Cosmic Connections

Images of the divine world permeated ancient society. Connecting with the divine world was serious business and occupied persons at almost every level. Members of elite classes in the Greek East and those associated with them actively sought the continuing benevolence of a god or gods. Many appropriated symbols associated with the divine world to bolster, maintain, or redefine their relation to political, social, and economic arenas of power. The stakes could be high. Tax breaks, acquisition of prestige, or the right to provide asylum could go to those cities whose elites argued effectively for legitimate and long-standing cosmic connections. Those who fell outside “proper” channels of divine power could suffer severe social, political, and economic sanctions. The gods had to be appeased. Jewish and Christian groups, who claimed to have access to a power greater than any other, also had their adherents in the larger society.

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