There's a very common misconception that in ancient times, people literally believed in the most ridiculous parts of polytheistic religions. But this is incorrect, most people did not believe that a chariot pulls the sun across the sky, not in a literal sense at least. The way ancient pagans saw the world was actually not that different from how modern Christians do today (outside of a few uneducated rural people maybe, nobody, no matter how devout, genuinely believes God is a literal flesh and bone old bearded man who lives in the clouds, rather seeing that as symbolic).

Outside of a few uneducated rural people maybe, nobody, no matter how devout, genuinely believed creatures like Centaurs or Sirens were real. Educated Greeks and Romans often interpreted myths allegorically or symbolically. Think of Plato, who criticized literal myth but acknowledged their metaphorical value; or Stoics, who reinterpreted gods as forces of nature or aspects of the soul. By the time of the Roman Empire, especially from the 1st century BCE onward, educated pagans interpreted myths allegorically and often integrated philosophical systems like Platonism, Stoicism, or Neoplatonism into religious thought. A pagan priest or philosopher in 300 CE did not believe in Zeus the same way a peasant in 800 BCE might have. Just like no serious modern Christian believes heaven is literally "above the sky" in a three-tiered universe anymore.

Thousands of years of Jewish, Christian, and later Islamic writers satirizing pagans as stupid has created the modern misconception that Greco-Roman polytheists living in the late Roman period held the same religious beliefs that their predecessors from the time of Homer did, which couldn't be further from the truth. This would be like thinking modern-day Christians believe the sun revolves around the earth because their ancient counterparts did.

>>17754529 (OP)
>Thousands of years of Jewish, Christian, and later Islamic writers satirizing pagans as stupid has created the modern misconception that Greco-Roman polytheists living in the late Roman period held the same religious beliefs that their predecessors from the time of Homer did, which couldn't be further from the truth. This would be like thinking modern-day Christians believe the sun revolves around the earth because their ancient counterparts did.

In fact, let’s discuss how Christianity took off since that influenced this misconception. Christianity mostly appealed to city folk who were generally disconnected from their native culture due to city life. Many were not even ethnic Greeks but migrants from elsewhere, so they looked up to foreign faiths for meaning and although there were many (Manichaeism, Mithraism, etc), Christianity ended up being the one that triumphed. It's actually not that different from people today looking to astrology, new age stuff or extremist political ideologies.

Rural areas remained pagan long after Christianity became the state religion of the Roman Empire. Much of rural Italy, France and Spain were still pagan in the early middle ages, and in Greece the Mani peninsula remained so until the 900s. Hell, areas of the Basque country in Spain weren't even Christianized until the 1300s. That's actually why "Pagan" is the word used to describe people who followed pre-Christian polytheistic religions. It comes from the Latin word "Paganus" meaning "of or relating to the countryside", "country dweller", "villager", "rustic", "unlearned", "yokel", "bumpkin", and is cognate with the English "Peasant", and Spanish "Paisano" (meaning rural person).

>christian apologetics: zeus edition
who the fuck cares dude it's dead.

>>17754540
I assure you Hellenism is alive and thriving

>>17754540
I'm a vodoo practitioner

classic fallacy where OP says nobody believed this "outside of a few uneducated rural people maybe" then he can only point to fucking philosophers and other "educated pagans" who were quite controversial in their time. This would be like me saying nobody in 18th century France actually believed in Christianity and pointing to the writings of Voltaire etc.

>>17754529 (OP)
>But this is incorrect, most people did not believe that a chariot pulls the sun across the sky
>nobody, no matter how devout, genuinely believed creatures like Centaurs or Sirens were real
These things aren't really that outlandish to believe in the context of the ancient or even early medieval world. While some fancy pants scholars could predict the movements of planets and stars no one had any clue what they really were or how they worked. They had a similarly poor understanding of biology and most people didn't travel much. So they had no reason to disbelieve that the more understated mythological creatures could exist somewhere. People still believe in cryptids after all.
But even if they did still believe in these things, they would have eventually shed those beliefs just like christians have. And because of the less authoritative way their religion was preserved and disseminated, this adaptation would have likely been even easier. Some christians still grapple with the timeline of the universe not lining up with their bible. I don't see a continuous tradition of Hellenic pagans having any issue accepting that the stories about Helios and his chariot were mistaken about the details.

>>17754529 (OP)
Man was created in Gods image, of course he looks like a perfect human being.

>>17754529 (OP)
>outside of a few uneducated rural people maybe, nobody, no matter how devout, genuinely believes God is a literal flesh and bone old bearded man who lives in the clouds, rather seeing that as symbolic
The bible never identifies God as an old bearded man who lives in clouds, and consistently contradicts the idea. Christians have never believed God is a man in the clouds, and any who does is shockingly ignorant, extraordinary, and most likely does not attend a serious church. It is not "symbolic", there is nothing to be "symbolic", the symbolism existed in late medieval and early modern depictions of God (and virtually never before since such depictions were and are universally theologically condemned, unlike say depictions of Jesus which are only condemned by Protestants and ancient Christians) and modern atheists are so incredibly ignorant a literalistic misinterpretation of these artworks is their main reference for theology proper.

>>17755750
post your bbc