Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

DIONYSUS

(Gk. Diónysos)

The Greek vegetation deity (Roman Bacchus), worshipped primarily as god of wine. His great festival was known as the Dionysia (Greece) or Bacchanalia (Rome), but Dionysiac festivals were held at different times in various locales. Worship involved ecstatic, even orgiastic behavior. Bacchanalia were banned from Rome in 186 b.c.e., but re-emerged in the 1st and 2nd centuries c.e. The ecstatic aspect of the cult and its appeal for women are commemorated in Euripides’ The Bacchae. In Hellenistic times Dionysus was worshipped widely as a mystery deity and adopted as the patron of various voluntary associations. Aspects of the mysteries comparable to Christianity include Dionysus’ association with death and rebirth and the sense of identification with the god experienced by initiates.

Antiochus IV Epiphanes compelled the Jews to wear ivy wreaths in the annual Dionysiac procession (2 Macc. 6:7). His general Nicanor sought to coerce the Jerusalem priests into handing over Judas Maccabeus by threatening to raze the temple and replace it with a temple of Dionysus (1 Macc. 14:33). Ptolemy IV Philopater registered the Egyptian Jewish community, branding them with the ivy-leaf symbol of Dionysus (3 Macc. 2:29).

Mary Ann Beavis

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

DIONYSUS

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)