Session 2: Goddess Worship in Antiquity
Ancient Greek and Roman worship of goddesses was commonplace and highly variegated. This panel explores goddess worship and scholarly investigation thereof by focusing on three themes and interrelated questions pertaining to each.
1. The viability of “Goddess worship” as a scholarly category:
· To what extent and in what ways do cults of goddesses differ from cults of gods?
· Do worshipers of goddesses tend to be either female or male?
· Do ritual functionaries (e.g., priestesses or priests) in the cults of goddesses tend to be either female or male?
2. Variations in the worship of goddesses with regard to location and time:
· Are goddess cults especially popular during particular periods or in particular locales?
· To what extent and in what ways do goddess cults manifest transformations through time, and how might the transformations be explained?
· To what extent and in what ways do goddess cults manifest transformations when moving to new locales, and can the transformations be attributable to the shifts in locale?
3. Goddess worship in relationship with other religions:
· How did foreign (relative to Greek and Roman cultural milieus) worship of a goddess affect worship of the same goddess in Greek or Roman contexts?
· How did worship of goddesses relate to other Greek or Roman (or Greco-Roman) cults?
· How did worship of goddesses affect Judaism and Christianity, with their monotheistic focus on male divinity; and, in converse, how did Judaism and Christianity affect the worship of goddesses?
· What appeal do the Greek and Roman goddesses have to modern neopagans? In what ways are modern conceptions and practices surrounding these divinities connected to ancient conceptions and practices?
Greco-Roman Religions 