My take is somewhat different. I blame the Enlightenment.
Euripides' Bacchae comes to mind:
Of the Greek gods only Dionysus was murdered and reborn. The giants who killed him and ate parts of his body were the ancestors of humans. If you can think metaphorically about that it means Dionysus himself was a sacrificial victim and humans are descendants of his murderers.
Concerning Dionysian madness, the maenads of today are obsessed with abstractions called racism and sexism (and human rights). But these are Apollonian in character, manufactured by intellectuals, and are an attack on natural order, one would think. Therefore, Dionysian nature is asserting itself by destroying modernism, not traditional Christianity.
Curiously, in Euripides’ <i>Bacchae</i> Cadmus and Tiresias were in opposition to Pentheus because of his impiety towards Dionysus. He (Pentheus) tried to force virtue on women. In fact, Tiresias calls Pentheus mad (line 326 in my edition).
Thank you Chris… I’m so grateful for your voice!
My take is somewhat different. I blame the Enlightenment.
Euripides' Bacchae comes to mind:
Of the Greek gods only Dionysus was murdered and reborn. The giants who killed him and ate parts of his body were the ancestors of humans. If you can think metaphorically about that it means Dionysus himself was a sacrificial victim and humans are descendants of his murderers.
Concerning Dionysian madness, the maenads of today are obsessed with abstractions called racism and sexism (and human rights). But these are Apollonian in character, manufactured by intellectuals, and are an attack on natural order, one would think. Therefore, Dionysian nature is asserting itself by destroying modernism, not traditional Christianity.
Curiously, in Euripides’ <i>Bacchae</i> Cadmus and Tiresias were in opposition to Pentheus because of his impiety towards Dionysus. He (Pentheus) tried to force virtue on women. In fact, Tiresias calls Pentheus mad (line 326 in my edition).
I think it was a great disservice to the idea of the Dionysian too. Nietzsche had important insight here.