Zeus : a study in ancient religion - Warburg Institute

664 The Significance of the Bull
These lines, quoted from a lost hexameter poem by Epimenides(P) 1
,
seem at first sight to be a flat negation of the Cretan faith, opposing
to it a later and nobler conception of the deity. But, as spoken by
Minos, tiny more probably preserve to us the view taken by the
genuine mystic of Idaean Zeus. If so, we may be very sure that
-
the\ contain no vague transcendental philosophy, but the main
point and purpose of the Cretan cult. In -
earl} days the child that
represented the god re-born, in later times the bull that served as
his surrogate, was essentially a focus of divine force. Those who
tasted of the sacred flesh and blood therein- renewed their life, their
movement, their very being; for they became one with the god
whom they worshipped. Such a belief, though primitive in its
inception, was obviously capable of further development. Paul,
when preaching at Athens, quoted the words of Minos and attached
to them in perpetuity a significance at once deeper and higher,
lie must have been aware that the fine concluding phrase referred
originally ;
to the Cretan Zeus for
elsewhere- he cites Minos'
description of the Cretans as given in the same context. Nay
more, with the next breath 3 he adduces from Aratos a line in which
So the blessed Paul took this sentence from Minos; and he took the (imitation,
"We are the offspring of God,"'
from Aratus, a poet who wrote about God, and about the seven [planets] and the twelve
[-ignsj; saying, "from God we begin, from the Lord of heaven, that is Zeus: for all
markets, and seas, and havens are filled with llis name: and also in every place, all men
are in want of Him, because we are llis offspring; and lie out of His goodness giveth
good signs to us and to all men. He moves us to come forward to work ; and He ordains
all that is visible and invisible; and because of this we all worship Him, and say. 'Hail
to thee, our Father, wonderful and great !
'"
Plato also and others say that souls are by nature from God."
' "
1
I )r
->,i
kendel Harris refers them to the
M.
(cp. 1912 p. 3,-01 restores : rvpjiov ereKr-qvavro