Note 54 — Chapter IX · DIONYSIAC RELIGION IN GREECE ITS AMALGAMATION WITH APOLLINE RELIGION. ECSTATIC PROPHECY. RITUAL PURIFICATION AND EXORCISM. ASCETICISM

In the inspired mantikê the soul becomes “free” from the body: animus ita solutus est et vacuus ut eo plane nihil sit cum corpore, Cic., Div. i, 113; cf. 70. (καθ’ ἑαυτὴν γίγνεται ἡ ψυχή in dreaming and μαντεῖαι: Arist. ap. S.E., M. 9, 21 [fr. 10 R.]. ἔοικε ἡ ἀρχὴ (of νοῦς) ἀπολυομένου τοῦ λόγου ἰσχύει μᾶλλον in enthousiasmos, EE. 1248a, 40; cf. 1225A, 28.) This is ἔκστασις of the understanding itself: see above, p. 260 ff. At other times it is said that the god enters into men and fills their souls; whereupon the man is ἔνθεος: see above, chap. viii, n. 50; cf. pleni et mixti deo vates, Minuc. 7, 6. The priestess at the oracle of Branchidai δέχεται τὸν θεόν, Iamb., M. 3, 11, p. 127, 7 Par.—ἐξοικίζεται ὁ ἐν ἡμῖν νοῦς κατὰ τὴν τοῦ θείου πνεύματος ἄφιξιν, κατὰ δὲ τὴν μετανάστασιν αὐτοῦ πάλιν ἐσοικίζεται κτλ: Philo, Q. rer. div. 53, i, p. 511 M., speaking of the ἔνθεος κατοχωτική τε μανία, ᾗ τὸ προφητικὸν γένος χρῆται (p. 509 M.); cf. also Spec. Leg. i, p. 343 M. This also was the idea prevailing at Delphi. Plu., Def. Or. 9, p. 414 E, rejects as εὔηθες, τὸ οἴεσθαι τὸν θεὸν αὐτόν, ὥσπερ τοὺς ἐγγαστριμύθους, ἐνδυόμενον εἰς τὰ σώματα τῶν προφητῶν ὑποφθέγγεσθαι, τοῖς ἐκείνων στόμασι καὶ φωναῖς χρώμενον ὀργάνοις. But this was evidently the ordinary and deep-rooted opinion (τὸν θεὸν εἰς σῶμα καθειργνύναι θνητόν, Plu., Pyth. Or. 8, p. 398 A). The primitive idea is naively expressed by a late magic papyrus (Kenyon, Gk. Pap. in BM. i, p. 116 [1893], No. 122 [fourth century B.C.] l. 2 ff.): ἐλθέ μοι, κύριε Ἑρμῆ ὡς τὰ βρέφη εἰς τὰς κοιλίας τῶν γυναικῶν κτλ.—Neither in mantikê nor in ἔκστασις is any great distinction made between the out-going of the soul and the in-coming of the god: the two ideas merge together. The condition is regarded as one in which two persons are united and become one; the human being οἷον ἄλλος γενόμενος καὶ οὐκ αὐτός, θεὸς γενόμενος μᾶλλον δὲ ὤν, no longer experiencing a sense of division between himself and divinity μεταξὺ γὰρ οὐδέν, οὐδ’ ἔτι δύο ἀλλ’ ἕν ἄμφω (as the subtle mysticism of Plotinos describes ἔκστασις, 6, 9, 9–10; 6, 7, 34–5). In the above-mentioned magic invocation of Hermes the γόης who has conjured the god into himself says to the god (l. 36 ff., p. 117) σὺ (σοι MSS.) γὰρ ἐγὼ, καὶ ἐγὼ σύ (σοι MSS.)· τὸ σὸν ὄνομα ἐμὸν καὶ τὸ ἐμὸν σόν· ἐγὼ γάρ εἰμι τὸ εἴδωλόν σου κτλ. [Cf. Swinburne, Songs before Sunrise ii, 74 f.]