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FILIP DOROSZEWSKI
The history and meaning of the term dpyta in ancient Greek literature has been
addressed several times in the secondary literature, yet to date, the Christian
usage has not been satisfactorily explored.” This lacuna in the scholarship can
lead to simplifications and misunderstandings. In the conclusion to a paper
entitled Le mot et les rites. Aperçu des significations de öpyıa et de quelques
dérivés, André Motte and Vinciane Pirenne-Delforge state that “la notion de
mystère sacré accompagné d’une communion avec la divinité” was the reason
why “certains auteurs chrétiens … ont repris à leur compte un mot comme
öpyıa pour designer certaines de leurs célébrations”? This opinion was later
repeated even more explicitly and without qualification by Fayo Schuddeboom
in Greek Religious Terminology — Telete & Orgia. A Revised and Expanded
English Edition of the Studies by Zijderveld and Van der Burg.*
While it is certainly true that in late antiquity many mystery terms, e.g.
LvoTi pia, tedetai, dppyta etc., frequently referred to Christian celebrations,
at the same time, it is disputable whether this was also the case with the term
öpyıa itself. It seems telling that neither Motte and Pirenne-Delforge nor
Schuddeboom provided any specific examples of such cultic use in Greek
Christian literature.® The present paper, therefore, seeks to determine if the
word was actually employed by Christian authors for Church celebrations by
analysing occurrences of the term in Greek Christian writings of the fourth
and fifth centuries. This was a period when mystery terminology, previously
used by Christian authors almost exclusively in a figurative manner,
The most important contributions are: Nicolaas M.H. van der Burg, Andppyta—dpwpeva—
öpyıa: Bijdrage tot de kennis der religieuze terminologie in het Grieksch, Amsterdam,
HJ. Paris 1939; André Motte — Vinciane Pirenne-Delforge, Le mot et les rites. Aperçu
des significations de dpyta et de quelques dérivés, Kernos 5 (1992), 119-140; Fayo L.
Schuddeboom, Greek Religious Terminology — Telete & Orgia. A Revised and Expanded
English Edition of the Studies by Zijderveld and Van der Burg, Leiden, Brill, 2009. See also
Calogero Riggi, Vita cristiana e dialogo liturgico nel Simposio di Metodio (6,5), Salesianum
37 (1975), 503-545, passim. Francesco Massa, Tra la vigna e la croce. Dioniso nei discorsi
letterari e figurativi cristiani (II-IV secolo), Stuttgart, Franz Steiner Verlag, 2014, 125-128.
Motte — Pirenne-Delforge, Le mot et les rites, 139.
Schuddeboom, Greek Religious Terminology, XIII: “André Motte and Vinciane Pirenne¬
Delforge ... concluded, among other things, that the notion of sacred mysteries entailed
a sort of communion with the deities for whom öpyıa were celebrated. This also explains how
certain Christian ... authors could use the term for their own celebrations’; see also Riggi,
Vita Cristiana, 526.
There is only one such example in Latin Christian literature, i.e. Prudentius Perist. 2.65-68.
However, the person who calls Christian rites dpyta in this passage is a pagan prefect, which
raises legitimate doubts as to the intentions of the author, see Schuddeboom, Greek Religious
Terminology, 194-195; Massa, Tra la vigna e la croce, 128.
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