Similar in important respects to the Egyptian Osiris was the Adonis of Phœnicia, who may therefore be mentioned in the present connection, even though little is known about mysteries connected with his worship. According to the well-known myth, the youth Adonis, beloved by Aphrodite, was killed by a wild boar, and then bemoaned by the goddess. The cult of Adonis was found in various places, notably at Byblos in Phœnicia, where the death and resurrection of the god were celebrated. With regard to this double festival, Lucian says in his treatise "On the Syrian Goddess": "They [the inhabitants of Byblos] assert that the legend about Adonis and the wild boar is true, and that the facts occurred in their country, and in memory of this calamity they beat their breasts and wail every year, and perform their secret ritual amid signs of mourning through the whole countryside. When they have finished their mourning and wailing, they sacrifice in the first place to Adonis, as to one who has departed this life: after this they allege that he is alive again, and exhibit his effigy to the sky."[152] The wailing for Adonis at Byblos is similar to what is narrated about the worship of the Babylonian god Tammuz. Even the Old Testament mentions in a noteworthy passage "the women weeping for Tammuz" (Ezek. viii. 14). But the Tammuz-worship does not seem to have contained any celebration of a resurrection. [152] Lucian, _De dea syria_, 6, translation of Garstang (_The Syrian Goddess_, 1913, pp. 45f.). Attis, Osiris, and Adonis are alike in that all of them are apparently represented as dying and coming to life again. They are regarded by Brückner[153] and many other modern scholars as representing the widespread notion of a "dying and rising saviour-god." But it is perhaps worthy of note that the "resurrection" of these gods is very different from what is meant by that word in Christian belief. The myth of Attis, for example, contains no mention of a resurrection; though apparently the cult, in which mourning is followed by gladness, did presuppose some such notion. In the myth of Osiris, also, there is nothing that could be called resurrection; after his passion the god becomes ruler, not over the living, but over the dead. In Lucian's description of the worship of Adonis at Byblos, there is perhaps as clear an account as is to be found anywhere of the celebration of the dying and resuscitation of a god, but even in this account there is not strictly speaking a resurrection. A tendency is found in certain recent writers to exaggerate enormously the prevalence and the clarity of the pagan ideas about a dying and rising god. [153] _Der sterbende und auferstehende Gottheiland_, 1908.