jgibson000

Are you certain that this is the correct reference? So far as I know, Plutarch wrote no work entitled Python.

Jeffrey

Ecrasez L'infame

enegkasan, of course = some ghastly inflected form of ferO (out of laziness, I transliterate and use capitals for long E and O. It looks horrible, but saves much needless finger gymnastics).

So - "she brought forth the baby". I can't see anything other than the obvious meaning here. I can't see any hint for example that Hermes rescued the baby from her body at the moment of her death, as in the thigh version. It's not just that DS can't be bothered to mention it because he knows it so well (as you suggested) - this is a completely different form of the story. You asked for any ancient source that "knows of or describes" Dionysus as being born of a woman. I provided DS. You didn't say you wanted the exact words "born of woman" - which in any case looks to me like Paul quoting Job rather than some pagan template. I was only answering your question. Earl makes a dubious sounding claim, you question it, I reply that in this case at least he's right. I'm not making any point other than that here. Pax?

Ecrasez L'infame

Quite right, Jeffrey. Apologies. I had found a reference in Robert Graves's the Greek Myths, quoting the schoriast on PINDAR's Pythian Odes iii and Plutarch's Symposiacs vii to the effect that Dionysus' mother was Demeter or Persephone or someone else. I can only say that "my analeptic self" conjoined the two. Graves provided the Orphic source, as well. AFAICS none of these are on-line, and they're not worth a trip to the university to check since, as you say, the mothers are all goddesses, not women. My only reason for mentioning it was to show there are many different versions of this myth.

Time for bed here in the UK.

Robert

jakejonesiv

I too would would classify Dionysus as a child of (a) god and a mortal woman. (All myth of course). To argue otherwise is to play word games to obscure the obvious?

According to THE BACCHAE by Euripedes, Dionysus is the child of Zeus and a Semele. Dionysus changed his form from god to mortal.

The Dionysus myth, before the alleged time of Christ, was introduced by Antiochus Epiphanes the king of Syria, the descendant of Alexander of Macedon. On Christ and Antichrist, 49 (Hippolytus). It is reasonable to argue that elements of this myth were incorporated into the emerging Christ myth.

Dionysus is indeed a savior god. He becomes the wine himself as an offering to the gods.
"Apart from wine, there is no cure for human hardship. He, being a god, is poured out to the gods, so human beings receive fine benefits as gifts from him."

This leads us to the pagan parallels to the Eucharist.

According to Cicero,
When we speak of corn as Ceres, and of wine as Liber, we use, it is true, a customary mode of speech, but do you think that any one is so senseless as to believe that what he is eating is the divine substance?
Marcus Tullius Cicero, On The Nature of the Gods , Book III 44 BCE. (Note that Liber is equivalent to Dionysus).

Now, this was a rhetorical question, but later on Christians would be "so senseless".

This was a great concern to the church fathers. The only defense was the absurd doctine of Diabolical Mimicry.

"The devils, accordingly, when they heard these prophetic words, said that Bacchus was the son of Jupiter, and gave out that he was the discoverer of the vine, and they number wine among his mysteries; and they taught that, having been torn in pieces, he ascended into heaven." Justin Martyr, First Apology, Chapter LIV.

Jake Jones IV

jgibson000

Yes, ἐνέγκασαν is a form of FERW, but in this case it is not being used (as it is not anywhere else, so far as I know -- see BDAG and LSJ), as part of a description of birth, let alone that of Dionysus. It here means "endure" and it is the verb used in DS's note about Semele being unable "to bear up to" the revelation of Zeus' divine glory (note that it is preceded by OUK).

Except that this aint the meaning. So you are seeing what's not there. And as to whether Semele's "bringing forth" the chiled is viewed by Greco-Romans as a "birth", let alone, a birth of a woman", see Euripides Bakchae 88-99.

Jeffrey

jgibson000

No. It's to note with precision what the evidence actually says.

Right, somewhat on the first assertion. But that's not quite what Euripides says either at lines 1-5

ηκω διὸs παῖs τήνδε θηβαίων χθόνα
διόνυσοs, ὃν τίκτει ποθ' ἡ κάδμου κόρη
σεμέλη λοχευθεῖς' ἀστραπηφόρ* πυρί·
μορφὴν δ' ἀμείψαs ἐκ θεοῦ βροτησίαν
πάρειμι δίρκηs νάματ' ισμηνοῦ θ' ὕδωρ.

at least if the "changing" (is that the right word?) of his form is taken to be an ontological change from god to mortal.

Nor at line 88-98

γυιάs, τὸν βρόμιον·

ὅν [ἀντ.
ποτ' ἔχους' ἐν *δίνων
λοχίαιs ἀνάγκαισι
πταμέναs διὸs βροντᾶj νηδύοs ἔκβολον μάτηρ
ἔτεκεν, λιποῦς' αἰῶνα κεραυνίω πληγʹ·
λοχίοιs δ' αὐτίκα νιν δέξατο
θαλάμαιs κρονίδαs ζεύs,
κατὰ μηρ�* δὲ καλύψαs
χρυσέαισιν συνερείδει
περόναιs κρυπτὸν ἀφ' ηραs.

where Dionysus describes his birth

I take it, Jake, that you are basing your claims on an English translation and not on the Greek text?

Besides that, the issue isn't the parentage of Dionysus, let alone whether he (like his father or any other god) can disguise himself as a mortal.

It's whether when he came to term and was born, he was "born of a woman".

Euripides clearly says he wasn't.

So even if you are correct in your understanding of what Euripides says in Bakchae 1-5, it's irrelevant to the issue at hand.

Accordingly, if anyone is playing word games here, it's you.

JG

jgibson000

Might I ask you to tell me whether you will still maintain this after you look up
the meaning of

(1) the word that you/C.H. Oldfather translate above as "baby", i.e., βρέφοs, and compare it to what it means in such texts as Il. 23, 266; Plut., Mor. 1052f; Diosc. 5, 74; SIG 1267, 23; IAndrosIsis, Kyme 18; PGM 8, 1 PFlor 93, 21; Ps.-Phocyl. 184; Jos., Ant. 20, 18; and of

(2) ἐκτρῶσαι?

Jeffrey

Ecrasez L'infame

Yeah, I'll buy that. Fifteen-love to you. The ektrOsai, then. But you know this "she... brought forth the babe untimely" isn't mine - it's Oldfather's. Take it up with Loeb. Or else tell us what you're getting at - are you suggesting that DS just missed out the three months in Zeus' thigh? And Zeus' smiting her because she wouldn't sleep with him, and Hermes' rescue of the baby, and the rest of the thigh version? All taking care to leave what remains as a consistent story? (No wonder it took him him thirty years to write!) Or are you saying that Oldfather simply translated the passage wrong? Semele is the subject of the ektrOma, which rules out any kind of Caesarian. The baby survived, so it wasn't a miscarriage. "Untimely" as an adverb is unusual in current English, today we might say "she delivered the baby prematurely", dying in the process. That's the obvious reading, that's Oldfather's reading. So what's your case?

But, once more - even if DS expunged or overlooked the episode, "twice-born" Dionysus would still have been born of a woman (and of a god's thigh as well). Dionysus of the double door.

Thanks

Robert

Ecrasez L'infame

In Luke 18.15 it means infants, babies, toddlers, young children.

Ecrasez L'infame

You're the one making the extraordinary claim. You tell me.