In English, a rite is a religious or other solemn ceremony or act, a religious custom. Something related to a rite is called ritual. Initially an adjective, a ritual is also used as a noun synonymous with a rite. In French, a rite is primarily defined as a set of rules and ceremonies that are practiced in a particular Church or religious community, e.g. the Roman rite, rules fixing the course of a liturgical celebration, a magical act, repetitive in nature, the object of which is to direct an occult force towards a determined action. The individual rite consists of gestures, words, or attitudes. It manifests itself collectively in fixed and often complex songs, dances, or ceremonies. But, in French, rite has a second set of meanings with no religious connotations which have been lost in English. It is an action carried out in accordance with rules, e.g. the rites of the presentation of decoration; the specific way of acting, of a social group, or of someone who invariably obeys a rule[1]. The Latin ancestor of these words, ritus, meant habit, custom, usage, ceremony, not necessarily religious. The semantic drift towards religion seems to have occurred in the post-Roman era.
The closest Greek equivalent of rite
is the etymologically unrelated word τελετή (teletē). Post-Roman
scholars interpreted teletē as rite, especially initiation in the
mysteries, mystic rituals practiced at initiation, theological doctrines, a
making magically potent, a festival accompanied by mystic rites, a priesthood
or sacred office. Only rarely, do we see teletē used in non-religious
contexts such as the birth of a child which requires prescribed procedures and
gestures to be performed with care to perfection. Yet, following
secular rules in everyday and professional life must have been much more common
behavior than following religious rules in a festival. Secular rules were
trivial in the minds of religious scholars. That teletē could be used in
the context of boiling an egg or signing a contract was beyond their
imagination.
Post-Roman scholars, to whom we owe
everything we know about Ancient Greek language and culture, seem to have
attributed to teletē religious semantic charge reflecting their own
religious obsessions. Because teletē is the noun of the verb τελέω (teleō),
which has nothing to do with religious practices per se. The verb means to fulfill,
accomplish, execute (a legal document), perform, do, bring to issue, grant in
full, work out, make effective, bring to fulfillment or perfection, mature,
bring to birth, make perfectly, bring to an end, finish, end, turn out, pay, pay
what one owes, present, pay tax (duty, toll), layout, spend, consume, eat, become
a citizen, belong to a class, be reckoned among, be formally appointed. Of
course, sememes of initiation to mysteries and of magic have been added to the
dictionaries because of later aberrant interpretations of Greek texts. In the
context of training, instruction, or education, which is what the mysteries
were all about (see section The Mysteries
and the Nike of Samothrace), teletē would be exactly equivalent to
English graduation. Certainly, customary rules and regulations must be
followed to ascertain that a student has paid the due tuition fees, has
successfully fulfilled the requirements of training, has matured to perfection,
and is able to exercise her discipline as an independent professional. In
return, the student is given a certificate and is registered to the corresponding
class of professionals following legal procedures. There is no involvement of
supernatural ghosts in a Greek teletē.
The Mysteries of Samothrace were probably
about the mastering of plumbing and other arts requiring the use of a furnace (Sam-o-thrace;
Samothrace). The ‘Great Gods’, a religious translation of the term Cabeiri by Joseph
Justus Scaliger (1540 –1609) and later authors, were simply the great goods,
the large-scale public networks requiring knowledgeable assemblage, such as a
public water network. Their temple was the school of civil engineering. Friedrich
Wilhelm Schelling (1775 –1854) got a bit closer when associating the Cabeiri
with priestly blacksmiths
The term μυστήριον (mystērion;
mystery) splits as my-stēr-ion. It will be argued that my is the
internal, invisible part of something (see
section Mu). The stem stēr starts the verb στηρίζω (stērizō),
to make or set fast, prop, fix, support, confirm, establish, settle, determine
to a particular part, be firmly set or fixed, stand fast, or merely to be
situated. Hence, στήριγμα (stērigma) means support,
foundation. Using standard rather than scholarly transliteration, the stems my-stēr
would form the English word muster meaning an assemblage, and orderly
collection of people or things, introduction into service. The sememes of a fixture, establishment, and order, are found also in monastery, minister,
to administer, steric (chemistry term relating
to or involving the arrangement of atoms in space), steroid
(supporting or enhancing muscle growth and athletic performance), etc. The
mysteries seem, thus, to be the internal setup of Samothrace. It is, though, not
clear if the phrase referred to the setup, or making of Samothrace itself or to
the things one could make with it; perhaps both.
The mysteries remained, by definition,
‘secret’ to the illiterate public, but even to non-specialist scholars, because
it all required technical graphics and terminology that laypeople could not
quite understand. It was like trying to explain quantum mechanics to a farmer,
or farming tool and methods, to an astrophysicist. Historians could well write
intelligible texts but did not necessarily understand the chemical difference
between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ cholesterol. Language is created along with technology
by specific social and professional groups for internal communication. The
terms spread and become common words when technology is democratized. With
the financial crisis of 2008, we all became familiar with Wall Street terms,
and after the COVID19 pandemic, with epidemiological modeling.
I can see the objection forming in the mind
of the reader, the words good and god are very similar in
English, but no comparable similarity exists between the Greek analogs θεός (theos;
god) and ἀγαθόν (agathon; good, serviceable) or any other Greek term for
good. With the ending morpheme -os meaning the person who, or the thing
that (see section Vowels),
only two letters remain to explain. The stem θε- (the-) forms the verb θέω
(theō), to run. This verb has been used since Homer in the context of
running horses, rolling stones, flying birds, traveling ships, and all sorts of
moving things, including the potter’s wheel[2].
A rarer similar verb, θεῶ (theō) differs from θέω only in the tonic
accent and means to behold. The noun, therefore, theos must have meant
the person who beholds (scientist, researcher, invertor, engineer; compare, theory),
the person who runs (entrepreneur, manufacturer, actor, producer; compare theater),
the thing that runs (the wheel, the potter’s wheel, any tool or machine that
moves), or the thing that we see, observe, behold. Using the Archaic alphabet,
the word theos would have been spelled with a starting 𐌈, which depicts a wheel, a turning thing. A god, in today’s sense,
is certainly not something that we observe or something that runs, turns, or
moves in any way. The Greeks had no word for god. Theos (god) was the
creator or administrator of something observable and useful (e.g. the public
water network), not the sole Creator and Administrator of everything (the
universe).
In fact, the word θρησκεία (thrēskeia;
religion) appears only twice in non-Judeo-Christian Greek literature. Both
instances are in Herodotus’ Histories, referring to the ‘religion’ of the
Egyptians[3],
perhaps in a wider sense of the Semites including Jews[4].
Herodotus also uses the verb θρησκεύω (thrēskeyō), which
has been translated as to perform religious observances[5].
However, a simpler but similar verb, θρήσκω
(thrēskō) appears in Hesychius as νοῶ (noō), a
Byzantine form of νοόω (nooō), to convert into pure intelligence,
cognate of the Homeric νόος (noos), mind, as employed in perceiving and
thinking, sense, wit, resolve, purpose, reason, intellect, an act of the mind,
thought, meaning (of a word). Where is the supernatural, the ritual, or the
worship hidden in these terms? The concept of religion, as we understand it
today, was invented in the Bible[6]
and used much later by Jewish scholars[7]
studying the Bible. The Christian theologian and philosopher Clement of
Alexandria (circa 150 – circa 215 AD) would agree that Greeks called gods any man-made artifacts of carved stone,
wood, or other materials
An important element of the Phoenician
myths is the cult of Heracles[8].
When he went to Tyre, Herodotus saw a temple of Heracles, whom the translator
Alfred Godley identifies as the Tyrian god Melkart[9]
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Let us, for simplicity, examine the English
version of this myth assuming it accurately translates the sememes from the
Greek text. One more assumption, that Heracles means wood, is taken for
granted here but is validated elsewhere (see
section Hera and Heracles – the house and the wood). In
English, the word temple is the augmentative of the template since
the latter is the diminutive of the former[11].
Phonetic analysis of temple cognates leads to a PIE root *tem-
meaning to cut, or the notion of place reserved or cut out[12];
compare Greek τέμνω (temnō), to cut, prune, cut up, cut to
pieces, slaughter, sacrifice, but also to divide, dilute, thin, cut into shape,
cut lengthwise, cut or make a road, hold a middle course, etc. Essentially, a temple
is an important construction based on a template, a model, a maquette, a
pattern. It can be any construction seen as important for some activity and
minutely cared for. It needs not to be monumental or hold a religious presence. A
church, or any religious temple, is a temple because it is built on an
architectural pattern or because it is regarded as important and minutely cared
for. But, as it is frequently the case in semantics, the opposite in not
necessarily valid. Something built on a pattern and minutely cared for (i.e., a
temple) is not necessarily a church. A car, or a cart, is built on a
pattern, it is regarded as important for transport, and it is minutely cared
for. A cart is a temple in this regard. If it is wooden, it is a temple
of Heracles, i.e. a useful, patterned construction made of wood. Another
possible temple of Heracles is a patterned construction for carrying
(cart), processing (tools, gear), or storing wood (shed, workshop).
The temple of Heracles, the construct for
carrying or storing wood, was standing next to two pillars, one of gold and one
of emerald. We would be naïve to believe that the ethnic Phoenicians had the
wealth to build such pillars in the literal sense. If so, they would have a
much greater impact on world history. The minerals lend their color. There was
a golden-yellow (gold) and a bright green (emerald) pile. The first was
most probably of dry yellowish prepared timber, wood that has been pre-cut and
is ready for use in construction. The second was of freshly trimmed young,
greenish suckers and leaves. The other temple, of Thasian Heracles, was brut,
unprocessed wood like the undiluted Thasian wine jars mentioned by Aristophanes
(see section Thrace and Thasos).
That unprocessed wood would be used for burning down to Thrace (burning
coal) under a Thasos vessel heated for chemistry or cooking.
The Thasians, those who used wood to heat
up a Thasos mixing vessel, initially valued the unprocessed wood (Thasian
Heracles) because it was a cheaper combustible. Later, they learned to
appreciate the leftovers of wood processing (Heracles, son of Amphitryon).
The prefix ἀμφί (amphi-), of Amphitryon, means on both sides. The
ending morpheme of Ἀμφιτρύων (Amphitryōn; Amphitryon), -tryōn,
is in the verb τρύω (tryō) meaning to wear out, distress, waste,
consume; compare Greek τρυγάω (trygaō), gather in the
fruit or crop; τρύος (tryos), distress, toil, labor; τρύφος
(tryphos), that which is broken off; τρύξ (tryx),
lees of wine, dregs; τρῦπα (trypa), hole; French trou,
hole; Old French trier, to choose, pick out or separate
from others; Gothic tiran, to tear away, remove;
Proto-Germanic *teraną, to tear, tear apart; and the
English cognates try, to divide, separate, trim,
and trunk. They all imply a useful part and a waste. The
waste of wood processing was even easier to burn and more cost-effective as a
source of thermal power for the furnace because it would otherwise be thrown
away.
Here, Herodotus, like practically everyone
else in Greek mythology, uses the verb σέβομαι (sebomai) not in the
senses of religious reverence, reverential awe, dread, fear, awestruck wonder,
or worship, as translators love to elevate it, but the sense of respect,
regard, price, praise, honor, value, appreciation, preference. The Thasians
appreciated the value, the affordance of wood (Heracles). They did not worship,
dread, or fear it. Western scholars have typically been theologists or
graduates of religious institutions as have been most of the prestigious
universities. Their motive was to find out what the ancients believed about
God. They were much less interested in primitive technologies. Therefore, every
term they didn’t understand was, for them, the name of a deity. This attitude
was not restricted to the study of Greek mythology. Scholars of Jewish origin
and culture tend likewise to interpret everything with reference to the Bible.
The Bible itself also needs to be re-interpreted from zero. Speaking no
Semitic language, I cannot analyze Melqart, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this
too turned out to mean some sort of wood, or wood product, like softwood for
writing (mellow card) or shipbuilding. The Levant was known to the
Egyptians for its wood production (Fig.
2; see section The Phoenicians).
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Herodotus also tells us that Cadmus left a
Phoenician colony on the island of Thera[13].
His story about the spread of the Phoenicians was very influential. In the Bibliotheca,
Apollodorus (1st or 2nd century AD) implies that Crete
was colonized by the Phoenicians, through Europa, the young Phoenician lady
abducted by Zeus. He also confirms that the Phoenicians Cadmus and Telephassa
took up their abode in Thrace while Thasus, also Phoenician, founded a city
Thasos in the homonymous island off Thrace and dwelt there. Therefore, the
Thracians and Thasians were Phoenicians. Pausanias agrees that the natives of
Thasos were Phoenicians by descent and traced their origin to Thasus, son of
Agenor[14].
The Greek historian Diodorus of Sicily (from Agyrium, now Agira, in Sicily; 1st
century BC) reports that Cadmus established a Phoenician colony in Rhodes, where
the descendants of the colonists held the hereditary priesthood of Poseidon, as
that had been instituted by Cadmus[15].
Strabo revisited and expanded the
Phoenician story. He claimed that the whole of Greece was once occupied by barbarians,
Macedonia, certain parts of Thessaly, and Attica itself were held by the
Thracians – who were already Phoenicians by other authors – Thebes of Boeotia
(he calls it Cadmia) was founded by the Phoenicians of Cadmus, and so on[16].
He implicitly admits not to understand the eponyms and toponyms created a few
centuries earlier: ‘the barbarian origin of some is indicated by their names’
With so much cross-validated ‘historical’
evidence, the mainstream academic view just cannot be mistaken! Ethnic
Phoenicians from the Levant, and from the city of Tyre (identified as Ṣūr,
ṢR, in modern-day Lebanon; see section
Sidon and Tyre) in particular, had colonized Crete, Thera, the East, and
North Aegean islands including Rhodes, Samos, Samothrace, and Thasos, as well
as the quasi-totality of mainland Greece, namely the entire North (Thrace,
Macedonia, and Thessaly), down to Boeotia (Thebes), and Attica (Athens), in the
Bronze Age. Those colonists brought with them their Phoenician alphabet.
References
Ferguson, John. 1974. Clement of Alexandria. Tweynes’ World Author. New York, NY: Twayne Publishers.
Herodotus. 1920. The Histories. Translated by Alfred D Godley. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Strabo. 1924. The Geography of Strabo. Edited by H L Jones. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.
[7] Starting with Flavius Josephus (born Yosef ben Matityahu; 37 – c.
100 AD); J.
AJ 1.18.
[9] Also spelt Melqart. Melkarth or Melicarthus. In
Akkadian, his name was written Milqartu.
[15] Diod. 5.59.2ff in Apollod.
3.1.1, though the cited passage of Diodorus is about the Cretan king
Catreus establishing the cult of Atabyrian Zeus.