Lyfing
10-07-2009, 07:19 PM
Dionysos, by Richard Seaford.. (http://www.mediafire.com/file/uugzly5jmml/Richard.Seaford-Dionysos.pdf)
Covering a wide range of issues which have been overlooked in the past, including mystery, cult and philosophy, Richard Seaford explores Dionysos – one of the most studied figures of the ancient Greek gods.
Popularly known as the god of wine and frenzied abandon, and an influential figure for theatre where drama originated as part of the cult of Dionysos, Seaford goes beyond the mundane and usual to explore the history and influence of this god as never before.
As a volume in the popular Gods and Heroes series, this is an indispensible introduction to the subject, and an excellent reference point for higher-level study.
http://www.routledge-ny.com/books/Dionysos-isbn9780415324885
WHY DOES DIONYSOS MATTER
IN THE MODERN WORLD?
Why, in the twenty-first century, should anybody be interested in the
ancient Greek god Dionysos? From the Internet alone we can make
the acquaintance of a hundred living religions, whereas the cult of
Dionysos, and the ecstasy he inspired, died long ago.
But the passing away of Dionysos raises a doubt. The psychological
fragmentation and manipulated homogeneity of our mediadominated
consumerism may create an intense need for some kind of
transcendence. It is a need that, for most people, cannot be fulfilled
by institutionalised religion, in part because such religion is inextricably
wedded to forms of social control that tend to limit the moral
and religious experience of the controlled. Nor can it be fulfilled by
the cheap forms of spiritual liberation on offer from various religious
cults.
True liberation from the consumerist mind-set can be achieved
only by finding a perspective from which to perceive its narrowness.
And in the search for this perspective enormous resources may be
found in the past, albeit not in the fragmented past purveyed to the
modern consumer: true liberation always requires mental focus.
I am not of course suggesting that we should revive the cult of
Dionysos. Rather, Dionysos provides a perspective on the narrowness
of modern religious experience, and helps us to understand how
different kinds of society tend to produce different forms of religious
organisation and experience. There are various reasons why Dionysos
is more helpful than are other alien gods in providing these perspectives
on our own insularity.
First, when Christianity was establishing itself in the ancient
Mediterranean world, the cult of Dionysos was its most geographically
widespread and deeply rooted rival. And so the Christian church,
while enclosing the revolutionary ethics of its gospels within the
necessity of social control, was influenced by Dionysiac cult as well as
opposing it.
Second, until the triumph of Christianity the cult of Dionysos
had flourished throughout the recorded history of the Greeks, for a
thousand years, always having at its heart the power of Dionysos to
bridge the gaps between the three spheres of the world – nature,
humanity, and divinity. Humanity emerges from nature and aspires
to divinity. Dionysos, by transcending these fundamental divisions,
may transform the identity of an individual into animal and god.
And it is by his presence that he liberates the individual from the
circumstances of this life. In these respects Dionysos contrasts with
the relatively remote and austere god of Christianity. A small but telling
symptom of the contrast is the early and persistent Christian hostility
to the mask, as diabolical. It is the joyful transformation of identity that
underlies the importance of Dionysos in various spheres – notably the
spheres of wine, mystery-cult, the underworld, politics, theatre, poetry,
philosophy, and visual art.
And indeed Dionysos – more than any other ancient Greek deity –
fills a modern need. He remains a symbol of something important that
cannot be so effectively expressed in any other way. For instance,
Richard Schechner, who directed the seminal New York performance
of Dionysus in 69, wrote in an essay entitled The Politics of Ecstasy
(1968) that Dionysos ‘is present in today’s America – showing himself
in the hippies, in the “carnival spirit” of black insurrectionists, on
campuses; and even, in disguise, on the patios and in the living rooms
of suburbia’. In the same tradition, The God of Ecstasy: Sex-Roles and
the Madness of Dionysos by Arthur Evans (1988) is a sustained invocation
of Dionysos as embodying the forces required to save our
civilisation from militarism, individualism, unfeeling intellect, greedy
destruction of the natural environment, male-dominated hierarchy,
and the conversion of people into objects. The book culminates in an
account of the ‘affirmation of the whole self through ecstatic ritual’ in
a homosexual ritual orgy on a California beach.
It is not only in the outlandish practices of the American counterculture
that Dionysos has survived, but even – under the influence of
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) – in the elaborate abstractions
of contemporary European philosophy, as we shall see at the end of
Chapter 10.
There is of course an enormous difference between the ancient and
the modern Dionysos. For the ancient Greeks Dionysos was believed
to be a god, and was given cult. But in our very different world, and
notably since Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy (1872), he seems rather to
be a symbol of a certain mental state – or at most the name for
whatever it is that produces that mental state. Dionysos has become
the Dionysiac. And yet it is not impossible that the mental state that
required and produced the ancient belief in Dionysos as a god overlaps
with the modern mental state that keeps alive the Dionysiac as an
irreducible symbol.
http://www.mediafire.com/file/uugzly5jmml/Richard.Seaford-Dionysos.pdf
Later,
-Lyfing
Covering a wide range of issues which have been overlooked in the past, including mystery, cult and philosophy, Richard Seaford explores Dionysos – one of the most studied figures of the ancient Greek gods.
Popularly known as the god of wine and frenzied abandon, and an influential figure for theatre where drama originated as part of the cult of Dionysos, Seaford goes beyond the mundane and usual to explore the history and influence of this god as never before.
As a volume in the popular Gods and Heroes series, this is an indispensible introduction to the subject, and an excellent reference point for higher-level study.
http://www.routledge-ny.com/books/Dionysos-isbn9780415324885
WHY DOES DIONYSOS MATTER
IN THE MODERN WORLD?
Why, in the twenty-first century, should anybody be interested in the
ancient Greek god Dionysos? From the Internet alone we can make
the acquaintance of a hundred living religions, whereas the cult of
Dionysos, and the ecstasy he inspired, died long ago.
But the passing away of Dionysos raises a doubt. The psychological
fragmentation and manipulated homogeneity of our mediadominated
consumerism may create an intense need for some kind of
transcendence. It is a need that, for most people, cannot be fulfilled
by institutionalised religion, in part because such religion is inextricably
wedded to forms of social control that tend to limit the moral
and religious experience of the controlled. Nor can it be fulfilled by
the cheap forms of spiritual liberation on offer from various religious
cults.
True liberation from the consumerist mind-set can be achieved
only by finding a perspective from which to perceive its narrowness.
And in the search for this perspective enormous resources may be
found in the past, albeit not in the fragmented past purveyed to the
modern consumer: true liberation always requires mental focus.
I am not of course suggesting that we should revive the cult of
Dionysos. Rather, Dionysos provides a perspective on the narrowness
of modern religious experience, and helps us to understand how
different kinds of society tend to produce different forms of religious
organisation and experience. There are various reasons why Dionysos
is more helpful than are other alien gods in providing these perspectives
on our own insularity.
First, when Christianity was establishing itself in the ancient
Mediterranean world, the cult of Dionysos was its most geographically
widespread and deeply rooted rival. And so the Christian church,
while enclosing the revolutionary ethics of its gospels within the
necessity of social control, was influenced by Dionysiac cult as well as
opposing it.
Second, until the triumph of Christianity the cult of Dionysos
had flourished throughout the recorded history of the Greeks, for a
thousand years, always having at its heart the power of Dionysos to
bridge the gaps between the three spheres of the world – nature,
humanity, and divinity. Humanity emerges from nature and aspires
to divinity. Dionysos, by transcending these fundamental divisions,
may transform the identity of an individual into animal and god.
And it is by his presence that he liberates the individual from the
circumstances of this life. In these respects Dionysos contrasts with
the relatively remote and austere god of Christianity. A small but telling
symptom of the contrast is the early and persistent Christian hostility
to the mask, as diabolical. It is the joyful transformation of identity that
underlies the importance of Dionysos in various spheres – notably the
spheres of wine, mystery-cult, the underworld, politics, theatre, poetry,
philosophy, and visual art.
And indeed Dionysos – more than any other ancient Greek deity –
fills a modern need. He remains a symbol of something important that
cannot be so effectively expressed in any other way. For instance,
Richard Schechner, who directed the seminal New York performance
of Dionysus in 69, wrote in an essay entitled The Politics of Ecstasy
(1968) that Dionysos ‘is present in today’s America – showing himself
in the hippies, in the “carnival spirit” of black insurrectionists, on
campuses; and even, in disguise, on the patios and in the living rooms
of suburbia’. In the same tradition, The God of Ecstasy: Sex-Roles and
the Madness of Dionysos by Arthur Evans (1988) is a sustained invocation
of Dionysos as embodying the forces required to save our
civilisation from militarism, individualism, unfeeling intellect, greedy
destruction of the natural environment, male-dominated hierarchy,
and the conversion of people into objects. The book culminates in an
account of the ‘affirmation of the whole self through ecstatic ritual’ in
a homosexual ritual orgy on a California beach.
It is not only in the outlandish practices of the American counterculture
that Dionysos has survived, but even – under the influence of
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) – in the elaborate abstractions
of contemporary European philosophy, as we shall see at the end of
Chapter 10.
There is of course an enormous difference between the ancient and
the modern Dionysos. For the ancient Greeks Dionysos was believed
to be a god, and was given cult. But in our very different world, and
notably since Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy (1872), he seems rather to
be a symbol of a certain mental state – or at most the name for
whatever it is that produces that mental state. Dionysos has become
the Dionysiac. And yet it is not impossible that the mental state that
required and produced the ancient belief in Dionysos as a god overlaps
with the modern mental state that keeps alive the Dionysiac as an
irreducible symbol.
http://www.mediafire.com/file/uugzly5jmml/Richard.Seaford-Dionysos.pdf
Later,
-Lyfing