The Gospel of Hellas - Research Institute for Waldorf Education

the lips of the gods
origin of the tribes was concerned, the story of Dionysus connected the son
of Zeus most closely with Pallas Athena. She it was who, after the Titans had
mutilated Dionysus, rescued his heart and brought it to Zeus who created him
anew. The myth described Dionysus as the son of Zeus and Demeter, then later
as Dionysus the Younger, the son of Zeus and the mortal woman, Semele of
Thebes. Hera, the principle of conserving the past state of divine consciousness,
inspired the Titans to dismember Dionysus. Athena, representing the
progressive principle, saved his heart, his immortal part, his individuality and,
together with Zeus, brought about his rebirth as Dionysus the Younger who
served as the bringer of wine, the master of individualization, the teacher who
introduced the first glimmer of the intellect.
The mission of wine was to break down the ties of blood on which
clairvoyance was based; the wine helped to dim the faculty of clairvoyance.
Wine in those ages helped to develop the individuality, the personal ego in
man. Its use resulted in the dismemberment of families, tribes and clans, and
loosened the ties which connected the individual with his polis. When Athens
became the city of Dionysus, she took her place as the first cosmopolis of all
Hellas.
Plato in his Cratylus gives the etymology of Dionysus’ name as derived
from didous oinon (oistai, to think), the bringer of thinking, a word which is also
linked with oinon-vinum (wine). The Platonic etymology may not suffice for
modern philologists, but it contains far more than our “schoolmasters dream
of.” Dionysus served as the bringer of wine which enkindled the first feeling of
individualization with the first glimmer of the intellect. He freed the human
soul gradually from the ties of blood on which atavistic clairvoyance was based.
Steiner emphasized this characteristic of Dionysus when he pointed out that
the Dionysian principle works on the construction of the brain.
The journey of Dionysus the Younger to the East took place prior to all
historical records. The followers of Dionysus were the satyrs and fauns, the last
stragglers from among the Atlanteans, according to the view of Greek fantasy
as Plato gives it. In continuation of the Platonic viewpoint, Steiner recognized,
in Pan and his satyrs, fauns and nymphs, beings whose bodies were still typical
of the decadent forms of the last times of Atlantis. To these beings Dionysus