Why does Homer care about fate anyway?

            In my second blog post, I dabbled with the role of fate and determinism in The Iliad by Homer. I discussed the free will of men and gods, and the circumstances that allowed for each. Upon further tinkering with this idea, I concluded that the message that Homer wants to convey to his readers about the real world is this: Although things are predetermined and their outcomes cannot be avoided, there is no reason for people not to act as though they have autonomy. People’s actions are still necessary for the world to continue turning. Clearly, this message makes an assumption that would be hotly contested by philosophers of modern times, but the belief that everything is fated was prevalent during the times of Homer.

            To reach this message, one must first visit the plot of Achilles. Achilles is the Achaeans’ best fighter, a true hero. However, when Agamemnon attempted to steal Briseis from him in a fit of rage, Achilles withdrew himself from the ranks of warriors and refused to partake in any battles. Achilles tells Atrides “back I go to Phthia. Better that way by far, to journey home in the beaked ships of war. I have no mind to linger here disgraced, brimming your cup and piling up your plunder” (Homer 83). Since Achilles has decided he will not fight, the Achaean forces are deeply weakened. The gods begin to take sides in the battle: “those two goddesses there are Menelaus’ best defense, Hera of Argos, Boeotian Athena, guard of armies… but Aphrodite here with her everlasting laughter always stands by Paris” (Homer 145). This shows that without the direct involvement of Achilles in the War, the outcome of the war becomes jeopardized and the gods intervene. The gods eventually maintain the fate of the War in the favor of the Achaeans. However, since Achilles decided not to fight and thus had no influence on the war, this took considerable effort.

            Homer conveys the theme that free will still exists in a deterministic world through both the inaction of Achilles and the actions of every other character. To maintain the golden balance of fate, everybody but Achilles played their part: Thetis tried to sooth Achilles; “Hera trumpeted, lashing the nerve and fighting-fury in each man as Athena, her eyes blazing, made for Diomedes” and she “urged him on with so much winning force” (Homer 190). The men themselves who fought the war needed to fight for victory to be had. Eventually, Achilles returns to battle and wins the war for Achaea. These examples do not even begin to represent every forward action taken. The point of all this is that even though fate dictated that Troy must fall at the hands of Achaea, it would never have happened without the comprehensive and total participation of the individuals; the free will of the characters, who chose to fight for a cause, was the reason fate held true. This thinking allowed me to arrive at a theme, a message that Homer is trying to send his readers. This message is that no matter what is fated, people still have the ability to freely make decisions, and the meaning of these decisions is not lost because of a deterministic world.

As I read this epic poem, I tried to keep my list of what good readers do handy so that I could employ some of my new strategies. One strategy I used is rereading. When I thought I found a quote for these blog posts, I reread the entire chapter I found it in so that I might gain more insight into the meaning of the quote. I used a quote in my third blog post from page 605, where Achilles cries with Priam. My first time reading this chapter, I only noticed that this was the first true display of emotion for anyone but Patroclus Achilles shows in the entire story. However, on my second time through I made the connection that this strong emotional side to Achilles was probably something very valued in Homer’s culture. This leads to how I read with my spine throughout this book. For me, I allowed my initial reactions to certain events dictate how I perceive them. The emotional scene I mentioned before, for example, made me feel like Homer exalted Achilles for having such strong emotions underneath his tough exterior.

            I wholeheartedly recommend this book to all readers. If you can read these words, you should read this work of art. If you, reader, would like to understand more allusions in novels and find deeper meaning in any future works of literature you read, I implore you to read The Iliad. Every author who has ever written anything of worth has read Homer at some point; it shows up in their writing. Homer has been read for centuries, and The Iliad will remain a famous and historical epic poem for longer than can be predicted. If you read The Iliad, then the next time you read about a character being compared to the Trojan Hector or the beautiful Helen the meaning of those words will not be lost; the newer work might carry a whole new message, a heavier message, and the result will surprise you.

            

Achilles: a Platonic ideal

Chapters read: 1-24

Pages read: up to 615

            In The Iliad by the Greek poet Homer, Achilles is, undoubtedly, the center of the story. Even with the dozens of other main characters, the outcome of the novel is ultimately hinged upon the return of Achilles to the battlefield. Even though the fate of the city was determined, there always seemed to be two possible outcomes for Achilles. He summarizes what the sea-goddess told him earlier: “Mother tells me, the immortal goddess Thetis with her glistening feet, that two fates bear me on to the day of death. If I hold out here and I lay siege to Troy, my journey home is gone, but my glory never dies. If I voyage back to the fatherland I love, my pride, my glory dies” (Homer 265). Returning to the discussion about fate in my last post, Achilles appears to be in control of his own fate, a unique situation. Homer probably did this to exemplify Achilles’ superiority among men, and his almost godlike existence. After all, the future of an entire war lay in his hands, a privilege normally only possessed by the gods.

            More than just the privileges that Achilles held set him apart from all other men. Achilles’ goodness and strength of character were incredible. Other men, such as Agamemnon, were not nearly as honorable as Achilles. Atrides (Agamemnon) was overly confident and emotional, especially when he was forced to give up his wife Chryseis and he told his best fighter, Achilles, “Desert, by all means—if the spirit drives you home! I will never beg you to stay, not on my account… I hate you most of all the warlords… What if you are a great soldier? That’s just a gift of god” (Homer 83). Clearly, king Agamemnon’s very understandable, but very negative human qualities reveal that he is not the perfection of a man that Achilles is.

Even compared to gods, Achilles’ character seemed to be less flawed. The gods were often tricksters: when Hera wanted to support the cause of the Achaeans, she went through with a plan to “dress in all her glory and go to Ida—perhaps the old desire would overwhelm the king to lie by her naked body and make immortal love and she might drift an oblivious, soft warm sleep across his eyes and numb that seething brain,” after which she could intervene in the Trojan War as she pleased (Homer 375). This type of deception was not something Achilles engaged in.

Most importantly about Achilles, I would say, is his ability to show new sides of himself. Throughout The Iliad, Achilles is a hard warrior who rarely expresses emotion except for the loss of his beloved friend Patroclus. However, when Priam, king of Troy came to Achilles’ tent to beg for his son Hector’s body back and to tell Achilles to think of how important he is to his father, Achilles got “a deep desire to grieve for his own father…overpowered by memory both men gave way to grief. Priam wept freely for man-killing Hector, throbbing…as Achilles wept himself, now for his father, now for Patroclus once again” (Homer 605). This incredible display of emotion from Achilles’ completes his personality as an embodiment of what ancient Greeks thought was the perfect human being; he was compassionate, strong, honest, and level-headed. According to the philosophy of Plato, Achilles could be seen as a Platonic ideal of a human.

Here is the wikipedia article about platonic idealism.

The role of fate in The Iliad

Chapters read: 1-16

Pages read: up to 441

            The Iliad by Homer is millennia old. In the time that this epic poem was written, the belief that everything in the world had an immutable fate was widespread. The influence that this belief has on The Iliad is clear; fate is one of the major governing forces of events in this novel.

Even the gods bow down to the supremacy of fate. For example, when Zeus realizes that Hera has helped the Achaeans while he slept, Zeus is angry for Hera’s deceit but not for the outcome of her actions because, as Zeus says, “back the fighting goes, no stopping it, ever, all the way till Achaean armies seize the beetling heights of Troy through Athena’s grand design” (Homer 389-390). It seems that the gods, however, might be the ones who create fate in the first place. Even so, they enforce their own rules on the mortal world with rigid governance.

It is also possible that some instances of fate are not in the gods’ hands. At some point during the war, “Zeus held out his sacred golden scales: in them he placed two fates of death that lays men low—one for Trojan horsemen, one for Argives armed in bronze… and down went Achaea’s day of doom, Achaea’s fate settling down on the earth that feeds us all as the fate of Troy went lifting towards the sky” (Homer 233-234). This suggests that Zeus’s will does not control fate, but rather it enforces a fate that is intricately embedded in events of the mortal and immortal world.

Fate may not be as immutable as thought in some cases. This argument brings into question the idea of free will, or the ability for characters to make decisions entirely on their own, outside the influence of fate, so that their decisions may go against and even alter whatever fate was said to exist. The Trojan Sarpedon, a son of Zeus, proclaimed to his men “But now, as it is, the fates of death await us, thousands posed to strike, and not a man alive can flee them or escape—so in we go for attack! Give our enemy glory or win it for ourselves!” (Homer 335-336). Here Sarpedon succumbs to the fate of death that awaits him, but does not believe any outside forces can determine who leaves the battle with glory and honor. The free will of the Trojans, in their minds, allows their own actions to dictate how much honor they have when their time of death comes. In other words, fate does not provide a detailed map of everyone’s lives.

As powerful as fate is, its influence appears to fluctuate in The Iliad. Not even the poet Homer understands fate completely. Nor do the gods or any of the mortals in the epic poem. Instead, the assumption is that fate will always play a role, but this does not stop the characters from trying to effect their own preferred outcomes.

Why I enjoy The Iliad

Chapters read: 1-8

Pages read: up to 250

            For my first quarter independent reading assignment, I decided to take on The Iliad, an ancient Greek epic poem originally written by the bard Homer, and translated by Robert Fagles (my copy was, at least). This famous work has stood the test of time, having been written nearly three millennia ago. Make no mistake; its fame speaks just as much about the story as it does about its age. Never have I been more engaged with a text.

            The Iliad is set during the mythical Trojan War, in which the Achaeans waged against the city of Troy for Paris’s stealing of Helen. However, this epic poem only begins nine years into the War. The story is difficult to follow; there are so many characters, both Greek and Trojan. There’s Achilles, a fighter; Agamemnon, the Greek king; Hector, the Trojan warrior; the Trojan Paris, “a challenger, lithe, magnificent as a god” (Homer 129); Odysseus “led the island men of Ithaca” (Homer 120). This list is only cursory; the heroes are double and then there are all of the gods. This barraging of figures would be confusing to anyone unfamiliar with Greek literature. However, I appreciated the vast amount of information that Homer throws around. It is what makes this story a page-turner; every page is meaningful to the plot and presents something new. A lot of times Homer will do something called invocation of a muse, which presents a different narrator’s perspective in order to, for example, go through the Greek and Trojan ranks and characterize the heroes. This literary device also captures interest and is unique from anything I’ve ever read (besides The Odyssey); reading is more enjoyable with this novel literary style.

             For me, the mythical nature of The Iliad is the real reason that I love the story so much. Most fiction novels still follow most fundamental principles of the universe, with a few events in the story going outside the bounds of reality. The Iliad is almost as much about gods and goddesses as it is about the mortal men on earth. Thetis, the mother of Achilles, promises to assist Achilles in his conflict with Agamemnon, saying, “I shall go to Olympus crowned with snow and repeat your prayer to Zeus” (Homer 91). The consequence of this is that the gods become entangled in the conflict: Zeus began to ponder “how to exalt Achilles?—how to slaughter hordes of Achaeans pinned against their ships?” (Homer 99); Aphrodite intervenes in the fight between Paris and Menelaus. There is a plethora of other instances of god-mortal interaction. The War was as much among the gods as men.

            I am used to reading books and stories for English class the main character is always the focus, and he develops, evolves, and ultimately becomes an entirely different person. The Iliad is not like this. Instead, there are dozens of characters, each with a personality embodying a different human trait, the gods included. This type of storytelling combined with the mythical nature of The Iliad are the reasons that this story brings me pleasure to a greater extent than any other novel could.