The Galatians and the Mother Goddess, Cybele

Galatia and the Anatolian Mother Goddess - Cybele
Ankara, Gordion, Pessinus, and Beyond
 
Paul sets forth a series of parallel contrasts in Galatians 4:21-5:1 using Abraham's family household structure and interprets the contrasts allegorically in an effort to argue against those who were advocating that circumcision was necessary for inclusion among God's people.  What has often been overlooked when interpreting this passage is the Greco-Roman cultural background of Galatia. This context is vital to the proper interpretation of the passage because of the high context environment of Paul's audience. Both rhetorical criticism and epistolary criticism show the necessity of the importance of incorporating the Greco-Roman context of the audience and using it to help form a basis for the interpretation of Gal 4:21-5:1. The Greco-Roman context that is purported as missing in most theological interpretations of the passage is the Anatolian civilization context which pervaded the area of Galatia.
  
Some of the most convincing work that pioneered this area of study was done by Susan Elliott in a ground-breaking biblical studies article entitled, “Choose Your Mother, Choose Your Master: Galatians 4:21-5:1 in the Shadow of the Anatolian Mother of the Gods” in Journal of Biblical Literature 118:4 (1999), 661-683. Her presumption was that Paul's argument in Gal 4:21-5:1 had to be intelligible and convincing to the audience of the letter and address a relevant issue that was important to their cultural setting. Her premise for considering the religious background of the Anatolian civilization began by asserting that the audience's context is at least as informative in interpreting the passage as attempting to reconstruct the argument of Paul's opponents. 

A second reason for considering the religious frame of reference of Paul's letter to the Galatians was that his audience was predominantly former pagan Gentiles. Considering the religious background of Paul's audience in Galatia solves several enigmatic problems in the parallel contrasts he sets up and allegorical interpretation of Abraham's family structure that he offers. When reading this passage in the light of the local Anatolian Mountain Mother Goddess, Cybele, and the religious mileu of that cult following, many irreconcilable links in Paul's allegory become logically clearer an serve to actually strengthen the point he is trying to make.
 
As Paul enters into his argument, it becomes readily apparent that the content of his argument relies on a layered analogy constructed with seemingly odd connections. What has long been noted as a difficulty in interpreting the passage is the relationship between Hagar, Mt. Sinai, the Sinai covenant, and slavery. Scholars have offered several possible interpretive solutions to for this passage but none of them satisfactorily answer the question of why Paul chooses to use these parallels and contrasts. The conundrum in interpreting this passage is that it appears Paul's argument is composed of self-evident corollaries for which his audience did not require an extensive explanation (or really none at all). 
 
Paul parallels beginning in verse 22 are divided into two halves and assembled into a series of contrasts under the headings Abraham's two sons, one according to the “free woman” (Sarah) and one according to the “slave woman” (Hagar). The sons then are correlated under the headings of their mothers and Paul declares that these two mothers represent two covenants. First is “Hagar”, “Mt. Sinai”, “bearing children for slavery.” Hagar is then identified with “Mt. Sinai” in Arabia and with “present day Jerusalem” because she is “enslaved with her children.” Next Paul speaks about the “other woman” (“Sarah”) and states that she corresponds to the “Jerusalem above”, who is “free” and who is our “mother”. What is unexpected is that Paul does not include an important descriptor for the “free woman” like he did with “Hagar” - a corresponding mountain name. 
 
Elliott argues that in Paul's argument with the Anatolian Mother Goddess context, it actually serves his purpose to not name a mountain, and further to not even name the “other woman” (i.e. “the free woman”). We are left with a concatenation of images that Paul strings together without offering any contextual clues as to why he omitted the corresponding mountain and name of the “free woman” or what the contrasts are even supposed to signify. We are left with many pervading questions, as Elliott notes, “How can the Jewish law (the Sinai covenant) be identified with a slave concubine who was expelled from the family with her son, and how can all these negative elements be connected to the city that is at the heart of Jewish life? How can a Jew (like Paul) in the mid-first century C.E., even as a convert to Christ, not only think such things but also offer them as explanations he assumes will be self-evident to his audience? As Elliott proposes (and as I am persuaded as well), in the context of the Anatolian Mother Goddess cult following in Galatia, we find many answers that help explain Paul's argument and why he has structured his argument in such a way in the passage.
  
The details of my study are still ongoing and this post is not the place to begin a technical explanation of biblical interpretation. But a few critical points that much be considered from the Anatolian Mother Goddess context of the Galatians.
 
1) The Anatolian Mother Goddess, Cybele, was a very distinguished cult that was nearly ubiquitous throughout the region of Galatia during the first-century A.D. (but its beginnings were hundreds of years earlier during the Phrygian Empire). The cult center of Cybele was in Pessinus but evidence of the worship of Cybele has been discovered all over the area of Galatia.
 
2) Worship of the Mother Goddess involved worship of nature and specifically mountains, where she was thought to reside and look over her subjects in the lands below. She was often associated with particular mountains in different places and called “Mater” with the specific mountain as her surname.
 
3) One specific form of cult followers were called the galli. These were were young men who in a ecstatic, mania-induced ceremony castrated themselves. They were considered the most devoted followers of the goddess and were well known throughout the region.
 
4) The mythology behind the goddess Cybele involved her manipulation of her lover Attis (who was unfaithful) into self-castration and death by bleeding out. This has a direct relevance to the self-castration behavior of her followers.
 
The self-castration of the cult followers is highly relevant to Paul's argument against circumcision and in his reference to desiring that his opponents would “castrate themselves” (Gal 5:12).
 
I will be working on an article regarding the context of the Mother Goddess in the interpretation of Gal 4:21-5:1 when I return in October and hopefully will be able to publish that article on my website by the end of the year (for anyone who would be interested in learning more about interpreting this challenging passage in Galatians).