Sun, Worship of

(Heliolatry). The worship of the great orb which insures to us light, warmth, and life is as ancient as history. It existed in the earliest ages among the Phoenicians, Egyptians, Persians, and Hindus, and later among the Greeks and Romans of the West, venerating its object under the different names of Helios or Sol, or of Baal, Osiris, or Mithras. Various forms of sacrifice and prayer characterized this worship among the different nations, but they agreed in regarding the sun as a mighty and superior deity who ruled the world with an independent authority more or less complete. The Greeks alone did not render higher honors to the sun than to the other gods regarded as of superior rank. All Eastern nations considered it as practically the supreme divinity. The Romans, too, maintained the worship of the sun after Heliogabalus had introduced it and had built a temple to, Sol. SEE SUN.