Baudissin, Adonis und Esmun, remarks that Adonis belongs to “einer Klasse von Wesen sehr unbestimmter Art der wohl über den Menschen aber unter den grossen Göttern stehen, und weniger Individualität besitzen als diese."[1] Such a criticism applies of course equally to Attis.

Mithra, on the other hand, occupies an entirely different position.  Cumont, in his Mystères de Mithra, thus describes him; he is “le génie de la lumière céleste.  Il n’est ni le soleil, ni la lune, ni les étoiles, mais à l’aide de ces mille oreilles, et de ces deux milles yeux, il surveille le monde."[2]

His beneficent activities might seem to afford a meeting ground with the Vegetation goods—­“Il donne l’accroissement, il donne l’abondance, il donne les troupeaux, il donne la progéniture et la vie."[3]

This summary may aptly be compared with the lament for Tammuz, quoted in Chapter 3.

But the worship of Mithra in the form in which it spread throughout the Roman Empire, Mithra as the god of the Imperial armies, the deity beloved of the Roman legionary, was in no sense of this concrete and material type.

This is how Cumont sums up the main features.  Mithra is the Mediator, who stands between “le Dieu inaccessible, et inconnaissable, qui règne dans les sphères éthérées, et le genre humain qui s’agite ici-bas.”—­“Il est le Logos émané de Dieu, et participant à sa toute puissance, qui après avoir formé le monde comme démiurge continue à veiller sur lui.”  The initiates must practice a strict chastity—­“La résistance à la sensualité était un des aspects du combat contre le principe du mal—­le dualisme Mithraique servait de fondement à une morale très pure et très efficace."[4]

Finally, Mithraism taught the resurrection of the body—­Mithra will descend upon earth, and will revive all men.  All will issue from their graves, resume their former appearance and recognize each other.  All will be united in one great assembly, and the good will be separated from the evil.  Then in one supreme sacrifice Mithra will immolate the divine bull, and mixing its fat with the consecrated wine will offer to the righteous the cup of Eternal Life.[5]

The final parallel with the Messianic Feast described in Chapter 9 is too striking to be overlooked.

The celestial nature of the deity is also well brought out in the curious text edited by Dieterich from the great Magic Papyrus of the Bibliothèque Nationale, and referred to in a previous chapter.  This text purports to be a formula of initiation, and we find the aspirant ascending through the Seven Heavenly Spheres, to be finally met by Mithra who brings him to the presence of God.  So in the Mithraic temples we find seven ladders, the ascent of which by the Initiate typified his passage to the seventh and supreme Heaven.[6]

Bousset points out that the original idea was that of three Heavens above which was Paradise; the conception of Seven Heavens, ruled by the seven Planets, which we find in Mithraism, is due to the influence of Babylonian sidereal cults.[7]