The three core dogmas of classical theology:

1. The Gods exist.
The Gods really exist. They are not metaphors or social constructs, nor are they merely anthropomorphic depictions of natural phenomena. This does not mean myths should be understood literally.

2. The Gods govern the universe well and justly.

3. The Gods cannot be corrupted.
Gods cannot be bribed, manipulated, or tricked. They cannot be influenced for evil by anyone or anything.

I do not claim that all classical pagans accepted these three things, only that they are true, that there was something close to a consensus on them (especially in the philosophical literature) and that they are an excellent set of parameters for us to operate in.

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"But what good and virtuous man can be miserable? Truly this is an ill-governed universe if Zeus doesn't set out to ensure that his own fellow citizens should be happy like himself. No, that is unthinkable; it is sheer impiety to suppose any such thing, and if Odysseus shed tears and wept, then he wasn't a good man. For how can someone be good if he doesn't know who he is? And who would know that if he'd forgotten that everything that comes into being is bound to perish, and that it isn't possible for one human being to live with another for ever and a day? What follows, then? That to desire the impossible is the mark of a slave and a fool; it is the behaviour of one who is a stranger in the world, and is fighting against God through the only means that is available to him, through his own judgements."

Epictetus, Discourses 3.24.18-21

"If a good man sacrifices to the gods and keeps them constant company in his prayers and offerings and every kind of worship he can give them, this will be the best and noblest policy he can follow."

Plato, Laws 716d

"Much more wonderful than these [kinds of friendship], however, were what [the Pythagoreans] established about partnership in divine goods, and about unity of intellect and the divine soul. For they often encouraged one another not to disperse the god within themselves. At any rate, all their zeal for friendship, both in words and deeds, aimed at some kind of mingling and union with God, and at communion with intellect and with the divine soul. For no one could find anything better, either in words spoken or in ways of life practiced, than this kind of friendship."

Iamblichus, De Vita Pythagorica 33.240

Metaphysics is good.

The earliest extant European examples of metaphysics are not terribly younger than the written record. It turns out that Europe has an awful lot of metaphysics and that it more than holds its own against the metaphysics of any other region or religion.

The idea that we should throw it out is absurd nonsense and a great example of the sort of self-defeating foolishness that has plagued the pagan community (and, I'm sorry to say, the Germanic pagan community in particular) for as long as I've been pagan.

Just like material science, metaphysics (and philosophy in general) is a product of curiosity about the reality we live in, a reality that derives from and is shaped by the Gods. It is, therefore, a pious pursuit, at its best. It informs us about God and brings us closer to divinity.

On a more practical note, we need it in order to defend ourselves against inevitable attacks from other religions. As paganism continues to grow, you can rest assured that we will, sooner or later, face serious challenges by intelligent and well-educated practitioners of Christianity, Islam, and other religions. We will not be treated with the kid gloves reserved for other ethnic traditions. Our debate opponents will not always be animecrusader123 on Twitter and the like. They will be sharp and sophisticated and polished. If we are not prepared for that, we will lose battles we should win.

But, more importantly, metaphysics and all spiritual sciences enlarge, clarify, and invigorate our spirituality and our communion with the Gods.

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Socrates instead of Jesus; Plato instead of Paul. Proclus instead of Aquinas. Instead of the Psalms, the Homeric and Orphic Hymns. Instead of the Beatitudes, the Golden Verses. The Cave instead of the Crucifixion. Instead of the parables, the Choice and Labors of Hercules. Instead of the Old Testament histories, the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Metamorphoses and the Aeneid.

The stars are like letters that inscribe themselves at every moment in the sky. Everything in the world is full of signs. All events are coordinated. All things depend on each other. Everything breathes together.

Plotinus

"Accustom yourself to control these:
First of all, gluttony, sloth, lust,
and anger."

The Golden Verses of Pythagoras 9-11

To the best of my knowledge, Platonism does not teach "universalism." I have no idea where this comes from or why it is such a widespread criticism of Platonism. Nothing essential about the Platonic worldview would break by denying "universalism."

I'm posting this because there are people who constantly try to undermine Platonism as a valid spiritual path by claiming it is "universalist." First of all, they rarely explain what that's supposed to even mean. But, as far as I can tell, it's a catchall term for a failure to recognize group differences (or something?). But Platonism does not fail to recognize group differences at all. The criticism is endlessly repeated, usually by people who have no clue what they're talking about but are very happy to trash a 2.5 millennia old tradition of Europe anyway.

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"By 'daemons' I mean the generative and creative powers of the Gods in the furthest extremity of their emanations and in its last stages of division, while heroes are produced according to principles of life among the Gods; and that the foremost and perfect due measures of souls result from and are distinguished from these powers.

Since daemons and heroes have thus come into being from different sources, their true nature also differs. That of daemons is fit for finishing and completing encosmic natures, and it exercises oversight on each thing coming into existence; that of heroes is full of life and reason, and has leadership over souls. One must assign to daemons productive powers that oversee nature and the bond uniting souls to bodies; but to heroes it is right to assign life-giving powers, directive of human beings, and yet exempt from becoming.

Next, one must also define their activities, and posit that those of daemons extend further into the cosmos, and have greater sway over the things accomplished by them; but the activities of the heroes have a more restricted field, and are concerned with the organisation of souls."

Iamblichus, On the Mysteries 2.1-2

"Father of the Dawn with her snow-white eyelids,
you who follow in your rose-pink chariot
the track of your flying steeds,
exulting in the gold of your hair,
twining your darting rays
across the boundless vault of sky,
whirling around the whole earth
the thread of your all-seeing beams,
while flowing rivers of your deathless fire
beget the lovely day.

For you the peaceful chorus of stars
dance their measure across Olympos their lord,
forever singing their leisured song,
rejoicing in the music of Apollo’s lyre;
and leading them the silvery-grey Moon
marshals the months and seasons,
drawn by her team of milk-white heifers.
And your benevolent mind rejoices
as it whirls around the manifold raiment of the universe."

Mesomedes, Hymn to the Sun [emphasis mine]

I have created a new chat for this channel. Feel free to join for discussion. Please be respectful and responsible.

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Below is a list of classical music compositions which are based on or inspired by Greek or Roman mythology, religion, or philosophy.

Ludwig van Beethoven
The Creatures of Prometheus (ballet)

Hector Berlioz
The Trojans (opera: based on Virgil's Aeneid)

Francesco Cavalli
Hercules in Love (opera)

Luigi Cherubini
Medea (opéra-comique)

Claude Debussy
Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun (symphonic poem)

Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf
Six Symphonies After Ovid’s Metamorphoses

Gabriel Fauré
Prométhée (cantata)

César Franck
Psyché (symphonic poem)

Christoph Willibald Gluck
Alceste (opera)
Iphigenia in Tauris (opera)
Orpheus and Eurydice (opera)
Paris and Helen (opera)

Reynaldo Hahn
Andromeda Resigned (poem for piano)
Eros Hidden in the Woods (poem for piano)
Ouranos (poem for piano)
Prometheus Triumphant (choral poem)

G.F. Handel
Acis and Galatea (pastoral opera)
Acis, Galatea and Polyphemus (serenata)
The Choice of Hercules (oratorio)
Hercules (oratorio)
Semele (oratorio)

Gustav Holst
The Planets (orchestral suite)

Leonardo Leo
The Marriage of Iole and Hercules (cantata)

Franz Liszt
Symphonic Poem No. 4 "Orpheus"
Symphonic Poem No. 5 “Prometheus”

Jean-Baptiste Lully
Phaëton (opera)

Felix Mendelssohn
Oedipus at Colonus (incidental music for the Sophocles play)

Wolfgang Mozart
Symphony No. 41 "Jupiter" (note: "Jupiter" is a nickname and not the title given by Mozart himself)
Apollo and Hyacinthus

Claudio Monteverdi
The Coronation of Poppaea (opera: features numerous Roman gods as well as the philosopher Seneca)
L'Orfeo (opera)
The Return of Ulysses to his Homeland (opera)

Jacques Offenbach
Daphnis et Chloé (operetta)

Carl Orff
Antigone (opera)

Henry Purcell
Dido and Aeneas (opera)

Jean-Philippe Rameau
Hippolytus and Aricia (opera)

Maurice Ravel
Daphnis et Chloé (ballet)

J.F. Rebel
Ulysses (opera)

Albert Roussel
Bacchus and Ariane (ballet)

Erik Satie
Socrates (symphonic drama)

Alexander Scriabin
Prometheus: The Poem of Fire (tone poem)

Gaspare Spontini
The Vestal Virgin (opera)

Johann Strauss II
Echoes of Rhadamantus (waltz)

Richard Strauss
Ariadne on Naxos (opera)
The Love of Danae (opera)
Daphne (opera)

Igor Stravinsky
Apollo (ballet)
Oedipus Rex (opera)

Karol Szymanowski
Myths (violin & piano)
The Fountain of Arethusa
Narcissus
Dryads and Pan

Antonio Vivaldi
Hercules in Thermodon (opera)

"Though innocent, Roman, you will pay for the sins
of your fathers until you restore
the crumbling temples and shrines of the Gods
and their smoke-blackened images.

You rule because you hold yourself inferior to the Gods.
Make this the beginning and the end of all things.
Neglect of the Gods has brought many ills
to the sorrowing land of Hesperia.

... Our generation is prolific in evil.
First it has corrupted marriage, family, and home,
and from that source disaster has flowed
over our whole land and its people.

The young girl thrills to learn the movements
of Ionian dance steps, long moulded to such arts
by obscene lusts practiced
from tenderest childhood.

... What has injurious time not diminished?
Our parents were not the men their fathers were,
and they bore children worse than themselves,
whose children will be baser still."

Horace, Odes 3.6 "Delicta maiorum"

"For a man ought to hold his ground though frightened, not because he will incur disrepute, nor through anger, nor because he does not expect to be killed or has powers by which to protect himself; for in that case he will not even think there is anything to be feared. But since all excellence implies choice ... it is clear that bravery, because it is an excellence, will make a man face what is frightening for some end, so that he does it neither through ignorance - for his excellence rather makes him judge correctly - nor for pleasure, but because the act is noble; since, if it is not noble but frantic, he does not face the danger, for that would be disgraceful."

Aristotle, Eudemian Ethics 1230a23-34

The Cardinal Virtues: Part One of a Multipart Series on Virtue

Virtue – or excellence – is the perfection of the nature of a thing: through virtue, every being arrives at its summit. The natural function of the virtues is to impose order onto chaos and to purify the superior of the inferior. Virtue herself is a Goddess – called Aretê in Greek and Virtus in Latin – and all of the virtues, in themselves, have their origins in the Gods.

The four cardinal virtues are Wisdom, Courage, Temperance, and Justice.

WISDOM is the perfection of the rational aspect of man. It is the power to discriminate accurately between the good and the bad. Wisdom is acquired when the soul acts alone, avoiding the confusions of embodiment.

COURAGE is the perfection of the willful aspect of man. It consists of an unwavering resistance to that which is inferior. It is the power to uphold the dictates of law and reason and to preserve through everything the correct belief about what is to be feared and what isn’t. The courageous person does not fear separation from the body.

TEMPERANCE is the perfection of the desiring aspect of man. It is the power to turn away from the inferior and to turn towards the better. The temperate person desires that which is good but does not desire that which is bad.

JUSTICE is the harmonization in man of his tripartite soul. It is in itself the activity which is proper to a being and truly belonging to it. The just person does precisely what he should do, only what he should do, only with what is his, and endeavors to maintain this proper apportionment in all his affairs and dealings.

The Scale of Virtues: Part Two of a Multipart Series on Virtue

We can divide virtue into two basic types: the slavish and the noble. The slave’s "virtues" are worth little and are mixed with vice. They are the virtues of the person who is courageous only because he doesn't want others to think him cowardly, or temperate only because he fears the consequences of intemperance. In short, he is – absurdly – virtuous because of vice. In contrast, the noble virtues are virtues per se.

Of the noble virtues, we can divide them again into the practical and the divine. The practical virtues make a person good while the sciences of divine virtue make him Godlike. As the small precedes the large, so we must become human beings first, and then Gods.

Of the practical virtues, we can divide them into the natural; the ethical (or habitual); and the civic (or social).

We can divide divine virtue into the cathartic (or purifying); the contemplative (or theoretical); the paradigmatic (or archetypal); and the priestly (or inspired).

Each class of virtue – from the natural all the way up to the priestly – relates to its neighboring classes hierarchically, and they together form a ladder, or scale, of virtues. Each successive class of virtue presupposes the prior one, such that no one can ascend the scale of virtues without first acquiring the prerequisite virtues, and no one who possesses the higher virtues can possibly lack the lower classes of virtue. For example, no one can achieve the state of cathartic virtue without already possessing the natural, habitual, and civic levels of virtue; nor can anyone possess the cathartic virtues but lack the civic.

We will look at the seven classes of the noble scale of virtues in detail in the subsequent parts of this series.

Natural Virtue: Part Three of a Multipart Series on Virtue

The lowest level of virtue on the scale of virtues is Natural Virtue.

Each virtue is possessed in some sense naturally, since everyone has a measure of wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance from birth. Individuals are more or less brave, more or less self-controlled, and so on, and it is clear that these dispositions are to some extent innate, whether they come to us by chance of birth or were acquired in a past life.

These natural virtues are the sort of virtues we share with animals. Just as it is plain to everyone that some animals have more excellent natures than other members of their species, so it is with human beings. And just as lions are courageous, cattle are temperate, and storks are just, humans are characterized by rationality, natural wisdom.

Along with disposition, natural virtue also encompasses such things as bodily vigor, natural intelligence, acute sense perception (such as good eyesight), and other things of that kind.

Therefore, we see that a naturally virtuous person is one who is by birth fair minded (just), gentle (wise), resistant to fear (courageous), not easily overwhelmed by impulse (temperate), with a sharp mind and a strong body.

But insofar as our endowments are natural, they are, for better or worse, difficult to change through training. As Aristotle wrote, a stone won’t learn to fly no matter how many times you throw it in the air. Some people are predisposed to a life of virtue, others less so. Virtue comes easier for some. That is the way of things.

But everyone, regardless of how naturally excellent they may be, is imperfect. Arrogance is not a virtue, and so we must be aware of our strengths and weaknesses. We must make the most out of what we were born with, erring neither in the direction of conceit nor bitterness.

Sovereign: Bacchus.

Other divinities of particular relevance: Vulcan.

Texts: Plato discusses them in The Laws and Statesman.

Ethical Virtue: Part Four of a Multipart Series on Virtue

Next are the ethical virtues, which are built up in us by habituation and by a sort of true opinion. They are what allow us to tame our initial, infantile state in which we are governed by the irrational and dangerous mob rule of our emotions and appetites as if by a multi-headed hydra monster. They are the virtues of well-bred children, lawful societies, and some animals. They are, approximately, what we would call “manners”, “civility,” and “good upbringing.”

Ethical virtue is that which is most visible in healthy societies – as traditions, customs, and good laws – and in families – as discipline and education –, and it habituates according to correct standards. Education is the initial acquisition of virtue by a person (typically, a child), “when the feelings of pleasure and affection, pain and hatred, that well up in his soul are channeled in the right courses before he can understand the reason why,” as Plato writes. Ethical virtue is this concord of reason and emotion. By it, we hate what we ought to hate and love what we ought to love.

This class of virtue is analogous to craft or hobby insofar as it is by practice and inculcation that the ethical virtues are acquired, given to us by tradition and authority. They are not fully rational, being more an inheritance of social or familial consensus than personal insight, but they are not altogether irrational either, since they are formed over time by collective reason and experience. With respect to natural virtue, we first receive the capacities for them and later exhibit the activities. We do not, for example, acquire good eyesight by frequent acts of seeing – we naturally have it or don’t. By contrast, we acquire habitual virtue by first engaging in the activities. We become builders by building and musicians by making music. Similarly, we become just people by doing just actions, temperate people by doing temperate actions, and courageous people by doing courageous ones.

But since the ethical virtues are not entirely rational, and are largely handed down to us by authorities, they are not fully personal virtues. We have them almost unconsciously and they are, consequently, a kind of animal virtue. This is why the ethical virtues, though good and necessary, are inferior to the higher classes of virtue which we will discuss next.

Sovereign: Bacchus

Other divinities of particular relevance: Jupiter; Minerva; Hercules; the Horai.

Texts: Plato’s Laws (especially 653a-c). Aristotle’s ethical writings deal frequently with this class of virtue. The first half of The Golden Verses of Pythagoras includes them, as does the ethical theory of the Stoics.