Sometimes the worshipper sat at the table of the god, who was in some sense present at the meal celebrated in his honour. In the usage of ancient Israel the householder shared with his family, kinsmen, neighbours, and guests, in the sacred feast "before Yahweh." How far the belief in Yahweh's presence was actually cherished by the participants cannot {145} be definitely affirmed; it does not appear, for instance, in the Babylonian ritual. But a corresponding idea may certainly be traced in Greece and Rome. From the early cult of the sacred stone or pillar as the abode of deity, some kind of divine power inhered in the altar and the image; and when the members of the clan feasted together on solemn occasions, the clan-god was present with his worshippers. The Greek ritual sometimes provided a place for the table-companions or "parasites," at sacred banquets, such as were held in the temples of Apollo at Acharnæ or Delos. An inscription at Magnesia describes a festival of twelve gods, whose images, adorned with festal array, were carried into the marketplace, and arranged on three cushions under a canopy. When sacrifices had been offered, the priests and people partook of a common meal with the gods. The old Latins and other Italians believed the deities of the house to be present at their meals. The Penates, Mr. Warde Fowler tells us, were the spirits of the foods. Rome celebrated its solemn feast of Jove in the Capitoline temple every September on full-moon day, when Jupiter, with his face painted red, Juno, and Minerva, were present in their statues to share the meal with the magistrates and Senate of the city. To "lay a couch for the god" (as we might say "to lay a table") was a common phrase. Recently discovered papyri, illustrating so {146} many aspects of daily life in the Eastern Mediterranean, show that such hospitalities were of frequent occurrence, alike in temples and in private houses. Among the precious remains from Oxyrhynchus are such notes as this: "Antonius son of Ptolemæus invites you to dine with him at the table of our Lord Sarapis in the house of Claudius Sarapion on the 16th at 9 o'clock."