Hellenic Paganism still has some followers even though it is an ancient religion.
However most of the people who follow hellenic paganism as a path have adopted some different traditions by later religions. (Neo)
There are very few that follow this path (Paleo) and have the exact same beliefs with the ancient pagans.
Paleo
The original religion of Ancient Greece was polytheistic. Ancient Greeks believed in 12 Gods. However even though these 12 Gods were the center of their worship, Ancient Greeks believed in many other "lower" Gods dietiesand nymphs.
In the paleo paganism there we often rituals and sucrifices to please the Gods.
In this form of hellenistic paganism Gods were more feared than worshiped. Described by stories and myths that survived through the years (e.g Odessey) they had a rather selfish behavior and in that way they lost the wisdom aspect of the God (*) keeping theaspect of power . For people at the time Gods were humans undistructable, immortal with great powers.
(*) like in christianity
Many people would believe that the Gods take many forms and shapes and visit the human world constantly. In general in the Paleo path Gods are in a way humanised.
In the Paleo path the appearence of lower deieties is very often. There are numerous of them but not all of equal importance still all of them are believed to have great powers. (eg Primordial dieties, sea dieties, air dieties, nymphs, personified concepts etc) SO paleo pagans also believe in the existence of all dieties not only the Gods.
Neo
The Neo path is quite diferent. It is based in a more philosophical concept of this religion. It looks through the deeper meaning, the metaphore if you d like of every God.
In the neo path they believe in the same Gods but see them more as a representation of something they consider divine like: Aphrodite for love.
In the neo path they mostly use rituals and prayers that do not contain sucrifices
In the neo path the human element is absent from the Gods characters. They see them wiser and they don't necceserly belive they can interfere with their lives in a high level. Other dieties can be admired but not commonly worshiped. They mostly see other dieties in a more philosophical than spiritual point of view.
Also neo pagans often adopt traditions from later religions
Also I wanted to outline that both paths have the same philosophy about matters of life since this part is consisted of very important and briliant philosphy
Re: Hellenic Paganism By: Artindark Moderator / Adept
Post # 3 Oct 07, 2013
Very informative thread ,I really enjoyed reading it.Please ,consider doing some future work and contribution towards it's expansion.We do not have that many threads dedicated to this particular path ,despite the fact that many Eclectic people adopt the Greek pantheon (or Deity /Deities from it)to honor and worship , as a whole concept this type of paganism is still largely unknown territory to most of us.
