6 - Divinity for All

Summary

Chapter six considers Greek and Roman conceptions of human nature. Greeks and Romans had wide-ranging views on humanity’s relation with the divine. However, in philosophical and scientific circles, it was common to find talk of humanity’s intrinsic share in the divine nature even in its natural condition. Certain groups thought of the self as a space comprising different material bodies, some nondivine and some divine. Others imagined it as a space comprising material and immaterial parts, the former being mortal and the latter having a latent share in the divine state. There was thus general agreement that, regardless of the nature of the different parts or aspects of the self, the human enjoyed some share in the divine nature. Many seem to have imagined some rulers to have had an exalted ontology. Unfortunately, the evidence is simply not conclusive. In any case, Greeks and Romans quite widely thought that the regular human self participated in the divine state.