SABAZIUS. A Phrygian deity. Sabazius is the Phrygian Jupiter or Dionysus. According to Cumont, Sabazius was frequently confounded with Attis, a con fusion due to the great similarity of their mysteries. " By means of an audacious etymology that dates back to the Hellenistic period, this old Thraco-Phrygian divinity has been identified with Tahveh Zebaoth,' the Biblical ' Lord of Hosts.' The corresponding expression in the Septuagint has been regarded as the equivalent of the kurios Sabazios of the barbarians. The latter was worshipped as the supreme, almighty and holy Lord. In the light of a new interpretation the purifications practised in the mysteries were believed to wipe out the hereditary impurity of a guilty ancestor who had aroused the wrath of heaven against. his posterity, much as the original sin with which Adam's disobedience had stained the human race was to be wiped out. The custom observed by the votaries of Sabazius of dedicating votive hands which made the liturgic sign of benediction with the first three fingers extended (the benedictio Latina of the church) was probably taken from the ritual of the Semitic temples through the agency of the Jews. The
initiates believed, again like the Jews, that after death their good angel (angelus bonus) would lead them to the banquet of the eternally happy, and the everlasting joys of these banquets were anticipated on earth by the liturgic repasts. This celestial feast can be seen in a fresco painting on the grave of a priest of Sabazius called Vincentius. who was buried in the Christian cata comb of Praetextatus, a strange fact for which no satis factory explanation has as yet been furnished. Till dou-btedly he belonged to a Jewish-pagan sect that. admitted neophytes of every race to its mystic cere monies." The worship of Sabazius was introduced into Greece and Italy. It invaded every Latin province, and extended as far as the most remote limits of Germany. See Franz Cumont, Ori-en-ta-1 Religions in R.P., 1911.