The influence of the Delphic priesthood rose and spread with the
power of the Dorians. It did so, not merely because that power was
an apt instrument for its propagation, but also because in Hellas at
large the time was favourable. The religion of Apollo, as his
Pythian interpreters set it forth, was suited to an age which had
begun to reflect, but which retained a vivid faith in the older
mythology. Here we are concerned with only one aspect of the
Apolline cult, that which relates to blood-guiltiness. The Homeric
man who has killed another may either pay a fine to the kinsfolk, or
go into exile
1; but in Homer there is no idea that he
can be purified by a ritual. In other words, there is the notion of
a debt in this respect, but hardly of a sin; of quittance, but not
of absolution. It was a somewhat later stage when men began more
distinctly to recognise that in cases of homicide there are kinds
and degrees of moral guilt which cannot be expressed in the terms of
human debtor and creditor. Clearly a man ought to do what the gods
command. But what if a god tells a man to do something which most
men think wrong? If the man obeys, and if his conduct is to be
judged aright, the tribunal, like the instigation, must be divine.
Nor is this so only when the opinion offended is that of men. A god
may command a mortal to do an act by which some other god, or
supernatural being, will be incensed. Suppose, for instance, that a
man receives a divine mandate to slay a guilty kinsman; if he obeys,
nothing can save him from angering the Erinyes, who resent every
injury to kinsfolk.
For questions such as these the Pythian creed provided
Purification from
bloodguilt. |
an answer, or at least a mystic compromise.
Apollo, the god of light, is the all-seeing arbiter of purity. A man
who commits homicide displeases Apollo, who abhors every stain of
blood. But Apollo can estimate the degree of guilt. And he has
empowered his servants to administer rites by which, under certain
conditions, a defiled person may be freed from the stain. In later
days the critics of Apollo could object that he had encouraged crime
by thus far alleviating its consequences. But in the age when the
doctrine was first put forth, it must have been, on the whole,
beneficent. It tempered the fear of capricious or vindictive deities
by trust in a god who, as his priests taught, never swerved from
equity, and who was always capable of clemency. At the same time it
laid the unabsolved offender under a ban worse than mere out lawry,
for it cut him off from the worship of the temple and of the hearth,
and, indeed, from all intercourse with god-fearing men. It made his
hope depend on submission to a religion representing the highest
spiritual influence which ever became widely operative among the
people of pagan Hellas.
The ritual of Apollo the Purifier had already a place in the Cyclic
epic called the
Aethiopis2, said to have been composed by
Arctînus of Miletus, about 776 B.C. More than a century
elapsed after that date before Lyric poetry was matured; and
meanwhile the worship of the Pythian Apollo, with its ritual of
purification from blood, was diffused throughout the Greek world. It
was to be expected, therefore, that, when the story of Orestes began
to receive lyric treatment, the influence of Delphi should be
apparent. If, in avenging his father, Orestes killed Clytaemnestra
as well as Aegisthus, the Pythian priesthood had a text than which
they could desire none more impressive. For, according to the
immemorial and general belief of Hellenes, Orestes did well to
avenge Agamemnon. If, however, he slew his mother, the Erinyes were
necessarily called into activity. Who, then, was to vindicate the
avenger? Who was to assert, even against the Erinyes, that his deed
was righteous? Who but Apollo, the supreme judge of purity? And then
it was only another step to represent Apollo himself as having
prescribed the vengeance. A Greek vase-painting
3 portrays him in the act of doing
so. The scene is in the temple at Delphi. Apollo, laurel-crowned, is
sitting on the omphalos; in his left hand is a lyre; with the stem
of a laurel-branch, held in his right, he is touching the sheathed
sword of Orestes, who stands in a reverent attitude before him; he
thus consecrates it to the work of retribution. Behind Apollo, the
Pythia sits upon the tripod, holding a diadem for the brows of
Orestes, when he shall have done the deed
4; and near her is Pylades.
