Asebie

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Asebie or Asebeia ( ancient Greek ἀσέβεια asébeia ) means “godlessness”, “iniquity against the gods” or “infidelity” and was a criminal offense in ancient Greece .

Criminal offense

Sources for the content of the law

The law that punished Asebie is not recorded. What is certain, however, is that such laws existed. There are various details about their specific content and thus about the exact status of the Asi area:

  • According to a legislative proposal reproduced by Plutarch by a certain Diopeithes (a religious fanatic and professional soothsayer who hated “modern” philosophy because of his profession) at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War around the year 432 BC. Chr. Should be held accountable in a special procedure, "who does not believe in the gods and deals with celestial phenomena in scientific lectures".
  • According to Polybius , Asebie is "insulting the gods, the parents and the dead".
  • Aristotle calls the "wrong behavior towards the gods, the divine beings (demons), the deceased, parents and the fatherland" Asebie.
  • The Asebie charge against Socrates specifically accused him of not believing in the gods recognized by the state, introducing new divine beings ( daimonia ) and corrupting the youth.

Protected legal interest: the state religion

In order to understand what constitutes a criminal offense, it must first be pointed out that in ancient Greece there was no freedom of belief and - at least in religious matters - no freedom of opinion and that the separation between state and religion was unknown. Religion was not a private matter, but religious and sovereign tasks were equally in the hands of the state, whose institutions, such as the Areopagus in Athens , often performed sacred functions and ensured the purity and preservation of religious tradition. It was also determined which gods were recognized by the state. The state religion also included the respect that had to be shown to parents and deceased ancestors.

Manifestations of Asebie

First and foremost, the denial of the existence of the gods is an Asebie. It was accused, for example, of Anaxagoras , who thought the sun was a glowing stone and not a god. It was also Protagoras accused's statement that he knew the gods not to say whether they were or whether they were not. The status of the Asi region did not focus on the private, idealistic "belief", but on the public refusal to honor these gods.

The ridicule of the gods recognized by the state represented an attack on the state religion, which fell under the Asebie. So Alkibiades was accused of mocking the goddess Demeter and Kora by aping the mysteries, of Andokides the mutilation of Hermes busts and denigration of the mysteries of Eleusis .

Furthermore, the introduction of new deities or the deification of people was Asebie. However, the charge against Socrates of corrupting young people in particular expresses the fact that, in general, questioning the traditional values ​​of the community - which in Athens included the democratic system - was viewed as acebie.

Asebeia was a term used to refer to the philosophical views of some ancient scholars, such as Anaxagoras and Socrates . The accusation of godlessness was often used to punish unpopular opponents of the conservatives.

The opposite of Asebeia is the Eusebeia ( εὐσέβεια eusébeia ), from which the Latin-Greek name Eusebius is derived.

Procedure

Asebie was one of the crimes that any citizen could bring to court through a public charge ( graphē ).

The asebeias graphē was to be submitted to the Archon basileus, who was responsible for sacred affairs . He carried out a preliminary investigation ( anakrisis ), took the evidence and determined the date of the hearing and the competent arbitration body.

The people's court, the Heliaia, was responsible for the hearing . For public trials, she decided in a cast of 501 jury determined by lot (heliasts). The trial had to be held in one day, and the judgment was passed on the same day without consultation. The verdict was final, there was no appeal. The court could only choose between the two motions of the prosecution and the defendant; even a narrow majority was enough for a condemnation - as in the case of Socrates (281 of 501 votes).

Legal consequence

The law did not provide a specific punishment for the Asebian crime. A conviction therefore had to be carried out in two steps: In a first vote, a vote was taken on guilt or innocence (guilt interlocut ). If the majority of the heliasts found it "guilty", a negotiation and vote on the sentence followed. Both parties were given the floor again and made motions about the penalty to be imposed. In the final vote, the heliasts could only choose between these two proposals.

The punishment could be a fine, exile, or the death penalty. In contrast, prison sentences were not common in Athens.

The eleven men (Hendeka) were responsible for enforcement.

Asebie trials

The Asebie trials , which were aimed at by conservative -minded forces in ancient Greece against philosophers and sophists , were a main outlet for ideological tensions.

  • The first victim was around 430 BC Anaxagoras and his physical ( materialistic ) worldview. Anaxagoras escaped the death penalty but was banished .
  • About 15 years later Diagoras von Melos had to defend himself in court for Asebie. He was a poet and sophist in the true sense of the word. It was said that he denied the gods and he was also accused of disregarding the Eleusian Mysteries . He was sentenced to death and had to flee Athens.
  • The sophist Protagoras was banished from Athens because he said in his work About the Gods : I cannot tell of the gods whether they exist or not and how they are shaped .

The atheist Theodoros of Cyrene is said to have narrowly escaped the charge.

literature

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Plutarch, Pericles 32: 1.
  2. ↑ Polybios 36: 9, 15.
  3. ↑ Aristotle, Of Virtue and Vice 7.2.
  4. ^ Plato, Apology 26 d
  5. ↑ Plutarch, Alkibiades 22.3.
  6. ↑ Diogenes Laertios , On the Lives and Teachings of Famous Philosophers 2,101.