The Odyssey, on this most recent listen, reveals it as even more faith-focused than the Iliad, which is the most religious war story I have read, by far. Roughly every second verse among protagonists and supporting characters and adversaries, speaks of God, gods, prayer, heaven, providence, fate, and sacrifice. Religious statements are more frequent per word than Bradford’s or Mourt’s relation of the founding of Plymouth Colony, cited by historians as the foundation of America as a Christian nation—America’s most holy prequel.
As a writer of sequels, it seems to me that Homer composed the Odyssey as an examination of God’s words to his lesser lights of heaven [angels in Christian context] that man is the most sorrowful creature upon the earth, a being of suffering, and that the least He could do to relieve some portion of this was to test such men in the hopes that they would gain everlasting fame among future men, and hence enjoy the only kind of immortality available to mortals.
Odysseus, the “Grieved-lord,” is most often referred to as “That Man” by his family and fellows. He is never for a loss in a tight spot. He is said to have been named after slaying a boar which wounded him on sacred Mount Pharnassus in his youth, “The man of all odds.” He is described as the “most unlucky” “unhappy” man in the world. He is a combination of an afflicted Job, hunted Paul, wandering Jonah and triumphant David.
God is a harsh father who gives good and bad to men in the world. The term God is usually applied to Zeus, sometimes as an aggregate of all heavenly powers as a concept, and about five times in reference to Poseidon, brother of God Almighty Zeus. Zeus, Poseidon and Hades, the three Sons of Time, rule Creation between them: Poseidon the sea, Hades the underworld and Zeus Heaven and Earth. Zeus, through his primary exhibition of power, storm, cloud and thunder and his command of the Winds has significant control of the sea, its surface at least, and men upon the “broad back” of “the fish-giving sea.” Genesis, 4, I think, describes God activating a generative force of the sea in such a way as to indicate a secondary, subservient power to the Lord of Heaven and Earth.
The following are quotes from The Odyssey, a book which mentions God, heaven, heavenly power, prayer and observations of faith far more often per wood then any book of the Old Testament. The Odyssey, like Ovid’s Metamorphoses, seem to beg for a heaven-sent savior to take up man’s cause, especially in view of the underworld. The Greeks of Homer never ate or drank wine without a prayer and their prayers, when in the presence of women, were greeted by an earthly chorus of praise to God, “Alleluia!” The heroes of the ancient Greeks, minus a few damned souls such as Ajax who questioned God, were more pious than any Biblical figure predating Christ, except for David, author of Psalms, who would have fit in in the pious halls of Dark Age Hellas as a bright light worthy of an Odysseus.
The Odyssey:
General:
“Born to sorrow if any man was”
“the wrath of God”
“Fear God”
“The Spinner” [Fate, taken up as an aspect of God in Christian poetics, with Beowulf describing God on His War Loom weaving men’s fate.]
“Snatchers” phantoms that abduct oath-breakers and sinners to the Underworld
“Avengers” who punish sinners in the Underworld
Sayings
“Bold as brass”
“Tramping to the devil”
“A ravenous belly cannot be hid, damn the thing”
“Catch ‘em Ecotosh, the bogie king, who chops men into mince meat” [mentioned 4 times]
“The drops of grace” [wine poured to the gods]
Notable Statements
“Made her tall and full and more white than polished ivory,” on a divine restoration of Penelope’s beauty even as her husband is restored by turning his pale old skin into richly tanned skin, “glossy like the skin of a dried onion.”
“I wind my schemes on my distaff.” [Penelope]
“A groom to carry each earring.” [Slaves given as a compliment to a gift given, marking the earrings as more valuable than those two human lives.]
Chapter Quotes, mostly from dialogue, which had to have been rendered believable for Homer’s audience to enjoy the tale. The quotes are only a portion of the many and nearly constant reference to heavenly power. Composing in about 720 B.C., Homer reflects an ethos close to that of feudal Europe, with many small towns and kingdoms abiding by a universal faith governing the moral tenor of their interactions.
Book 2
“This is God’s will.”
Book 3
“Thanks be to God.”
“God scattered the fleet.”
“God made smooth the great billows of the deep.” [Not Poseidon, but Zeus Time-holder Almighty.]
“We prayed God to show us.”
“By the voice of God.”
“If it should be the will of God.”
Book 4
“Zeus Olympian in his infinite wisdom.”
“Too much happiness for God to grant.”
“God gives good fortune or bad fortune.”
“God willing or not,” [The damning curse of Ajax.]
“The Lord God.”
Book 8
“God Crowns his words.” [Possibly in reference to Apollo.]
“God has been generous to you and inspired your song.” [Later the litmus test for including of Gospels in the Bible.]
“God can do it or not do it, as he pleases.” [Reference to Poseidon.]
Book 9
“God gave us what we wanted.”
“God walks with him to see he gets no wrong.” [See Enoch and Exodus]
“God made him do it.”
“God breathed great courage into us.” [This may be in regard to Athena, who is described as closest to Zeus Almighty, to understand his will with no explanation, and to carry his power to Earth and Sea, an aspect of God said to have been born from his head, and referred to often as Tritagenea. Scholars disagree if this means “of the sea” or in reference to her place in a Trinity. She bears his storm shield. His messenger is Iris “Storm-foot,” very much a minor angel like those who warned Lot.]
“Clouds and darkness are all about him and he rules over all.” [Compare to Exodus and the God of the Covenant.]
Book 11
“God will make your journey hard and dangerous.” [Of Poseidon.]
“Come and praise God.”
“Thanks be to heaven.”
Book 15
“Zeus, loud-thundering Lord of heaven.”
“God’s messenger, Hermes,”
Book 16
“The destiny God spun for him.” [This departs from the traditional view that God only knows what Fate has spun, and places him at the loom, a practice in pagan-to-Christian poetic adaptation.]
“No one but very God.”
“By the grace of God.”
“What comes from God none can avoid.”
“Inquire the will of God,” [Uttered by a man plotting murder.]
Book 17
“God forbid.”
“Suppose there really is a God in heaven?” [The first atheist, among the murder plotters?]
“Affront the brazen sky.” [To challenge heaven with human hubris.]
“May God blast them before they do any harm.’
“I will do my best with God’s help.”
“Brought by God to our very doors.”
“Zeus all-wise takes away half his sense when slavery is upon him.”
Book 18
“God will spare me.”
Book 19
“A king who is a God-fearing man and rules over a mighty nation.” [Zeus often speaks of being feared, yet it is unclear if this statement should read god-fearing. They all frighten me.]
“Many call him blessed.”
“Men quickly grow old in evil days.” [Compare to Exodus when Moses and God speak of God working evil among men and Moses’ transformation upon seeing God.]
“God has robbed him of his return.”
“A child of many prayers.”
“The will of God.”
“Leave the rest to God.”
Book 20
“How God sent omens of the wrath to come.” [Often eagles, sometimes thunder without clouds.]
“May God punish them.”
“God’s wrath.” [The entire book is about faith in heaven and God’s wrath upon sinners, Odysseus merely a tool of heaven. See below.]
Book 21
“If God shall destroy all these men by my hand.”
“God will give the victory to who he will.” [Athena, playing the angel of God, working his will through a man, only one man at a time, including various persecuted prophets who aid the hero.]
I trust the above samples help the reader in their consideration of the Bible, particularly Job, Judges, Exodus and Psalms, in light of the fact that the Gospels were brought to us through the Greek word, by men educated in Homer, Hesiod and Ovid.
This effort is an effort at a contextual backdrop to the faith of Alexander as described in Arrian’s Expedition of Alexander and examined in The Son of God, an amplification of that work.
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Notes
Other treatments of the Odyssey will focus on ethnology, geography and the afterlife.
