ORATION ON ORPHEUS THE GOD

Thracian religious doctrine seems to have been oral and accessible only to the select circle of the king and the nobility. Today, this doctrine is generally called "Thracian Orphism", in part because our knowledge of it comes predominantly from Thrace and in part to distinguish it from the Greek philosophical and religious teaching also known as Orphism, which was a transformation of the original Thracian doctrine that occurred sometime around the end of the sixth century BC. In contrast to the Greek teaching, Thracian Orphism perceived the Great Mother Goddess as representing the initial state of the world at rest. The goddess was believed to have brought forth from herself a son, who personified the male principle, and who could be identified both with the sun - as a sky god or "uranic" deity, and with the fire - as an underworld god or "chthonic" deity. The Great Mother Goddess dual-natured son was worshiped in both his aspects and was unique in his omnipotence.

However, the continuing life of the world depended upon the fertilization of all its potent elements, which according to the Orphic doctrine was achieved through the "hieros gamos" /sacred marriage/ of the Great Mother Goddess and her son. This union produced another son, who personified and set free the energies of creation. This son was the first to be initiated into the mysteries of the sacred marriage of the Mother Goddess; he was a priest-king, the carrier of the teachings of his own origins and he was predestined to bring order to the world. It was only with his coming that the Cosmos begin to function and the world - both in the sense of physical creation and in the sense of human society - was brought into being.

In the Hellenic literary variant of Orphism, the Great Goddess first son is called both "Apollo" and "Dionysus". These names correspond to the dual uranic/chthonic deity worshiped in both his aspects at the sanctuary of Delphi since the eight century BC. On Mount Parnassus there was a cult center even during the pre-Hellenic period, which later became a center of Thracian Orphism, although none of the early Thracian names of the deities were preserved there. The first Thracian names to appear were those of the gods "Sabazius" and "Zagreus" in the sixth century BC when these two deities were already popular in Thrace and Phrygia.

The child born from the sacred marriage of the Great Mother Goddess and her son; the priest-king, was both a prophet and an evangelist of this faith. Both Thracian oral tradition and written Greek myth refer to him as "Orpheus", The Thracian poet whom the ancient greek authors considered the equal of their own great poet Homer. Throughout Greek literary history - from the sixth century BC Greek philosopher Pythagoras, through the Athenian philosopher Plato and his followers, to third century AD Greek philosopher Plotinus - the Orphic cosmogony, theogony and ethical systems differ from the universally accepted Olympian ones. That is to say, in intellectual and literary circles, Orphism remained purely a philosophical and religious vision, however, it also continued as a religious sect with a particular emphasis on divination.

In Thracian practice, the Orphic king and the initiates in his cult represented almost complete opposites. The initiates disciplined their bodies with abstinence and strove for spiritual self-knowledge, hoping to attain immortality. The Thracian notion of immortality differs from the Hellenic belief in the afterlife. To the Thracians, immortality was attainable only for a chosen few initiates, who, it was believed would rise both in body and in spirit to join the deity and remain with him eternally.

The priest-king who became a demigod was the principal idea of the oral Orphic tradition. This idea represents the second union of the king with the Great Mother Goddess, which, according to the doctrine is achieved in stages through the kings gradual self-improvement. The four elements of Earth, Air, Water and Fire are projected in a tetrad of the cosmic phases of the life cycle of the goddess: rest /earth/, self-fertilization /air/, carrying unborn son /water/ and giving birth /fire/. This is followed by the life cycle of the son. In the fifth cosmic phase, the son irradiates the world with his light; in the sixth, he reaches his zenith; and in the seventh, he enters into the sacred marriage. In the eight cosmic phase, the priest-king is reborn again; and in the ninth phase, the priest-king attains enlightenment again. In the tenth phase, He, too, is granted the right to be united in a sacred marriage with the Great Mother Goddess.

The number ten represents the Cosmos, because this number is contained in four phases as well comprising the numbers four, three, two and one, expressed as the formula "4 + 3 + 2 + 1 = 10". In the Thracian Orphism the tetrad is the cosmic module.

Orphic initiates believed that one could pass through these stages by understanding their nature. It was this belief that led men of the nobility to climb the rock-cut steps of the sacred mountain, from the cave-womb of the Great Mother to the summit, dressed in white linen, unarmed, and with gold pins in their hair. The common people of Thrace were not allowed to participate in the mountain rite. Ordinary men and women worshiped instead in the sanctuaries.

Obviously, regular worship and ritual practice were not strictly doctrinal. In the mountain sanctuaries of the Great Mother Goddess the worship of the deities was orgiastic, with nocturnal dances to the accompaniment of drums, cymbals and flutes. According to the ancient authors, the music played was Thracian and Asian in origin. It is believed that in these nocturnal orgies the woman who had dedicated themselves to the god /known as Bacchae/, ran barefoot with snakes hissing in their hair and carrying a "thyrsos" /a mystic staff surmounted by a pine cone and entwined with ivy or vine leaves/ in one hand. These Bacchae tore to pieces a sacrificial animal, eating its flesh and drinking its blood.

According to his legend, Orpheus himself, the poet, soothsayer and evangelist of this faith was killed in the same way, because he did not allow the Bacchae to witness or participate in the mysteries - that is, the secret religious rites that were reserved for men. Possessed by divine fury, the women tore the singer to pieces and threw his dismembered parts into the Hebros River. Later the gods ordained that his head should be turned into a sacred snake, that is, into the incarnation of the bull god and that his lyre should become a constellation. From the drops of Orpheus blood a cithara plant sprang up. The plant grew on Mount Pangaion, the most southwestern spur of the Rhodopes…

None of the other mythological Thracian singers and poets - Olen, Linus, Musaeus or Thamyris , whose poetry rivaled that of Orpheus were destined to die by dismemberment. That fate befell only Orpheus, the first teacher of the faith, as it had to the Great Goddess dual-natured son. The Thracian Orphic Cosmos is part of our inheritance from the ancient world.