Divine Healing. A relief dedicated about 370 B.C. by Aeschmus to the hero healer Amphiaraus. The relief is in the form of a
building, with the god's all-seeing eyes shown on the roof. At the right the patient sleeps in the sanctuary and is visited by
the divine snake which licks his wounded shoulder. At the left the god himself operates. Incubation in the sanctuary brought
psychologically reassuring dreams of healing, and this, with more practical assistance, may sometimes have effected cures.
All this was practical religion. There were few expressions of unpractical religion, of concern for a world other than this.
After death, according to Homer, a kind of wraith of the dead man vanished to the underworld, there to lead a joyless,
eventless, meaningless shadow existence. (Bliss and punishment were reserved for a few select heroes.) Nothing therefore
of any value persisted beyond the funeral pyre. In classical times it was normal to bring offerings of food and drink to the
dead (indeed at Athens this was a condition of inheritance; when an inheritance was disputed, unseemly competitions in
mourning took place), but there was no clear theory about the afterlife to justify them and no substantial hopes were based
upon them. We often find in Athenian orators the cautious formula, 'The dead, if they have any perception, will think ...'
Stories about punishment and reward in the underworld were in circulation, but were only half believed. The whole
question was an open one, as Socrates' remarks in Plato's Apology (41) show. Firmer claims were made in connection with
certain 'mysteries' or secret rites, entry to which was by 'initiation' (not an ordeal, but a spectacular and moving ritual lasting
several days). The most important mysteries were those of Demeter and Persephone at Eleusis near Athens, which promised
a better lot in the afterlife (eternal feasting perhaps), while for non-initiates 'everything there would be bad' (by the fifth
century specific torments had been devised for them). The Eleusinian cult was famed throughout the Greek world, and it is
spoken of with a reverence, tinged with moral awe, which shows that initiation was somehow much more than a technique
for purchasing such felicity as might be available in the afterlife. But Greeks did not allow such an experience to inspire
them with more than, at most, 'good hopes'. Even though many Athenians had been initiated, the normal attitude to the
afterlife at Athens remained, as we have seen, one of uncertainty.
The Eleusinian cult was incorporated into the public religion of the Athenian state. Other more radical religious movements