Joe Ratner’s Outline of Magika Hiera Chapter 10
“Nullum Crimen sine
Lege: Socioreligious Sanctions on Magic”
by C. R. Phillips III
I. Modern Classicists see magical elements
in Greco-Roman literature and religion
a. Evidence of repression of magic in ancient sources creates assumption
that ancients were universally and strongly against “magic”
b. Nineteenth century idea of magic as “primitive” and “bad”
religion or “bad” science still common
c. “Magic” is practices that are not in accord with “developed”
religion
d. Accept ancient texts against magic as valid
e. Assumption ancients had universal standards and what was “magic”
then is “magic” now
f. Unsanctioned religious activity was common, unlike Christian view
of magic as opposite of religion, ancients were tolerant.
g. Repression was based on specific circumstances, not general.
II. Legal definitions and Sanctions
a. Evidence for legal action against magic is sparse
i. Reflects societal acceptance or
ii. Inability to achieve legal consensus
iii. Will look at ancient and modern view of “magic”
b. Using modern definition of “magic” in regard to ancient
beliefs problematic
i. Define that which does not conform to Judeo-Christian ideas or modern
science as magic
ii. Ancient religion and science did not provide framework for law
1. Various labels could be applied to unsanctioned religious activity
2. Unsanctioned religious activity not necessarily illegal
3. If you could make the charge of magic stick, than it was magic
c. No ban on magic per se in Greek law
i. Legal action against asebeia (impiety) based on specific action
ii. Examples
1. Pharmaka could be actionable as asebeia, but not called
magic; could be viewed as part of religious ritual or not
2. Diopeithes’ law c.432-1 B.C.E. and prosecution of Anaxagoras involved
astrophysical observations and may have been aimed at Pericles
3. Alcibiades profanation of mysteries was asebeia
4. Socrates trial (399 B.C.E.) involved accusations of 1) refusal to
recognize state gods, 2) introduction of new divinities, 3) corruption
of youth
5. Theft of sacred objects could be asebeia or just theft
d. All societies have norms of behavior
i. Ancients legitimized norms with divine sanction
1. Secular transgression = religious transgression
2. Pagan religion did not clearly define “orthodoxy” and “heresy”
3. Polytheism and syncretism prevented rigid “right” and “wrong”
regarding religious practice
4. Cult rules did not preclude other religious associations
ii. Beyond theft of sacred objects and transgression of religious ordinances
unsanctioned religious activity vague
1. Three examples above have secular political agenda
2. Charge of impiety was strong social control
3. Science did not provide framework either (unlike early modern Europe)
iii. Without universally accepted religious or scientific basis, local
and personal standards prevailed
1. Plato “It is not easy to know the truth about these and similar
practices, and even if one were to find out, it would be difficult to convince
others; and it is just not worth the effort to try to persuade people whose
heads are full of mutual suspicion”
e. Socioeconomic elite could act against unsanctioned religious activity
i. Literature reminded elite of this activity
ii. Unsanctioned religious activity were a given in daily life
iii. Elite not likely to take action unless social order in danger
f. Bulk of “magical” relics precludes large-scale repression
g. Elite contempt for lower classes limited scrutiny
h. Roman evidence punishes result, not means
i. Law only applied where complaint was made. Murder by poison, for
example, was outside secular norms and so implied unsanctioned religious
activity
i. Astrology labeled as magic by moderns
i. Common in ancient world
ii. Sanctions were practical, not theological
iii. Not practical to repress
1. Repeated expulsions of astrologers from Rome indicate lack of continual
repression
2. Only when someone came to authorities attention for a particular
reason
j. In late antiquity, rise of Christianity gave norms (though competing)
of religious activity and hence defined unsanctioned activity
k. In general
i. Unsanctioned religious activity was common
ii. Repression was infrequent
iii. No general ban, only specific activities
iv. Legal action unusual
v. Example of legal reaction to obscenity in U.S.
1. Religious definitions do not apply due to separation of church and
state
2. Scientific definitions lacking due to indifference to legal issues
3. Supreme Court said “contemporary community standards” of
“prurient interest” applied
4. Later questioned “prurient interest” as subject to person
defining them
5. Definition avoids theory
vi. Ultimate legitimacy relied on traditional authority, which was applied
by those in power vii. Thus legal system functioned without definition
III. Religious Definitions
a. Pagan antiquity did not have a universally accepted sacred or theological
law
i.. Definitions and norms varied
ii. Criminality depended on who, what, when, and why
b. Modern definitional problems
i. Human religious thought evolved from irrational, savage magic
ii. Influence of nineteenth-century Christianity
1. Greco-Roman ideas not Christian and therefore magic by definition
2. Some exceptions for Plato and Aristotle
3. Evolved to Christianity
iii. Anthropological tradition
1. Anticlerical agenda
2. Religion evolved from magic, but had further evolved into science
3. Evidenced by evolution theory and technological achievement
iv. Magic was thought system of early society
v. Contemporary “primitive” societies had practices similar
to “magic” of antiquity
vi. To clerics “magic” evolved into science (bad religion)
vii. To anthropologists “magic” evolved into religion (bad
science)
viii. Conclusion, they couldn’t think clearly and classical religion
=magic
c. What constituted “magic” in antiquity needs rethinking
i. Only what they labeled as magic, not all unsanctioned religious activity
IV. Scientific Definitions
a. Modern science is “true”
i. What we can explain and earlier societies could not explain naturalistically
was “primitive religion” or “magic”
b. Evolution of scientific thinking replaces old paradigms with new
i. Therefore science is relative to its time and not a valid criteria
c. Ancient science was not separate from religious thought and philosophy
i. Lacked symbolic language, so meaning could be vague
ii. Labels depended on point of view of source
V. Conclusions
a. No universal religious and scientific norms
b. Unsanctioned religious activity not subject to comprehensive legislation
c. Ancients called small subset of unsanctioned religious activity “magic”
d. Sanctions were based more on motive than practice
e. Sanction was usually against specific activity
f. Point of view of ruling elite was basis for sanction
g. No specific legal, religious, or scientific definition of unsanctioned
religious activities
h. Only modern Christian theology attempts to rigidly define magic
i. We should look at specific activities and prosecutions of unsanctioned
religious activity which might or might not have been considered magic.
Return To Main Page: CLST 4003 H. Spring, 2002.
Greek Religion Honors Colloquium.
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