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Diana of the Ephesians

Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible

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DIANA OF THE EPHESIANS . This name is really erroneous, and it is unfortunate that it has become popularized beyond possibility of correction. The goddess meant is Artemis. There were two conceptions of Artemis in ancient times: (1) the Greek maiden huntress, sister of Apollo; to this conception corresponds the Italian Diana; (2) the mother-goddess, the emblem of fertility, the fountain of nourishment, an Anatolian divinity, who was Grecized under the name of Artemis: this is the goddess referred to in Acts, and she has nothing to do with Diana, representing in fact a contrary idea. While Artemis (Diana) was represented in art attired as a huntress, with the bow and arrows, the Anatolian Artemis was represented with many breasts ( multimammia ), and sometimes in company with two stags. In this form she was worshipped over the whole of Lydia, before Greeks ever settled there, and the same divine power of reproduction was worshipped under other names over most of the peninsula of Asia Minor. The rude idol preserved in her chief temple at Ephesus was said to have fallen from heaven (this is the real meaning of Acts 19:35 ), a not uncommon idea in ancient times, which suggests that such images were sometimes meteoric stones. The chief priest, who bore a Persian title, had under him a large company of priestesses. There was also a large body of priests, each appointed for a year, who seem to have been city officials at the same time, and other bodies of ministers. The ritual was of the abominable character which it might be expected to have. The epithet ‘great’ ( Acts 19:34 ) is proved by inscriptions to have been characteristically applied to the goddess, and the exclamation in Acts may have been really an invocation. The silver shrines ( Acts 19:24 ) were small representations of the goddess within her shrine purchased by the rich. The poor bought them in terra-cotta or marble. Both classes dedicated them as offerings to the goddess, in whose temple they would be hung up. When the accumulation became too great, the priests cleared them away, throwing the terra-cotta or marble ones onto the rubbish heap, or into a hole, but securing the others for the melting-pot. All those which survive are naturally in terra-cotta or marble. The goddess had so many worshippers ( Acts 19:27 ) that the manufacture of such silver shrines was very profitable.

A. Souter.