Asclepius and Medicine

The healing god Asclepius’ sanctuary is surrounded on all sides by boundary markers and within these markers no birth and no death is to take place. Inside the sanctuary are people devoting themselves to the god in hopes of being cured of their health problems. They eat sleep and live at the sanctuary giving dedications to the god and hoping for a vision telling them what to do to be cured. (Warrior 6.26-27) All around the sanctuary are inscriptions detailing past cures given by the God such as mutes given speech, the blind given sight, and women getting pregnant when they could not before. Athens and rome would be interested in having Asclepius in their cities for two reasons. First their citizens would want Asclepius in their city for their own individual sake. Getting sick in the ancient world was a scary thing and a big deal, so the closer they could be to a healing god, the better. The second reason that they would want Asclepius in their cities is for the health of the sate. Livy records in Periocha, “When the state was troubled by a plague, envoys were sent to bring the image of Asclepius from Epidaurus to Rome.”(Warrior, 14.27)

The relationship that Asclepius has with Aristides is one of dreams and visions. Aristides at the beginning of the sacred tales says about the God, he revealed somethings openly in his own presence, and others by the sending of dreams, as far as it was possible to obtain sleep…Therefore in view of this I decided to submit truly to the God, as as to a doctor and to do in silence whatever he wishes.” (Sacred Tales, 1.3-4) Asclepius appeared to Aristides as he did to many who sought his help and guidance, in his dreams. When Aristides was ill it was Asclepius’ council that was the most valuable and he would do what ever the god would tell him to. Another characteristic of the relationship is that it is personal. When Aristides has a problem he seeks out Asclepius on his own and expects to get a direct and individual answer. This relationship is different from those of the Classical age in this aspect. He does not go to a festival, or worship at an altar in a great crowd. Aristides’ ailments are his own and so is his relationship with Asclepius.

The impression of the state of medical knowledge at the time of Aelius Aristides was certainly not advanced. Medical knowledge was not very deep at the time and seeing a doctor seems like it would have been almost as much of a gamble as praying to Asclepius and going to his sanctuary for healing. In this quote from the The Sacred Tales, Aelius Aristides has a tumor on his groin and he is trying to heal himself. The doctors, give many and varied consultations as to what he should do, “At this point, the doctors cried out all sorts of things, some said surgery, some said cauterization by drug, or that an infection would arise and I must surely die. But the God gave a contrary opinion and told me to endure and foster the growth. And clearly there was no choice between listening to the doctors or to the God.”(The Sacred Tales, 62-63) This quote also does a good job of establishing the relationship between medicine and religion at the time. While Aelius seeks the opinions of doctors about his malady the thought of not doing what his vision guided him to do is unthinkable to him. The guidance his vision of Asclepius gave him has the final say. 

The Healer and Savior Asclepius.

In the temple of Asclepius there is an ivory and gold statue that is half the size of the statue of Zeus in Athens. This statue of Asclepius depicts him sitting on a throne; in one hand he wields a staff, and the other he holds above the head of a serpent. Across from the temple is where the god’s suppliants sleep. Within the Tholos (Round House) there stood several slabs inscribed with the names of people Asclepius had healed and what he had healed them from. After entering the sanctuary, the suppliant would fall asleep and await a vision from the god. The general pattern of the healing was that the god would approach the infirmed in dream and then promise to heal the wound.  When day came, the suppliant would awake and find himself healed exactly as it had been seen in the vision. Sometimes snakes would carry out the healings for Asclepius, as seen in the selection from Aristophanes’ Wealth (Warrior 112). Disease and sickness were daily realities for everyone in the Hellenistic era, and even more so for those living in highly populated cities such as Athens and Rome. The Roman historian Livy observes that a plague running through Rome was a serious threat (Warrior 260). To have a god of healing present in the city would be of great benefit.

Aristides seems to have a very personal and direct relationship with Asclepius. He writes as though Asclepius speaks in an audible voice concerning his ailments and healings. In the story of how his tumor on his leg is healed, the doctors and other people have no communication with the god. Aristides is the only one who can hear the god’s divine guidance towards healing. Most often he refers to Asclepius as the God, but other times he uses the term “Savior” (Pg. 224 line 7) or even “Lord” (228 line 24).  This highly personal relationship operates very differently from the divine-human relationships of the Classical Age.  The first major difference is that in the case of Asclepius it is the god who initiates the interaction. Instead of Aristides going to a temple or festival, he is met by the god in his dreams wherever he may be. Additionally, Aristides is healed before any form of sacrifice is made, if one is even made at all. This contrasts to the Classical Age cults, where an offering had to be made on the human’s side if there was any hope of the gods acting benevolently.

Based on the readings, it seems to me that ancient medicine and religion were at odds with one another and didn’t mix well. This sentiment is best captured when Aristides tumor has been healed, and the doctors insist that the only way for the remaining skin to finish healing was by surgery.  Aristides states that the doctors “thought it right that I grant this, for now the God’s part had been done. He did not even allow them this… And he brought everything back together, so that after a few days had passed, no one was able to find on which thigh the tumor had been, but they were both unscarred in every respect” (Aristides 220 line 67-68). While some of his ailments would be cured by use of drugs or remedies, the cure was always attributed to the work of the god and never a result of ancient medicine.