>>17937698
>In order to justify this ubiquity, and in particular his advent on the material plane, the artists of Imperial Rome strove to depict the birth of Mithras out of a rock, an episode known as the petrogenia. In such monuments we see the solar god, younger than usual, naked except for his inseparable Phrygian cap, emerging from the rock generatrix with his arms raised, holding a dagger and a torch in his hands
>This event is usually preceded in retablos by the image of a well-built adult, also naked, but in this case lying down, apparently asleep. This enigmatic figure is none other than Saturn-Chronos, who, as we know, plays an important role in the mysteries of Mithras as the protector of the patres of the Mithraic communities, as well as giving his name to the most distant planet in the ancient solar system and last station in the ascent of souls during the process of reincarnation, as explained by Origen of Alexandria
>Cumont, as usual, tried to relate the Chronos-Saturn of the Mithraic retablos to the Mesopotamian tradition and ventured that it could be the same god who revealed the universal flood in a dream to Ziusudra, the Sumerian Noah. Vermaseren interpreted the scene as the moment when Chronos, in a dream, tells the attentive ear of Jupiter how to create the world. Merkelbach suggested that such a scene might represent the instructions given by Saturn to the Mithraic patres in their dreams to lead their respective communities. The latter author also proposed that it was in dreams that Saturn learned of the need to beget a saviour god from a rock