Agnosticism / Atheism: What's Hot Now: Entrance to the Temple of Bacchus

Agnosticism / Atheism: What's Hot Now These articles that had the largest increase in popularity over the last week

Entrance to the Temple of Bacchus Jul 31st 2011, 10:01 Consisting of temples to the developing Roman trinity of Jupiter, Bacchus, and Venus, the Roman temple complex at Baalbek is based upon an earlier, existing sacred site dedicated to another triad of deities: Hadad (Dionysus), Atargatis (Astarte), and Baal. The transformation from a Canaanite religious site to a Roman one began after 332 BCE when Alexander conquered the city and initiated a process of Hellenization. What this means, in effect, is that three Canaanite or Eastern deities were worshipped under Roman names. Baal-Hadad was worshipped under the Roman name Jove, Astarte was worshipped under the Roman name Venus, and Dionysus was worshipped under the Roman name Bacchus. This sort of religious integration was common for Romans: wherever they went, the gods they encountered were either incorporated into their own pantheon as newly recognized deities or they were associated with their current deities but as simply having different names. Because of the cultural and political importance of people's deities, such religious integration helped smooth the way for cultural and political integration as well. In this photo, we see what's left of the entrance to the Temple of Bacchus in Baalbek. If you look closely, you'll see a person standing near the bottom center of the image. Notice just how large the entrance is when compared to the height of a human being and then remember that this is the smaller of the two temples: The Temple of Jupiter Baal ("Heliopolitan Zeus") was much larger.

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