ABSTRACT
Religion in the ancient Mediterranean appears from our evidence to have been primarily a public matter. The gods did not follow human standards of morality and religion was not so much concerned with individual belief and behaviour as with ensuring the success of the community through the correct carrying out of ritual and fulfilment of obligations. Worship of the city’s gods was communal, involving processions and open-air sacrifices. Even the shrines in individual houses (lararia) were often the scenes of gatherings of the whole household. Much Roman belief looks to us today like superstition. A thunderbolt
might indicate the disapproval of the gods towards what was being done or said, a flame that leaped high in the air their approval. Naturally, the interpretation of such omens could be a matter of dispute, but it is not until some way into our period that there is any evidence of a distinction being made between more and less ‘respectable’ elements within religion. Some Romans who believed themselves to be sophisticated mocked some of the beliefs in signs and portents, as is clear from the second book of Cicero’s On Divination, written in 44/43, although the first book presents the case for belief in traditional augury. Nigidius Figulus, praetor in 58, was the first Roman, so far as we know, to define certain traditional practices as belonging to the world of magic as distinct from religion. Later, Augustus and his supporters, as we saw in Chapter 12, made great play with the idea of the difference between proper and improper religion in their abuse of Cleopatra. It should not be assumed that the upper classes took a sceptical attitude
towards religion or interpreted it in a more philosophical manner, while the plebs clung to their superstitions. There was great ambiguity in attitudes within the elite. In 33, Agrippa drove ‘astrologers and charlatans’ from Rome (Dio 49.43). But according to Suetonius (Augustus 94) Augustus himself eagerly consulted astrologers.
