FAITH IN “THE FATHER OF GODS AND MEN”

As the first lines of both the Iliad and the Odyssey indicate, the Homeric education opens with the gods: “Sing, Goddess, of the wrath of Peleus’s son, Achilles”; “Tell me of the man, Muse.” But how are we to under­stand those gods? In order to understand Homer’s education of us, the hearers and readers of his poems, it is vital to recognize the distinction between what Homer’s human characters believe about the gods and how Homer presents the gods.

that faith throughout each poem. And yet over the course of both poems, more explicitly in the Iliad than in the Odyssey, Homer challenges that faith most powerfully and shockingly by juxtaposing the trusting piety of his human characters with the fundamentally untrustworthy nature of the gods. In this way, Homer leads us from a simple, trusting piety to an enlightened, skeptical view of the divine.

Both the Iliad and the Odyssey open with a human being turning to gods for enlightenment. In this way, Homer opens the poems by presum­ing, evidently along with his audience, that the gods, as exemplified by the divine Muse, are wise beings who are glad to share their wisdom with human beings.^[56] Indeed, as Homer suggests, when he turns to address the Muses as a whole in Book II of the Iliad, these goddesses are omniscient: “Tell me now, Muses, Who have homes in Olympus - for You are Goddesses, are present, and know all things, but we hear only of their glory and we do not know at all” (2.484-486).

From the very start of the Iliad the human characters of the poem look to the gods specifically for justice, beginning in Book I with a plea to Apollo, “the son of Leto and Zeus” (1.9). In the very first words spoken by a character in the poem, Chryses, an old priest of Apollo from a city near Troy, begs King Agamemnon for the return of his “beloved... child,” whom the Achaians have captured and given to their king (1.20-21). The distraught father offers the king and the assembled Achaians “boundless ransom” (1.13) and a public prayer that the gods grant the Achaians success in conquering Troy and returning home safely. So morally compelling is this request from the wronged father and priest that “all” of the Achaians, apparently including the king’s own brother, beseech the king to yield the girl (1.23). But the king responds by dismiss­ing the old man “in an evil way” (1.24-25), threatening the priest twice, and cruelly boasting that he will keep the girl as his slave until she grows old. And the Achaians acquiesce in this decision. Overwhelmed by the wickedness of the powerful king, the moral cowardice of the Achaians, and his own helplessness, the old man prays to “the lord Apollo” for justice: “Hear me, Silver-bowed One.... Let the Danaans pay for my tears with your shafts” (1.37-42).

Similarly, in Book II, as the Achaians and the Trojans are about to swear oaths to respect the terms of a truce and the result of a duel between Menelaus, the husband of Helen, and Paris, the lover and now husband of Helen, to decide the outcome of the war, Agamemnon prays to Zeus and other deities to enforce the truce and punish those who violate it: “Father Zeus, Thoughtful One, from Ida, Most Glorious, Greatest, and Helios, You Who watch over all things and listen to all things, and rivers and earth and You Who under the earth punish weary human beings, who­ever has sworn a false oath, You be witnesses, guard the oaths of trust” (3.276-280).

Later, when the sworn terms of the duel and truce are broken, and his brother Menelaus is treacherously wounded, an outraged Agamemnon affirms,

thus the Trojans struck you and trampled on their sworn oaths. But in no way will the oath and the blood of the lambs be in vain, nor the unmixed libations and the right hands we trusted in. For, if at once the Olympian has not accomplished it, he will accomplish it hereafter, and they will pay a great penalty, with their own heads and wives and children. For I myself well know this in my mind and my spirit. A day will come when sacred Ilium will perish and Priam and the people of Priam of the ash spear, and Zeus, the son of Cronus, high-throned, dwelling in the upper air, will shake the black aegis over all, seething in anger at this deception. These things will not go unfulfilled. (4.157-168)

Agamemnon goes on to rally the Achaians against the Trojans by assuring them that “Father Zeus” will inflict terrible sorrows on the Trojan “liars” (4.234-239).

Similarly, in the Odyssey, the family and faithful servants of Odysseus, when faced with years of continual oppression and threats at the hands of the overbearing suitors of Penelope, look to the gods for justice. As Odysseus’s son Telemachus explains to the people of Ithaca, after describ­ing the sufferings inflicted on his household by the suitors:

I would defend myself, if there were power in me. For the deeds that have been done are no longer endurable, nor is it noble that my home has been destroyed. You yourselves should be indignant, and feel reverence for the neighboring humans, who dwell around us. Fear the wrath of the gods, lest they turn them­selves around, astonished by these evil deeds. I beseech you in the name of Olympian Zeus and Righteousness [Themis], who dissolves and convenes the assemblies of men. (2.62-69)

Confident that the gods will see that justice is done, the human characters of the poem repeatedly turn to them (see 14.83-84). Telemachus prays to Zeus, Athena, Apollo, and the other everlasting gods for the destruction of the wicked suitors (2.141-145, 15.172-181, 18.235-242); prays to Athena for assistance against the suitors (2.260-266, 15.222); and prays to Poseidon for assistance in discovering the fate of his father (3.63-64). Penelope prays to Athena, Zeus, Apollo, and all the other gods for the protection of her family and the punishment of the suitors (4.750-767, 17.50-60, 17.494; see also 18.202-205, 20.60-66). Eumaeus prays to Zeus and his daughters, the Nymphs, for the destruction of the suitors (17.238-246, 17.597) and prays to all the gods for Odysseus’s homecoming (14.423-424, 20.238-239.

The human characters believe that the gods are not only just in their disposition but also that they have the power to enforce justice. For, as Eumaeus affirms, a god “can do anything” and as Helen observes in par­ticular of Zeus, “he can do anything” (Odyssey 14.445, 4.23 5-237). In the words of Agamemnon, “So will it be pleasing to high-spirited Zeus, who has brought down the citadels of many cities and will yet bring more; for his might is greatest” (Iliad 2.116-118). The gods, therefore, led by Zeus, are believed to be all powerful as well as just and therefore to be effective enforcers of justice. Odysseus accordingly declares confidently to the Cyclops, “Have reverence for the gods, most excellent one. We are your suppliants and Zeus is the avenger of suppliants and strangers, the protector of strangers, one who accompanies strangers who are reverent” (Odyssey 9.269-271).

The center of this belief in divine providence is Zeus, the god who, as Hector declares, “rules all mortals and immortals” (Iliad 12.241-242).^[60] Zeus is repeatedly referred to in both poems as “Father Zeus”: in the

Iliad, 27 times by the Achaians and Trojans alike,⁵⁵ and even 19 times by the gods - even by such gods as Hera and Poseidon who are his siblings;⁵⁶ and 26 times in the Odyssey, 16 times by humans⁵⁷ and 10 times by the gods - including once by his brother Poseidon.⁵⁸ In the first prayer in the Iliad addressed to Zeus, Thetis, speaking on behalf of her son Achilles, calls him “Father Zeus” (1.503) and, in the last prayer in the poem addressed to Zeus, Priam calls him “Father Zeus” (24.308). In the Odyssey, Odysseus, his son, and his father all pray to “Father Zeus” in their climactic struggle against the suitors and their relatives (18.235, 20.98, 24.376). The characters of the Iliad and the Odyssey, notwith­standing occasional frustration with him,⁵⁹ look to Zeus as a fatherly ruler who is understanding, loving, just, and powerful and who provides effective righteous rule, either directly or through his divine offspring, especially Apollo and Athena. In the Iliad, on 25 occasions, the human characters pray to Zeus as they would to a father, for protection, wisdom, and justice,⁶⁰ and on 16 occasions they pray for assistance to Apollo and Athena and to all the gods.⁶¹ In the Odyssey, the human characters pray to Zeus on 23 occasions for justice and support,⁶² and on 31 occasions they pray for assistance from Athena, Apollo, Poseidon, Artemis, the nymphs (daughters of Zeus), a river, and the gods as a whole.⁶³ According to Menelaus, humans believe that Zeus “surpasses all others in mind, both men and gods.”⁶⁴ Agamemnon reports that humans deem Zeus “the best of men and gods” (Iliad 19.95-96). Achilles calls him simply “the highest and best of gods” (23.43). Odysseus calls him “first of gods” (Odyssey 14.158,19.303, 20.230; see also 17.155), and goes so far as to declare that Zeus is the “Father of Gods and Men” (12.445, 18.137), the only human character in either poem to use that phrase, other than Homer himself.

2.371 (Agamemnon), 3.276 (Agamemnon), 3.320 (the Achaians and Trojans), 3.365 (Menelaus), 4.235 (Agamemnon), 4.288 (Agamemnon), 6.259 (Hecubae), 7.132 (Nestor), 7.179 (the Achaians), 7.202 (the Achaians), 8.236 (Agamemnon), 12.164 (Asios), 13.631 (Menelaus), 13.818 (Ajax), 15.372 (Nestor), 16.97 (Achilles), 17.19 (Menelaus), 17.630 (Ajax), 17.645 (Ajax), 19.121(Alcmene, as reported by Agamemnon), 19.270 (Achilles), 20.192 (Achilles), 21.83 (Achilles), 21.273 (Achilles), 22.60 (Priam), 24.287 (Hecubae), 24.308 (Priam).

Odyssey 1.503 (Thetis), 1.578 (Hephaestus), 1.579 (Hephaestus), 5.33 (Athena), 5.362 (Aphrodite), 5.421 (Athena), 5.457 (Apollo), 5.757 (Hera), 5.762 (Hera), 5.872 (Ares), 7.446 (Poseidon), 8.31 (Athena), 8.360 (Athena), 8.420 (Iris), 11.201 (Iris), 21.512 (Artemis), 22.178 (Athena), 22.221 (Athena), 24.461 (Hermes).

7.331 (Odysseus), 12.371 (Odysseus,in Odysseus’s narration), 12.445 (Odysseus), 13.51 (Alcinous), 13.324 (Odysseus), 14.440 (Odysseus), 15.341 (Odysseus), 16.260 (Odysseus), 18.137 (Odysseus), 18.235 (Telemachus), 20.98 (Odysseus), 20.112 (mill woman), 20.201 (Philoitios), 21.200 (Philoitios), 24.351 (Laertes), 24.376 (Laertes).

1.45 (Athena), 1.81 (Athena), 5.7 (Athena), 8.306 (Hephaestus, in Demodocus’s narration), 12.63 (Circe, in Odysseus’s narration), 12.65 (Circe, in Odysseus’s narration), 12.377 (Hyperion, in Odysseus’s narration), 13.128 (Poseidon), 13.342 (Athena), 24.473 (Athena).

See, for example, Iliad 3.162-165, 3.365, 19.137; Odyssey 20.201-203.

³.500-516 (Thetis, on behalf of Achilles - see ι.393-412, 15.72-77, 18.74-77), 2.371-374 (Agamemnon), 2.411-418 (Agamemnon), 3.275-291 (Agamemnon), 3.297-301 (the Achaians and Trojans), 3.319-323 (the Achaians and Trojans), 3.349-354 (Menelaus), 4.288-291 (Agamemnon), 6.475-481 (Hector), 7.177-180 (the Achaians), 7.200-205 (the Achaians), 8.236-244 (Agamemnon), 8.526-528 (Hector), 9.171-178 (Nestor and the Achaian elders), 11.735-736 (Nestor), 12.162-172 (Asios), 15.370-378 (Nestor), 16.97-100 (Achilles), 16.231-249 (Achilles), 17.19 (Menelaus), 17.498-506 (Automedon), 17.645-647 (Ajax), 19.257-266 (Agamemnon), 21.272-283 (Achilles), 24.306-316 (Priam). See also 7.132-135 (Nestor).

Now, Homer appears, on the very surface of both poems, to support and champion the belief that the gods, led by Father Zeus, provide for

⁶¹ For prayers to Apollo, see ι.35-45 (Chryses), ι.450-457 (Chryses), ι.472-474 (Achaian youths), 4.118-121 (Pandarus), 4.288-291 (Agamemnon), 16.97-100 (Achilles), 16.513-529 (Glaucus). For prayers to Athena, see 4.288-291 (Agamemnon), 5.114-122 (Diomedes), 6.286-296 (Theano and Trojan women), 10.277-282 (Odysseus), 10.283-295 (Diomedes), 10.460-464 (Odysseus), ιι.735-736 (Nestor), 16.97-100 (Achilles), 23.768-772 (Odysseus). For prayers to all the gods by the Achaians, see 8.343-347, 15.367-369. Consider as well 3.275-291 (Agamemnon), 6.475-481 (Hector), 7.132-135 (Nestor), 8.526-528 (Hector).

⁶² Odyssey 2.25-34 (Aigyptos), 2.68-75 (Telemachus), 2.143-145 (Telemachus), 4.341-346 (Menelaus - recounted by Telemachus at 17.132-136), 7.178-181 (Alcinous), 7.311-315 (Alcinous), 7.331-333 (Odysseus), 9.294-295 (Odysseus, in his narration), 9.551-555 (Odysseus, in his narration), 13.24-25 (Alcinous), 13.49-56 (Alcinous), 13.213-214 (Odysseus), 14.53-54 (Odysseus), 15.111-112 (Menelaus), 15.160-180 (Telemachus), 17.50-60 (Telemachus tells Penelope and women to pray), 17.354-355 (Odysseus), 17.591-597 (Eumaeus), 18.235-242 (Telemachus), 20.97-101 (Odysseus), 20.112-119 (mill woman), 21.199-202 (Philoitios), Laertes (24.376-382). See also 18.112-116.

⁶³ For prayers to Athena, see 2.260-266 (Telemachus), 3.380-385 (Nestor), 3.393-394 (Nestor), 3.416-423 (Nestor), 4.341-345 (Menelaus), 4.750-767 (Penelope), 7.311-315 (Alcinous), 15.222 (Telemachus), 18.235-242 (Telemachus), 24.376-382 (Laertes). For prayers to Apollo, see 4.341-345 (Menelaus), 7.311-315 (Alcinous), 17.492-494 (Penelope), 18.235-242 (Telemachus), 24.376-382 (Laertes). For prayers to Poseidon, see 3.4-6 (Nestor and his people), 3.63-64 (Telemachus), 9.527-536 (Polyphemus), 13.181-187 (Phaiacians). For prayers to Artemis, see 18.202-205 (Penelope), 20.60-66 (Penelope). For prayers to the nymphs and Hermes, see 14.435-436 (Eumaeus), and to the nymphs alone, see 17.238-246 (Eumaeus). For a prayer to a river, see 5.444-451 (Odysseus). For prayers to the gods as a whole, see 2.143-147 (Telemachus), 4.433-434 (Menelaus, in his narration), 8.411-412 (Nausikaa), 8.413-415 (Odysseus), 12.333-337 (Odysseus), 13.50-55 (Phaiacians), 14.423-424 (Eumaeus), 17.50-60 (Telemachus tells Penelope and women to pray), 20.169-171 (Odysseus), 20.238 (Eumaeus), 21.203 (Eumaeus).

⁶⁴ 13.631-632; see also 13.354-355; consider too 8.141-144. human beings. One sees this especially clearly in the Odyssey, where Homer portrays Zeus, his son Hermes, and especially his daughter Athena acting with single-minded energy and complete success to come to the rescue of Odysseus - who is the captive of the love-sick nymph Calypso - and his family - which is helpless before the oppression of the overbearing suitors. In the first four books, we see Athena help Telemachus stand up to the suitors, learn the fate of his father, and gain confidence in the company of the old heroes Nestor and Menelaus. In the second four books, we see Hermes induce Calypso to release Odysseus and Athena help him gain the goodwill and assistance of the Phaiacians. Finally, and most spectacularly, in the last 12 books we see Athena reunite Odysseus with his son and then aid them in ridding themselves of the suitors once and for all. As the poem ends, we see Zeus and Athena intervene to protect Odysseus from the vengeful relatives of the suitors, establish peace between them, and secure Odysseus’s rule over his king­dom, after 20 years of absence. Zeus’s last words in the poem are: “Since divine Odysseus punished the suitors, let them [the relatives of the slain suitors and Odysseus] make their oaths of faith and let him always be king, and we will make them forget the slaughter of their children. Let them love one another, as before, and let them have prosperity and peace in abundance” (24.482-486). As a result of such divine intervention, the Odyssey has a happy ending, with its hero said to be rejoicing in the very last lines of the poem (24.545-548). To be sure, the Odyssey presents Odysseus as suffering much and consequently weeping much, earlier in the poem, but once he returns, thanks to the gods, to Ithaca, his tears are provoked by his reunions with loved ones.^[61] What is more, over the course of the Odyssey, Homer describes Odysseus as happy - as feeling joy and delight - 26 times, far more than Homer describes any other character in either poem as feeling joy and delight.^[62] The happy ending of the hero Odysseus, then, an ending apparently due to the providence of

Homer, Plato, and the Homeric Education on the Gods 29 the gods, appears to vindicate entirely the pious belief in gods who are mighty and just, especially in Zeus, whom Odysseus proclaims, “Father of Gods and Men” (12.455, 18.137).⁶⁷

Even in the sadder and more somber Iliad, which does not present a happy ending for any character, and whose principal hero, Achilles, Homer describes as feeling delight or joy on only six occasions,⁶⁸ but as weeping on ten occasions⁶⁹ - more than any other character in the poem - Homer appears, on the surface of the poem, to support the belief in divine providence. Homer himself refers to Zeus as “Father”⁷⁰ 29 times and also calls him “the Father of Gods and Men” 13 times.⁷¹ Homer depicts Zeus and the other gods as actively present, interacting with humans and with each other virtually throughout the Iliad,⁷² appearing on stage during the drama of the poem for most of Books XVIII and XXI and for more than 20 percent of 10 other books (I, IV, V, VIII, XIII, XIV, XV, XX, XXII, XXIV) while being wholly absent only in ι (IX) of the 24 books of the poem.⁷³ Moreover, throughout the poem, Homer highlights instances in

⁶⁷ Consider Kitto's argument that the Odyssey teaches “that the gods hate and punish, in the long run, human lawlessness” (1966, 147). Consider also Clay's observation that, on the surface, at least, “The Odyssey ends as a morality tale with an edifying message” (1983, 235). See as well Lloyd-Jones 1971, 28-32; Edwards 1987, 130; Dimmock, 1989, 25-26, 30-31; Schein 1996, 15; Kearns 2004, 67-69.

⁶⁸ 9.185-188 (Achilles is said twice here to delight in singing of the glories of men); 19.18-19 (the angry Achilles is said twice here to delight in touching and beholding his new armor); 22.224 (he rejoices at Athena's help in killing Hector). At 24.513, Homer says that Achilles took delight in weeping over Patroclus and Peleus. Consider also ιι.607, 19.287. See Odyssey ιι.540.

⁶⁹ Iliad 1.348-361, 18.22-35, ¹9.4-5, ¹9.338, 23.1-17, 23.108-110, 23.152-153, 23.222-225, 24.1-13, 24.507-512. Griffin suggests, regarding the Iliad: “the grief here is far deeper than that of the Odyssey”” (1980, 68-69).

⁷⁰ Iliad ³.533-534, 2.146, 4.23, 5.662, 8.69, 8.245, 8.397, 8.438, 8.460, 10.154, ιι.66, ιι.544, 13.796, 14.352, 14.414, 15.236, 15.637, 16.227, 16.250, 16.253, 16.676, 17.46, 17.498, 17.648, 21.506, 21.508, 21.520, 22.209, 24.100. See also 21.469. In the Odyssey, Homer only refers to Zeus once, in his own name, as father - “ thundering father” of Athena (³.³0³).

⁷¹ ³.544, 4.68, 5.426, 5.764, 8.49, 8.132, 11.182, 15.12, 15.47, 16.458, 20.56, 22.167, 24.³03. In the Odyssey, Homer only refers to Zeus once, in his own name, as “Father of Gods and Men” (³.28).

⁷² Benardete remarks, in discussing the shield of Achilles, that “[t]he gods appear on the shield in the city of war, but they are absent in the city of peace: so it is not by chance that the gods are less active in the Odyssey” than in the Iliad (2005, ³³4). See Iliad 18.516-519, 535-540. See also Clay 1983, 183-185.

⁷³ Here, by my count, are the number of lines the gods appear in each book of the Iliad, along with the number of total lines in each book: I (259/611), II (80/877), III (71/461), IV (117/544), V (402/909), VI (2/529), VII (33/482), VIII (221/565), IX (0/713), X (4/ 579), XI (42/847), XII (24/471), XIII (206/837), XIV (256/522), XV (321/746), XVI

which the gods care for human beings, pity them, and hearken to their prayers. Hera “cared” for the Achaians, “pitied” them, heeds their prayers, and intervenes on a number of occasions to help alleviate their suffering.⁷⁴ Apollo “heeded” the prayers of Chryses and Glaucus.⁷⁵ Athena “heeded” the prayers of Odysseus and Diomedes and saves the life of Menelaus.⁷⁶ Poseidon “pitied” the Achaians and helps them, and feels “grief” for Aeneas and rescues him.⁷⁷ Aphrodite saves Paris and her “beloved son” Aeneas (3.373-382, 5.311-318). Above all, Zeus, in Homer’s account, repeatedly is said to feel pity and sorrow for virtually all the human characters of the poem: from Agamemnon and the Achaians to Hector and Sarpedon, from Ajax, Achilles, and the principal Achaian warriors to Priam, and even Achilles’ horses.⁷⁸ Zeus goes so far as to weep great tears of blood when his son Sarpedon is slain (16.458-461). And Zeus declares, on the eve of Hector’s death: “My heart sorrows for Hector” (22.169-170). Homer recounts, on five occa­sions, that Zeus also “heeded” the prayers of human beings.⁷⁹ In all these ways, Homer lends support and encouragement to the trusting piety of his audience.

Homer supports the belief in divine providence in the Iliad by framing the story of the poem with the apparent lesson that Zeus and his children answer the prayers of human beings for justice.⁸⁰ In Book I, the heart­rending prayer to Apollo for justice by the wronged father and priest Chryses is answered swiftly and effectively. Apollo responds with right­eous wrath, sending a terrible and deadly plague that ultimately compels the cruel king Agamemnon to return the girl Chryseis to her “beloved father” (1.441). It is hard to imagine an example that would inspire in the audience greater sympathy for the helpless victim of injustice or greater moral satisfaction at the outcome.⁸¹ Similarly, in the final book of the poem, we see the gods, led by Zeus, intervene to assist another old father victimized by another cruel tormentor. After Achilles slays the leading

(135/867), XVII (99/761), XVIII (445/616), XIX (56/424), XX (226/503), XXI (337/ 6ιι), XXII (130/515), XXIII (49/897), XXIV (338/804).

1.55-56, 1.194-196, 5.711-909, 8.343-353, 18.165-168, 18.239-242.

¹.35^-45^,1.45^0-457^,16.5¹3^-5²7.

5.114-122, 10.277-295, 10.460-513, 23.768-772, 4.127-129.

13.10-38, 15.41-44, 20.288-340.

8.245-246, 15.12, 16.431, 17.648, 19.340, 24.332. See also 17.441-442.

8.245-246, 15.377-378, 17.648-650, 21.273-298, 24.314-316.

See Scodel 2004, 53, 49; Crotty 1994, 24; Griffin 2004, 162.

See Gagarin 1987, 297.

Trojan defender Hector, and the other Achaians repeatedly stab his corpse, Achilles proceeds to drag the corpse along^[82] the walls of Troy, before the eyes of Hector’s parents and people (22.369-375, 22.395-411). King Priam, Hector’s father, overcome with grief, is power­less to stop the now-triumphant Achaians from outraging the corpse of his beloved son, day after day. We see the hitherto splendid and prosper­ous king reduced by his suffering to a pathetic, sobbing old man who rolls around in excrement and smears himself with it (22.412-429, 24.160-165). Zeus, however, commands Achilles to return the corpse of Hector to Priam and commands Priam to seek the corpse from Achilles. The uncertain Priam prays to “Father Zeus” for success on this dangerous mission and Zeus apparently grants it (24.308-309). And, in his final action in the Iliad, Zeus, taking pity on the grieving father, sends his own “beloved son” Hermes to escort Priam to the Achaian camp (24.332-339). Thanks to the gods’ intervention, the powerless old Priam receives the corpse of his “beloved son” and leads his family and city to mourn and bury their champion (24.24.146, 24.195, 24.619, 24.685).

The first and last prayers in the Iliad are made by victims of injustice who turn to the gods for help and whose prayers are effectively answered. Homer begins and closes the story of the poem by apparently assuring the audience that the gods as a whole, led by Zeus, effectively protect the just and pious, no matter how weak, against the cruelty of the wicked, no matter how strong. Homer appears, then, on the very surface of both this poem, as well as of the Odyssey, to be a champion of piety, a poet who justifies the ways of the gods to men, and who therefore encourages in us the hope that the gods, led by Zeus, the Thoughtful, Compassionate, Righteous, and Mighty Father of Gods and Men, love us, care for us, and ensure that justice is done.