Sophia Scriptura

Exhortation to the Greeks 2.21

Clement of Alexandria · Exhortation to the Greeks · ca. 190–200 · Alexandria · Read in context

Summary: Orpheus's own verses and the Eleusinian password bear witness to the obscenity of the Athenian mysteries.

Greek text · Stählin 1:16

μόλις ποτὲ δέχεται τὸ ποτόν, ἡσθεῖσα τῷ θεάματι. ταῦτʼ ἔστι τὰ κρύφια τῶν Ἀθηναίων μυστήρια. ταῦτά τοι καὶ Ὀρφεὺς ἀναγράφει. παραθήσομαι δέ σοι αὐτὰ τοῦ Ὀρφέως τὰ ἔπη, ἵνʼ ἔχῃς μάρτυρα τῆς ἀναισχυντίας τὸν μυσταγωγόν· ὣς εἰποῦσα πέπλους ἀνεσύρετο, δεῖξε δὲ πάντα σώματος οὐδὲ πρέποντα τύπον· παῖς δʼ ἦεν Ἴακχος, χειρί τέ μιν ῥίπτασκε γελῶν Βαυβοῦς ὑπὸ κόλποις· ἡ δʼ ἐπεὶ οὖν μείδησε θεά, μείδησʼ ἐνὶ θυμῷ, δέξατο δʼ αἰόλον ἄγγος, ἐν ᾧ κυκεὼν ἐνέκειτο. κἄστι τὸ σύνθημα Ἐλευσινίων μυστηρίων· »ἐνήστευσα, ἔπιον τὸν κυκεῶνα, ἔλαβον ἐκ κίστης, ἐργασάμενος ἀπεθέμην εἰς κάλαθον καὶ ἐκ καλάθου εἰς κίστην.« καλά γε τὰ θεάματα καὶ θεᾷ πρέποντα.

English · Claude translation

… at last accepts the drink, pleased by the spectacle. These are the secret mysteries of the Athenians. Orpheus too records them, and I will set before you the very verses of Orpheus, so that you may have the leader of the mysteries himself as witness to their shamelessness: “So saying, she drew up her robes and showed all her body, a shape unseemly; the child Iacchus was there, and laughing he kept tossing his hand beneath Baubo's bosom. And when the goddess smiled, she smiled in her heart, and accepted the gleaming cup in which the potion lay.” And the password of the Eleusinian mysteries is this: “I fasted, I drank the potion, I took from the chest, and having done the work I put it into the basket, and from the basket into the chest.” Fine sights indeed, and fit for a goddess!

About this passage

Source
Stählin 1:16 · Otto Stählin, ed., Clemens Alexandrinus, vol. 1, Protrepticus und Paedagogus, GCS 12 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1905) · Greek text: Otto Stählin, Clemens Alexandrinus 1: Protrepticus und Paedagogus (GCS 12, 1905), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Stählin, GCS 12. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation
Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-26 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Stählin (1905); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)
Extrabiblical texts
  • Orpheus (attributed), Orph. frag. (Orpheus (attributed), Orphic poems (fragments)) · quotation, high confidence

Notes

Translation notes

  • The Eleusinian password (σύνθημα) is preserved only here; its exact meaning is still debated.

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Protr. 2.21 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-protrepticus/2/21/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Protr. 2.21 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-protrepticus/2/21/).

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