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The Divine Audience and the Religion of the Iliad

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Jasper Griffin
Jasper Griffin
Affiliation:
Balliol College, Oxford
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Extract

One of the most striking features of the Iliad is that the gods are constantly present as an audience. Not only are they shown intervening and responding to human action, but repeatedly they are explicitly said to be watching. It will here be argued that this is much more than a ‘divine apparatus’, that it stands in a peculiar and identifiable relation to real religion, and that it is of the greatest importance both for the Iliad and for later Greek poetry.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 28 , Issue 1 , May 1978 , pp. 1 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1978

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References

1 As Il. 4.4Google Scholar; 7.61:8.51, 350; 11.73, 82, 336; 15.12, 599; 16.430, 644; 17.198; 20.22; 21.388; 22.166; 24.23.

2 ‘Es lässt sich m. E. zeigen, wie in der Ilias bisweilen die irdischen Ereignisse alsein Schauspiel für die Götter empfunden werden’, Fränkel, H., Die horn. Gleichnisse (1921), p.32Google Scholar n.l. See also Kullmann, W., Das Wirken der Götter in der Mas (1956), p.84.Google Scholar

3 In the Scholia on this line, is glossed as So too at Od. 8.163.Google Scholar

4 West, M. L. remarks, in his Commentary on the Works and Days, ad loc.Google Scholar: ‘Nothing that a man does escapes the eye of Zeus, who is and since he is the guardian of the moral law every wicked action is an affront to him.’ I am grateful to Professor West for letting me see his work before its publication.

5 Neither the Greek evidence nor that of comparative religion confirms the view of Cook, A. B., Zeus ii.502Google Scholar, that ‘later writers [sic] usually lay stress on the eye of Zeus as the wakeful witness of right and wrong, the avenger of impious deeds’ (cf. also ibid, ii.1130), implying that this was not original.

6 In Homer ‘always means vengeance or visitation of the gods for transgressing divine laws’, L.S.J, s.v.; cf. Frisk, Griech. etym. Wörterbuch s.v., for the development from ‘Aufsicht’ to ‘animadversio, Strafe’.

7 On this passage see Lloyd-Jones, H., The Justice of Zeus (1971), p.6 n.27Google Scholar and reff.: add Elliger, W., Landschaft in gr. Dichtung (1975), p.78.Google Scholar

8 See Fraenkel, E., Kleine Beiträge 1.188.Google Scholar

9 ‘ “sono spettatori”, e implica indifferenze’, Longo, ad loc.

10 See also the passages collected by Robinson Ellis in his Commentary on Catullus 29.1, ‘quis hoc potest videre, quis potest pati?’ Ellis cites no passage from Homer; to those mentioned above add Il. 8.397Google Scholar, 17.93, 19.16, Od. 7.306, 16.277.Google Scholar

11 The subtle glosses put on this passage by Marg, W. in Navicula Chiloniensis (1956), pp.16 ff.Google Scholar, and Deichgräber, K., Das letzte Gesang der ilias (S. B. Mainz 1972), p.18Google Scholar, suffer from disregarding the related passages here compared. Another note in ΣΤ in Il. 21.389Google Scholar already makes the comparison with Od. 8.78.Google Scholar An important article by Friedländer, P., Lacbende Götter, in die Antike 10 (1934), 209–26Google Scholar = Studien zur ant. Lit. und Kunst, pp.3–18.Google Scholar Cf. Eustath, . 1243.60Google Scholar (in Il. 21.408Google Scholar) .

12 Aeschines 2.181Google Scholar, cf.Dem. 23.69.Google Scholar The motif of pleasure in watching others in distress, ‘suave mari magno’, is both exploited and softened by Lucretius, Book 2, init.

13 The attempt of Kullman, W., Das Wirken der GötterGoogle Scholar, to argue that originally there were on the one hand songs purely about gods, and on the other songs purely about men, seems to me to be built in the air. See the review by Burkert, W., Gnomon 29 (1957), 166Google Scholar, who points out that the Song of Gilgamesb and similar works add to the a priori unlikelihood that heroic songs ever existed in which the gods played no part. Perhaps Tolkien's Lord of the Rings is the first heroic epic to be wholly without gods or religion.

14 Myths to which allusion is made in the Homeric poems are listed by Calhoun, G. M. in AJP 60 (1939), 4 ff.Google Scholar

15 Eloquently by Reinhardt, K., Tradition und Geist, pp.24 ff.Google Scholar

16 The late and special character of Il. 5Google Scholar is convincingly argued by Erbse, H. in RM 104 (1961), 150 ff.Google Scholar

17 The speculations of Whitman, C., HSCP 74 (1970), 37 ff.Google Scholar about this passage suggest to me the excesses of allegorical interpretation of Homer in late antiquity.

18 On the ancient poem which described the expulsion and return of Hephaestus to Olympus, , Wilamowitz, , NGG 1895.217 ff.Google Scholar; Nestle, W. in NJbb (1905), p.180Google Scholar; Friedländer, , Stud. z. ant. Lit. und Kunst, pp.4 ff.Google Scholar

19 Il. 21.462, 498, 492.Google Scholar See Reinhardt, , Die ilias und ihr Dichter, p.446Google Scholar, on the transposition of the Titanomachy into Unernst in Book 21.

20 ΣA in Il. 1.400Google Scholar, Bachmann, W., Die aestbetiscben Anscbau-ungen Aristarcbs (1901) 18Google Scholar: Franz, M.-L. von, Die astbetischen Anschauungen der Iliasscholien (Diss. Zürich 1943), pp.17 f.Google Scholar: Willcock, M. M. in CQ N.S. 14 (1964), 144.CrossRefGoogle ScholarKullmann, W. on the other hand (Das Wirken, p.14)Google Scholar believes the story is really ancient.

21 The Mycenean Origins of Greek Mythology (1927), pp.221 ff.Google ScholarContra, Jachmann, G. in Maia 6 (1953), 241Google Scholar; the probability of Eastern influence is stressed by Lesky, A. in the Hesiod volume in the series Wege der Forschung (1966), pp.598Google Scholar, = Saeculum 6 (1955), 50.Google ScholarFenik, B., Battle-Scenes in the Iliad = Hermes Einzelschriften 21 (1968), 42Google Scholar, argues that it is unlikely that ‘Homer created the divine world as it appears in the Iliad’, because he is so dependent on tradition in other areas, such as language, legend, and narrative style; but such an argument does not tell against the supposition that it was in the epic tradition that it was created.

22 ‘Das Unvollkommene, das an Schönheit und Leistung abfällt gegenüber dem Göttlichen’, Snell, in Gnomon 19 (1943), 72.Google ScholarOtto, W. F., The Homeric Gods, p. 164Google Scholar, calls the gods ‘primal forms of reality’ (‘Urgestalten der Wirklichkeit’ in the original, Die Götter Griechenlands 211).Google Scholar

23 Otto, W. F., The Homeric Gods, p.129.Google Scholar

24 See Schrade, H., Götter und Menschen Homers (1952), p.58Google Scholar: ‘Erst das Widerspiel zwischen Beiden [;sc. Göttern und Menschen] bezeichnet für Homer die ganze göttliche Wirklichkeit.’ I take the occasion of a footnote to deplore the disregard which seems to have been the fate of this rewarding book, never apparently reviewed in Britain. The important notice by Marg, W., Gnomon 28 (1956), 1–17, brings out the strong and weak points of the work.Google Scholar

25 Otto, , The Homeric Gods, p.128.Google Scholar

26 Cf. Nägelsbach, , Homerische Theologie2, p.38.Google Scholar

27 Cf. Il. 21.594:Google Scholar

Cf. also Il. 22.291Google Scholar and Kakridis, P. J., Achilleus' Rüstung, Hermes 89 (1961), 288–97.Google Scholar

28 Il. 6.515, 7.192, etc.; 1.295, 13.802, 17.72; 22.394.Google Scholar

29 Frisk, , Griecbisches etymologiscbes Wörterbuch s. v.Google ScholarChantraine, , Dict. étymologique de la langue grecque, s.v., set out but regard as uncertain the old derivation, which would give the word the meaning ‘deliverer from death’.Google Scholar

30 Cf. Ahrens, H. L., 'Pâ. Beitrag zur gr. Etymologie und Lexikographie (1873), p.11Google Scholar: ‘Ferner zeigt den Anfang einer tadelnden Bedeutung, Il. 22.19Google Scholar und Od. 1.160’.Google Scholar

31 ‘No word of rebuke in this: only his yearning for her and a resigned acceptance of his mortal lot’, Barrett, W. S., ad loc.Google Scholar But such an objective statement-she is a goddess, and so this action, like all others, is easy to her—inevitably carries an emotional weight; to him it is life and death, to her something ‘easy’. It is not ‘the puritan's ideal’ which is criticized here. ‘Es gibt kaum eine zweite Szene, die unter dem Mantel des Heiligen und Riihrenden so anklagt’, is the perceptive comment of Reinhardt, , Tradition und Geist, p.234.Google Scholar

32 Cf. also H.F. 1115, 1127.Google Scholar

33 See Wilamowitz, , Glaube der Hellenen 1.332 f.Google Scholar; Burkert, W. in RW 103 (1961), 140Google Scholar; Spieker, R. in Hermes 97 (1969), 149 ff.Google Scholar

34 Eustath. 947.1:

35 On the of gods for men and its meaning, Adkins, A. W. H. in JHS 92 (1972), 10 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar It is surprising to find no reference to the important paper by F. Dirlmeier, in Philol. 90 (1935).Google Scholar

36 Cf. Marg, W. in Die Antike 18 (1942), 177Google Scholar: Schadewaldt, W., Von Homers Welt und Werk4 (1965), pp.260 ff.Google Scholar: and CQ N.S. 26 (1976), 186.Google Scholar

37 Otherwise they would be, I suppose, merely repulsive or meaningless, like the massacres of Indians by an invulnerable Dionysus in Nonnus. Virgil had the insight to see that since Aeneas could not be killed in the fighting in the Aeneid, his fate must be made tragic by other means.

38 The point is well made by Erbse, H., Antike und Abendland 16 (1970), 110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

39 ΣA in Il. 1.604Google Scholar: slew the Achaeans from heaven in the early part of Book 1 is in heaven the divine singer who reflects order and beauty. Cf. Marg, W.. Homer über die Dichtung, p.10.Google Scholar

40 Plato, , Resp. 363 d.Google Scholar ‘Comprehende igitur et propone ante oculos deum nihil aliud in omni aeternitate nisi Mini pulchre est, et Ego beams sum, cogitantem’—Cicero's cruel portrayal of the gods of Epicurus, , de Nat. Deorum 1.114.Google Scholar

41 Despite such assertions as that of Bespaloff, Rachel, On the Iliad, trans. McCarthy, Mary (1947), p.68Google Scholar: ‘The one sin condemned and explicitly stigmatised by Homer: the happy carelessness of the Immortals.’ ‘Explicitly’ here seems to mean ‘implicitly’. By contrast, another short work translated by McCarthy, Mary, The Iliad: or, The Poem of ForceGoogle Scholar, by Simone Weil (n.d.), seems to me a profound and true account of the poem, and of other things besides (reprinted, in a different translation, in: Intimations of Christianity among the Ancient Greeks, ed. Geissbuhler, E. C. (1957, 1976).Google Scholar

42 The vividness of the sporting reports in Il. 23 is praised for example by the T Scholiast on 362: the listener loses nothing which the onlookers can see. See also the ΣA in 23.458, 476 .Google Scholar

43 ‘Die Götter des Homer sind sozugagen eine Adelsgesellschaft, die unsterblich ist’, Jaeger, W., Paideia i.32.Google Scholar See Kullmann, W., Das Wirken der Götter, pp.84–6Google Scholar; Cauer, P., Grundfragen der Homerkritik, p.358.Google Scholar

44 Cf. Usener, , Kleine Schriften iv.186Google Scholar; Schrade, , Götter und Menscben Homers, p.110Google Scholar; Borthwick, E. K. in Hermes 96 (1968), 64 and 97 (1969) 388.Google Scholar Σ in Il. 7.241Google Scholar: Cf Eustath. 926.3, 939.65.Google Scholar Von der Mühll regards the single combat in the Games for Patroclus as ‘sehr altertiimlich’.

45 Huizinga, J., Homo Ludens, Ch. 5Google Scholar: Play and War. The chapter ‘Jeux meurtriers’ in Severyns, A., Homière III L'Artiste (1948), pp.106–15Google Scholar, is not concerned with this aspect. For another side, see Meuli, K., Der griechiscbe AgonGoogle Scholar, and Burkert, W., Homo Necans (1972), p.65.Google Scholar

46 Cf. Il. 18.604Google Scholar, in the dance depicted on the shield:

Again the similarity of dancing and fighting; and here too a crowd of spectators stand watching the dance, (604).

47 Especially 15.68; 15.596 ff., 610–14; 17.207. Zeus also causes the reckless impulse which leads to the death of Patroclus, 16.688 f., whom he describes (17.204) as Achilles'

48 Thus Il. 12.179,Google Scholar

Cf. 13.206 and 24.33, Apollo's indignant address to the gods.

49 Notoriously the Alexandrians were concerned to deny that Homer ‘knew’ this story, cf. ΣA in 24.25, ΣT in 24.31. The demonstration by Karl Reinhardt that it does underlie the Iliad (Das Parisurteil (1938)Google Scholar = Tradition und Geist, pp.16–36)Google Scholar is, or should be, a landmark in Homeric studies. Regarded as certain in some quarters (‘Man hat längst erkannt’, Erbse in Ant. und Abendland 16 (1970), 106Google Scholar: see also, independently, Scott, J. A. in CJ 14 (1919), 226–30Google Scholar, Drerup, E., Das Homerproblem (1921), p.360Google Scholar n.l; Magnien, V. in REG 37 (1924), 145Google Scholar, and Calhoun, G. M. in AJP 60 (1939), 10Google Scholar n.23), it is still by some denied (Focke, F. in Hermes 82 (1954), 274Google Scholar: Jachmann, G., Homerische Einzellie der (1949), pp.16 f.), while in English writing it seems not to have made the impact that it should. More of Reinhardt's work should be made available in English.Google Scholar

50 EspeciallyIl. 4.28; 7.31 f.; 18.367; 20.313.

51 Many remarks in the Scholia treat the Iliad as akin to tragedy. Such words as and are quite common (reff. conveniently in Baar, J., Index zu den Ilias-Scholien (1962)), and Homer is said to be the first to introduce (Il. 1.332), divine (Il. 2.156), and (Il. 6.466). The Iliad itself consists of ‘tragedies’, ΣA in Il. 1.1. Plato calls Homer the first tragedian, Resp. 595 b, 598 d, 605 c.Google Scholar

52 ΣA in 22.201, Cf. also ΣT in 4.541: It is a pity that Baar (n.51) did not include when he included in his .

53 Here we have the original of the passages in Tragedy which criticize Zeus for his indifference to the sufferings of his offspring, especially the Trachiniae and the Heracles.

54 Presumably this corresponds to the fact that in the poet's time these cities had in fact been sacked. Their patron goddess allowed this to happen, in a gruesome bargain with Zeus. Cf. Codino, F., Introduzione a Omero (1965), p.66.Google Scholar

55 Cf. also CQ N.S. 26 (1976), 179Google Scholar, and Frankel, H., Dichtung und Pbilosopbie, p.61.Google Scholar

56 ‘It is quite evident that the Aethiopians serve as a convenient refuge for the gods when the poet wishes to keep them away from Olympus’, Kakridis, J. T.Homeric Researches, p.79.Google Scholar

57 It is no doubt more than a coincidence that striking effects are produced in the Iliad also both by the presence and by the absence of human watchers. Helen is brought out to watch the duel of Paris and Menelaus; Patroclus cannot bear to watch the disasters of the Achaeans; Priam and Hecuba watch Hector's death–and Andromache, yet more pathetically, is ignorant of it. See also the pleasure with which the other Achaeans imagine Achilles to be looking on at their sufferings, Il. 14.140.

58 Schrade, H., Götter und Menschen Homers, p.70Google Scholar. The puzzle about Homer's gods is their ‘Protean qualities', the ‘curious intermingling of the sublime with the vulgar’, says Calhoun, G. M., TAPA 68 (1937), 11Google Scholar; he thinks to resolve the difficulty by distinguishing the crude old myths on the one hand, and the progressive views of the poet on the other. This is not only a doomed enterprise but also a profoundly wrong one; it is the coexistence of both aspects which makes Homer's gods what they are. Not every compound is the better for being resolved into simple elements-even if it were possible to agree on the means of doing so. Schrade also emphasizes (p.94) the identity of Hephaestus the who controls destructive fire (as in Il. 21) and the supreme artificer who controls the cf. especially 21.366, where the two aspects are brought into immediate juxtapositio59 Reinhardt, K., Das Parisurteil, p.25.Google Scholar

60 Cf. Otto, W. F., The Homeric Gods, pp.66–7 on this Apollo.Google Scholar

61 Cf. Il. 1.574 8.428

62 On this episode see Burkert, W. in RM 103 (1960), 130–44.Google Scholar

63 ‘Das tief Ergreifende erscheint, aus dem Abstand des Göttlichen gesehen, auch wieder als gleichgültig’, Schadewaldt, , Von Homers Welt und Werk4, p.293.Google Scholar

64 ΣT in Il. 8.429: ΣT in 21.465: Cf. ΣBT in 4.1:

65 Pascal, Blaise, Pensiées, ed. Pléiade, p.1170.Google Scholar

66 Cf. Il. 12.29, the eventual complete effacement by the gods of the wall,

67 Cf. Gilgamesh, to Enkidu in the Epic of Gilgamesh, ANET 2 79, column 2: p.69 of the Penguin Classic translation.Google Scholar

68 Aristotle, Protrepticus B44 Düring, with his note: Jaeger, W., Scripta Minora i. 355Google Scholar:Burkert, W. in Hermes 88 (1960), 159Google Scholar ff. On the life of contemplation, Boll, F., Vita Contemplativa, SB Heidelberg 1920.8Google Scholar = Kleine Scbriften zur Stemkunde des Altertums (1950), pp.303–31. I find paradoxical Boll's view (p.307) that not the gods but Odysseus provided the archetype of theGoogle Scholar