Greek religion: temples, priests and sacrifices

The Greeks did not have one god. They had many, and each god took care of different things. Zeus was the king of the gods, Athena protected the city of Athens, and Poseidon ruled the sea. People believed that the gods could help them or punish them. So they tried to keep the gods happy with prayers and gifts.

Every god had holy places. A holy place was called a ἱερόν, a sanctuary. It was an open area that belonged to the god. Inside, there was usually a temple and an altar. All around stood the gifts of the faithful, called offerings: statues and stone slabs with writing on them. Some cities also built small buildings, called treasuries, to keep precious offerings safe. A famous sanctuary was the sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi, but every town had its own holy places.

The most beautiful building in a sanctuary was the temple, the ναός. But a Greek temple was not a place where people went inside to pray together. It was the house of the god, and its main job was to hold the god's statue.

The best-known temple is the Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens. The Athenians built it for their goddess Athena between 447 and 438 BC. Inside stood a huge statue of Athena made of gold and ivory, by the sculptor Pheidias. Nearby, in another temple, the Erechtheion, they kept an old wooden statue of Athena. It was the centre of the city's greatest festival, the Panathenaia. Centuries later, the Parthenon itself was turned into a Christian church.

So where did people worship? Outside! The altar, the βωμός, stood in the open air in front of the temple's entrance, so that the god's statue inside could “see” it. The ceremonies took place there, under the sky.

The most important act of worship was the θυσία, the sacrifice. Often an animal, for example an ox, was killed at the altar. The parts that people could not eat, such as the bones, were burned on the altar for the gods, and the smoke rose to the sky. The meat was cooked and shared among the people, so a sacrifice was also a big meal together.

The Greeks told a story to explain this. The poet Hesiod says that the clever Titan Prometheus once tried to trick Zeus. He cut up an ox. He hid the good meat inside the animal's stomach, and covered the white bones with shiny fat. Zeus took the fat and found only bones under it. Because of this, says Hesiod, people burn white bones for the gods on their altars.

Not every offering had blood. People also gave fruit, flowers, honey, milk and oil. They poured wine or honey on the altar or on the ground. This was called a σπονδή, a libation.

Each sanctuary had a priest, the ἱερεύς, or a priestess, the ἱέρεια. They looked after the god's house and led the ceremonies. In ancient Greek, ἱερεύς first meant “the one who makes the sacrifice”. Women were very important in Greek religion, and many goddesses were served by priestesses.

In Athens, one of the highest religious jobs belonged to a woman: the priestess of Athena Polias, the goddess who protected the city. She came from one old Athenian family. One of these priestesses, Lysimache, served the goddess for 64 years, and a statue of her stood on the Acropolis.

Religion was also joy. A ἑορτή, a festival, brought the whole city together to honour a god. Today the word lives on as γιορτή, a celebration or a name day. Many other temple words also live on in Greek churches: the ιερέας is the priest, the ιερό is the holy area behind the screen of icons, and βωμός can mean the church's Holy Table.