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The Triumph of Christianity over Paganism, a painting by Gustave Doré (1899). Paganism is commonly used to refer to various religions that existed during Antiquity and the Middle Ages, such as the Greco-Roman religions of the Roman Empire, including the Roman imperial cult, the various mystery religions, religious philosophies such as Neoplatonism and Gnosticism, and more localized ethnic ...
A marble statue of Jupiter, king of the Roman gods. Paganism (from Latin pāgānus 'rural', 'rustic', later 'civilian') is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, [1] or ethnic religions other than Judaism.
The largest modern pagan (also known as neo-pagan) religious movement is Wicca, followed by Neodruidism. Both of these religions or spiritual paths were introduced during the 1950s and 1960s from Great Britain. Germanic Neopaganism (also known as Heathenry) and Kemetism appeared in the US in the early 1970s. Hellenic Neopaganism appeared in the ...
The Christian God replaced the pagan gods in official documents and ceremonies, but few rich Christians renounced their wealth as Biblical stories proposed it. Church hierarchy followed the patterns of state administration: the bishops of the provincial capitals, known as metropolitan bishops , became the superior of other bishops in the province.
The right half of the front panel of the 7th-century Franks Casket, depicting the Anglo-Saxon (and wider Germanic) legend of Wayland the Smith. Anglo-Saxon paganism, sometimes termed Anglo-Saxon heathenism, Anglo-Saxon pre-Christian religion, Anglo-Saxon traditional religion, or Anglo-Saxon polytheism refers to the religious beliefs and practices followed by the Anglo-Saxons between the 5th ...
Christians generally regard Easter as the most important festival of the ecclesiastical calendar. It is also the oldest feast of Christianity, and connected to the Jewish Passover. Many terms relating to Easter, such as paschal are derived from the Hebrew term for passover. In many non-English speaking countries the feast is called by some ...
Slavic neo-paganism, or Slavic nativism, is a reconstruction of the pre-Christian pagan beliefs of the ancient Slavs, a return to the worship of Perun, Veles, Makosh, etc. based on some historical information and one's own ideas, with borrowings from the teachings and rituals of polytheistic beliefs of other peoples and the occult.
Many of them, notably the Goths and Vandals, adopted Arianism instead of the Trinitarian (a.k.a. Nicene or orthodox) beliefs that were dogmatically defined by the church in the Nicene Creed. [3] The gradual rise of Germanic Christianity was, at times, voluntary, particularly among groups associated with the Roman Empire.