Zalmoxis
Encyclopedia
Zalmoxis is a divinity of the Getae
Getae
The Getae was the name given by the Greeks to several Thracian tribes that occupied the regions south of the Lower Danube, in what is today northern Bulgaria, and north of the Lower Danube, in Romania...

, mentioned by Herodotus
Herodotus
Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...

 in his Histories IV, 93-96. In later interpretations, which begin with Jordanes
Jordanes
Jordanes, also written Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th century Roman bureaucrat, who turned his hand to history later in life....

 (6th century AC) and have proliferated during the 19th and 20th century, mainly in Romania, he was regarded as the sole god
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

 of the Getae (not to be confounded in this context with the Thracians
Thracians
The ancient Thracians were a group of Indo-European tribes inhabiting areas including Thrace in Southeastern Europe. They spoke the Thracian language – a scarcely attested branch of the Indo-European language family...

 or their relatives, the Dacians
Dacians
The Dacians were an Indo-European people, very close or part of the Thracians. Dacians were the ancient inhabitants of Dacia...

) or as a legendary social and religious reformer of the Getae people to which he would have taught, following Herodotus, the belief in immortality
Immortality
Immortality is the ability to live forever. It is unknown whether human physical immortality is an achievable condition. Biological forms have inherent limitations which may or may not be able to be overcome through medical interventions or engineering...

, so that they considered dying merely as going to Zalmoxis. Herodotus states that Zalmoxis was also called by some of the Getae Gebeleizis, which made some searchers conclude that Getae were actually henotheists
Henotheism
Henotheism is the belief and worship of a single god while accepting the existence or possible existence of other deities...

 or even polytheists. Another discussion exists about the chthonic
Chthonic
Chthonic designates, or pertains to, deities or spirits of the underworld, especially in relation to Greek religion. The Greek word khthon is one of several for "earth"; it typically refers to the interior of the soil, rather than the living surface of the land or the land as territory...

, infernal, or uranian, heavenly, character of Zalmoxis.

Herodotus

Herodotus writes about Zalmoxis in book 4 of his Histories:
93. ...the Getae are the bravest of the Thracians and the justest.
94. They believe they are immortal in the following sense: they think they do not die and that the one who dies joins Zalmoxis, a divine being; some call this same divine being Gebeleizis. Every four years, they send a messenger to Zalmoxis, who is chosen by chance. They ask him to tell Zalmoxis what they want on that occasion. The sending is done in the following way: men standing there for that purpose hold three spears; other people take the one who is sent to Zalmoxis by his hands and feet and fling him and throw him in the air on the spears. If he dies pierced, the think that the divinity is going to help them; if he does not die, it is him who is accused and they declare that he is a bad person. And, after he has been charged, they send another one. The messenger is told the requests while he is still alive. The same Thracians, on other occasions, when he thunders and lightens, shoot with arrows up in the air against the sky and menace the divinity because they think there is no other god then theirs.

According to Herodotus the Greeks of the Hellespont and the Black Sea tell that Zalmoxis was a slave on Samos of Pythagoras, son of Mnesarchos. After being liberated, he gathered a huge wealth and once rich, went back to his homeland. Thracians lived simple hard lives. Zalmoxis having lived amongst the wisest of Greeks - Pythagoras and had been initiated to the Ionian life and Eleusinian Mysteries. Building a banquet hall, he received the chiefs and his fellow countrymen throwing a banquet, he taught that none of his guests nor their descendants would ever die, but instead they would go to a place where they would live forever in a complete happiness. He then dug an underground residence and, once finished, he disappeared from the Thracians going down to his underground residence and lived there for three years. The Thracians missed him and wept fearing him dead. The fourth year, he came back amongst them and thus they believed what Zalmoxis had told them.

Zalmoxis may have lived much earlier than Pythagoras and was rumored either to be a divine being or from the country of the Getae.

There are different theories about the disappearance and return of Zalmoxis:
  • Some authors consider Herodotus is just making fun about the Getae's barbarian beliefs;
  • Some take the passage seriously, and consider Zalmoxis has created a ritual of passage; this theory is mainly supported by Mircea Eliade, who was the first to write a coherent interpretation about Zalmoxis;
  • Some authors insist on Zalmoxis' relation with Pythagoras, stating that he has founded a mystical cult; partly this theory may be found in Eliade's work;
  • Some see in Zalmoxis a Christ figure who dies and resurrects; this position was also defended by Jean (Ioan) Coman, a professor of patristics and orthodox priest, who was a friend of Eliade and published in Eliade's journal "Zalmoxis", which appeared in the 1930.


It is difficult to define the time when a cult to Zalmoxis may have existed. It is just sure that it must be anterior to Herodotus' work. It seems that some people have considered that the archaism of Zalmoxis's doctrine points out to an heritage from before the times of Indo-Europeans, which is nevertheless quite difficult, if not impossible, to demonstrate.

Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

 says in the Charmides
Charmides (dialogue)
The Charmides is a dialogue of Plato, in which Socrates engages a handsome and popular boy in a conversation about the meaning of sophrosyne, a Greek word usually translated into English as "temperance", "self-control", or "restraint"...

dialogue 156 D - 157 B that Zalmoxis was also a great physician who took a holistic approach to healing body and soul (psyche), being thus used by Platon for his one philosophical conceptions.

Cult

Strabo in his Geography, book 7, 3, 1-11 talks about a certain Deceneus
Deceneus
Deceneus refers in The Origin and Deeds of the Goths by Jordanes to two different men in Dacia:* Deceneus, the predecessor of Zalmoxis in the distant past ....

 (Dékainéos) which calls γόητα, "magician". Following Strabo, king Burebista
Burebista
Burebista was a king of the Getae and Dacians, who unified for the first time their tribes and ruled them between 82 BC and 44 BC. He led plunder and conquest raids across Central and Southeastern Europe, subjugating most of the neighbouring tribes...

 (82 BC - 44 BC) recruited this man, who had been in Egypt, to render his people more docile. As a sign of their obedience, Strabo affirms that they consented to destroy all their wines as Deceneus ordered so. The "reform of Deceneus" is the result of the elaborations of the 6th century bishop and historian Jordanes who includes the Getae in his history of the Goths: here he describes how Deceneus teaches the Getae people philosophy and physics. Even if it is far more probable that Jordanes just introduced his own philosophical knowledge in the text, a lot of modern Romanian authors considers that Deceneus is a priest who reforms the Getae cult, changing Zalmoxis' cult into a popular religion and imposing strict religious rules such as the restriction of wine consumption. Jean Coman considers it even as the origin of the modern orthodox food restrictions during Lent.

Iamblichus (280-333 AD): "For instructing the Getae in these things, and for having written laws for them, Zamolxis was by them considered as the greatest of the gods."

Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...

 equates Zalmoxis with Phoenicia
Phoenicia
Phoenicia , was an ancient civilization in Canaan which covered most of the western, coastal part of the Fertile Crescent. Several major Phoenician cities were built on the coastline of the Mediterranean. It was an enterprising maritime trading culture that spread across the Mediterranean from 1550...

n Okhon and Libya
Ancient Libya
The Latin name Libya referred to the region west of the Nile Valley, generally corresponding to modern Northwest Africa. Climate changes affected the locations of the settlements....

n Atlas
Atlas (mythology)
In Greek mythology, Atlas was the primordial Titan who supported the heavens. Although associated with various places, he became commonly identified with the Atlas Mountains in north-west Africa...

. Some authors believe it is possible that Zalmoxis is Sabazius, the Thracian Dionysus
Dionysus
Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...

 or Zeus
Zeus
In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...

. Mnaseas of Patrae
Mnaseas
Mnaseas of Patrae was a Greek historian of the late 3rd century BCE, who is reckoned to have been a pupil of Eratosthenes. His Periegesis or Periplus described Europe, Western Asia and North Africa, but whether in six or eight books cannot now be determined. His On Oracles appears to have...

 identified him with Cronos (Hesychius
Hesychius
Hesychius , may refer to:*Hesychius of Alexandria, lexicographer*St. Hesychius of Cazorla, saint, martyr, and bishop*Hesychius of Jerusalem, presbyter and exegete*Hesychius of Sinai, hieromonk and Byzantine author*Hesychius of Antioch...

 also has ).

In Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

, he is mentioned as skilled in the arts of incantation. Zalmoxis gave his name to a particular type of singing and dancing (Hesych)
His realm as a god is not very clear, as some considered him to be a sky-god, a god of the dead or a god of the Mysteries.

Lactantius (early Christian author 240 – 320 AD) about the Getae belief in Zalmoxis provide an approximate translation of Julian the Apostate writing, who put these words in [emperor] Traian's mouth:

We have conquered even these Getai ( Dacians ), the most warlike of all people that have ever existed, not only because of the strength in their bodies, but, also due to the teachings of Zalmoxis who is among their most hailed. He has told them that in their hearts they do not die, but change their location and, due to this, they go to their deaths happier than on any other journey."

Zalmoxian religion

The "Zalmoxian religion" is a debate dating of the beginning of the 20th century and which has last till today. It included very known searchers as Nicolae Densușianu, Vasile Pârvan, Giurescu father and son, Jean (Ioan) Coman, Constantin Daicoviciu, and Mircea Eliade. The most complete summary existing about these debates which often take a political (e.g. communist) or religious (e.g. orthodox) character is Dan Dana, Zalmoxis de la Herodot la Mircea Eliade. Istorii despre un zeu al pretextului, Iași 2008, work which was only partly published in French and not in English.

The "Zalmoxian religion" would be the Getae (often named jointly with their Dacian relatives, Daco-Getae) monotheist belief in Zalmoxis, which would be the predecessor of the Christian faith in Romania. This has created a debate between the monotheist, the henotheist and the polytheist position.

According to some authors, ancient sources do not present any other God of Getae-Dacians than Zalmoxis. In fact, the only author who states that Getae have only one divinity is Herodotus. Among others, Vasile Pârvan, Jean Coman, R. Pettazzon, E. Rohde and S. Paliaga consider that Getae-Dacians religion is monotheistic.

Others consider it henotheistic, that is, Zalmoxis would have been the supreme god at whose side exist minor divinities who are closely associated with him.

Finally, a third group of authors believe that Getae actually had a polytheist religion, like all the other Indo-European people. This would be confirmed e.g. by Diodorus Siculus
Diodorus Siculus
Diodorus Siculus was a Greek historian who flourished between 60 and 30 BC. According to Diodorus' own work, he was born at Agyrium in Sicily . With one exception, antiquity affords no further information about Diodorus' life and doings beyond what is to be found in his own work, Bibliotheca...

 who states that the Getae worship Hestia, following the teachings of Zalmoxis.

Not all the ancient sources consider that Zalmoxis was a god. In fact, there were even some searches in the beginning of the communist era in Romania, who thought Getae were actually atheists, as dit Constantin Balmuș in a short article "O apreciere a lui Herodot asupra geţilor", ignoring all the ancient sources stating that Zalmoxis was a divinity.

There have been also discussions about the belief in immortality, due to Herodotus affirmation that the Getae "think that they do not really die, but that when they depart this life they go to Zalmoxis". Orthodox authors, like Jean Coman, considered this to be the prove that the presumed ancestors of the Romanians, the Getae or Daco-Getae, had a proto-Christian belief and that, with the Christianisation of Romania, they very easily could accept the Christian doctrine. This idea even entered in Mircea Păcurariu's history of the Romanian orthodox Church, work which is considered as an authority by his Church.

The sending of the messenger to Zalmoxis and the fact that the Getae shoot arrows towards the sky made some authors believe Zalmoxis was a uranian, heavenly, god, aswhere his journey in a cavern made others write he was a chthonic, infernal divinity.

The most coherent and perhaps also original interpretation about Zalmoxis is due to Mircea Eliade who believes that Getae actually had a religion based upon a ritual of passage where a ritual death symbolized by the disappearance in a cavern, was followed by a ritual rebirth which was the leaving of the cavern. Zalmoxis was a constant in Eliade's life. His most complete work on this behalf is probably From Zalmoxis to Genghis Khan, which originally appeared in Paris in 1970.

Music and dance
Music and dance were an important part of Zalmoxis teachings and this corresponds to the special importance given by Getae-Dacians to the music.
Zalmoxis gave his name to a particular type of singing and dancing (Hesychius).

Etymology

A number of etymologies have been given for the name. Diogenes Laertius
Diogenes Laertius
Diogenes Laertius was a biographer of the Greek philosophers. Nothing is known about his life, but his surviving Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers is one of the principal surviving sources for the history of Greek philosophy.-Life:Nothing is definitively known about his life...

 (3rd century-4th century AD) claimed that Zalmoxis meant "bear skin". In his Vita Pythagorae, Porphyrius
Porphyry (philosopher)
Porphyry of Tyre , Porphyrios, AD 234–c. 305) was a Neoplatonic philosopher who was born in Tyre. He edited and published the Enneads, the only collection of the work of his teacher Plotinus. He also wrote many works himself on a wide variety of topics...

 (3rd century) says that zalmon is the Thracian word for "hide" . Hesychius
Hesychius of Alexandria
Hesychius of Alexandria , a grammarian who flourished probably in the 5th century CE, compiled the richest lexicon of unusual and obscure Greek words that has survived...

 (ca. 5th century) has zemelen (ζέμελεν) as a Phrygian
Phrygian language
The Phrygian language was the Indo-European language of the Phrygians, spoken in Asia Minor during Classical Antiquity .Phrygian is considered to have been closely related to Greek....

 word for "foreign slave".

The correct spelling of the name is also uncertain. Manuscripts of Herodotus' Historiae have all four spellings, viz. Zalmoxis, Salmoxis, Zamolxis, Samolxis, with a majority of manuscripts favouring Salmoxis. Later authors show a preference for Zamolxis. Hesychius quotes Herodotus, using Zalmoxis.

The -m-l- variant is favoured by those wishing to derive the name from a conjectured Thracian word for "earth", *zamol. Comparisons have also been made with the name of Zemelo & Žemelė
Žemyna
Žemyna is the goddess of the earth in Lithuanian mythology. She is usually regarded as mother goddess and one of the chief Lithuanian gods similar to Latvian Zemes māte. Žemyna personifies the fertile earth and nourishes all life on earth, human, plant, and animal. All that is born of earth will...

, the Phrygian and Lithuanian goddess of the earth, and with the Lithuanian chthonic
Chthonic
Chthonic designates, or pertains to, deities or spirits of the underworld, especially in relation to Greek religion. The Greek word khthon is one of several for "earth"; it typically refers to the interior of the soil, rather than the living surface of the land or the land as territory...

 god Žemeliūkštis. Lithuanian word Želmuo means corn shoot or fresh grass. Žalmokšnis is only another possible form of it.

The -l-m- variant is admitted to be the older form and the correct form by the majority of Thracologists, as this is the form found in the older Herodotus manuscripts and other ancient sources. The -l-m- form is further attested in Daco-Thracian in Zalmodegikos, the name of a Getic
Getae
The Getae was the name given by the Greeks to several Thracian tribes that occupied the regions south of the Lower Danube, in what is today northern Bulgaria, and north of the Lower Danube, in Romania...

 King; and in Thracian zalmon, 'hide', and zelmis, 'hide' (PIE *kel-, 'to cover'; cf. English helm).

The other name for Zalmoxis, Gebeleizis, is also spelled Belaizis and Belaixis in Herodotus manuscripts.

Since the Getae-Dacian religious system was monotheistic aniconism centered around the God Zalmoxis, it is less likely that the believers in his resurrection would use a name meaning "hide" / "foreign slave", as the hostile ancient Greek non-believers related about him.

Popular culture

Romanian
Romanian rock
Romanian rock is a genre of popular music in Romania. It was influenced by changes in Romanian politics to such an extreme, that both the themes and styles of musicians, and the tastes and interests of listeners, changed dramatically with every major event in Romania's internal politics.As a...

 rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 band Sfinx
Sfinx (band)
Sfinx was one of the most appreciated Romanian rock acts in the 1970s, along with Phoenix.-The early years :The band was formed in 1963, in Bucharest. It was singer and guitarist Octav Zemlicka who had the idea to start the band...

 worked from around 1975 through 1978 on what became one of the most appreciated Romanian progressive rock
Progressive rock
Progressive rock is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility." John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of...

 LPs, Zalmoxe. It was based on lyrics by poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

 Alexandru Basarab (actually a pen name
Pen name
A pen name, nom de plume, or literary double, is a pseudonym adopted by an author. A pen name may be used to make the author's name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works, to protect the author from retribution for his or her...

 for Adrian Hoajă), which retold the story of Zalmoxis's existence. However, the album was banned on being released
Release (music)
In the music industry, a release is usually a term referring to the creative output from an artist available for sale or distribution; a broad term covering the many different formats music can be released in, and different forms of pieces .The word can also refer to the event at which an album or...

 for about three years and was eventually shortened drastically by political censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...

 with the Communist regime
Criticisms of Communist party rule
Criticisms of communist party rule have been known since the first days of the first communist government in Soviet Russia, established after the October Revolution of 1917.-Background:...

.

Primary sources

  • Herodotus
    Herodotus
    Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...

    . Histories
    Histories (Herodotus)
    The Histories of Herodotus is considered one of the seminal works of history in Western literature. Written from the 450s to the 420s BC in the Ionic dialect of classical Greek, The Histories serves as a record of the ancient traditions, politics, geography, and clashes of various cultures that...

    , Book IV. 93-96
  • Herodotus
    Herodotus
    Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...

    . Histories
    Histories (Herodotus)
    The Histories of Herodotus is considered one of the seminal works of history in Western literature. Written from the 450s to the 420s BC in the Ionic dialect of classical Greek, The Histories serves as a record of the ancient traditions, politics, geography, and clashes of various cultures that...

    , History of Herodotus, Book IV. 94
  • Jordanes
    Jordanes
    Jordanes, also written Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th century Roman bureaucrat, who turned his hand to history later in life....

    . Getica. V.39
  • Strabo
    Strabo
    Strabo, also written Strabon was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher.-Life:Strabo was born to an affluent family from Amaseia in Pontus , a city which he said was situated the approximate equivalent of 75 km from the Black Sea...

    . Geographica
    Géographica
    Géographica is the French-language magazine of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society , published under the Society's French name, the Société géographique royale du Canada . Introduced in 1997, Géographica is not a stand-alone publication, but is published as an irregular supplement to La...

    , VII. 3. 5
  • Plato
    Plato
    Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

    . Charmides
    Charmides (dialogue)
    The Charmides is a dialogue of Plato, in which Socrates engages a handsome and popular boy in a conversation about the meaning of sophrosyne, a Greek word usually translated into English as "temperance", "self-control", or "restraint"...

    , 156-158
  • Apuleius
    Apuleius
    Apuleius was a Latin prose writer. He was a Berber, from Madaurus . He studied Platonist philosophy in Athens; travelled to Italy, Asia Minor and Egypt; and was an initiate in several cults or mysteries. The most famous incident in his life was when he was accused of using magic to gain the...

    . Pro Se De Magia (Apologia), 2.26
  • Diodorus Siculus
    Diodorus Siculus
    Diodorus Siculus was a Greek historian who flourished between 60 and 30 BC. According to Diodorus' own work, he was born at Agyrium in Sicily . With one exception, antiquity affords no further information about Diodorus' life and doings beyond what is to be found in his own work, Bibliotheca...

    . Bibliotheca historica
    Bibliotheca historica
    Bibliotheca historica , is a work of universal history by Diodorus Siculus. It consisted of forty books, which were divided into three sections. The first six books are geographical in theme, and describe the history and culture of Egypt , of Mesopotamia, India, Scythia, and Arabia , of North...

    , 94.2
  • Porphyry
    Porphyry (philosopher)
    Porphyry of Tyre , Porphyrios, AD 234–c. 305) was a Neoplatonic philosopher who was born in Tyre. He edited and published the Enneads, the only collection of the work of his teacher Plotinus. He also wrote many works himself on a wide variety of topics...

    , Life of Pythagoras, 14

Secondary sources

  • Dan Dana. Zalmoxis de la Herodot la Mircea Eliade. Istorii despre un zeu al pretextului, Polirom, Iași, 2008
  • Eliade, Mircea
    Mircea Eliade
    Mircea Eliade was a Romanian historian of religion, fiction writer, philosopher, and professor at the University of Chicago. He was a leading interpreter of religious experience, who established paradigms in religious studies that persist to this day...

    . "Zalmoxis, the vanishing God"
  • Kernbach, Victor. Miturile Esenţiale, Editura Ştiinţifică şi Enciclopedică, Bucharest, 1978
  • Popov, Dimitar. Bogat s mnogoto imena (The God with Multiple Names), Sofia, 1995
  • Venedikov, Ivan. Mitove na bulgarskata zemya: Mednoto Gumno (Myths of the Bulgarian Land: The Copper Threshing Floor), Sofia, 1982322234123365gdgdf

External links

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