For what little it's worth, the Colonies in the original BSG series were much more Egyptian in flavor.
That's something I'd been curious about, having not seen the original series.
Obviously the correspondence between Greek and Colonial religion isn't exact, or even close to exact, I don't disagree with that. But prophecies are so much at the heart of Greek religion, and that's what the colonial scriptures seem to be, that I really just read those as prophecies. I don't think that the Iliad or Theogony is even on a level to be compared with, e.g., Tanakh — I mean, Homer and Hesiod are poets, not priests. I think it would be easier, in a way, to make a comparison with Orphism (which, yes, is a wacky mystery cult, but on the other hand there are written texts specifying specific cult practices). I'm guessing that what they actually may have had foggily in mind is the Roman Sibylline prophecies. Besides which, of course, it just makes so much more "sense" to a modern-day Judeo-Christian audience (and writers of the show, apparently) if there is a physical handbook of the religion to refer to.
More Greek than anything else, but we've got two definite non-Greek connections established (Mars and Isis).
With Isis, I may agree, especially now that you've said the original series was more Egyptian than anything. In the case of Mars, though, I can't help but wonder whether it was a slip or whether it was intentional. Isis can be ignored so far, since the name's been used but there's been no mention of Isis as having divine status among the Colonies.
I also don't like the complete separation of Mars and Ares that Mars being a demigod (vel sim.) would imply. Yes, the Etruscan gods and the Greek gods are separate (though they didn't call him Mavors! *grin*), but the Romans thought of their pantheon as being the same as the Greek pantheon, and I'm very wary of dissociating the "reality" of gods from how they are perceived by the people who worship them.
Going back to inconsistencies between the religions, though, even having a temple be a place-where-you-go-to-worship is entirely wrong with the Greek religion. But every so often they do something that makes me go "yay!", like having snakes be oracularly significant.
It's obvious, yes, that the religion isn't supposed to completely be the Greek religion. I just hope that they have some fixed idea of what it's supposed to be, because it's nice when they flesh it out, but they usually only seem to flesh it out when it's directly relevant to the plot.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2006-10-21 07:42 pm (UTC)That's something I'd been curious about, having not seen the original series.
Obviously the correspondence between Greek and Colonial religion isn't exact, or even close to exact, I don't disagree with that. But prophecies are so much at the heart of Greek religion, and that's what the colonial scriptures seem to be, that I really just read those as prophecies. I don't think that the Iliad or Theogony is even on a level to be compared with, e.g., Tanakh — I mean, Homer and Hesiod are poets, not priests. I think it would be easier, in a way, to make a comparison with Orphism (which, yes, is a wacky mystery cult, but on the other hand there are written texts specifying specific cult practices). I'm guessing that what they actually may have had foggily in mind is the Roman Sibylline prophecies. Besides which, of course, it just makes so much more "sense" to a modern-day Judeo-Christian audience (and writers of the show, apparently) if there is a physical handbook of the religion to refer to.
More Greek than anything else, but we've got two definite non-Greek connections established (Mars and Isis).
With Isis, I may agree, especially now that you've said the original series was more Egyptian than anything. In the case of Mars, though, I can't help but wonder whether it was a slip or whether it was intentional. Isis can be ignored so far, since the name's been used but there's been no mention of Isis as having divine status among the Colonies.
I also don't like the complete separation of Mars and Ares that Mars being a demigod (vel sim.) would imply. Yes, the Etruscan gods and the Greek gods are separate (though they didn't call him Mavors! *grin*), but the Romans thought of their pantheon as being the same as the Greek pantheon, and I'm very wary of dissociating the "reality" of gods from how they are perceived by the people who worship them.
Going back to inconsistencies between the religions, though, even having a temple be a place-where-you-go-to-worship is entirely wrong with the Greek religion. But every so often they do something that makes me go "yay!", like having snakes be oracularly significant.
It's obvious, yes, that the religion isn't supposed to completely be the Greek religion. I just hope that they have some fixed idea of what it's supposed to be, because it's nice when they flesh it out, but they usually only seem to flesh it out when it's directly relevant to the plot.