The god whom Roman soldiers would later worship in caves first appears in history as a name on a diplomatic document. Before he slew a bull or was hailed as the invincible Sun, Mitra was the power that held two…
Part 3. Mithra and Mithraism
Part 3 follows one god across nearly two millennia. Mitra appears in the Hittite-Mitanni treaty and the Rigveda as a god of the contract, and becomes the Mithra of the Mihr Yasht. His place inside Zoroastrianism is disputed. He then becomes a god of kings in Achaemenid, Parthian, Armenian, Pontic and Commagene royal cult.
Chapters 19–27
- Mitra and Mithra: The Indo-Iranian God of the Contract (Vedic Mitra, the Mitanni Treaty and the Mihr Yasht)
- Mithra Inside Zoroastrianism: Exclusion, Reintegration and Mihr the Judge
- The God of Kings: Mithra in Achaemenid, Parthian, Armenian, Pontic and Commagene Royal Cult
- The Roman Mysteries of Mithras I: Myth, Mithraeum and the Bull-Slaying
- The Roman Mysteries of Mithras II: Seven Grades, Soldiers, Merchants and the Politics of a Brotherhood
- Where Did the Mysteries Come From? Cumont and His Critics (Hinnells, Gordon, Beck, Ulansey, Widengren)
- Sol Invictus, the Emperors and 25 December: Mithras in Imperial Politics and His Fall
- Mithras and Christ: Parallels, Polemics and the Question of Borrowing
- After Rome: Mani's Mithra, Mehregan and Yalda, Armenian Mher, and Modern Claims of a Mithraic Root of All Religions
Chapter 20. Mithra Inside Zoroastrianism: Exclusion, Reintegration and Mihr the Judge
Zarathustra’s Gathas never name Mithra, yet in the Younger Avesta Ahura Mazda declares that he made Mithra as worthy of worship as himself. The library’s scholars disagree sharply about how this happened. Some see a prophet hostile to the cult…
Chapter 21. The God of Kings: Mithra in Achaemenid, Parthian, Armenian, Pontic and Commagene Royal Cult
In the god Mithra the library’s sources most clearly show religion merging with state power. From the fourth century BC to the first century AD he appears in royal inscriptions and in the throne-names of Pontus, Parthia, Armenia and Commagene,…
Chapter 22. The Roman Mysteries of Mithras I: Myth, Mithraeum and the Bull-Slaying
The Roman Mithras has to be studied mainly from stones, paintings and graffiti rather than from books. Vermaseren states the problem directly: “Ancient literature gives hardly any information about the meaning of this symbolic act, and what little we know…
Chapter 23. The Roman Mysteries of Mithras II: Seven Grades, Soldiers, Merchants and the Politics of a Brotherhood
This chapter turns from images to people: initiation, the seven ranks, the meal, the exclusion of women, the charges of bloodshed, and who joined. The library’s sources agree that Mithraism was a small, secret, male, hierarchical brotherhood that was especially…
Chapter 24. Where Did the Mysteries Come From? Cumont and His Critics (Hinnells, Gordon, Beck, Ulansey, Widengren)
No question in Mithraic studies has been argued over more than this one: was the Roman cult of Mithras a western survival of an Iranian religion, or a new creation of the Roman world that used a Persian name and…
Chapter 25. Sol Invictus, the Emperors and 25 December: Mithras in Imperial Politics and His Fall
In the third and fourth centuries the worship of the sun moved from the private cave-sanctuaries of Mithras to the centre of the Roman state. Emperors gave the sun a temple, a priesthood, coins and a birthday. The Tetrarchs dedicated…
Chapter 26. Mithras and Christ: Parallels, Polemics and the Question of Borrowing
The relation of Mithraism to early Christianity is the most argued question in the study of the Roman cult. The ancient Christian writers did not deny the likeness of the rites. They explained it as demonic forgery, and in the…
Chapter 27. After Rome: Mani’s Mithra, Mehregan and Yalda, Armenian Mher, and Modern Claims of a Mithraic Root of All Religions
When the last mithraea of the West were destroyed, Mithra did not disappear. In the Iranian world his name passed into a new universal religion, Manichaeism, which carried it from Mesopotamia to Central Asia. His festivals survived the Arab conquest…