Polytheism

 

When we are looking at the concept of polytheism through the god of Hades, there isn't any which way to tackle the aspect of him being a "minor" god so to speak. Polytheism is the worship of many gods, the closest religion we have towards that today is the religion of Hinduism. Which is the only polytheism religion still surviving? We could question that within looking at the aspects of Christianity with the worships of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. Christianity is a monotheistic religion as Christians only worship one god, but yet we constantly see images or statue of Jesus and Virgin Mary. Many Christians worship not only God but Jesus and the Virgin Mary as well. With this said does this mean that the Christian religion just as the ancient Greek religion could be considered as a religion that is a polytheistic. As Rea defends the idea that Christianity has changed more into a Polytheistic religion ‘Christians should learn to be content regarding themselves as in some sense polytheists.’ As Rea remarks that Christians need to view their religions differently from the set belief of their own ideals of a one soul God religion. As the dynamics of their religion has changed over time to a religion that is more based towards polytheism. (http://www3.nd.edu/~mrea/papers/Polytheism.pdf : Last accessed 24/03/2013)

There is worship of other deities in the religion of Christianity even though the religion entail that there is only one God. The Greeks however as we know had multiple gods that they worshiped on a daily basis as which we believe from the temples and the mass sacrificing that we read about in texts and the literature of the time.  As mentioned in my previous post of how to view the issue when dealing with Greek religion Zaidmans reference to “mental adjustment” of our society that we need to take when dealing with the aspects of religion like Christianity. When we look at this model through the eyes of Hades, we start to see a gap in the worship of the lord of the underworld. Hades himself can be seen as a personification, he himself is the underworld and the underworld is him. So does this make him a god that they would technically worship? Would the Ancient Greeks have made sacrifices to him if today we just view him as a personification of the underworld? Burket comments ‘As if a polytheistic religion were the sum of many individual religions; one does in fact speak at times of a Zeus religion, an Apollo religion and a Dionysus religion.’(Burket, 1985:216) Burket here comments on polytheism as a religion as the gods being worshipped as a whole not as individuals. Therefore Hades would in this case in a Greek polytheistic society been worship as a god, which included him into this worshiping ritual, even though he could have been classed as a personification.

Another theory is that Hades is actually Zeus but Zeus himself has been divided so he can rule both the heavens and the underworld. As Burket comments upon this ‘Hades is a personal god, brother of Zeus-hence known also as the other Zeus, the subterranean Zeus.’(Burket, 1958,196)Burket talks about Hades being the same gods as Zeus. The word that Burket uses is “subterranean” describing the underground. That Hades is the underground version of Zeus himself.

We can tell from many texts from the Ancient world that I have mentioned before the means of death and burial are very important in the ways of lifestyle. One would think with having such a meaning towards this that they would have offered sacrifices to Hades himself to makes sure their loved ones passed over the river of Styx into the underworld. I feel the concept of the underworld and Hades as a god has been undermined by our own monotheistic views with the religions of Christianity, Judaism and Islamic. These religions in concept have the image of Hell which is clearly linked with the "devil" so to speak.  This again links back with our concepts and views on religion. The fear that is evoked with the term of death in all religious needs a scapegoat for an image that identifies with the concepts of different religions. For example the aspect of heaven and hell, this is a common saying “if a human leads a good life they will go to heaven if not to hell.” Hades linked with the underworld, which is considered the version of our modern day concepts of “hell”.  When we mention the word devil to many people they come up with words that are associated with Hades and the underworld. This is a problem that we can see when tackling the aspect of the Greek Gods, is that the concept of our own religious beliefs may cloud our judgment when tackling the Gods. We can again see this concept with Hades. Hades in classical imagery is represented by his three headed dog Cerberus, his staff.

Modern art has turned Hades into a CGI version of a mythological monster, this in turn is because of the changing views in our society and concept of worship of dead. 

We see Hades in the Disney version of Hercules with Flame on his head for the aspect of fire again the concept that can be seen with the devil and fire concept of him being on of Disney’s "villains" trying to destroy Hercules and the Gods on Mount Olympus. This therefore brings in aspects of having a harmless Disney film affect a generation of children that are viewing the film.  This in turn takes Hades the Greek God away from how we should view him. He is the God of the underworld this then does not intern make him into a God that in Ancient Greece was considered as an important God to the Ancient Greeks.

Bibliography

Burket W, (1983) Greek Religion. Harvard: Harvard University Press.

Zaidman,L B and Pantel, PC.(1989)  Religion in the Ancient Greek City. Translated by Paul Cartledge.  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Online Sources:
Brower, J.E and Rea M.C, Understanding the Trinity: http://www3.nd.edu/~mrea/papers/Polytheism.pdf Last accessed on:24/03/2013