Garrison Keillor has said “Anyone who thinks sitting in church can make you a Christian must also think that sitting in a garage can make you a car.” Religion seems to be a big part of our world, religion is a global thing and people seem to forget that. knowing a religion is good but if you also open yourself up to others then you can see different point of views. and one of the very less known is the Greek religion
The Greek religion was formed from the mycenaean religion during the bronze age in 3300 - 1200 BC. The Greeks named their religion Hellenism and it started before 6000 BC (with some help from the mycenaean religion). For the Greeks Hellenism was the base of their lives they often said a quick prayer before doing something important or making an important choice. Hellenism is a variety of religions of Ancient Greece. The Greeks symbol was two snakes wrapping around a pole with wings near the top. Most folktales told in hellenism tie to how things are today.
Hellenism is a polytheistic religion with exactly 13 major gods and goddesses and many more smaller gods or demigods. The Greeks thought of their gods rather like themselves and that they spoke to to ordinary people through priest and priestesses. The Greeks had temples built to be homes for the spirits of the gods and goddesses, no ordinary people could go in there for worship. The Greeks had a variety of beliefs for the afterlife from a shadowy existence in the underworld, to a paradise - like afterlife (mainly in mystery religions), to no afterlife at all. The writings of the Greeks were the poems by homer and hesiod and the plays by euripides sophocles and others. The Greeks belief of human life was subject to the whim of the gods and to fate these can be con...
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...leaves of whitethorn and smeared their door with tar to protect themselves from evil.
There are almost no follower anymore it is ancient to extinct, but people are trying to revive since 1990. There are as many as 2,000 followers to the hellenic tradition in greece, with an additional;1000,00 who are “interested” but not committed. Its is not a widespread religion like buddhism and christianity but its one that even today is apart of our society. The stories of the gods are ones we say in modern society, the story of “King Midas” is an example.
With all this said it seems that the greek religion was and is a strong religion. They held dedication and praise to their gods and learn to make it apart of there lives. With so much they did and learned is an amazing thing. And by learning a little more about another religion I hope you learn to open up to more of them.
Everyone has heard the stories of the Greek gods and goddesses. Almost all people of today know that the earth is a sphere that is surrounded by an atmosphere. The Greek believed that the earth was flat that was surrounded by a dome that contained the sky’s night and day. These myths of the earth were carried on through families and civilizations until every Greek believed the same. They not only believed the same physically but they also all believed the same spiritually. They believed in the gods, goddesses, and titans. The Greeks had their own way of worship. Christians would leave an offering to the church to be used for God. The Greeks also left their offering for their gods. They would take their most divine items and leave them for the
Religion reinforces the beliefs of individuals within a society. Additionally, religion has played a vital role in society since it influenced the way they lived and the rituals they may or may not have practiced. Different regions of the world during ancient time held a distinct set of beliefs, each based on different or similar principals. Deriving from the polytheistic set of beliefs, monotheism came in place of many Gods, holding just one god accountable for the creation and the existence of mankind. Christianity and Buddhism share similarities and differences, but most importantly the impact that each had on the culture is what is mostly referred to.
The religion of this culture group involved many gods. Unlike the present-day United States of America where the running of the country depends on the separation of church and state, religion, including the pleasing of the gods, heavily influenced the government of the ancient Greeks. Of all the gods they had, the most important gods of this religion emerged
"Look death in the face with joyful hope, and consider this a lasting truth: the righteous man has nothing to fear, neither in life, nor in death, and the Gods will not forsake him."-Socrates, a Greek philosopher and contemplative thinker. The above quote is the basis for Greek belief, demonstrating the respectable Greek citizen. It displays courage and obedience for the Gods in which the Greek world revolved around. Greeks had many traditions and ways of life. Greek cosmos played an important role in Greek life including the God's influence and personality, Greek military ideas, philosophers, and Greek poetry.
Many people would blatantly state that the importance of the gods in Greek society derives from the fact that Gods in any society are usually used to explain phenomenon that people cannot logically comprehend, but in ancient Greece gods were actually entities that took part in the workings of society itself. Even simple aspects of day-to-day life such as sex and disputes between mortals were supposedly influenced by godly workings. Unlike modern religions such as Catholicism, Buddhism, and Hinduism, where an omnipotent force supposedly controls the workings of the world, a hierarchy of Gods characterized religion in ancient Greece. Working as one big family, which they actually were, each one of the Greek gods governed a certain aspect of the world in a way that usually reflected their own humanlike personalities. These unique personalities also contained many human flaws such as envy and greed, and were where the Greek God’s importance lay. Greek religion was more concentrated on the way an individual dealt with situations that popped up in the world around him than on understanding the world itself. In other words the Greeks were more interested in the workings of the mind than in the workings of the environment around them.
There are many topics to be explored in Ancient Greek mythology. This unique polytheistic religion was based upon myth about anthropomorphic gods and goddesses. It impacted every facet of Grecian life from law and ritual to culture and art. The individual as well as society both influenced the characteristics of the religion and were influenced by the religion itself.
Ancient Greek religion was a polytheistic religion that believed in many gods and goddesses. To Greeks, these gods and goddesses would be able to control everything. Each god or goddess had his or her own distinct personality and territory. “Greek myths explained the origins of the gods and their individual relations with mankind” (Hemingway). Unlike current religions, like Christianity and Judaism, Greek gods were not known for being moral or being truly good or evil. Many of the Greek gods and goddesses were disorganized and self-contradicting. Although this was apparent to the Greeks, the Greeks believed that their religion was to brighten their own lives, rather than give them godlike guidance. The best example of a self-contradicting Greek god is Zeus – father of all gods and humans (Cunningham and Reich 32-33).
...uing the belief in various gods and goddesses. After the expansion of Rome they started developing other forms of deities based on Greek culture, basically meaning “Greco-Roman” religion. Although many religious cults that were connected to Rome including Greece were often accepted, many were banished.
The idea of gods and goddesses began as far back as the ancient Egyptians, but the ancient Greeks were the first group to form a religion based on gods and goddesses. They believed that the gods and goddesses were not different from humans. Some of the few ways humans were different from gods were that the gods were stronger and lived forever. Since the Greeks believe in many gods, they are Polytheists.
The ancient Greeks practiced a religion that was in effect, a building block to many ensuing pagan religions. This religion revolved around their reverence to the gods. Essentially, the Greeks worshipped numerous gods, making their religion polytheistic. They believed that exercising the opportunity to choose between a wide array of gods to worship offered them a great sense of freedom that they treasured. After all, the Greeks were known for their intellectual distinction of which their means of worship played a huge part. Each city-state, or polis, thus had an affiliated god who protected and guided its residents. Within a given polis, the belief in common gods unified the people. Ultimately, the Greeks yearned for this unity and order in the universe, which is a characteristic that is not unlike that of people today. It might seem contradictory that they believed in many gods and sought organization at the same time, for larger numbers are inherently unstable. But, to the god-fearing Greeks, each god represented a different facet of life that together upheld an organized universe if each of these gods was properly appeased. To satisfy these gods, the Greeks participated in activities such as prayer and sacrifice and erected divine temples and centers for oracles in honor of specific gods. There is evidence of this institutionalization early on in the reign of the Olympian gods, thus forming the Olympian religion.
The Greek civilization was incredibly sophisticated, and they highly developed their government, economy, and philosophy. As advanced as their cult...
Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece both believed in many gods and goddesses, known as Polytheistic religion.1 In Ancient Egypt early practices of religion began in different villages who worshiped their own gods, adapting animal like symbols such as crocodiles, scarab beetle, and bull. As time progressed Ancient Egypt believed in many gods and goddesses and the most significant ones included Amon-Ra, originally the sky god, and sun god combined. Egypt also worshipped Osiris, the god of the afterlife who judged people after death, and Isis the goddess of royal throne who was the protector of her husband Osiris. Unlike the Egyptians, Greeks worshipped all their gods and goddesses. Greeks worshipped Zues the ruler of all gods and goddess who resided and ruled on Mount Olympus. They worshipped Athena the goddess of wisdom and war, which Athens one of the central polis was named after. Unlike Egyptian deities, Greek gods and goddesses w...
In Ancient Greece, the lives of the multi-religious yet cognitive people were structured accordingly to their religious practices. Althought there was no dominant set of religious beliefs or dieties, the Greeks believed in what rather seems to be a pantheon of gods all similar in each definitive culture that seem to come together and reign supreme as the polytheistic religion of the Greek people. These beliefs came about from cultural diffusion between different religions and are reflected majorly in Roman polytheistic beliefs which transpired into the beliefs of many other cultures. It is believed that the Ancient Greek religion was comprised of ideologies from philosphers such as Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates, and that it became significant through the poetry of the epic writer Homer. The Greek beliefs influenced the cultures and minds of people in many city states throughout Ancient Greece especially Athens, Sparta, and the Minoan civilization and served as a foundation for the culture of these civilizations.
... to believe in the Gods/Goddesses and that they had complete control over every part of their lives. The stories that the children grew up with made them fearful of the divinities and going against them was very scary. The stories were guides on how live for instance don’t be greedy, stand by your family, respect the gods and lots more. In the Greek culture it was very important to live by these moral codes. From a very early time the people were almost “brainwashed” by their own religion to follow the “rules” or else terrible things would happen. Even though their city was so progressive and prosperous they were held back because of their religion. Instead of learning about science it was easier to just assume a mightier power was controlling the weather or harvest. They could never think for themselves because they constantly relied on the Gods to think for them.
Both the Greek and the Roman civilization were polytheistic. Greeks were a very religious people. In Greece each city-state had a patron god or goddess that protected their city. Greeks believed that their Gods appeared in human form but had superhuman strength and ageless beauty. Many of the Gods are depicted on various painted scenes on vases, and stone, terracotta and bronze sculptures by themselves or in mythological scenes interacting with humans and lesser Gods (Realign and Death). Rome’s Gods and Goddesses were from a blend of a variety of cultures including Greece. They too believed the gods were actively involved in their everyday life, so much so that they held sacred meals for their Gods during religious festivals in which the invitations were sent in the God’s name and a place was set for them at the table. The oldest male in the family preformed religious rituals for the whole household to the family God, while the state employed priests and Priestesses to worship at the temple. Though they could not predict the future the priests were the one who could read signs to see if the Gods were happy or angry with the people. In the first century a new religion was born in the Rome that spread all throughout the empire and corners of the world, Christianity (Life in