# Didn't the ancient Greeks ever climb Mount Olympus to see that there are no Gods there? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 7, 2012, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234 "2012-11-07T16:21:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/41 "2012-11-08T00:16:05Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Look at all the “temples and huge monuments” we’ve built to Santa Claus. Why haven’t we ever traveled to the North Pole to see that there is no Santa Claus there? Flew over it in 1926. Got there by air in 1948. First surface trip wasn’t until 1968. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/42 "2012-11-08T00:33:28Z")
> [@Sampsiceramos](#): > > /begin slight hijack > > No, he’s not. It’s the standard interpretation of Plato’s writings, by academics, for at least hundred years. Got it right here in my “Cambridge Companion to Plato”. IAAPS - at least until I transfer to med school. What are you saying is the standard interpretation? That Plato was an atheist? Bullcrap! That he thought his “forms” more important and more “real” than gods, I will agree, and I am sure he did not take the standard Greek myths very literally, but that is a long way from the ahistorical implication that I was objecting to, that Plato’s views in some way resembled modern atheism. On the contrary, his views were deeply mystical and have been congenial to religious thinkers of many types ever since. He thought his forms were more real than physical objects too. It is true that one of the accusations against Socrates, at his trial, was “impiety” towards the gods, but, he firmly denied this charge (and certainly not merely to save his skin). I can only guess what IAAPS means, but if I am guessing right, well then, IAAPT. > [@Sampsiceramos](#): > > And he’s certainly not wrong about the “believe or get murdered” part - history attests to that with _abundant_ clarity. Again, utter bullcrap. History attests to no such thing. I do not think you can give me **one** example of someone from the ancient world (or the medieval or Renaissance worlds, come to that) who was done to death for being an atheist, certainly not abundant ones. There are lots of examples of people done to death for having the _wrong_ religious beliefs, but their problem was that their religious convictions were too strong and too idiosyncratic, not they had none. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_In_Black)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/43 "2012-11-08T00:33:54Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Yes, the story of Bellerophon is instructive. Bellerophon was the world’s greatest horseman, so great that when he chanced upon Pegasus grazing he was able to lasso and tame it. Later the countryside was ravaged by the Chimera, a hideous creature with the head of a goat, a lion, and a snake that could breathe fire and was immune to weapons. Bellerophon stuck a lump of lead onto his spear, mounted Pegasus and flew off to fight it. He managed to fly close enough to jam the lump of lead into one of the creature’s mouths, where the fire melted it. The melted lead poured down the Chimera’s throat and killed it. > > Bellerophon thought he was such a bad-ass after this exploit that he decided he was an equal to the gods. So he mounted up Pegasus and flew towards Mt Olympus. Zeus, who had until now watched Bellerophon’s deeds with approval, became angry at his hubris, and threw a thunderbolt at him. But the thunderbolt didn’t kill him, it knocked him off Pegasus and he fell to the ground, crushing his legs. Pegasus flew on to Olympus alone, where he was welcomed by the gods, and Bellerophon lived out his days as a crippled beggar. > > So there you go. I think he meant did a person actually climb up there. Not a story about someone flying there and being struck down for it. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/44 "2012-11-08T00:39:03Z")
Heh, I got curious and found a 360 view of the summit of the Current Mount Olympus, in Google earth, lots of graffiti and engravings of names in the rocks, and no one to throw a thunderbolt to those vandals! > **[Mount Olympus Skala Summit Greece 360 Panorama | 360Cities](http://www.360cities.net/image/mount-olympus-skala-summit-greece?utm_source=google_earth&utm_medium=all_images#307.30,19.20,70.0)** > > 360° panorama photo from Greece by Vasilis Triantafyllou. ---
**Author:** ![lisiate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f05b48/32.png) [@lisiate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisiate)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/45 "2012-11-08T01:05:41Z")
You know sometimes I forget what an age of wonders we live in. That’s an awesome view ---
**Author:** ![Hottius\_Maximus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3ab097/32.png) [@Hottius\_Maximus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hottius_Maximus)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/46 "2012-11-08T01:12:04Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > Modern humans have been traveling into the “heavens” for fifty years now without crashing into the pearly gates. This doesn’t seem to have put a dent in the wide belief in a Christian god, even among many astronauts. In the interest of full disclosure I am a practicing “Unorthodox Catholic” or to put it in a more derogatory term, “Cafeteria Catholic” and Yes I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Personal Savior. That being said, I can respect the beliefs of others even though I may not agree with them. Now to respond to your post, while it’s true that we believe that Jesus ascended into heaven, the fact of the matter is that NOWHERE does Christianity teach that if you fly high enough into outer space that you will somehow encounter the pearly gates. Heaven is taught to be a spiritual realm, inaccessible to humans on this physical plane (similar to how Shambahla is taught among some eastern religions). Hence the fact that no astronauts have encountered the “pearly gates” does not disprove the existence of Heaven. ---
**Author:** ![Sampsiceramos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Sampsiceramos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampsiceramos)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/47 "2012-11-08T01:39:50Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > What are you saying is the standard interpretation? That Plato was an atheist? Bullcrap! > > That he thought his “forms” more important and more “real” than gods, I will agree, and I am sure he did not take the standard Greek myths very literally, but that is a long way from the ahistorical implication that I was objecting to, that Plato’s views in some way resembled modern atheism. On the contrary, his views were deeply mystical and have been congenial to religious thinkers of many types ever since. He thought his forms were more real than physical objects too. > > It is true that one of the accusations against Socrates, at his trial, was “impiety” towards the gods, but, he firmly denied this charge (and certainly not merely to save his skin). > > I can only guess what IAAPS means, but if I am guessing right, well then, IAAPT. > > Again, utter bullcrap. History attests to no such thing. I do not think you can give me **one** example of someone from the ancient world (or the medieval or Renaissance worlds, come to that) who was done to death for being an atheist, certainly not abundant ones. There are lots of examples of people done to death for having the _wrong_ religious beliefs, but their problem was that their religious convictions were too strong and too idiosyncratic, not they had none. I am in agreement with all that you state about Plato - but I simply fail to see that Second Stone should ever have advanced the claim that Plato was an atheist - your trudging about in the notion that someone might have construed him as such is a waste of time, at best. As to your claim that history does not attest to the persecution of atheists, this is not the place to discuss it in detail, but let me shortly accept your challenge; you’ll find this “utter bullcrap” of yours in the section entitled “Early Modern Period and Renaissance”: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination\_against\_atheists#Ancient\_times](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination_against_atheists#Ancient_times) On topic, I repeat the refrain: We do not know much about whether they did or did not climb it, and if even they did, it likely changed absolutely nothing. ---
**Author:** ![AaronX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7bcc69/32.png) [@AaronX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AaronX)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/48 "2012-11-08T04:17:43Z")
> [@eclectic\_wench](#): > > You’re defining ‘real’ through a twenty-first-century perspective, in which there’s only one way for things to be real. If it’s not real the same way your shoe is real, then it’s not real at all. Therefore, if I go up Mount Olympus and can’t see any gods, it necessarily follows that they’re not there! > > The Ancient Greeks didn’t see the world that way at all. It was perfectly possible for something to be real and yet be visible and tangible only some of the time, or only to some people. For them, there were two different forms of reality: logos, which is the literal reality (the one you’re talking about), and mythos, which is mythic reality. For a lot of ancient civilisations, the two coexisted and were both necessary without being identical. The gods weren’t ‘real’ in the same way that your shoe is real - they were real in an entirely different and no less valid way. If you go up Mount Olympus and don’t see any gods, that absolutely proves that they’re not real in the logos sense, but you knew that anyway. It doesn’t tell you anything at all about whether or not they’re real in the mythos sense. > > Link (I’m sure there are better ones, but just on a very fast Google): [http://surge.ods.org/idle\_religion/mythoslogos.htm](http://surge.ods.org/idle_religion/mythoslogos.htm) This is interesting. 100 years from now, will people ask why we didn’t visit data centers to see The Google? ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/49 "2012-11-08T04:51:16Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Flew over it in 1926. Got there by air in 1948. First surface trip wasn’t until 1968. Wow, how old _are_ you? 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/50 "2012-11-08T07:29:38Z")
> [@Sampsiceramos](#): > > I am in agreement with all that you state about Plato - but I simply fail to see that Second Stone should ever have advanced the claim that Plato was an atheist - your trudging about in the notion that someone might have construed him as such is a waste of time, at best. It is right there in his post. Right after talking about how Plato was only paying lip service to the gods he says: > [@](#): > > Being an open atheist back in the day could get you killed. I suspect that there were just as many atheists, but that they were in the closet. The implication is perfectly clear. He thinks Plato was an atheist. And, to repeat, both that clear implication that Plato was a closet atheist and the explicit claim that the classical world was full of closet atheists are both nonsense. There _were_ some near-atheists in classical times, the Epicureans, and possibly the atomists (Democritus and Leucippus) who preceded them, but they were few in number (although the Epicurean school survived for centuries), and I know of no evidence to suggest that they were ever secretive about their views, or that they suffered any persecution for them. Before the rise of Christianity there was little in the way of religious intolerance in the classical Greek or Roman worlds. Even after the rise of Christianity, it is mostly either Christians being persecuted, or Christians persecuting followers of other religions or, more often, persecuting other types of Christian. **The Second Stone** is projecting his image of religiously intolerant Christianity back into the pre-Christian era, where it does not belong. > [@Sampsiceramos](#): > > As to your claim that history does not attest to the persecution of atheists, this is not the place to discuss it in detail, but let me shortly accept your challenge; you’ll find this “utter bullcrap” of yours in the section entitled “Early Modern Period and Renaissance”: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination\_against\_atheists#Ancient\_times](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination_against_atheists#Ancient_times) Did you actually read what is at your link? It explicitly supports my position and contradicts yours. Let’s quote the paragraph you link to, in full: > [@](#): > > Originally posted by **[Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination_against_atheists#Ancient_times):** > Historians including Lucien Febvre agree atheism in its modern sense did not exist before the end of the seventeenth century.[3][4][5] However, as governmental authority rested on the notion of divine right, it was threatened by those who denied the existence of the local god. Philosophers such as Plato argued that atheism (as we understand it today) was a danger to society and should be punished as a crime.[6] Those labeled as atheist, which included early Christians and Muslims, were as a result targeted for legal persecution. To sum that up: there were no atheists in classical times; Plato, far from being an atheist, thought atheism, were it to exist, ought to be considered a crime; and the people who were (later) sometimes attacked for being “atheist” (because they rejected traditional polytheism) were not in fact atheists as we understand the term at all, but followers of new, more militant religions such as Christianity and Islam. (I take it that _you_ do not think Christians and Muslims are atheists.) The next paragraph of the Wikipedia article you cite goes on to explain that even through the 17th century, those few who were accused of and persecuted for “atheism” were not actually atheists in anything like the modern sense. The people in question all believed in some form of invisible spiritual power or powers, and all, or very nearly all of them believed in some version of the Christian God, just not the form that was generally approved in their area in their time. (The correct term for them, even by the standards of the time, would have been _heretics_. The word “atheist” was simply being used as a bit of hyperbolic slander.) Your Wikipedia article in fact claims that the first actual atheists to be persecuted for their lack of belief are from the 19th century. The earliest person named there as a persecuted atheist is the poet Percy Shelley, whose persecution consisted not in being murdered, but in getting expelled from Oxford (in 1811). I actually think the Wikipedia article overstates its point a bit, because, as I said, I think it is very arguable the Epicureans _were_ near-as-dammit atheists. However, unlike the Christians, they were not assholes about their rejection of the gods (and the supernatural in general), so they did not get themselves persecuted. So, that quibble aside, your cite quite explicitly supports the position I have been taking, and it directly refutes that taken by \*\*The Second Stone \*\*. Furthermore, you have entirely failed to meet my challenge to give **even one single example** of someone who was persecuted for actual atheism in ancient times (or even in medieval or renaissance times). So yes, your claim that > [@](#): > > he’s certainly not wrong about the “believe or get murdered” part - history attests to that with abundant clarity is indeed utter bullcrap. According to your own cite, history does not attest to it _at all_. > [@Sampsiceramos](#): > > On topic, I repeat the refrain: We do not know much about whether they did or did not climb it, and if even they did, it likely changed absolutely nothing. With that, I do not disagree. I just wish the rest of your post was not so full of disinformation and misrepresentation. ---
**Author:** ![Dog80](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6bbea6/32.png) [@Dog80](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dog80)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/51 "2012-11-08T11:51:56Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Or they believed that you could climb Mt Olympus to see if the gods really lived there, and when you did they would punish you for your hubris, as happened to Bellerophon. You don’t just march into Olympus without an invitation unless you’re immune to lightning bolts. Even worse, one could climb all the way up to mt. Olympus only to find that our earthly gods are actually overseen by the Other Gods :eek: ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/52 "2012-11-08T14:57:29Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Flew over it in 1926. Got there by air in 1948. First surface trip wasn’t until 1968. My virginity has a similar timeline. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/53 "2012-11-08T16:24:48Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Before the rise of Christianity there was little in the way of religious intolerance in the classical Greek or Roman worlds. Even after the rise of Christianity, it is mostly either Christians being persecuted, or Christians persecuting followers of other religions or, more often, persecuting other types of Christian. **The Second Stone** is projecting his image of religiously intolerant Christianity back into the pre-Christian era, where it does not belong. > > n. False. Religious persecution has been with us since the first shaman shook his rattle. Just taking the Romans (who were actually known for their religious tolerance) , they persecuted : Bacchanals Druids Jews Mystery Cults (Isis, Attis and even Mithraism at the start) > **[Religious persecution in the Roman Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_persecution_in_the_Roman_Empire)** > > As the Roman Republic, and later the Roman Empire, expanded, it came to include people from a variety of cultures, and religions. The worship of an ever increasing number of deities was tolerated and accepted. The government, and the Romans in general, tended to be tolerant towards most religions and religious practices. Some religions were banned for political reasons rather than dogmatic zeal, and other rites which involved human sacrifice were banned. > When Christianity became the state chu... It’s true, few were violently persecuted for lack of belief. Few were truly atheists, Deism was more common. Heresy or Paganism were the common reasons for being persecuted (early Christians were considered heretics by many Romans). Note that the Jews were persecuted by other religions in the early Middle east and even vice versa. ---
**Author:** ![April\_R](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@April\_R](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/April_R)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/54 "2012-11-08T16:30:12Z")
> [@picker](#): > > [Ahem.](https://www.google.com/search?q=megachurch+architecture&hl=en&safe=off&tbo=u&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ei=Fo-aULzbNeqGyAHi5YDIBg&ved=0CEwQsAQ&biw=1047&bih=544) > > [You](https://www.google.com/search?q=mormon+temple&hl=en&safe=off&tbo=d&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=BI-aUNj3G4WEyAHauIDwCQ&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAA&biw=1047&bih=544) [were](https://www.google.com/search?q=westminster+abbey&hl=en&safe=off&tbo=d&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=C4-aUMjrFqrfyQHDyIHQBA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAA&biw=1047&bih=544) [saying?](https://www.google.com/search?q=national+cathedral&hl=en&safe=off&tbo=d&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=EI-aUP6kEu-WyAGJ4oHgCw&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAA&biw=1047&bih=544) > I love [touchdown Jesus](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v642/shakespeares_sister/jesuschrist.bmp) the best. [http://www.nationalcathedral.org/about/darthVader.shtml](http://www.nationalcathedral.org/about/darthVader.shtml) All Hail Lord Vader, All Hail the Dark Side ( they has cookies ) ---
**Author:** ![eclectic\_wench](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ac91a4/32.png) [@eclectic\_wench](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eclectic_wench)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/55 "2012-11-08T17:07:26Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Just taking the Romans (who were actually known for their religious tolerance) , they persecuted : > Bacchanals > Druids > Jews > Mystery Cults (Isis, Attis and even Mithraism at the start) From what I’ve read (and I’m very far from an expert on this, so I could be way off), the Romans mainly persecuted the Druids for political reasons rather than religious ones. The Druids had a tendency to act as instigators of rebellion, whipping up their tribe to rebel against the Roman occupiers. If you killed off the Druids, the rest of the people were more likely to settle down under Roman rule. So it wasn’t religious persecution per se, so much as political strategy. Actual religious persecution seems to me to be associated very strongly with monotheism. Either the monotheists are going after the polytheists for saying that there’s more than one god, or the polytheists are going after the monotheists for saying that all their gods are rubbish, or the two sets of monotheists are going after each other for giving the one god different names. Various sets of polytheists seemed to manage to coexist relatively peacefully, on the whole. If you already believe in a few dozen gods, the neighbours’ extra dozen don’t exactly strike at the foundations of your belief system. ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/56 "2012-11-08T17:44:13Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > One doesn’t just walk into Olympus… How about if we send 20,000 friends to the front gate to distract them while a couple of us sneak in the back way. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/57 "2012-11-08T19:15:22Z")
> [@eclectic\_wench](#): > > From what I’ve read (and I’m very far from an expert on this, so I could be way off), the Romans mainly persecuted the Druids for political reasons rather than religious ones. The Druids had a tendency to act as instigators of rebellion, whipping up their tribe to rebel against the Roman occupiers. If you killed off the Druids, the rest of the people were more likely to settle down under Roman rule. So it wasn’t religious persecution per se, so much as political strategy. > > Actual religious persecution seems to me to be associated very strongly with monotheism. Either the monotheists are going after the polytheists for saying that there’s more than one god, or the polytheists are going after the monotheists for saying that all their gods are rubbish, or the two sets of monotheists are going after each other for giving the one god different names. Various sets of polytheists seemed to manage to coexist relatively peacefully, on the whole. If you already believe in a few dozen gods, the neighbours’ extra dozen don’t exactly strike at the foundations of your belief system. Well, sorta. It’s true that Monotheism tends to persecute all other religions as theirs is the “One True Faith”. But the Romans persecuted the Mystery cults and what not as they were really outré, considered subversive and “dangerous to the Republic”. The Romans really hated anything which had anything to do with Human Sacrifice, for example. So, yes, polytheistic nations tends to be more accepting of other faiths, but they can certainly turn on anything which is too outside the norm. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/58 "2012-11-09T00:50:05Z")
> [@md2000](#): > > Again, was there any “good book” of Olympian tales, or was it all oral tradition and such, how they impacted other stories like the Illiad, etc.? I haven’t heard there was an orthodoxy and fight over heresy, etc. Unlike the Bible, there was no specific account of the gods that was held to be right and others, wrong. For example, in the Iliad, Aphrodite is the daughter of Zeus and Dione; in Hesiod’s Theogony, She rises from the sea-foam created from the castrated genitals of Ouranos. I have no reason to believe that followers of Hesiod’s account regarded followers of Homer’s account as heretics or vice-versa. Greek religion was (what seems to us today as) amazingly tolerant of widely varying culti and accounts of the gods. When followers of a new polytheistic god came along, that deity was simply accommodated into the religious structure. There wasn’t even a coherent account of how many gods there were. In most accounts of the myth of Demeter and Persephone, for example, Triptolemus is described as a mortal to whom Demeter gave the art of sowing; but there’s reason to believe that in the Eleusinian Mysteries He was regarded as a god. There’s evidence to suggest that Charon was the pre-existing god of the dead before Hades took over and Charon was downgraded to ferryman of the dead. John Cuthbert Lawson’s _Modern Greek Folklore and Ancient Greek Religion_ discusses this in detail. > [@](#): > > Originally Posted by **eclectic wench** > You’re defining ‘real’ through a twenty-first-century perspective, in which there’s only one way for things to be real. If it’s not real the same way your shoe is real, then it’s not real at all. Therefore, if I go up Mount Olympus and can’t see any gods, it necessarily follows that they’re not there! > > The Ancient Greeks didn’t see the world that way at all. It was perfectly possible for something to be real and yet be visible and tangible only some of the time, or only to some people. For them, there were two different forms of reality: logos, which is the literal reality (the one you’re talking about), and mythos, which is mythic reality. For a lot of ancient civilisations, the two coexisted and were both necessary without being identical. The gods weren’t ‘real’ in the same way that your shoe is real - they were real in an entirely different and no less valid way. If you go up Mount Olympus and don’t see any gods, that absolutely proves that they’re not real in the logos sense, but you knew that anyway. It doesn’t tell you anything at all about whether or not they’re real in the mythos sense. Joseph Campbell’s _The Masks of God_ begins with a very instructive account of the difference between logos and mythos. For example, in a festival in which a person wears the mask of a god and then speaks as the god, the faithful truly believe that the god is present, all the while perfectly well aware that the person in front of them is simply their neighbour. The idea that items of religious belief must be materially real or else utterly false is an innovation. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/59 "2012-11-09T09:52:36Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > False. Religious persecution has been with us since the first shaman shook his rattle. > > Just taking the Romans (who were actually known for their religious tolerance) , they persecuted : > Bacchanals > Druids > Jews > Mystery Cults (Isis, Attis and even Mithraism at the start) > > [Religious persecution in the Roman Empire - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_persecution_in_the_Roman_Empire) One of the pervasive problems with Wikipedia is that it takes expert knowledge to distinguish significant facts that are part of a pattern from insignificant “exception to the rule” type facts. Few if any of the regular Wikipedia editors have such expertise, and if an expert does come along, edits he or she makes that reflect their expertise are likely to be reverted by the regulars on the grounds that they are “original research” or not NPOV. Yes, of course people occasionally got persecuted on religious grounds before the Christian era, and others apart from Christians occasionally got persecuted by the pagan Roman authorities after that era began. These events, however, were rare and exceptional. In general, before it became officially Christianized, the culture of the Roman Empire was very religiously tolerant. Even Christians were not persecuted as extensively as the popular mind probably believes, they only suffered a few intermittent bouts of systematic persecution over the Roman centuries. The persecution of mystery cultists and Mithraists are not mentioned at your link, so I only have your word that it happened at all. It certainly was not extensive. As for Druids and Jews, their persecution had nothing to do with their religious beliefs and practices as such. The Druids played a leading role in orchestrating armed resistance to Roman rule in Britain, and the Jews, although they had been allowed to practice their religion in peace (as is quite apparent from the New Testament, and elsewhere) nevertheless staged a series of armed revolts in Palestine. Roman actions against these groups were thus politically, not religiously motivated. (In fact, the persecution of Christians was also essentially for political reasons. Even Christians did not get persecuted for the content of their beliefs about God or Jesus, or for their religious practices. They were mainly persecuted because the Romans thought that Christians, like Jews, were liable to be disloyal to the Roman state. Some Romans may also have thought - presumably wrongly - that Christians were secretly engaging in human sacrifice and/or cannibalism, because of what they had heard about the ceremony of the Eucharist.) > [@DrDeth](#): > > It’s true, few were violently persecuted for lack of belief. Few were truly atheists, Deism was more common. No-one has yet met my challenge to provide a single example of anyone in the ancient world being persecuted in any way for lacking belief in a god or gods, so saying “few” is disingenuous and misleading. As for deism, it was not common at all! Even more than atheism (where we have the arguable exception of the Epicureans), it was non-existent. Deism is scarcely a coherent notion at all absent the conceptions of an omnipotent creator God and of scientific law. The idea of pagan deism is incoherent. Perhaps a Jewish deist might have been a remote conceptual possibility in the ancient world, but I very much doubt that there actually were any. In fact deism, like atheism, is an attitude that really does not become thinkable until the 18th century, in a world where there is a concept of scientific law (which the Deist can imagine as laws laid down by God), a mechanical universe (that will carry on working, like a clock, once it has been made and “wound up” by God), and where long established Christian certainties are being broken down in the wake of the scientific revolution. None of those conditions obtained in the ancient world. There were no ancient (or medieval, or even renaissance) deists. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234/60 "2012-11-09T14:09:31Z")
> [@Hottius\_Maximus](#): > > Now to respond to your post, while it’s true that we believe that Jesus ascended into heaven, the fact of the matter is that NOWHERE does Christianity teach that if you fly high enough into outer space that you will somehow encounter the pearly gates. Heaven is taught to be a spiritual realm, inaccessible to humans on this physical plane (similar to how Shambahla is taught among some eastern religions). Hence the fact that no astronauts have encountered the “pearly gates” does not disprove the existence of Heaven. What do you make of that bit with the Tower of Babel? Folks start building a tower, they say the top will reach heaven – and the Lord promptly shows up, not to dispute their claims but to note that, yup, these brick-and-mortar types will accomplish what they propose unless He steps in to interfere right then and there. (Also, shouldn’t there still be a flaming sword turning this way and that near the physical Garden of Eden?) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/didnt-the-ancient-greeks-ever-climb-mount-olympus-to-see-that-there-are-no-gods-there/640234.md?page=4)