# Does Anybody Still WORSHIP The Toman, Greek, Egyptian, Norse (etc.) Gods? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 29, 2003, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220 "2003-10-29T13:42:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2003, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/21 "2003-10-30T04:03:32Z")
[I asked a similiar question last year.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=104088) ---
**Author:** ![caveman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/caveman/32/7242_2.png) [@caveman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/caveman)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2003, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/22 "2003-10-30T05:42:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Kizarvexius \* > \*\*[…] Jupiter Optimus Maximus. \*\* Yeah, but does he transform into semi? :: d&r :: ---
**Author:** ![Mayor\_McJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ce73a5/32.png) [@Mayor\_McJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mayor_McJesus)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2003, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/23 "2003-10-30T07:34:30Z")
Several American Indian religions are still being practiced. They hold regular worship services and some of their rituals are indeed very neat. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2003, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/24 "2003-10-30T11:07:56Z")
The Lithuanian pagan religion didn’t just lie down and die out after the 1390s. It is known to have continued for centuries. It was documented as still in continuous existence as late as the 18th century. Some think it actually continued in hiding until the 20th century, and of course it is now being revived along with the other ancient pagan religions, like the Fellowship of Isis which is headquartered in a castle in Ireland. If any ancient European pagan religion actually survived in unbroken continuity down to the present day, I think the Lithuanian is the only one that has a chance of this being true. Wasn’t there a Temple of Athena dedicated in Memphis, Tennessee about 10 years ago? The report I read of it said that it was built by a group that is quite serious about following the ancient Greek religion. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2003, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/25 "2003-10-30T11:22:29Z")
OK. the [Temple of Athena](http://www.parthenon.org/) isn’t in Memphis, it’s in Nashville. The rededication of the temple to Athena that I was thinking of was held at the 1993 Panathenaia festival in Nashville. Google got me the information that the Tennessee Parthenon wasn’t actually built by the neopagan revivalists. It was the work of Nashville civic boosters for a 19th-century exposition. But now the Greek neopagans have claimed it. Here is a site full of links for the Greek neopagan groups: [http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/OM/](http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/OM/) ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2003, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/26 "2003-10-30T23:42:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \* > \*\*OK. the [Temple of Athena](http://www.parthenon.org/) isn’t in Memphis, it’s in Nashville. The rededication of the temple to Athena that I was thinking of was held at the 1993 Panathenaia festival in Nashville. Google got me the information that the Tennessee Parthenon wasn’t actually built by the neopagan revivalists. It was the work of Nashville civic boosters for a 19th-century exposition. But now the Greek neopagans have claimed it. > > Here is a site full of links for the Greek neopagan groups: > [http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/OM/](http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/OM/) \*\* Funny, I haven’t heard of any neopagans doing anything at the temple (I live about 1/2 an hour away from Nashvegas.). The last time the temple made news was right before the war when a group of professors held a performance of [the ancient Greek play _Lysistrata_ as part of an antiwar protest](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=167637). ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2003, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/27 "2003-10-31T00:03:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Duke \* > \*\*I have also heard reports, second-hand, from people who have seen the “ceremonies,” of Icelanders worshipping the Norse gods. \*\* I’ve gotta second this. The rumors have been persistant since the middle 70’s. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2003, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/28 "2003-10-31T02:13:50Z")
**Tuckerfan** , if the Panathenaia festivals were in the news at all, they might have been buried down on page 23. You could have easily missed something pagan going on right under your nose. I heard about it in the early 1990s because I had ordered some books from Phanes Press, and having gotten my address, for a while they were sending me a newsletter with articles on things like that. The Nashville Parthenon had been built in 1897 for the Tenneseee Centennial. The Athena worshipers came along in the 1980s or so. The Southern ruling class in the 19th century liked to think that they were the heirs of Classical Greek civilization. Maybe because the ancient Greeks were slaveowners too? All that Greek Revival architecture in the South culminated in the Nashville Parthenon. It was at the Panathenaia festival in the early 1990s that the brand new statue of Athena, a replica of the original that had once stood in the Parthenon in Greece, was dedicated by the modern Athena worshipers. Somehow I don’t imagine all those old colonels in their white suits and handlebar mustaches sippin’ mint juleps on the front porches of their Greek Revival mansions ever quite envisaged actual neopagan Athena worship when they decided to build the Parthenon replica. At first I had misremembered the location as Memphis. Probably because of that line sung by the Talking Heads: _Did I forget to mention Memphis Home of Elvis and the ancient Greeks_ But the Talking Heads were wrong! Memphis was the home of ancient Egyptians, not Greeks. ---
**Author:** ![TheSundanceKid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/838e76/32.png) [@TheSundanceKid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheSundanceKid)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2003, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/29 "2003-10-31T02:48:07Z")
National Geographic had an interesting article in September 2002 about a culture in Western Georgia that still worships “the first gods ever feared by men.” That claim is a little melodramatic, but that’s only to be expected because it was part of an opening vignette designed to draw the reader in. The people living in the mountains east of the Black Sea call themselves Christian but still worship local gods, individual nature spirits attached to individual towns. They still do regular animal sacrifices to their Khati (village gods), drink beer from goat horns, and all that good stuff. They also baptise their kids and believe in their religion strongly enough to kill anybody who calls them pagan. It’s a weird mix of pagan, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Persian, Mesopotamian, Russian, Arab, and Roman cultures. Also, beer is a sacred drink. I don’t see anything in the article about specific Greek or Roman gods, but apparently they inherited the tradition of worshipping a local town-god from Greece. Religion’s a weird thing. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2003, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/30 "2003-10-31T23:52:51Z")
**Jomo Mojo** , I doubt that they would have been buried on page 23. Back in the late 1980s a couple of kids spray painted some pagan symbols on a few things and the news was overran for _months_ with wild tales of Satanists loose in our midst. Tennessee is the frigging buckle on the bible belt. This state had Prohibition before the 18th Amendment was passed, and the county where Jack Daniels is distilled is a _dry county!_ (Not to mention that in this state sodomy is illegal and bestiality _is_ legal.) As for what the folks were thinking when they built the Parthenon, well, that’s pretty simple. The Parthenon is the _only_ remaining building from the exposition. There were tons of others, all built to look like various famous buildings from around the world. (You can see pictures of them when you take the tour of the Parthenon.) None of the buildings (including the original Parthenon) were planned to be permanent. They were all cheaply made, wooden structures which were little more than facades. Since Nashvegas was calling itself “the Athens of the South” (a title which has since been usurped by Atlanta), folks decided to keep the building. By the 1920s, it was falling apart, so they raised money to rebuild it out of concrete. Then they puttered around until the early 1980s and decided to raise the money for the statue, which they didn’t get completed until fairly recently. (Like two years ago. The statue was up, but needed painting and guilding.) ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2003, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/31 "2003-11-01T03:58:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Spectre of Pithecanthropus \* > \*\*It’s difficult to research traditional paganism on the Web, however. For every relevant hit you get a dozen on Wicca or Neopaganism. \*\* You think THAT’S tough? Try doing some serious research on huge breasts or naked celebrities!:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2003, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/32 "2003-11-01T13:45:49Z")
**Tuckerfan** , there was an article written by one of the Hellenic neopagans behind the Nashville Panathenaia festival, relating the story of how they rededicated the Tennessee Parthenon to Athena. There was a link to it from the page I linked to above. However, that link was broken. I googled around for a while looking for another copy of that article, but all the links are broken. So I haven’t been able to find an account of the event. But it does look like it really happened, and I guess you just missed it. Maybe something else distracted your attention that day. Ever ponder how many things happen right under your nose all the time, and you never notice? ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2003, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/33 "2003-11-02T08:28:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \* > \*\ ***Tuckerfan** , there was an article written by one of the Hellenic neopagans behind the Nashville Panathenaia festival, relating the story of how they rededicated the Tennessee Parthenon to Athena. There was a link to it from the page I linked to above. However, that link was broken. I googled around for a while looking for another copy of that article, but all the links are broken. So I haven’t been able to find an account of the event. But it does look like it really happened, and I guess you just missed it. Maybe something else distracted your attention that day. Ever ponder how many things happen right under your nose all the time, and you never notice? \*\* In 1993 I was _living_ with a group of pretentious pseudo-pagans (I say “pseudo-pagans” because they claimed to be pagans, but they never practiced the religion and olny called themselves pagan to appear cool at their philosophy parties.), so if it had been any more than just three or four folks showing up and sprinkling water in the place on the sly, I’d most likely have heard about it. (They did keep track of those things because they knew some actual pagans and they didn’t want to embarass themselves by not knowing about the important happenings.) With the links you’ve searched for all being dead, I’d say that speaks volumes about how active the Greek neopagans are in Nashville (i.e. there ain’t too many of them). ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2003, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/34 "2003-11-02T13:07:11Z")
You made me google harder just because you missed the fun. [This page](http://www.geocities.com/bornhoney/ncult.htm) has some mention of it: > [@](#): > > **In 1993, the Parthenon was the inspiration for the Panathenaia Festival. The celebration was modeled after ancient Greek athletic competitive olympics, which were played entirely in the nude. Officials wanted to replicate authenticity as much as possible, but balked at totally naked participants. Settling for for Greek loincloths, called “perizomai”, the men were rubbed with olive oil and dusted with red clay. White clay was used for the women. The games, held at the Tennessee State University, consisted of a foot race, javelin throw, discus throw, long jump and wrestling.** Just picture that, will you… Surviving accounts on the internet, from an event that occurred just a short time before Americans started getting hooked up to the World Wide Web, are now as scanty as the _perizomai_ they wore at the games. The article “How Athena Came to Athens” had many links to it from many different sites recently, but seems to have been recently taken down. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2003, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/35 "2003-11-02T19:59:08Z")
Aha! Those nutters! There _was_ coverage of that, however, they’re purely an atheletic organization IIRC, and **not** religious! (I remember hearing about it and laughing because they _weren’t_ going to be nekkid!) To show you how illogical that whole thing is/was, there’s _ample_ room at Centennial Park (where the Parthenon is located) for those games to have been held, and if you wanted a _really_ large venue for the games, why Vanderbilt University is right across the street from Centennial. But _TSU_? Well, now, that’s quite a ways away from Centennial, and it’s not exactly in the best of neighborhoods, so I stand by my statement that if they did anything at the Parthenon that had any religious overtones, it was a couple of guys on the sly. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2003, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/36 "2003-11-06T13:11:36Z")
Asatru (Norse) Priests now permitted to conduct marriages. [http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story\_page/0,5744,7784368%5E29677,00.html](http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,7784368%255E29677,00.html) Denmark gives OK for marriages, funerals. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2003, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/37 "2003-11-06T17:50:02Z")
Posted by **Kizarvexius:** > [@](#): > > However, I would have to choose the tenth. This would just be the most practical. Instead of limiting specifically things that the federal government can and can’t do, we would limit everything to the states that isn’t in the constitution itself. We would just have to rely on the states to pass reasonable laws. If actually enforced, this would prevent the federal government from growing too large and trambling the would be other ammendments. Here is the site of an organization called “Nova Roma,” which purports to worship the Roman gods: [http://www.novaroma.org/](http://www.novaroma.org/) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2003, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/38 "2003-11-06T17:55:16Z")
Sorry, I was quoting the wrong post, from a different thread in a different forum (GD)-- flubbed my ctrl-V. **Kizarvexius,** of course, said: > [@](#): > > I was looking up information on reconstructing Roman armour and came upon a website (sorry, no cite) that at first glance looked like the classical equivalent of the SCA. A bunch of people hanging out and acting like Romans with somewhat more authenticity (and less vomiting) than your average toga party. Pretty intersting, I thought, and read on. Turns out that the driving factor behind their group was the restored worship of Jupiter Optimus Maximus. Sorry. I prefer not to make my personal decisions in life based upon the flights of birds and the condition of animal entrails. ---
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2003, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/39 "2003-11-06T18:13:24Z")
Believe it or not the answer is yes, ignoring neo-pagans and romantic revivalists, there is a small tribe in Afghanistan who are descendants of soldiers in Alexander the Great’s army (which passed through the area) who settled down and took local wifes. They still worship Gods from the Greek panthenon, though I wonder how they fared under the Taliban. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2003, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220/40 "2003-11-06T18:44:18Z")
Posted by **MC Master of Ceremonies:** > [@](#): > > Believe it or not the answer is yes, ignoring neo-pagans and romantic revivalists, there is a small tribe in Afghanistan who are descendants of soldiers in Alexander the Great’s army (which passed through the area) who settled down and took local wifes. They still worship Gods from the Greek panthenon, though I wonder how they fared under the Taliban. !!! Cite? This sounds a lot like the plot of Kipling’s story, “The Man Who Would Be King”! Except that in that story, what the people of Kaffiristan inherited from Alexander’s army was not Greek religion, but Freemasonry. I know that the actual Kaffiristan (“land of infidels”) is a region in Afghanistan where the people remained pagan holdouts until they finally converted to Islam – in the 19th Century, I think – after which the province became known as Luristan (“land of light”). But I had always assumed their paganism was of a native form, not Greek. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-still-worship-the-toman-greek-egyptian-norse-etc-gods/210220.md?page=3)