Research Catalog
Romanising oriental Gods : myth, salvation, and ethics in the cults of Cybele, Isis, and Mithras / by Jaime Alvar ; translator and editor, Richard Gordon.
- Title
- Romanising oriental Gods : myth, salvation, and ethics in the cults of Cybele, Isis, and Mithras / by Jaime Alvar ; translator and editor, Richard Gordon.
- Author
- Alvar Ezquerra, Jaime
- Publication
- Leiden ; Boston : Brill, 2008.
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| Status | Format | Access | Call Number | Item Location |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Text | Request in advance | BL820.C8 A48 2008 | Off-site |
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Details
- Additional Authors
- Gordon, R. L. (Richard Lindsay)
- Description
- xx, 486 p. : ill.; 25 cm.
- Summary
- "The traditional grand narrative correlating the decline of Graeco-Roman religion with the rise of Christianity has been under pressure for three decades. This book argues that the alternative accounts now emerging significantly underestimate the role of three major cults, of Cybele and Attis, Isis and Serapis, and Mithras. Although their differences are plain, these cults present sufficient common features to justify their being taken typologically as a group. All were selective adaptations of much older cults of the Fertile Crescent. It was their relative sophistication, their combination of the imaginative power of unfamiliar myth with distinctive ritual performance and ethical seriousness, that enabled them both to focus and to articulate a sense of the autonomy of religion from the socio-political order, a sense they shared with Early Christianity. The notion of 'mystery' was central to their ability to navigate the Weberian shift from ritualist to ethical salvation."--BOOK JACKET.
- Series Statement
- Religions in the Graeco-Roman world, 0927-7633 ; v. 165
- Uniform Title
- Religions in the Graeco-Roman world v. 165.
- Subject
- Note
- Based on the author's earlier work in Spanish: Los misterios. Barcelona: Critica, c2001.
- "This is emphatically a version and not a literal translation. Moreover, I have suggested many changes to the argument, called attention to new work, advised omissions, and generally intervened in the text so as to fit the work for a new academic audience"--P. [xi].
- Bibliography (note)
- Includes bibliographical references (p. [423]-444) and indexes.
- Processing Action (note)
- committed to retain
- Contents
- Ch. 1. Religion, Cult and Mystery -- Ch. 2. Systems of Belief -- Ch. 3. Systems of Value -- Ch. 4. Ritual Systems -- Ch. 5. Oriental Cults and Christianity.
- ISBN
- 9789004132931 (hardback : alk. paper)
- 9004132937 (hardback : alk. paper)
- LCCN
- ^^2008015353
- OCLC
- 225532638
- SCSB-12652820
- Owning Institutions
- Harvard Library