Contents List of Figures Abbreviations Introduction  Eleni Pachoumi Part 1: Religion, Kingship and Politics 1 The Mesopotamian King between Gods and Men in the First Millennium BCE  Philippe Clancier 2 The Intersection of Gods and Kings in Achaemenid Iran  Christopher J. Tuplin 3 Confronting and Uniting with Divinity in Ancient Egypt  Robert K. Ritner 4 Constantine: God-Man or Man of God?  Mark J. Edwards Part 2: Religion, Sex and Mythology 5 Human-Divine Interactions in Homer, Hittite and Other Near Eastern Literary Traditions  Elias K. Petropoulos 6 Θεῶν φίλτρα: Sexual Union between Gods and Mortals  Robert Parker Part 3: Religion, Philosophy and Ritual 7 Genos Olbion, Genos Ouranion: Divine Ancestry in the Orphic Gold Tablets  Miguel Herrero de Jáuregui 8 Union with the Divine in Greece and India: Mysteries and Monetisation  Richard Seaford 9 Philosophy and the Daimonic in Plato  Robert Vinkesteijn 10 Confusion (Ekplêxis) and Sympathy (Sympatheia): The Neoplatonist Proclus on the Aesthetics of Epiphany and Theurgic Union  Robbert M. van den Berg 11 Proclus’ Theurgic Union, θεουργικὴ ἕνωσις, and the Concept of Fire  Eleni Pachoumi 12 Determinism and Divine Intervention: Divine Punishment in Stoic Theology  Maarten van Houte 13 Divine Unions in Byzantine Christianity: The Penetration of Fire into Iron as a Metaphor of Theosis  Dmitry Biriukov Index