The Gods of the Odyssey
Do the Gods in the Odyssey represent the Good and Evil sides of everyone, are they actually there to either help the person, or make their life worse?
In the Odyssey, the Gods seem to have a very huge part in the play. However, are the Gods actually real? Or are they just their sub-conscious telling everyone what to do. However if that’s true, then how could Odysseus’s and his “sub-conscious” spend 7 years on an island thinking that he was somewhere else? Anyways, in this thesis paper, ill be talking about how the Gods were portrayed and if they might actually be real or not. Ill also be discussing the role in which the Gods took in Odysseus life. So, with out further blabber talk....
The depiction of the roles the gods played in the Odyssey is both presented in good and evil. The Greeks portrayed their gods as powerful and merciful. However, in the Odyssey the gods play a role in a savior and tormentor like. The savior of the Odyssey is of course Athena, Telemachus refers to her as a “Mentor” (page 37, line 239) or “goddess” as the narrator refers to her (page 37, line229) The tormentor will most likely be portrayed through Poseidon, Lord of the Earthquake. Although no solid evidence has shown that this God is Evil, any God that requires sacrifices (“where they found the people of the seashore sacrificing jet-black bulls” page 30, line 5) can not be that good.
With the present role in the story of Odyssey, the gods can be seen as an important role in Odysseus life. Odysseus alone cannot have escaped the treacherous Trojan War without the aid of the gods. However, can it be reconcile that the gods were truly the ones who controlled our lives? In Odysseus’s case, the gods played a vital role. Through the treacherous paths Odysseus travels, it’s the hope of seeing Penelope and his son Telemachus will bring him his strength and wisdom. Without the help of Athena, and her wisdom and devotion to Odysseus, his challenges would be help with no boundaries. With the most gods in favor of Odysseus return, all he has to fight are the challenges Poseidon throws at him. With the water being the only road back to his home this challenge is fare more difficult then the Trojan War itself.
Throughout Homer’s Odyssey there is a consistent internal conflict regarding identity. Odysseus’ long circuitous route home can be attributed not only to the gods but to his own flaws that additively form his identity. Particularly, these faults of complacency, arrogance, and desire for concealment as means of avoidance are outlined in his early interactions most explicitly with Polyphemus (IX). Phaeacia, where he recounts his adventures, serves as a transition point where Odysseus is forced to address his flaws. He gains the capacity to learn from his mistakes and change the person he sought to cover up with disguises (VI, VII).
In this long narrative poem, Odysseus changes from being disrespectful to the gods by explicitly saying that he doesn’t need them, to longing forgiveness later by stating that he is nothing without them. After the success with the Trojan Horse, Odysseus considered himself higher than the gods because he, a mortal, was able to accomplish something even the gods couldn’t. He boasted to Poseidon and the others about how he is overpowering, and how his power and abilities were far beyond their limits. His epic boasting to the gods had lead him to create his own obstacles as, he is one who essentially was the cause. This disrespectful attitude is the personality which shows how Odysseus behaved at the beginning of the story. It not only demonstrates what he was once like, but how his obstacles get much more precarious. As this is the attitude in the beginning, by the end of this epic, Odysseus understands the value of gods and their power, even if it’s for good or bad. At the end of book twenty-two, page 1160, on lines 107-109, Odysseus finally accepts the fact that he is not the biggest thing
In the ancient world, the gods of the Greeks had been predominately confined to cosmological deeds prior to the works of Homer. "As Hesiod laid out the roles of the gods in his Theogony and the Works and Days, it is apparent that though the gods were active in the creation of the cosmos, natural phenomenon, and cyclical events such as seasons, they were not however, functioning in any historical way"(Bloom 36). This strictly cosmological view of the gods was in no way unusual to the ancient world. Though the breech of theology into historical events was perhaps first introduced by the Hebrews at the turn of the first millennia B.C.E., it was soon echoed in the religious paradigms of homo religiosus throughout the Near East and Europe. In the seventh and sixth centuries B.C.E. another predominate thought swept the ancient world; life is suffering. An obvious question arises from the mixture of these two thoughts; if the gods are functioning in the historical reality of mankind why do they allow and/or cause suffering? This is the dilemma that Homer sets out to solve in the epic poem The Odyssey.
In Homer’s The Odyssey, the main protagonist, Odysseus, is trying to make his way home to Ithaca, ten years later, after the end of the Trojan War. Odysseus is portrayed as a hero throughout the epic; however, the events surrounding his heroism is with considerable help from the gods and goddess. Being a hero is defined as a person who is admired or idealized for courage, outstanding achievements, or noble qualities. Based on the play, there is evidence to suggest that Odysseus is not a hero as defined but that he relied on the help of the gods and goddess.
When we look at Greek Mythology we often run into the gods of that era. Sometimes they are merely backdrops to the human element of the story but in stories such as The Odyssey the gods play a prominent if not vital role to the central themes of the story.
Many Greek gods were seen as both benefactors and tormentors, typically it depends on which god or goddess you are researching about. The seemingly contradictory behavior of the gods, acting as both benefactors and tormentors of man, can readily be explained when viewed in light of the prime directive for man, to worship the gods and not “overstep,” and the ensuing “Deus ex Mahina” which served to coerce man to fulfill his destiny as evidenced by the myths: “Pandora,” “Arachne, and “Odysseus.” Humankind and it’s range of vision over the gods beauty and power portrayed them to be benefactors but unseemingly it depicted their affliction towards humans.
The Odyssey, written by Homer, is an epic of the great adventures of Odysseus. It tells of the challenging travels form leaving his home to serve in the Trojan War, to his well-deserved return to Ithaca. Odysseus known as “the man of many wiles” endured many challenging tasks as he traveled in search of his once home. Leaving behind his wife Penelope and son Telemachus, he was forced to leave. Around the sixteenth year Odysseus was gone, many believed that their once great leader was left for dead on an unknown country or was never to return to the land of Ithaca once again. Soon the suitors of over a hundred filled the halls of Odysseus’s palace, trying to marry his beautiful wife Penelope. When the suitors arrived in Odysseus’s home, hectic times became twice or even triple times worse. The suitors walked over everyone as if they had now ruled the town of Ithaca. They did not care who they hurt, as long as they got what they wanted when they wanted it. They broke almost every law of the gods; soon they realized they would have to may for dearly. As Odysseus desperately tried to fight his way back to his homeland. However, every time he got close it seems that the power of the gods was holding him back. The gods affected almost every aspect of Odysseus return and travels. They pushed him away, gave him heartache, destroyed his crew, and demolished his ship, they almost got him killed on several occasions and saved him from death. The actions that Odysseus once faced shaped his return home, because of his own choices he was able to return home but it is also what caused him to remain lost for ten years.
A modern religious parallel of The Odyssey is that it mirrors how Odysseus relays on specific Gods and Goddesses for direction throughout the epic with modern human behavior for the search of answers through religion. Likewise, In the modern world it is common in human behavior to worship certain deities in hopes for prosperity in all aspects of life. Although, Odysseus’s major mistake was not recognizing and appreciating Poseidon for his assistance early on he still calls upon Athena and other deities for guidance throughout his
The first controversy is about the virtue of justice which means as equal or right. It could imply the relation of equality or morality between person to person or a person to society and vice versa. The Odyssey is reliable evidence about the non- existence of justice since ancient world. Even there were many Gods who had high position and strong power that could control everything and protect people from dangers, most of the cases they just did what they favored and for their own benefits. First, the bright-eyed goddess Athena who favored Odysseus asked her father Zeus to let Odysseus returned his home. She said to Zeus “but my heart breaks for Odysseus” (1.57) “that wise Odysseus shall return-home at last” (1.99). Then, she always helped him to overcome obstacles. For example, she assured Odysseus when he was escaping from Calypso’s land by countering Poseidon’s revenge on him “The rest of the winds she stopped right in their tracks” (5.422), “the goddess beat the breakers flat before Odysseus,/so he could reach the Phaeacians” (5.425-426). Another evidence of the non-justice is about the hatred and revenge of the King of the sea Poseidon to Odysseus "then every god took pity,/all except Poseidon. He raged on, seething against the great Odysseus till he reached his native lan...
I 'm both stories the gods help mortals, and don 't even attempt to destroy them unless they do something outrageous. In both stories morals disrespected a god, In The Metamorphoses, Arachne and Marsyas challenged gods to a weaving and musical contest. That was the part where the story talked about The Role Of Art. It was much more characteristic in this story because of all the themes than in The Odyssey. For example, Love makes all Gods and to Mortals alike because we all have a soft spot for it. Ovid demonstrates that love is dangerous because it has power over everyone. Nobody can avoid the affects of love, or the danger it brings. In my opinion you could avoid some effects of love by not loving to hard. People get hurt inside all the time and the more they get hurt the more they don 't feel when it comes to love. They start to stop showing emotion outside. That is just how it goes now a days. The god of death, PLuto is attracted to love. Love and happiness are the reasons why we as people live. Woman being impregnant is a common relationship in love. They instantly fall in love with their baby. Augustus made an attempt to create legal and illegal forms of love to regulate
Aftir Tramen doscuvirid thet hi wes on e muvoi sit end thet nuni uf hos lofi hed biin spunteniuas hi os govin e chuoci, lievi ur stey.
The Greeks in the Odyssey viewed justice as only coming from the gods. They believed the gods punished them because they have fallen out of their favor, and not because they had really done anything wrong by human standards. As Socrates later stated in the Euthyphro, what is holy, and perhaps then just, is what is “approved by the gods.” Although Socrates proved this to be wrong, it still shows the view of most Greeks. Zeus in the opening book of the Odyssey stated, “Upon my word, just see how mortal men always put the blame on us gods! We are the source of evil, so they say- when they have only their own madness to thank if their miseries are worse than they ought to be.” This shows that the Greeks feared justice; they felt it was negative and often undeserved. However, each Greek deserved his punishment because he has a hand in its reason. For example, when Odysseus’s troops killed the cattle of Helios, they deserved Zeus destroying their ships because he had warned Odysseus beforehand not to let the men eat the cattle. When the Greeks disobeyed the gods, they disrupted the right order of things, and when the gods punished them, they made the other Greeks respect them once again, and thus fixed the balance of the world.
Comparing to "Free Software", the term ``open source software'' is associated with a different engineering approach, different values, and even a different criterion for which licenses are acceptable. We differentiate the Free Software movement and the Open Source movement with different views and goals, although engineers can and do work together on some practical projects.
Looking at Greek Mythology we tend to encounter the gods of that time. Sometimes they work in the background of the human part of the story, but in epics like The Odyssey the gods play a very large if not central role in the main developments of the story.