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are more distinct mirrors by the nature of their birth also.” 35 Plutarch thus indicates that animal
worship is acceptable when viewed as a metaphor for honoring the gods.
In the latter instance, animal worship is not viewed in a negative light, and one can argue
that Plutarch depicts it in a favorable fashion by supporting the opinion that the Egyptians had
discovered secret knowledge unknown to Plutarch’s audience, and that, when interpreted as an
allegory, animal worship was quite reasonable. 36 Scholars such as D.S. Richter read Plutarch’s
text as wholly negative and see Plutarch’s treatment of Egyptian myth as a critique of the
practice of animal worship. Richter 37 proposes that Plutarch’s account of the myth of Isis and
Osiris and the cult that accompanied it is a Middle-Platonic quest to prove the primacy of Greek
philosophy over Egyptian religion, and argues that the Greeks understood the concept of divinity
better than the Egyptians.
Before continuing with an analysis of the texts gathered by Smelik and Hemelrijk, we
may pause, for there are two important points to make. The first of these is that the literary
sources are not wholly negative, and are at worst ambivalent to the worship of animals. We
cannot use them as firm proof that the Romans were as strongly opposed to animal worship as
past scholarship has led us to believe. Secondly, it seems problematic to ascribe the beliefs of
these authors to the population at large who would be practicing the religions in question. 38
Certainly, this is true of Plutarch, a member of the wealthy, elite, and educated class, who
disavowed superstition. The Romans classified ritual practices in one of two ways: religio or
superstitio, 39 and it is possible that the Roman upper-class would have thought of animal worship
as a rustic practice categorized as superstitio. In fact, Egyptian gods and their images are
prevalent in the practice of magic. 40
If we follow Richter and the notion that Plutarch seeks to justify Greco-Roman religious
practice through Middle-Platonic philosophy, we can safely assume that he is not representative
35
Plut. De Is. et Os. 76. Greek Text taken from Plutarch’s De Iside et Osiride, edited by J G Griffith, Cambridge:
University of Wales Press, 1970, p.240. (Translation by Author.)
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36
Smelik and Hemelrijk 1984, 1968.
37
Richter 2001, 194, 209.
38
North (2000, 8) states, “The extant evidence generally reflects not the experience of the mass of individual
Romans, but the religious activity that affects the state and its activities, above all the doings of magistrates and
priests.”
39
Beard, North, Price 1998, 214-27.
40 Graf 1997, 5.
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