The origin of identifying ‘saints’ apart from other believers and of praying to them originates from Greek culture (we might says 'Graeco-Roman' culture). This is an example of how a culture might, and often does, influence Christian practices and faith. The Reformation rightly rejected such accretions to Biblical Christianity. The pressure to honour, even fear, dead ancestors is something Christians face in Africa and Asia today, and so the topic remains relevant culturally if not in Protestant rejection of the Roman Catholic practice. This brief essay will examine the cultural practice in Greece as found in Plato's Laws. Prayer to heroes was well-established in the culture before the early Church arose in the 1st century AD. Plato, in laying down good practices for worship, says, Next after these gods the wise man will offer worship to the daemons, and after the daemons to the heroes. After these will come private shrines l...
In a work titled Laws, Plato discusses the officials ( archontōn ) needed for a colony or city-state. The officials selected should be ‘keepers’ in three areas: city stewards, market stewards, and the priesthood ( Laws 6.759; cf. Aristotle, Politics 6.1322b). As to the priesthood, Plato describes three groups: the priests and priestesses, a group of interpreters of religious laws, and treasurers. In the imaginary colony Plato is describing, he has in mind four classes of citizens defined by economic status. People in religious service are to be drawn from the highest class. We should note that Plato’s famous student, Aristotle, wrote a work that identifies the various supervisors of institutions in a city-state in greater detail. One such group is the priesthood. Like Aristotle, he insists that they should be drawn from citizens and not ‘tillers of the soil’ (slaves) or artisans. Aristotle also says, like Plato, that priests should be older....