The myths connected with individual sanctuaries and ceremonies were merely part of the apparatus of the worship; they served to excite the fancy and sustain the interest of the worshipper... no one cared what he believed about its origin. — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
The god, it would appear, was frequently thought of as the physical progenitor or first father of his people. — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
Thus a man was born into a fixed relation to certain gods as surely as he was born into a relation to his fellow-men;… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
In all the antique religions, mythology takes the place of dogma; that is, the sacred lore of priests and people... and these stories afford… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
It is only in times of social dissolution, as in the last age of the small Semitic states, when men and their gods were… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
In better times the religion of the tribe or state has nothing in common with the private and foreign superstitions or magical rites that… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
This being so, it follows that mythology ought not to take the prominent place that is too often assigned to it in the scientific… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
But, strictly speaking, this mythology was no essential part of ancient religion, for it had no sacred sanction and no binding force on the… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
The god can no more exist without his people than the nation without its god. — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
Even the highest forms of sacrificial worship present much that is repulsive to modern ideas, and in particular it requires an effort to reconcile… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
Belief in a certain series of myths was neither obligatory as a part of the true religion, nor was it supposed that, by believing,… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
We are so accustomed to think of religion as a thing between individual men and God that we can hardly enter into the idea… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
But if it not be true, the myth itself requires to be explained, and every principle of philosophy and common sense demand that the… — William Robertson Smith Copy Share Image
