Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks

192 Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks
that their founder was so enlightened that he could even remember
his previous incarnations, a suggestion that exposed him to ridicule.
In a lost work, the philosopher Xenophanes of Kolophon in
Ionia tells the following facetious anecdote about the sage: “They
say that Pythagoras was passing by one day when a puppy was
being whipped. Taking pity on the animal, he said, ‘Stop don’t beat
it. It’s the soul of my friend. I recognize him by his bark.’ ”
Far more popular than Pythagoreanism or Orphism were the socalled
mystery religions, which offered the condition of blessedness
(olbia) in the hereafter to those who had undergone initiation into
their secret rites. The most celebrated of these were the Eleusinian
Mysteries, which took their name from Eleusis, an Attic deme
situated about twelve miles west of Athens. Eleusis was visited
by the goddess Demeter when she was searching for her daughter
Persephone after she had been abducted by Hades (see p. 75).
The Eleusinian Mysteries attracted initiates from all over the Greekspeaking
world and were held for well over a thousand years. They
remained popular well into the late fourth century c.e. and numbered
several Roman emperors among their initiates, including
Hadrian and Marcus Aurelius.
Overall, the Greeks lacked a clear idea about the type of afterlife
that was reserved for the fortunate minority. Even the Homeric
Hymn to Demeter, which incorporates the founding charter of the Eleusinian
Mysteries, merely states that those who have been initiated
into the mysteries will become “blessed” (lines 480–82). A series
of Classical reliefs, however, depict the dead savoring the delights
of this world with no evidence of wasting or physical decay, as if
taking their ease at the symposium. Although we do not know for
certain whether this scene is situated in the hereafter, this cannot be
ruled out, because the symposium was the nearest earthly equivalent
to a sensual paradise that the Greeks ever devised. All this does
not add up to much, however, and we are left with the impression
that the Greeks found it as difficult to envisage paradise as most
people have throughout history.
Conclusions
The afterlife is extremely resistant to clear and unambiguous
conclusions. Ideas about it are inevitably a hotchpotch of contradictory
and ill-thought-out hopes, fears, and fantasies. Our own
beliefs and practices are no less conflictive than those of the Greeks.
Few people are able to dispose of the belongings of a dead relative