Theseus is portrayed by Virgil as suffering eternal punishment in Hades,
but Proclus writes concerning him as follows: "Theseus, and Pirithous
are fabled to have ravished Helen, and to have descended to the infernal
regions--i.e. they were lovers of intelligible and visible beauty.
Afterwards Theseus was liberated by Pericles from Hades, but Pirithous
remained there because he could not sustain the arduous attitude of
divine contemplation."
Dr. Warburton, in his _Divine Legation of Moses,_ gives it as his
opinion that Theseus was a living character who once forced his way into
the Eleusinian Mysteries, for which crime he was imprisoned on earth and
afterwards damned in the infernal regions.
The Eleusinian Mysteries seem to have constituted the most vital portion
of the Attic religion, and always to have retained something of awe and
solemnity. They were not known outside Attica until the time of the
Median wars, when they spread to the Greek colonies in Asia as part of
the constitution of the daughter states, where the cult seems to have
exercised a considerable influence both on the populace and on the
philosophers. Outside Eleusis the Mysteries were not celebrated so
frequently nor on so magnificent a scale. At Celeas, where they were
celebrated every fourth year, a hierophant, who was not bound by the law
of celibacy, as at Eleusis, was elected by the people for each
celebration. Pausanias is the authority for a statement by the
Phliasians that they imitated the Eleusinian Mysteries. They maintained,
however, that their rendering was instituted by Dysaules, brother of
Celeus, who went to their country after he had been expelled from
Eleusis by Ion, the son of Xuthus, at the time when Ion was chosen
commander-in-chief of the Athenians in the war against Eleusis.
Pausanias disputed that any Eleusinian was defeated in battle and forced
into exile, maintaining that peace was concluded between the Athenians
and the Eleusinians before the war was fought out, even Eumolpus himself
being permitted to remain in Eleusis. Pausanias, also, while admitting
that Dysaules might have gone to Phlias for some cause other than that
admitted by the Phliasians, questioned whether Dysaules was related to
Celeus, or, indeed, to any illustrious Eleusinian family. The name of
Dysaules does not occur in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, where are
enumerated all who were taught the ritual of the Mysteries by the
goddess, though that of Celeus is mentioned:--
She showed to Triptolemus and Diocles, smiter of horses
And mighty Eumolpus and Celeus, leader of people,
The way of performing the sacred rites and explained
to all of them the orgies.
Nevertheless, according to the Phliasians, it was Dysaules who
instituted the Mysteries among them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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