Although the nature of the soil, the climate, and other factors made farming difficult, the people of Palestine have always made their living off of the land. One of the earliest crops to be introduced into the area was the vine, which grew both wild and cultivated along Palestine's many hills. There are numerous references to wine in the Hebrew Bible - including yayin 'wine', sekar 'strong drink', and tiros 'sweet or new wine' showing its importance to the people. (New Bible Dictionary 'wine') The God of Wine, Mesopotamian Siras, or Ugaritic Tirsu, was also worshipped here from a very early time. (This provides an interesting linguistic connection - tiros > Tirsu > thyrsos, the magical wand carried by Dionysos that made wine flow.) The Levitical Hebrews tried to mask this God's presence by claiming that Noah had invented viniculture. (Genesis 9:20).
Plutarch of Chaeronea held that the God of the Jews was none other than Dionysos. "First the time and character of the greatest, most sacred holiday of the Jews clearly befit Dionysos. When they celebrate their so-called Fast, at the height of the vintage, they set out tables of all sorts of fruit under tents and huts plaited for the most part of vines and ivy. They call the first of the two days Tabernacles. A few days later they celebrate another festival, this time identified with Bacchos not through obscure hints but plainly called by his name, a festival that is a sort of 'Procession of Branches' or 'Thyrsos Procession' in which they enter the Temple each carrying a thyrsos. What they do after entering we do not know, but it is probable that the rite is a Bacchic revelry, for in fact they use little trumpets to invoke their God as do the Argives at their Dionysia. Others of them advance playing harps; these players are called in their language Levites, either from 'Lysios' or better, from 'Euois.'
"I believe that even the feast of the Sabbath is not completely unrelated to Dionysos. Many even now call the Bacchantes 'Saboi' and utter the cry when celebrating the God. Testimnoy of this can be found in Demosthenes and Menander. The Jews themselves testify to a connection with Dionysos when they keep the Sabbath by inviting each other to drink and enjoy wine; when more important business interferes with this custom, they regularly take at least a sip of neat wine. Now thus far one might call the argument only probable; but the opposition is quite demolished, in the first place by the High Priest, who leads the procession at their festival wearing a miter and clad in a gold-embrodered fawnskin, a robe reaching to the ankles, and buskins, with many bells attached to his clothes and ringing below him as he walks. All this corresponds to our custom. In the second place, they also have noise as an element in their nocturnal festivals, and call the nurses of the God 'bronze rattlers.' The carved thyrsos in the relief on the pediment of the Temple and the drums provide other parallels. All this surely befits no divinity but Dionysos." (Quaestiones Convivales 4.6.1-2)
Tacitus said that Dionysos Liber was the God of Jerusalem in former times, but a different God had replaced him, a God with less attractive characteristics: "Liber established a festive and cheerful worship, while the Jewish religion is tasteless and mean." (660)
Antiochos IV Epiphanes tried to Hellenize the Jews, which he almost accomplished through the very popular Greek gymnasia and theaters that he erected. The people liked them so much that they began to neglect their traditions, adopted Greek customs and names, and even refrained from circumcizing their sons. There was a considerable backlash led by the Temple to which Antiochos was forced to respond by taking over the Temple, and rededicating it to Olympian Zeus. To bring peace to the warring factions, he compelled the Jews to celebrate the Dionysia with a procession of ivy. (2 Maccabbees 6:7) When Demetrios I Soter wished to take Judas Maccabbee, a brigand who lived in the hills outside Jerusalem and who had much support from the Temple authorities, his governor threatened to destroy the Temple and build a sanctuary of Dionysos in its place. (2 Maccabbees 14:33) Another King, Ptolemy IV, threatened to have the Jews branded with the ivy-leaf sign of Dionysos. (3 Maccabbees 2:29) When one considers the number of potential Gods that were out there, it is interesting that he should choose Dionysos for this. It is also interesting that Jesus was accused by Talmudic authority Rabbi Eliezer of having magical tattoos carved into his flesh. (Morton Smith's Jesus the Magician pg 62)
Copyright 2002 Sannion
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