OK. Apparently, that wasn’t the Last Supper at the opening ceremony.
Except also, it clearly was:
The Paris 2024 organisers have apologised to Catholics and other Christian groups angered after a parody of Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous The Last Supper painting during the Olympics opening ceremony on Friday night.
A kitsch tableau parodied the iconic painting, recreating the biblical scene of Jesus Christ and his apostles sharing a last meal before crucifixion.
See?
However, this facebook post tells us (while dripping with condescending sarcasm):
It was not the Last Supper. It was a depiction of an ancient Greek Bacchanal.
Because, you know, the Olympics are ancient and Greek. Surprise!
But hang on. It was the Last Supper – the organisers foolishly apologised for that above – and Bacchanalia (the plural) were a ROMAN thing, not a Greek thing.
Bacchus was the Roman god of wine. He wasn’t Greek.
So actually, the Olympics are ancient and… er… Roman? No. Because that wasn’t a depiction of a Bacchanal. It was a depiction of the Last Supper with some added Dionysus.
Dionysian Mysteries are the Greek thing on which Bacchanalia were based: parties in honour of their god of wine-making: Dionysus.
Dionysus was also god of… just off the top of my head:
Orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre.
And yes – if you saw that bit of the opening ceremony – that does seem to fit the bill a little more accurately.
But if you’re going to write 500 words on how stupid people were to think that was the Last Supper (which it was), then at least get your facts straight. Because, as mentioned above:
The Bacchanalia were Roman festivals of Bacchus, the Greco-Roman god of wine, freedom, intoxication and ecstasy. They were based on the Greek Dionysia and the Dionysian Mysteries, and probably arrived in Rome c. 200 BC via the Greek colonies in southern Italy.
To be fair though, both Bacchus and Dionysus (I can’t speak for Jesus) regularly had their scrota (and often a lot more) hanging out when depicted in contemporary media.
So at least that bit was right.