…sacrifice to the deathless gods purely and cleanly, and burn rich meats also, and at other times propitiate them with libations and incense, both when you go to bed and when the holy light has come back, that they may be gracious to you in heart and spirit…” ~ Hesiod, Works and Days

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In one of my many conversations regarding Hellenismos, an individual told me he did not believe there was any good “basic” information regarding the ritual practices from the many sources online. The accusation seems to be that most new to Hellenismos should independently sift through volumes of texts, extracting the basics of practice, and as a result, most conversations were over the newbie’s head. Doing a quick search, I was actually surprised how sparse and scattered the most basic information was, and while I have addressed these more basic topics in The Beginner’s Guide to Hellenismos, I wanted to create a Quick Guide for those who are new. A Quick Guide is a document that is not intended to be all-inclusive, but provides the bare-bones essentials to start. No one can look at this work as all that is needed, but it does provide basic information for a person to create a working practice while continuing to learn.

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I was recently asked about a comment made regarding the Twelve. The basic question was about the worship of the Twelve being distinct. What did that mean? The reader took from this declaration the writer wanted to imply honoring the Twelve was “distinct from” the Hellenic religion. The idea being that there were many cults in Greece that cannot be said to be indicative of the Greek religion. That the worship of the Twelve was its own unique cult within the Greek system, but cannot be said to define the Greek religion. I went to the site and read the whole comment, and in context it seemed to be a statement that there are more Olympians than just the Twelve, which is true, but this does seem to have reignited controversy in this topic. Therefore, I have gone back through my material, and had a long conversation with my friend Astalon. This is what we have (again) concluded.

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