BMCR 2008.11.17, Joerg Ruepke, Religion of the Romans

Joerg Ruepke, Religion of the Romans. (Translation of 2001 edition by
Richard Gordon).  Cambridge, UK/Malden, MA:  Polity Press, 2007.  Pp.
368.  ISBN 9780745630151.  $26.95 (pb).

Reviewed by Jan Nelis, University of Ghent ([email protected])
Word count:  1260 words
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Religion of the Romans: the title in itself indicates the author's
intention to offer an 'inner' look on the way in which the ancient
Romans supposedly lived and experienced their religion(s). In all, we
have found Ruepke's to be a fruitful contribution to the understanding
of how both elite and lower class Roman citizens behaved in a religious
context. The book's highly original approach is based on a variety of
source materials, apart from which the author also displays a thorough
knowledge of the relevant secondary literature, which he uses, when
necessary, in a critical, sensible manner. In other words, this is a
very solid treatment of Roman religion, or rather of 'religion of the
Romans'. In the following, we will provide a brief summary of the
book's contents.

The introductory part, which consists of two chapters (pp. 1-61),
initially offers some general reflections on the concept of religion,
and on the limits attached to the latter term's application to
antiquity. From the outset, the very existence of ancient 'religion',
or at least its scarce resemblance to what it nowadays is commonly
considered to be, is questioned. Apart from this aspect, the reader is
also warned against the anachronistic dangers contained by the study of
religion in ancient Rome. In this way, important issues such as ancient
religion's public versus its private face, polytheism versus
monotheism, elite versus popular religion, as well as the issue of
controlling religious practice, are treated in a very deliberate
manner, reconstructing as much as possible the viewpoint of ancient
Romans. The second part of the prolegomena focuses on problems such as,
first and foremost, the use and often difficult interpretation of
source material (cf. supra). As in the study of history in general, the
latter indeed is a particularly fundamental aspect in scholarship on
religion in antiquity, and Ruepke seems to be very well aware of this.
Furthermore, he also points out how historical research is not only
determined by the scholar's own ideology, but also by the very nature
of the available source material. Indeed, not without reason, he states
that every "society creates an image of its own history. This image is
configured by certain current or contemporary pre-occupations and
interests, and is directed far more towards these than by a concern for
how things really were." (p. 43) The prolegomena are concluded by a
discussion of the possible periodizations of the religion of the
Romans.

Part 1, entitled Structures (p. 63-134), starts with a philosophical
discussion of the concept of religion, after which we get a treatment
of various aspects related to people's relationship to the dead, as
well as to gods, most importantly in the shape of cult-images, as well
as their respective, and evolving, attributes. This is followed by a
discussion of the polytheistic nature of the Romans' religion, and,
more importantly, by an elaborate illustration of the various
conceptions of divinity which one would have been able to observe in
ancient Rome. All this is connected to an already mentioned aspect,
namely the fact that the religion of the Romans is not only a quite
heterogeneous object of study, but that it is also something which
should best be taken on its own terms, a situation which inevitably
leads to considerable distance between the researcher and the object of
his study. In so far as possible Ruepke tries to bridge this distance,
mainly through a discussion of various rituals performed by ancient
Romans and of their possible interpretations. Pointing at the fact that
the nature and original intention of most rituals was not even clear in
antiquity itself, the author points at the difficulty of interpreting
them, both in themselves and in relationship to one another, in other
words 'semantically' as well as 'syntactically'. This part of the book
finishes with a closer look at the possibilities and limitations of
conceptualizing religion, a discussion which is all the more
interesting as it can apply both to ancient and present religious
traditions.

The second part, Religion in Action (p. 135-201), first of all presents
a discussion of the social function of sacrifice and feasting, in which
the author analyzes, among other things, the various ways in which
rituals, i.e. sacrificial rituals, create, reproduce and produce
hierarchy, hierarchy between man and god, but also, on a lower level,
between human and animal. Ruepke proceeds with an illustration of the
various ways in which sacrifices could be interpreted ('gifts: do ut
des'), which types of sacrifice were needed for different intentions
and different contexts ('system'), and how the practice of sacrifice
could also be manipulated according to specific needs. Finally, and
most interestingly, the economic factor is taken into account, as well
as the influence it could have had on the act of sacrifice itself.
Subsequently, the subject of votives is introduced. Paying special
attention to animal votives, Ruepke here points at the difficulty in
interpreting these objects, especially anatomic ones, to conclude with
an extensive treatment of the role and importance of vow pledging, as
well as of the place of the concepts of 'space' and 'time' in the
Romans' religious life.

The most interesting section of the third part of the book, entitled
Social Reality (pp. 203-57), can be found at the beginning, where
Ruepke comments on the existence, organization and role of the
so-called collegia, as well as their specific religious functions. From
this analysis, it once again emerges that the 'religion of the Romans'
was both a private and a public activity, with specific social
functions which can only to a very limited extent be compared to
Christian religious patterns. The book then contains a treatment of
religious personnel, in which we particularly appreciated the long,
systematic list provided on pages 223-8, as well as some additional
considerations, which in a way serve as conclusion. Here the author
makes some final remarks on the way in which he has analyzed religion
in ancient Rome, i.e. through basically an 'inner approach', which, as
we have highlighted, tries to grasp the 'otherness' of the ancient
past, and of its religion, viewpoints which do not only count for the
study of ancient religion, but for the whole of antiquity and its
culture. Therefore, we would like to end this brief summary with a
short citation (p. 257): "That [the complexity of urban society during
the Principate] is what makes the models, conclusions, hypotheses and
questions that arise out of an engagement with the ancient world so
interesting for the present day. At the same time, these contemporary
implications are bound also to call attention to the otherness of
ancient society: if we want to use the ancient world in order to draw
lessons for today, we must also accept that otherness. The inverse is
also true: even if we are interested in the otherness of antiquity, in
its exoticism, we cannot avoid seeing its contemporary relevance. We
would do well not to relinquish our grasp of either term of the
paradox."

Religion of the Romans is without a doubt a very valuable source for
the study of ancient religion, both for a specialized and for a student
public. Combined with the continuous and consistent use of primary
source material, the specific approach makes this study a very lively
and well sustained analytical treatment of a subject whose 'otherness'
can easily lead to simplistic, and anachronistic, interpretation. This
is nowhere the case in Ruepke, and for this reason alone his book is
highly recommendable. The only, minor, flaws are the quite numerous
typographical errors, which we hope will disappear in future reprints.