Chapter 4: Ancient Religious World Views
INTRODUCTION
This lecture presents a “distilled”
model for ancient polytheistic religions. We are going to examine first the cosmology
or world view of the polytheistic mindset. How did ancient societies generally perceive
the universe to be organized? We will then examine the inherent logic to the ancient
cosmological world view. The fact that this world view was consistent and coherent
demonstrates that its believers gave it a considerable amount of thought and that
their explanations account for aspects of order that they observed in the
universe. Last we will examine the ways in which inhabitants of ancient societies
communicated with their deities. To ancient worshipers the ability to communicate
with deities meant that they could to some degree control them and through them
the natural environment. Hopefully what will come from this discussion is an appreciation
for the manner in which the ancient religious world view not only fulfilled the
needs of past societies but also formed part of the essential fabric to their inhabitants'
daily lives. It is difficult to appreciate how ancient peoples went about organizing
their societies, their communities, or their lives without understanding their spiritual
attitudes.
In a word, ancient peoples were
extremely superstitious. All around them natural phenomena released destructive
energy that they could not understand. All they knew is that these forces were greater
than human kind. Ancient polytheistic world views focused on the causation and/or
the "deterrence" of destructive or frightening natural phenomena. Lacking
scientific understanding prehistoric peoples presumed that any force more powerful
than humankind -- lightening, floods, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc. -- were inherently
divine or the direct manifestations of divine forces. The assignment of names and
personalities to these various manifestations enabled prehistoric peoples to identify
and to classify divinities, and hence to devise a means by which to communicate
with them. To some degree the process resembled the tagging of a crime scene. The more divinities that one could identify, the greater the likelihood
ultimately that each one could be communicated with and appeased. In addition
to identifying forces of Nature, ancient polytheistic religions were also concerned
with the process of the "life cycle," the seemingly perpetual rhythm of
Birth, Death, and Regeneration. These events represent corporeal "rites of
passage" for human kind and evoke the most pious, powerful emotions. The love
that existed between man and woman, the love of mother and father for their children
(and vice versa), the pain at losing a loved one, and the fear of death were all
embodied by belief systems concerned with the “life cycle.” In addition, much of
ancient worship concerned animism, that
is, the use of magical power to gain control over one's food supply. Bound up in
this concept was the recognition that all organic life inherently must consume life
to survive. In essence, one is what one eats. When combined with broader notions
of anthropomorphic divinities that existed and manifested themselves on the earth,
the power to take life acquired vast significance. How did one know, when taking
the life of a deer in the forest, for example, that one was not in fact slaying
the favorite deer of the huntress goddess Artemis? This is precisely what occurred
to Agamemnon, the King of Bronze Age Mycenae, who was forced to sacrifice his daughter
Iphigenia in recompense. To avoid the risk of divine retribution, ancient peoples
intrinsically recognized the sacred character of life by offering to share the fruits
of the hunt with the gods through sacrifice. Despite its complementary tendencies
toward the ecstatic and the macabre, sacrifice implicitly recognized the sacredness
of all life and the fine line that existed between corporeal existence and nothingness.
I. POLYTHEISTIC COSMOLOGY. HOW DID THE ANCIENTS
VIEW THE ORGANIZATION OF THE SPIRITUAL UNIVERSE?
Polytheism means the belief in
the existence of many gods. There were anthropomorphic and non anthropomorphic deities
in most ancient cosmologies. As noted above, most ancient societies displayed a
bewildering tendency to incorporate more gods, new gods, foreign gods, into their
cosmologies as a means to obtain the benefit of new and “untapped” divine resources.
When coming in contact with foreign cultures it was commonplace to search for
recognizable attributes of one’s own deities in the newly encountered deities
of foreigners. This resulted in syncretism -- the merging of religious beliefs across
cultures. Traveling abroad the Greeks associated Melkaart
with Zeus, Astarte with Aphrodite, and Cybele with Artemis. The Libyan desert oracle consulted by the Macedonian king Alexander the
Great and known to the Greek world as the oracle of “Zeus Ammon” furnishes a
famous example of syncretism.
Typically, the ancient universe
was perceived as existing in three planes – the arc of the heaven above, the flat
land surface of the earth in the middle, and the arc of the underworld below.
The deities who inhabited the heavens were the Sky Gods, or the Olympic deities.
These deities were typically associated with celestial bodies, the sun, the moon,
stars, etc., though Zeus, the father of the gods in Mediterranean cosmology was
mostly personified as the storm god. The sky gods controlled the changes of day
and night and the seasons; they could also induce storms, floods, drought, snow,
hail, and wind. These abilities inevitably gave them power over human affairs.
Their ability to peer down on humans from the heavens also enabled them to observe
and thus to witness good and bad behavior. Where the fulfillment of sacred
oaths were concerned, the Olympic deities enjoyed the capacity to determine “equity,”
that is, the recognition that a mortal could be prevented from fulfilling a vow
by circumstances beyond his or her control. The sky gods tended to recognize the
untoward outcome of an obligation, not merely its original terms. Generally, sky
gods gave good things to human kind and were beseeched with promises and hope.
As opposed to the Olympic
deities of the heavens, Earth Gods, also known as Chthonic deities,
represented the dark, primordial forces of the earth. They included the
widespread belief in the Mother Goddess– epitomized by deities such as Isis, Demeter
and Persephone, and Inanna (Ishtar). The underworld
was also perceived as the realm of the male god Hades or Pluto, the underworld
carnation of Zeus. Hades was sometimes identified as Zeus’ brother, sometimes
identified as Zeus’ own “mirror image,” Zeus
Chthonios. Since earth gods dwelled below the surface
of the earth where everything was dark, they were perceived as blind and spiteful,
having to take their cue from messages emanating from the Sky Gods. As a result
they tended to follow the “letter of the law.” If a mortal failed to abide by a
sacred agreement, for example, earth gods were obligated to see to the
transgressor’s punishment without regard for equity. Most of all, Chthonic deities controlled the “life cycle.” Since all living
things ultimately arose from the earth at birth and returned to the earth in death,
the earth gods were presumed to direct this process. Chthonic
deities such as Hades received the spirits of all deceased humans and was
described by poets as “rich in souls.” Earth gods were generally feared,
therefore. Since their control of the life cycle was absolute, human dealings
with them were unavoidable. The best one could hope was to placate the Chthonic deities through sacrifice and veneration and thereby
delay the inevitability of one’s own demise or that of a loved one.
Numina, non-anthropomorphic deities, or spirit forces, were another divine
element that had to be placated. Hestia or Vesta, the
essence of fire, was goddess of hearth. Human mastery of fire dated back some
300,000 years. In fact, fire was the first natural energy to be mastered by
human kind. The maintenance of the eternal flame of an ancient community such
as Rome was viewed as a sacred responsibility, not to mention a communal
necessity. The Romans appointed a college of priestesses, the Vestal Virgins,
to watch over the eternal flame of the city. They were chosen at puberty from
leading aristocratic families and remained virgin devotees of the goddess for the
30 year duration. They lived in a cloistered villa beside the temple and
faithfully maintained the cult. They enjoyed high prestige in the community,
attended numerous state functions, and otherwise enjoyed privileged status even
for Roman aristocratic females. Due to their elevated status most Vestal
Virgins chose to remain with the cult when their term of duty expired. However,
whenever bad portents were received by the state, it was customary for the religious
authorities to investigate the recent behavior of the Vestal Virgins to insure
that none had violated the sanctity of their office. Vestal Virgins convicted
of immodest activities were executed through live inhumation. Other numina included the Lares
and the Penates, friendly spirit forces who warded over the doorsill
, the pantry of the household, and the crossroads of farming communities.
Many of these spirit forces or energies appear, in fact, to have been closely
linked to agricultural society (molds and fungi that could damage crops, for example)
and possibly originated their. Their existence at the surface plain of the
earth seems certain.
In general one could define polytheistic
deities of antiquity as superhuman entities displaying both the best and worst attributes
of human nature. Everything that humans did the gods seemingly did to an
extreme. Just as humans became angry, the gods became angry to an extreme; as humans
felt passion, the gods’ passion was uncontrollable. Consider the example of Zeus
and Hera, the former of which would disguise himself in
animal form to have sex with beautiful nymphs and maidens. He would then boast about
his conquests in the presence of his jealous wife Hera, who would then wreak her
vengeance on the unwitting victim. It is difficult to conceive of Zeus, the fornicating,
inebriated, mercurially angry god as the discriminating judge of all human actions
and the guardian of sacred oaths. Ancient Greco-Roman societies perceived of him
in just such a contradictory manner. Herein lay one of the defining distinctions
between Polytheistic and Monotheistic world views. Polytheistic world views attempt
to explain the random character of natural phenomena. Put simply, “stuff happens.”
There is nothing altogether moral or immoral about an earthquake, a flood, or a
volcanic eruption. Natural phenomena were inherently violent, destructive, and
unpredictable. Accordingly, they were neither moral nor immoral, but “amoral.” When there is no rhyme or reason to why things
happen; there is only chaos, and as modern chaos theory has demonstrated
even chaos is randomly predictable. Monotheism insists rather that things happen
for a reason, that there is an inherent logic to the universe. Gradually
identified universal truths, such as mathematical theorems and the predictable movement
of the stars, demonstrated that the universe contained irrefutable “particles”
of order. Where there is order, there must be law or a set of guiding principles
to the universe. Law, in turn, implies that there is a right way and a wrong way
to do things. In other words, life has purpose. Order implies the existence of
a reasoning intellect responsible for the architecture of the universe. In
other words, there is a god. In short, polythiestic
world views account for the random character of natural phenomena,
monotheistic ones demonstrate its inherent order. The contrast is ultimately
that visible.
To contemplate the
possibility that the universe lacked controlling deities or that if they did
exist, they ceased to concern themselves with human activity ages ago was to
commit the crime of hubris. Hubris was a loaded term that entailed a range of meanings.
Principally it referred to human arrogance, the act of putting oneself at the level
of the gods, to deny their existence or to say they had no power over one. To engage
in hubris was to invite divine retribution, and since the gods were immortal they
did not need to punish a human in a predictable manner. The gods enjoyed a different
sense of time and place; simply killing the transgressor would teach him nothing.
For greater effect they could choose to punish the guilty party's loved ones, his
village, or his entire society through the introduction of plague and pestilence.
In essence, the act of hubris put the entire society at risk and was therefore punishable
by death. Accused in 399 BC of corrupting the youth and denying the existence
of the gods, Socrates ultimately ran afoul this logic and paid for it with his
life. A sensible person feared the gods and scrupulously followed their prescriptions.
Careful attention to the wishes of the gods ensured the maintenance of order, the
fecundity of nature, and the maintenance of life. The fear of the unknown was one
way by which religious authorities controlled but also imposed conformity on their
societies.
II. Principle Means of Communication with Ancient
Deities: Ritual, Sacrifice, and Divination
One can successfully distill
the practice of communicating with divinities into three principal parts: Ritual, Sacrifice,
and Divination. Ritual was the invocation of the gods through magical
prayers and chants. If properly invoked a god could be compelled against his or
her will. Ritual consisted of various forms of prayers, chants, oaths, and curses
(black magic). The success of a given ritual gave it timeless legitimacy, not to
be deviated from. Ritual was accordingly highly formulaic, entrusted with
divine importance and all but frozen in time. Ritual inherently imposed inalterable
norms on worshipers. The ritualistic component to religion renders it one of
the most conservative attributes of any human culture. Sacrifice was the gift or offering made to a god in exchange for which
humans could ask a favor. Sacrifice implied that humans potentially enjoyed power
over the gods. The ancient Sumerians asserted
that the gods created humans to feed and to serve them. The gods did not necessarily
need to eat, but they longed for the recollection of the pleasure of eating. In
much the same manner the gods desired the vicarious experience of all the corporeal
pleasures of human life – eating, drinking, sexual relations, and sleep. These were
the only genuine proofs of mortal existence, and since mortality was fleeting it
possessed value to humans and gods alike. Accordingly, the control of corporeal
pleasures gave humans a handle over their gods. The logic of this is explained by
the assigned reading in the Gilgamesh epic, where Noah or Utnapushtim conducted his sacrifice following the flood,
(lines 150-165). As the text notes, “the gods smelled the sweet savor, the gods
crowded like flies around the sacrifice.”
Human dealings with the gods were
viewed in terms of a contractual relationship. The Latin vow, do ut des (I give
to you so that you might give me in return), expressed this succinctly. [footnote For discussion of this, see the works of Walter Burkert, Homo Necans, and Greek Religion]
Sacrifice was divided into two types, blood and non-blood sacrifices. Although
non blood sacrifices such as the dedication of votive objects and libations
into the ground were probably more commonplace, blood sacrifices of animals
such as chicken, sheep, goats, cows and bulls arrest our attention. Sacrifices represented
social interaction at a number of levels. First and foremost they functioned as
a Feast (adding protein to one’s diet) typically shared among a collective
since the victim needed to be consumed all at once. By cooking the inedible
portions over a fire to
create a sooty smoke column visible in the heavens, they represented
the sharing of life with a deity (communion). The macabre experience of
witnessing the shedding of blood convinced participants of the divine power of
the sacrificial action, that is, the human capacity to take life. And by
focusing on the otherworldly aspect of the moment, frequently enhanced through
consumption of wine or other stimulants, they exposed the participants to an ecstatic
experience shared in a collective. In Classical World Civilizations human sacrifice
did occur on occasion, but it was typically viewed as distasteful and a last resort
to summon the attention of the gods.
Divination was the belief that the gods sent signs predicting the future and that
these signs could be interpreted by skilled professionals. This is typically what
the priest or devotee requested, and what the god returned, invoked or uninvoked. Invoked signs implied that the gods could be summoned
magically or even compelled to give answers to human prayers
and requests. Uninvoked signs were natural phenomena
sent by the gods uninvited, such as storms with damaging hail and lightening or
births of unnaturally deformed animals. The chief purpose of invoking the gods
through ritual and sacrifice was to summon the attention of a deity momentarily
in order to place before it a proposed course of action. All official “state
sponsored” activities required due consultation of the gods. Divination took many
forms: astrology (observing the sky for natural phenomena), heptascopy (the examination of
the livers of sacrificial victims), avail observances, and even the hypnotic
utterances of ecstatic priests and priestesses. Typically it would occur in a precinct
referred to in Latin as a templum, a ritually purified area
for purposes of divination. In Rome
before a public voting assembly could be convened, the priestly college of the
augurs would monitor a given quadrant of the night sky for the “flight of the
birds.” Depending on the omens that were observed (positive vs. negative types
of birds) an assembly either would or would not occur. Military commanders
typically consulted the shape of the livers of sacrificial victims before
committing their forces to battle. With his navy arrayed in battle formation, a
Roman admiral had to await the outcome of the feeding of sacred chickens, kept
in a cage on the deck of his flagship. If they ate with gusto, that was a
positive sign and a naval battle would ensue. If they hesitated and looked to
the heavens this was a bad sign and the admiral was religiously obligated to
refrain from committing his warships to a divinely unsanctioned action. No public
activity could occur without due invocation of the gods and nothing was done without
their consent. Religious authority, in other words, was directly translatable
into legal, military, political or judicial power.
It is important to recognize that
today’s worst superstitious attitudes represented officially sanctioned policy in
the past. Days were viewed as Fas or Nefas (divinely
sanctioned or unsanctioned). Any untoward occurrence could be interpreted as an
omen. Stepping on a crack in the sidewalk, breaking mirrors,
walking under ladders, avoiding the path of a black cat pale in comparison to
the texture of superstitious lore sustained in antiquity. In 42 BC, Marcus
Brutus’ army killed an African (black) man who happened to cross its path on
the road to Philippi. What equally needs to be stressed is the inseparable character
of religious and secular life in most ancient civilizations. On any given day, sacrifices
of family cults would occur in each and every household, sacrifices would occur
in civic centers before they could be “opened for business,” and no army would commit
to battle short of an appropriate sign from the gods. Religious activity formed,
therefore, a regular, permanent background to social activity and was so commonplace
that it was taken for granted by ancient writers and their audiences. Ancient writers
in essence took it for granted that their readers were fully cognizant of this
fact, thus, offering little
explanation.
The standard view of after death
was fairly grim: The souls of departed humans traveled to the underworld kingdom
of Hades where they existed for eternity as shades. Despite the dismal
character of this ghost-like existence in the dark sphere of the underworld,
people believed that human spirits emitted an energy force like other spirit
forces that could be cultivated by the living through libations. Libations of
wine and oil poured into the earth were believed to infuse the remains of the
departed with substances resembling blood to remind the spirits, however
briefly, of the ineffable qualities of life. Thus, by revering the dead one gained
the potential assistance of their spiritual energy, which like other energies could
be channeled toward negative as well as positive ends. Reverence of the dead
helped to maintain the link between the living and the deceased in the wider
cycle of life.
[sidebar drawing of two
figures on an Attic white ground lekythos]
Within this larger “framework”
of afterlife belief existed numerous religious associations
more correctly identified as “cults.” The identification of a cult, as opposed
to a religion, rests with the closed character of its membership, and its
tendency to focus attention on a particular divinity. At least three types of
cults existed in the ancient world: ancestor cults, mystery cults, and hero cults.
From the perspective of
social status, ancestor cults were
the most notable of the three. Extended families of respectable, property
holding citizens in ancient communities tended to claim and/or recognize
descent from a common ancestor, usually a hero descended from the gods.
Land-holding families could point to the cemetery plots on their estates as
proof of the duration of their lineage. The collective energy of so many
ancestors, when properly revered, offered enormous potential of assistance in
the spirit world. Each family had its own unique cultic rituals and observances
that were handed down from father to son as the head of each presiding generation
in the household. The chief duty of the eldest male in such a context was to
produce a male heir who would maintain the cult of the dead after he himself
had passed into the afterworld. Otherwise, the cult observances would come to a
close, and he would be responsible for irreparably disrupting the continuum that
had connected the living and the dead since time in memoriam. In ancestor cults
the focus was always on male lineage because adult females would marry into the
households of other families, thus abandoning their own cults in favor of those
of their husbands. Ancestor cults tended to focus on the continuum of life, therefore,
the fact that all humans descended from ancestors who had managed to avoid extinction
and who were available to assist the living through proper maintenance of the
family cult and its principle assets, the remains of the ancestors themselves. In
archaic societies the presence of family burial plots rendered land inalienable
because of the associated religious taboo.
Proof of one’s descent from
heroic lineage typically identified someone as an aristocrat. It did not hurt,
of course, that aristocrats also claimed possession to the largest and most
productive portions of a community’s arable land, and it was always a good
question which came first, aristocratic descent or large landholdings. The very
least an aristocrat could claim was that his family had occupied a particular estate
for as long as the community itself could remember. The very notion of aristocratic descent distinguishes
itself from modern concepts of “class identification” because it was
intrinsically based on non-economic criteria such as “blue bloodedness.” Since
descent from the gods furnished the basis for nobility, aristocratic elders
tended to stand as the chief priests of the gods in question. Even when family
cults were incorporated by state authorities into the urban collective,
it was usually conditioned on the requirement that the priests of the newly
established “state” cult would be selected from that particular family. The
distinction of claiming descent from the gods meant that aristocrats were the
humans most capable of communicating with them. Why rely on someone whose
connection was more remote? This notion conferred on aristocrats intrinsic
leadership responsibilities. As we have seen, the religious authority of
aristocratic leaders was directly translatable into law.
Ancestor cults and descent
from the gods, thus, furnished the basis for aristocratic control of state religion.
Participation in the public cults of a state or community typically required
aristocratic status. The remainder of the community assumed the more passive role
of being allowed to observe aristocrats as they conducted the rites associated
with preserving the safety of the community. Lesser people could of course
approach the gods on their own, but it was tacitly understood that the gods
would listen to the prayers of those who were more directly related to them
(aristocrats) and could afford the most elaborate sacrifices (the wealthy). Those
seeking a more personal experience with the divine, particularly those who by
force of circumstance (enslavement, migration, or flight) had become cut adrift
from their lineage homes, tended to turn to other forms of cultic experience
such as mystery and hero cults.
Mystery cults
focused on a more intimate personal experience with deity who according to
tradition died and was reborn.. These included Dionysus,
Isis/Osiris, Demeter and Persephone, and Attis/Adonis.
Members of mystery cults did not necessarily deny the existence of other gods;
rather, by entering into the cult they vowed to commit their energies to the
veneration of a particular god above all others. All mystery cults tended to
exhibit the same attributes, including exclusivity (there was a clear
distinction between members of a cult and those without), rites of initiation
(to enter a cult all members had to undergo secret rites that revealed the true
essence of the deity), ecstatic experience (various means - wine, macabre
sacrifices, orgies - were used to heightened the consciousness of cult members and
to convince them of the divine power of the god), communion with a deity (in
this instance, belief in a one-to-one relationship with the god as its devotee),
democratic recruitment (membership was frequently status-blind with slaves and
freedmen welcome to membership; women were frequently listed as chief
priestesses), and the possibility of afterlife (since the beliefs of the cults
remained secret the precise nature of a member’s afterlife expectations remain
unrevealed; at the very least it was believed that the power of this particular
deity would make the member’s experience of the afterlife somehow more
pleasurable that otherwise). The widespread popularity of mystery cults such as
those of Dionysus, Isis-Serapis or the Magna Mater
(Cybele) during the Roman empire testify to the void
they filled in the lives of everyday people seeking a greater sense of purpose
to their otherwise ordinary lives. As opposed to the cold, detached character
of the official cults maintained by local aristocracies, these cults offered a
more intimate and meaningful religious experience to its members. Members of cults
typically formed closed community usually with a central religious focus. Habitual
meetings enabled members to develop closer personal bonds used to celebrate the
pivotal rites of passage of the human experience, births (and birthdays),
weddings, and funerals. Elderly members could take comfort in the notion that
their remains would receive proper rites after their departure. In fact, the
main purpose of most local cults was to function as burial associations and
members had to pay dues to insure their proper attention in the afterlife. The
chief purpose of a cult ultimately appears to have been to enable those without
family networks (isolated slaves, freed persons, orphans and widows) to forge
surrogate families to ensure their protection in the afterworld.
Hero cults are slightly
different from mystery cults in that the object of devotion was essentially a
mortal who performed such superhuman achievements on earth that he was awarded
divine status on his demise. The best example of this was the hero-god Herakles (Hercules). Destined by Zeus to be his greatest progeny
he was cheated of his rightful place in Olympic pantheon by jealous Hera and was
required to complete a list of superhuman “labors” in order to earn it. Each of
his labors in some way was associated with the conquest and overcoming of death.
In the process he rid the world of primordial monsters, taught humans the
science of agriculture, and showed them the proper manner to worship his divine
father Zeus. Tragically, in the end Herakles attained
his rightful place in the heavens and demonstrated to everyday mortals that it
was possible to defeat one’s allotted fate and obtain a better outcome in life.
One simply had to believe in the power of Herakles
and faithfully tithe a portion of one’s earnings to his cult. The tradition of the tithe and other aspects of the cult point to a
syncretic origin in this hero cult with the Phoenician cult of Melkaart of Tyre. In any
event, Herakles became the “patron saint” of all
those embarking on life-threatening missions, including merchants, sailors,
warriors, and women in childbirth. He offered hope of beating one’s allotted
fate in life to all those who through no fault of their own found themselves in
a disadvantaged state and desired more. To attain the divine status of hero
required superhuman accomplishments. The two most notable examples in this
regard remain Alexander the Great, the King of Macedonia (336-323 BC) and the
Roman dictator, Julius Caesar (101-44 BC). Alexander conquered most of the
known world from Greece all the way to India without ever losing a battle.
Julius Caesar conquered ancient Gaul and then defeated all his rivals in a long
and bloody Civil War (49-45 BC) only to be assassinated by other political
rivals on the Ides of March 44 BC. On the night of his funeral a comet appeared
in the sky removing any doubt among the devout that his soul had ascended to
the heavens. An altar was erected on the site of his cremation that was widely
used by ordinary Romans for oath observances. it is
worth noting that both heroes were high born, both claimed descent from the
gods, and enjoyed optimum positions and every possible advantage with which to
attempt superhuman accomplishments in the first place. Be that as it may, each
was believed to have attained divine status, laying the foundation for ruler cults
for their descendants and reassuring the devout that the possibility of
obtaining divine afterlife was real.
[
– a brief description of the
character of the Sumerian pantheon of gods needed here.
Sumerian gods:
Anu - sky god (Uruk)
Enlil (Marduk, Zeus) air god
(Nippur)
Inanna (Ishtar, Aphrodite) - love and fertility
Enki (EA) earth and water, life giving (Eridu)
Utu (Shamash) - Justice
Nanna (Sin) - mood goddess (UR)
Hadad - storm god
In conclusion it remains essential
for modern readers of ancient texts of all kinds -- the Old Testament, Demosthenes
Speeches, Plutarch's lives, to inform themselves of the inherent organization and
logic of pagan religious world views and to bear these in mind. Otherwise, much
of what they have to relate will seem unintelligible, imperceptible, and
largely misunderstood. Given the centrality of religious activity to ancient social
life, this textbook devotes considerable attention to the matter as it
addresses various significant civilizations. The importance of ancient religious
activity is perhaps the single greatest facet of past civilizations that has become
lost on students today. To understand the behavior of ancient societies we need
to bear in mind this mindset.