In this timeless book—a series of lectures at the University of Berkeley aimed at non-specialists—André-Jean Festugière, one of the most distinguished historians of ancient Greek philosophy and religion, reveals a neglected yet fundamental aspect of the spiritual life of the ancient Greeks: the personal, unmediated relationship of the believer with their god, beyond the framework of public worship: soul to soul, heart to heart, "one to one."
Drawing examples from the entire range of ancient Greek literature—from the Homeric epics to late antiquity—Festugière shows the ancient Greeks encountering their gods not as aesthetic symbols but as living beings. We see them thirsting and hungering for the divine; feeling that the gods care for them; and praying to their god in the way one addresses a friend.
Euripides' Hippolytus finds happiness at the side of his beloved Artemis. In Aeschylus and Sophocles, the deeply pessimistic sense of life is balanced by an unwavering faith in the justice of Zeus. With Plato, the grand vision of the ascent towards the divine and the imitation of it is formulated. Among the Stoics, the idea of free consent to a divine plan that transcends individual persons and embraces the entire universe is articulated. With the great current of ancient asceticism, man withdraws from the community to draw closer to the god, while in the Greco-Roman era we find complete devotion to a savior and liberator god who issues a personal call to their worshiper. Finally, in the great philosophical-theological systems of late antiquity, the secret journey of the soul's ascent to the god and the ineffable union with it predominates.
At the same time, however, the book opens up to a more universal dimension, highlighting how the personal religion of the ancient Greeks provided the ground on which Christianity could later take root, thus sealing the subsequent evolution of European culture.
