The Bacchae

For philosophy and literature, this week's reading assignment was The Bacchae by Euripedes. It's enormously entertaining, if a bit grotesque in places. In fact, my first impression was that if you took one of the Christian gospels and turned it into a horror story, you'd probably end up with something quite similar to The Bacchae... but the Bacchae dates to 403 BCE. Note: I seem to have Woodruff's translation, which is not available on line. Here is a different translation.

So what similarities to the gospels... Dionysus is referred to as "son of god", referring, of course, to Zeus. His mother, Semele, caught Zeus's fancy, but Zeus's wife Hera did not approve, and tricked Semele into asking Zeus to appear in his true form. As this was a lightning bolt, this didn't go so well, but their unborn child, Dionysus, was saved.

So his mother bore him once
in labor bitter; lightning-struck,
forced by fire that flared from Zeus,
consumed, she died, untimely torn,
in childbed dead by blow of light!
Of light the son was born!
88-94

The plot of the play is Dionysus's return to his almost-birthplace, Thebes, where he has been ridiculed rather than acknowledged as god.

No, he desires his honor from all mankind.
He wants no one excluded from his worship.
208-9

The theme for Dionysus is intoxication, particularly by wine. This image is particularly interesting:

And when we pour libations
to the gods, we pour the god of wine himself
that through his intercession man may win the favor of heaven
283-6

Sound familiar? Sounds rather like the Roman Catholic view of the communal wine, though in that case it becomes only the blood of their god. Something else is required for the flesh. Additionally, Dionysus is described as:

the prince of the blessed,
the god of garlands and banquets
375-6

Now we get to the meat of the play, and if you read it through, you'll understand that nastiness of that pun. Dionysus comes to Thebes disguised as one of his own priests, and is imprisoned for attempting to import the Dionysian Mysteries into Thebes. After Pentheus orders his men to chain him, we have this:

You do not know
the limits of your strength. You do not know
what you do. You do not know who you are.
505-7

and after his hands are bound and they are leading him to the stables:

I go,
but not to suffer, since that cannot be.
But Dionysus whom you outrage by your acts,
who you deny is god, will call you to account.
When you set chains on my, you manacle the god.
515-9

There's also a theme of the god releasing his people from bondage, via a sacrifice.

O Dionysus, do you see
how in shackles we are held
unbreakably, in the bonds of oppressors?
Descend from Olympus, lord!
Come, whirl your wand of gold
and quell with death this beast of blood
whose violence abuses man and god
outrageously.
551-7

While in some sense the sacrifice will not be by Dionysus himself, in another, the one sacrificed has become Dionysus before the end. Pentheus goes to spy on the rites of the Bacchae (the followers of Dionysus), who include his mother:

Uncontrollable, the unbeliever goes,
in spitting rage, rebellious and amok,
madly assaulting the mysteries of god,
profaning the rites of the mother of god

As Dionysus' own mother died before his birth, this can only refer to Pentheus's mother, and thus Pentheus must thus become the god. This fits, as he is dressed as the god in order to try and spy on the Bacchae.

And there's an analogue to the splitting of the temple in the gospels, one scene prior to Pentheus's sacrifice: an earthquake collapses Pentheus's palace, cracking the stones apart, and anything left is consumed by the thunderbolt that follows.

He has brought the high house low!
He comes, our god, the son of Zeus!
603-4

O greatest light of our holy revels,
... Without you, I was lost.
608-9

But let the truth be told: there is no god
greater than Dionysus
777-8

Those are the parallels. The overall message, though, is quite different. In the end, Dionysus is more destroyer than redeemer. The impression I get is that balance is needed. You cannot stop these mysteries; worse, trying to stop them is both futile and fatal. You also can't ignore them without ignoring the god. What's needed is a compromise. This play does not find one, though if you read the articles I linked to, Greece eventually does work out a balance, by harnessing the power of the mysteries rather than fighting them. This article, linked from Wikipedia, suggests Euripides thought that civilization itself was incompatible with the Dionysian mysteries, but I wouldn't take it that far. It's more that it's incompatible with rigidity.

If we consider Dionysus as the god of wine (and more generally, of intoxication), this fits. In moderate amounts, alcohol has pleasant, even soothing effects. In large quantities, it can turn people violent, and even make them insane. When banned outright, these effects become the predominant ones. So I see it as a play warning of the dangers of excess, in either direction.