Feast of the Gods

Today, since it is Thanksgiving after all, I thought I’d discuss the scene at the end of Book I of the Iliad, in which the gods are having a feast on Olympus. This time, I don’t want to discuss the mechanics of translation. Instead, I want to talk about the ways in which our modern sensibilities clash with the ancient values of Homer and his original audience. Often, the characters in Homer are motivated by values that are very familiar to us today: loyalty, piety, family, friendship—power, ambition, fear, revenge. But just as often, their values can seem alien to us; and we may wonder what the ancient listeners of Homer truly thought when they heard these stories.

Let me set the stage for the scene (Iliad I.533-611; I won’t bother to label the passages below). Zeus has just made a secret agreement with Achilles’ mother, the goddess Thetis. Achilles has been slighted by the Greek commander Agamemnon, and his mother wants to ensure that it doesn’t go unpunished. And how do the gods punish a general? By slaughtering his soldiers, of course. Zeus agrees to strengthen the Trojans in battle to force Agamemnon to make amends with Achilles. He warns Thetis that “this is toxic business, when you set me at odds with Hera,” because Hera favors the Greeks and would never condone their slaughter at the hands of the Trojans. Still, he makes a secret pact with her, and heads back to Olympus:

Zeus returned to his own house—all of the gods together
rose from their seats to greet the Father face to face, and
no one dared to tarry, but everyone stood to greet him.

Right away we sense the fear of Zeus in the other gods as they scramble to stand and greet him. Hera is the only one who shows no fear at first:

Thus he took his seat upon his throne; but Hera
wasn’t oblivious, she had seen him hatching plans with
silver-footed Thetis, the ancient sea god’s daughter.
Speaking, she cut at the heart of Zeus the son of Cronus:
“Which of those sneaky gods were you hatching plans with this time?
Every time I turn my back, you always love to
ponder on secret things, and pass down secret judgments—
never a word of what you will, do you dare to tell me.”

She uses the same word, “dare” (variant forms of “τλάω”), that Homer used to communicate the fear in the other gods—implying that, whereas the other gods are afraid of Zeus, Zeus is only afraid of Hera.

Hera’s feelings are complex. Zeus is her husband, and her brother, and in the mythology they are intimately bound by a history of shared struggles on the one hand, antagonism on the other. She is jealous, and rightly so: her husband is well known as a philanderer with both mortals and goddesses. She could never leave him, or she would risk facing eternal punishment at the hands the god of thunder—how can anyone leave an abusive god? On the other hand, maybe she doesn’t want to leave him. She can give as much as she gets, and she does enjoy a certain privilege as the wife of the most powerful god, and certainly she uses this to her advantage; after all, how could she assist her beloved Greeks if she were powerless?

So she’s outraged at her husband’s secrecy and what she supposes he’s planning, with maybe a tinge of jealousy because the secrecy involves another goddess. These are emotions we can understand. It’s a dispute among gods, with implications for the fate of the Greek and Trojan armies—but really, it’s not so different from any argument between a secretive husband and a jealous wife. Let’s move on.

Then in return, the Father of men and gods responded:
“Hera, do not hope to know of all my designs, for
even though you’re my wife, they’ll be hard for you to fathom.
Still, though, whatever you would be able to hear, there’s no one,
neither among the gods nor men, who will know it before you.
But, whatever I want to will apart from the other
gods, you don’t get to probe and pry with all of your questions.”

Zeus’s response is patronizing in the extreme. “What I’m planning is really too complicated for you to understand, my dear. But you’ll be the first to know when there’s something worth telling you.” Well, maybe except Thetis, right? Do we really expect this to win Hera over? Does Zeus think she is stupid enough to take it and roll over? I think not. He’s playing a game; he’s trying to win the upper hand, and force her to concede to his position. We can tell by the way he ends his response. First he patronizes her, then he placates her, and then he implies his power over her: “you don’t get to,” he says.

Hera does not back down. But her retort is more careful, more politic, than her initial impulse:

Then in response to him, Hera the cow-eyed queen retorted:
“Terrible son of Cronus, what sort of words are you saying?
I’ve never probed and prodded too much in the past, now have I?
You feel free to tell yourself whatever you want, though.
Now there’s a terrible fear in my heart that she’s won you over—
silver-footed Thetis, the ancient sea god’s daughter.
Early this morning, she sat you down and grasped your knees, and
I suspect you nodded your head to honor Achilles,
ending the lives of many against the Achaean warships.”

She’s playing coy: “I’ve never done that before, have I?” Of course she has. If Zeus is gonna patronize her, she’ll do it right back to him. But then she cuts to the heart of the matter: she knows he met with Thetis. She knows Thetis got on her knees for him (as a supplicant, of course; but maybe there’s a hint of sexual innuendo here as well). And she knows what Thetis wanted, and she suspects that Zeus went along with it—her husband’s not great, after all, at refusing the pleas of women.

Now it starts to get a little darker:

Then in answer, Zeus who assembles the clouds addressed her:
“Mischievous little sprite, you’re always full of suspicion.
Nothing slips past you. But what can you gain, except to be farther
still from my heart, where you’ll find it only gets colder and colder.
If it is as you say, then it must be the way that I like it.
Sit back down and be quiet, and you will do as I tell you—
all the gods on Olympus cannot protect you, when I come
closer and lay my irresistible hands upon you.”

The word Zeus calls her, “sprite” (“δαιμονίη” or “daemon”), is meant as a diminutive insult, in context. She is a lesser deity, and she’d best be careful. Again he imposes his will upon her: “If it is as you say, then it must be the way that I like it.” If I did it, then damn it, I wanted to do it, and what are you gonna do about it? “Sit back down and be quiet,” he says, “and you will do as I tell you.” He ends by threatening physical violence upon her: you better shut up, or I will beat you.

It’s not that such scenes are absent from the modern world. Of course domestic violence is still a thing, of course there are abusers in the world (too many, though even one is far too many) who make threats just as Zeus does. There always have been, and always will be. The fact of it is not what’s alien to us. The context is what makes it strange. This is Zeus, the God of gods, after all; and he’s saying all this in front of every god on Olympus, and nobody does a thing. No one so much as suggests that he’s in the wrong. Partly, it’s out of fear: if you cross Zeus, you will pay for it.

But we have to wonder, is it partly out of acceptance? How did the ancient audience perceive this? Surely most of them sympathized with Hera’s dilemma—but did they accept Zeus’s behavior as “normal.” Poor Hera, but there’s nothing she can do about it? Strength is the currency of power for Homer’s gods and warriors. Hera relents; she chooses to back down rather than be beaten in front of all her friends and family, and who can blame her?:

Thus he spoke, and Hera the cow-eyed queen now feared him—
now she sat down quietly, bending her heart to his pleasure.
All through the house of Zeus, the gods of Heaven were troubled.

That wonderful line. It’s exactly what the audience is feeling. A good bard would pause a moment here, and let the disquiet soak in with the quiet.

Now the god Hephaestus, their son, who has been watching silently during the entire scene, chimes in, hoping to temper the mood a little:

Then Hephaestus, the famous craftsman, began to address them,
lifting the mood of his loving mother, the white-armed Hera:
“This is toxic business, unbearable really, if you two
squabble and carry on like this for the sake of mortals,
driving your discord home to the gods. And there’ll be nothing
good to enjoy in the feast, when the worst prevails among us.

He uses the same phrase his father used when making his secret pact with Thetis: “This is toxic business.” But he doesn’t confront his father—he minimizes the whole thing. It’s not that Zeus is out of line, no. Instead, the real problem is that the two of them have brought their bedroom squabbles to the dinner table, and damn it, it’s ruining our good time! What’s more, you’re bickering over the fates of mortals—what could be less important? Now, let’s stop this fighting and enjoy the feast. Hephaestus’ response reminds me of the line in Monty Python and the Holy Grail: “This is supposed to be a happy occasion! Let’s not bicker and argue about who killed who.”

We could take it at face value: perhaps Hephaestus really is so coldhearted, so selfish, that he’s more concerned with enjoying the feast than he is with his mother’s welfare. Perhaps he thinks his father is in the right, or at least within his rights. Or perhaps he only being politic, just as his mother was before. How else can he calm the situation without invoking the wrath of the Father of gods? Hephaestus continues:

Mother, no matter what you might have perceived, I urge you:
lift the mood of our dear Father Zeus, so Father
never abuses us again, nor disturbs our feasting.
If the Olympian lord of lightning ever wants to
strike us from our seats, he is far too strong to resist it.
So, go back to him now, and you pin him up with your soft words;
then the Olympian god will again be gracious to us.”

Now, this really affronts our modern sensibilities. Hephaestus is urging his mother to placate his abusive father. He begins with a little light gaslighting: “no matter what you might have perceived.” The phrase at once questions and dismisses Hera’s knowledge of the secret pact between Zeus and Thetis. Then he urges her to cheer up her husband, so that he doesn’t beat them. It offends our sensibilities… but how many people find themselves in this exact situation? How many people make the exact compromise Hephaestus has made? Zeus has all the power over them, and perhaps this really is the best they can do to survive in their situation.

Hephaestus reiterates his plea, and then recounts the story of what happened the last time he stood up to the God Zeus, his father:

Thus he spoke, and springing up with a two-handled goblet,
placed it in both of his loving mother’s hands; and he told her:
“Patience, my mother, bear up, no matter how much you’re distressed, or
dear as you are, I’ll have to see you beaten before my
very eyes, and no matter how greatly I grieve, I will never
manage to save you then, for it’s dire to oppose the Olympian.
I was bent on defending you once already—
grabbing my foot, he flung me off of the gods’ high doorstep.
All day long I dropped, borne down with the setting sun, and
landed in Lemnos, with little breath still left in my spirit.
After the fall, the Sintian people nursed me to health there.”

He stood up to Zeus once before, and his father slung him off the mountain by his foot. This isn’t a joke. Father will kill you, or since you’re immortal, he’ll come as close as he can. The fall from Olympus nearly killed Hephaestus. Though it isn’t mentioned here, the fall also permanently crippled him, giving him a limp that becomes a feature of the passage that follows:

Thus he spoke, and the white-armed goddess Hera smiled, and
smiling still, she took the cup from the hand of her child.
Making the rounds from left to right to the other gods, he
dipped sweet nectar up from the mixing bowl and poured it.
Now an unquenchable laughter arose in the blessed gods, who
watched as Hephaestus bustled, panting throughout the palace.

Hera was feeling afraid, beginning to back down—but maybe she would’ve risked it all, if it weren’t for her son. How true to life, how true to a mortal mother, though Hera is a goddess: she submits herself to her abusive husband, only for the sake of her son.

Then Hephaestus bustles around pouring wine, and the gods all laugh at him—presumably at the difficulty he is having due to his limp. What is the audience supposed to feel here? Is this meant as a moment of levity, as it is for the laughing gods, after so tense and dark a scene? Let’s all laugh at the cripple? Perhaps this was Homer’s intention, or perhaps not; perhaps his ancient audiences would have laughed along with the heartless gods, or perhaps not. But surely to us, the scene only becomes even darker. Zeus gave Hephaestus that limp, when he cast him off Olympus for standing up to him; and now the gods are laughing at his disability. Surely Hephaestus feels it, surely his mother can feel it—but are the rest of the gods laughing for fear of Zeus, or is this really a “let them eat cake” moment for them? The genius of Homer is that he never tells us.

The scene, as well as Book I, ends with the following passage. The gods go on with the feast as though nothing has happened:

So, after that, and the whole day long till the sun went down, they
feasted, and no one’s spirit was missing a share of the feasting,
nor the beautiful sound of the lyre in the hands of Apollo,
nor the beautiful voice of the Muses singing in answer.

After the blazing light of the sun went down, they all went
back to rest in their chambers, each to their own abode, for
each of them had a house that Hephaestus, the famous cripple,
built with his skillful hands and all of his cunning and knowhow.
Zeus, the Olympian lord of lightning, went up to his own bed,
where he had always lain when sweet sleep came upon him.
There he lay asleep, with gold-throned Hera beside him.

They enjoy the music and food and drink of the gods until sunset, then they all return to their chambers. Hephaestus, the abused son, the cripple they were making fun of, is the one who built them all their houses. But that’s easy to forget, wandering drunk through the door after the party, ready to lie down and sleep.

The end of Book I is beautiful and dark and terrifying: “There he lay asleep, with gold-throned Hera beside him.” Zeus falls asleep after the feasting and partying, as if nothing had happened. He is undisturbed. But after everything—the lies, the abuse, the threats, the brainwashing—Hera in the end has to lie down beside him. I imagine her eyes are open.

How did Homer’s original audience feel about all of this? Some of them—some of them had to have understood it as we do today. No doubt there were victims of domestic abuse among the many in Homer’s audience—at the very least, they would have understood. But others perhaps shrugged it off and enjoyed the feast, just as the other gods did. Strength is indeed the currency of power in Homer’s world, and Zeus is the strongest god. And how does anyone disobey the strongest god?