The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion

The Phrygian divinity was a handsome herdsman loved by Cybele, the mother of the gods (and, in some versions of the story, Attis himself). Attis died violently at the foot of a pine tree, either, like Adonis, being gored by a boar or bleeding to death after castrating himself.

The priests of Cybele normally took the name of Attis and, in remembrance of the latter of the two narratives of his death, were often eunuchs. During the festival in honor of Attis, a pine tree would be ceremonially decorated, and the priests would self-mutilate before it (with novices perhaps undergoing castration on the same occasion). Recalling the death of the satyr Marsyas on a pine tree, The Golden Bough suggests that the pine tree of Attis may have belonged to a tradition of sacred gallows-trees.

Balder was a much-loved son of the Norse god Odin who, following a dream prophesying his death, was protected by the goddess Frigg. She took oaths from all the creatures, elements, and substances that might pose a risk to the god that they would not harm him. Loki tricked the blind god Hother into shooting Balder with mistletoe, the only plant that did not take the oath. Balder then died and was cremated.

The Golden Bough presents Balder as an example of a man-god suspended between heaven and Earth through his unnaturally prolonged and protected life. The text focuses on the commemoration of Balder’s cremation through annual fire festivals and on the significance of mistletoe, an evergreen parasite that grows on the deciduous oak tree. The text argues that mistletoe represents the externalized soul of the oak tree and was the original reference for the myth of the golden bough.

The sacrificial priest-kings at Nemi were dedicated to the Roman goddess Diana, and the first of these priests, Virbius, was in fact Hippolytus, a Greek hero beloved by Diana, whom she brought back to life after he had been murdered. Diana is the goddess of the woodland, nature, and fertility, comparable to the Greek goddess Artemis. Throughout the text, parallels between Diana and Virbius are made with other couples consisting of a sacrificed and resurrected man-god and a goddess.

Although best known as a god of wine and revelry, Dionysus was also the Greek god of trees, fertility, agriculture, and corn. Dionysus was believed to have died a violent death and been resurrected, and this sequence of events was re-enacted at his festivals. The infant Dionysus, son of Zeus, was attacked and dismembered by Titans while he was sitting on his father’s throne, wielding his thunderbolt. Dionysus therefore sets an important precedent for the recurring figure of the mock or temporary king at the various festivals described in the text.

In the version of the Dionysian myth recounted by the poet Nonnus, the god evaded capture by changing shape and had assumed the form of a bull when he was finally caught. Perhaps for this reason, bulls and oxen were often sacrificed to Dionysus, symbolizing The Necessity of Sacrifice for Renewal. The Golden Bough posits that human kings may also have been sacrificed to symbolize Dionysus in order to protect the harvest.

The story of Haman and Mordecai, as recounted in the Book of Esther, is the origin for the Jewish harvest festival, Purim. The vizier Haman plotted to have his enemy, Mordecai, executed on a public gallows while he expected to be awarded the honor of wearing the king’s crown and riding his horse. However, the fates of the two rivals were reversed: Mordecai became the temporary king and Haman was executed.

The text points to the destruction of effigies of Haman during Purim as evidence that the festival may originally have involved human sacrifice. It suggests that this doubling of the potential sacrificial victims, with one saved and one executed, served the function of the resurrection narrative, paralleling the stories of Adonis and Attis. Haman is the old, dying god while Mordecai is the new, emerging one.

Citing the New Testament accounts of Pilate’s offer to save one condemned prisoner, The Golden Bough theorizes that Christ may have been crucified to symbolize Haman at one such ritual, with Barabbas being chosen for the role of Mordecai. 

In the text, the Egyptian god Osiris is the counterpart of Adonis and Attis and, as such, is a forerunner of Christ. Born from an intrigue between the earth-god Seb and the sky-goddess Nut, Osiris was married to his sister, Isis. Osiris ruled as a king on Earth, converting the Egyptians from cannibalism to agriculture. Afterwards, he travelled the world, bringing civilization and agriculture with him.

Osiris was murdered by Set, who tricked him into lying in a coffin, then sealed it, and tossed it into the Nile. The coffin of Osiris floated to Byblus, where it was enclosed in the trunk of an Erica tree. The King had the tree cut down and made into a pillar for his home, unaware of the presence of Osiris’s body. Disguised as a mortal, Isis travelled to Byblus and was hired as a wet nurse for the king’s son. After the goddess revealed herself, she was given the coffin, leaving the tree to be venerated in a temple in her honor.

The sun-god, Ra, took pity on the distraught Isis and resurrected Osiris as the god of the Underworld. The text posits that the festival of Osiris, during which lamps were lit in all the houses, was a general festival of the dead and a precedent for the Christian festival of All Souls.

Like Astarte and Cybele, Isis was a goddess of fecundity, but she differed from her forebearers in her fidelity to her husband, which the text interprets as suggesting that she is the product of a more civilized society. Like Osiris, Isis was likely a corn deity. The Golden Bough posits that the cult of Isis, especially in the form it took during the decadence of the Roman Empire, has much in common with the Christian iconography of the Virgin Mary.