Apuleius Metamorphoses 11.21.6-7
Posted: Tue Jun 30, 2015 5:08 pm
Apuleius Metamorphoses 11.21.6-7 wrote: "But he [the priest] said that no one from his unit was of such a reckless mind, or rather so determined to die, that he would dare to undertake this ministry in a rash and sacrilegious spirit ... for both the gates of the underworld (inferum) and the guardianship of life were in the hands of the goddess [Isis], and the initiation itself was celebrated in the manner of voluntary death and of salvation received through grace (uoluntariae mortis et precariae salutis celebrati) -- as is natural when the will of the goddess is wont to select the ones who can be safely trusted with the silent secrets of the great religion, from those who have been put on the threshold of their last days after their span of life has finished, and is also wont to set those people back, after they have been reborn in some way through her providence, upon the course of a renewed life."
Groningen Commentaries on Apuleius, Metamorphoses Book XI, The Isis Book (Brill 2015)
The initiate into the Isis mysteries undergoes a "voluntary death and salvation received through grace," and is "reborn," though I'm not sure of the translation of "grace." Sounds exactly like Christianity. Any comments on Book XI of Apuleius?