteries from nation to nation; some mysteries had some of the above religious tenants, while not all; and others had their own compliment but none included all of the above religious beliefs. Again, let us understand that these pagan mysteries were "flexible" and this ensured their success and spread throughout the peoples.
If Mithraism is a religion of salvation, it must provide a way to achieve salvation. It isn’t much of a risk to say that this was accomplished through the series of initiations represented by the grades. I think then that just like an ancient Roman we can approach the secret of Mithraism by going through the grades of initiation.
The fact is that the parallel between Mithraism and Essenism and apostolic Christianity was actually far more extensive than any of the early Fathers implied:
* All three taught almost identical doctrines concerning heaven and hell
* All three taught almost the identical doctrines concerning the last judgment
* All three taught almost the identical doctrines concerning the immortality of the soul
* All three practiced the same sacraments, those of baptism and the communion of bread and wine
* All three taught Regeneration through the second birth
* All three had the same conception concerning the inter-relationship of their members,—that all were mystical brethren.
* All three believed that its founder was mediator between God and man
* All three believed that through their mediator alone was salvation possible
* All three taught that their mediator would be the final judge of all
* All three taught the doctrine of primitive revelation
* All three emphasized the constant warfare between good and evil
* All three required abstinence and selfcontrol
* All three accorded the highest honor to celibacy
Places to see
* Museum of Dieburg, Germany, displays finds from a mithraeum, including ceramics used in the service.
* The museum of Hanau, Germany displays a reconstruction of a mithraeum.
* The museum at the University of Newcastle displays findings from the three sites along Hadrian's Wall and recreates a mithraeum.
* Church of St. Clement in Rome has a preserved mithraeum with the altarpiece still intact in the excavations under the modern church.
* The Castra Peregrinorum mithreum in Rome, under the basilica of Santo Stefano Rotondo was excavated in the 20th century.
* The city of Martigny (Octodurus), in the Swiss Alps displays a reconstructed Mithraeum [4]
* Ostia Antica, the port of Rome, where the remains of 17 mithraea have been found so far; one of them is substantial.
* The Cincinnati Art Museum displays a relief from a mithraeum in Rome itself depicting Mithras slaying a bull.
* Museum of Ptuj, Slovenia and town Hajdina near Ptuj
Mithraic studies
The First International Congress of Mithraic Studies was held in 1971 at Manchester, England.
Franz Cumont (1868 - 1947) was the main proponent of the theory that Mithraism came originally from Persia. Cumont's student, Maarten J. Vermaseren, author of Mithras, the Secret God (1963), was very active in translating Mithraic inscriptions.
Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, Harvard University Press, 1987. A book, based on his Jackson Lectures at Harvard University in 1982, dispels some misconceptions and stereotypes.
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