• DOI:10.1177/1476993X09347454
• Corpus ID: 161124650

Graeco-Roman Religion in the Roman Empire: Old Assumptions and New Approaches

@article{Rives2010GraecoRomanRI,
  title={Graeco-Roman Religion in the Roman Empire: Old Assumptions and New Approaches},
  author={James B. Rives},
  journal={Currents in Biblical Research},
  year={2010},
  volume={8},
  pages={240 - 299}
}

• J. Rives
• Published 1 February 2010
• History
• Currents in Biblical Research

This article surveys recent trends in research on Graeco-Roman religion, focusing on the first and second centuries CE. In the first half, I assess current views on what I call the old ‘master narrative’ of Graeco-Roman religious history in this period, that is, the assumption that the decline of traditional Graeco-Roman religion left a void filled on the one hand by the purely political phenomenon of imperial cult and on the other by mystery/oriental religions, which met the emotional needs of the populace. In the second half I discuss two areas of interest that have come to the fore in the wake of the old master narrative’s collapse: an approach to interpreting traditional Graeco-Roman religion that some scholars have termed the ‘polis -religion model’, and a focus on religious life in the provinces of the Roman empire. As an appendix I include a brief survey of available scholarly resources in this field.