The writings of Clement of Alexandria, Vol. 1 (of 2)Clement, of Alexandria, Saint
Religion
The writings of Clement of Alexandria, Vol. 1 (of 2)
Clement, of Alexandria, Saint
Theology -- Early works to 1800; Theology -- History -- Early Church, ca. 30-600
This is Jupiter the good, the prophetic, the patron of hospitality, the
protector of suppliants, the benign, the author of omens, the avenger
of wrongs; rather the unjust, the violator of right and of law, the
impious, the inhuman, the violent, the seducer, the adulterer, the
amatory. But perhaps when he was such he was a man; but now these
fables seem to have grown old on our hands. Zeus is no longer a
serpent, a swan, nor an eagle, nor a licentious man; the god no longer
flies, nor loves boys, nor kisses, nor offers violence, although there
are still many beautiful women, more comely than Leda, more blooming
than Semele, and boys of better looks and manners than the Phrygian
herdsman. Where is now that eagle? where now that swan? where now is
Zeus himself? He has grown old with his feathers; for as yet he does
not repent of his amatory exploits, nor is he taught continence. The
fable is exposed before you: Leda is dead, the swan is dead. Seek your
Jupiter. Ransack not heaven, but earth. The Cretan, in whose country he
was buried, will show him to you,--I mean Callimachus, in his hymns:
“For thy tomb, O king,
The Cretans fashioned!”
For Zeus is dead, be not distressed, as Leda is dead, and the swan,
and the eagle, and the libertine, and the serpent. And now even the
superstitious seem, although reluctantly, yet truly, to have come to
understand their error respecting the gods.
“For not from an ancient oak, nor from a rock,
But from men, is thy descent.”[45]
But shortly after this, they will be found to be but oaks and stones.
One Agamemnon is said by Staphylus to be worshipped as a Jupiter in
Sparta; and Phanocles, in his book of the _Brave and Fair_,
relates that Agamemnon king of the Hellenes erected the temple of
Argennian Aphrodite, in honour of Argennus his friend. An Artemis,
named the Strangled, is worshipped by the Arcadians, as Callimachus
says in his _Book of Causes_; and at Methymna another Artemis had
divine honours paid her, viz. Artemis Condylitis. There is also the
temple of another Artemis--Artemis Podagra (or, the gout)--in Laconica,
as Sosibius says. Polemo tells of an image of a yawning Apollo; and
again of another image, reverenced in Elis, of the guzzling Apollo.
Then the Eleans sacrifice to Zeus, the averter of flies; and the
Romans sacrifice to Hercules, the averter of flies; and to Fever, and
to Terror, whom also they reckon among the attendants of Hercules. (I
pass over the Argives, who worshipped Aphrodite, opener of graves.) The
Argives and Spartans reverence Artemis Chelytis, or the cougher, from
χελύττειν, which in their speech signifies to cough.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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