Citation with stable link: Philip A. Harland, 'Persian wisdom: Euboulos and Porphyry of Tyre on Zoroaster and the cave (third century CE),' Ethnic Relations and Migration in the Ancient World, last modified June 17, 2024, https://philipharland.com/Blog/?p=19382.
Ancient authors: Euboulos (perhaps first or second century CE), Concerning Mithras, as discussed by Porphyry of Tyre (third century CE), On the Cave of the Nymphs in the Thirteenth Book of the Odyssey / De Antro 5-6, 24 (link; link to Greek).
Comments: Porphyry was a third century CE figure from Tyre in Phoenicia who associated himself with the Platonic sect in the era that scholars label Neoplatonism. In his commentary on “the cave of the Nymphs” mentioned by Homer (Odyssey 13.102-112 [link]), Porphyry draws out the significance of the cave. In this specific passage, Porphyry argues that the cave is, first and foremost, a symbol of the cosmos or universe itself. Here Porphyry cites as an authority Euboulos’ discussion of the Persian wise man Zoroaster (Zarathustra) in a now lost work Concerning Mithras. According to this tradition, Zoroaster considered the cave as a symbol of the cosmos and was the first to dedicate such a cave to the Persian deity Mithras. Moreover, this tradition also imagines Zoroaster as the founder of initiations into mysteries which themselves took place within the cave as cosmos, with descending and ascending souls as central. In this way, a wise sage of the east is appropriated not only as an authority for Mithras’ mysteries (in Roman form) but also for a Platonic perspective on the nature of the cosmos.
In the Roman mysteries of Mithras (which are only attested from the second century CE on), the meetings and initiations took place within natural or artificially-constructed caves representing the universe, of course. The idea that Zoroaster started that is an ethnographic projection (in this instance a projection of Euboulos taken on by Porphyry) but nonetheless shows the importance of the aura of an eastern, Persian connection for some Greeks and Romans interested in the Persian deity Mithras.
Porphyry also makes use of Euboulos’ work when Porphyry discusses Persian Magians generally (link).
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[Cave as symbol of the cosmos]
Actually, the ancients very appropriately consecrated a cave to the cosmos, as a whole as well as its parts. So they considered earth as a symbol of that matter of which the cosmos consists. For this reason, some thought that matter and earth are the same. The ancients also found in caves symbols of the cosmos which was generated from matter, because caves are, for the most part, natural productions emerging with the earth, being comprehended as one uniform mass of stone. The interior parts of a cave are concave, but the exterior parts are extended over an indefinite portion of land. The cosmos, which is spontaneously produced and also self-adherent, is allied to matter. According to a secret signification, it is denominated a stone and a rock, on account of its having an inert and repercussive nature with respect to form. At the same time, the ancients assert that matter is infinite through its lack of form. Since, however, it is continually changing and on its own lacks the supervening investments of form, through which it participates in form and becomes visible, the dampness, darkness, or (as the poet says) obscurity of the cave were considered by the ancients as appropriate symbols of what the cosmos contains, because of the matter with which it is connected. Through matter, therefore, the cosmos is obscure and dark; but through the connecting power and orderly distribution of form, from which also it is called “cosmos” (“order”), it is beautiful and lovely. So the cave may very appropriately be considered “lovely” to the person who first enters into it and perceives in it a participation of forms. However, it may be considered “obscure” to the person who views its foundation and examines it with an intellectual eye. So its exterior and superficial parts are actually lovely, but its interior and deeper parts are obscure.
[Persians and Zoroaster on the cave as cosmos]
So also the Persian leaders of the initiation (mystagōgountes) complete the ritual for the initiate (mystēs) by explaining the descent of the soul and the soul’s return, and they call the place where this happens a “cave.” For, as Euboulos says, Zoroaster [Zarathustra] was the first person who, in the neighbouring mountains of Persia, consecrated a natural cave with flowers and fountains in honour of Mithras, the creator and father of everything, because a cave, according to Zoroaster, resembled the cosmos which was created by Mithras. But the things contained in the cave were arranged according to commensurate intervals and were symbols of the elements and regions of the cosmos.
After the time of Zoroaster, it was likewise customary for others to perform the rites pertaining to the mysteries in caves and grottoes, whether natural or man-made ones. For since they established temples, groves, and altars for the Olympian gods, but altars only for the earthly deities and heroes and pits and cells for the deities below the earth, in the same way they dedicated caves and grottoes to the cosmos and to Nymphs as well because of the water which trickles into or rises from caves. As we will soon see, the Naiades preside over these.
However, not only did the ancients make a cave a symbol of the cosmos or of a generated and sensible nature, as we have said, but they also took it as a symbol of all invisible powers, because as caverns are obscure and dark, so the essence of these powers is invisible. . . [omitted long sections].
[Further references to Mithras’ astrological significance]
(24) For this reason, the gates of the Homeric cave are not dedicated to the east and west, nor to the equinoxes, the Ram [Aries] and the Yoke [Libra], but to the north and south, and to those celestial signs which towards the south are most southerly, and, towards the north are most northerly. This is because this cave was sacred to souls and aquatic Nymphs. But these places are adapted to descent and ascent of souls. Hence, a place near to the equinoxes was assigned to Mithras as an appropriate seat. For this reason, Mithras bears the sword of Aries, which is a military sign. He is likewise carried in the Bull, which is the sign of Aphrodite [Venus]. For Mithras is the creator like the bull and lord of generation. But he is placed near the equinoxes, having the northern parts on his right hand, and the southern on his left. They likewise arranged towards the south the southern hemisphere because it is hot; but the northern hemisphere towards the north, through the coldness of the north wind.
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Source of translation: T. Taylor, Select works of Porphyry (London: T. Rodd, 1823), public domain, adapted by Harland.