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Philosophy: Myth in Hesiod and Homer” SummaryHumans have wondered at our own existence and asked questions like, “What’s
it all about?” “How are we to understand this life of ours?” “How is it best lived?” “Does it end at death?” “This world we find ourselves in --- where does it come from?” “What is it, anyway?” “How is it related to us?” Every culture offers answers, though not every culture has developed what we know as
philosophy. Philosophers try to give us good reasons about believing one thing or another about these matters. There becomes a tension between the myths and philosophy, a tension that occasionally breaks into open conflict. 399 B.C. Socrates was accused of not believing in the city’s gods and corrupting the young people of Athens. The Greeks of the sixth and fifth centuries B.C. who first began to ask the questions that led to philosophical thinking. The poet we know as Hesiod probably composed his poem Theogony toward the end of the eighth century B.C. which he includes an immense amount of detail in his short work. Hesiod tells of many other gods and goddesses, some obscure and some identifiable with features of the earth, natural forces, human passions, or moral enforcement. Hesiod’s version of a characteristic theme in Greek thought, a theme repeated again and again in the great classical tragedies and also echoed in later philosophy: Violating the rule of justice---even in the service of justice---brings consequences. Xenophanes tells us that “from the beginning all have learnt in accordance with Homer.” Poets were thought to write by divine inspiration, and for centuries people listened to or read the works of Homer, much as they read the Bible today. Homer’s world is one of kings and heroes, majestic but flawed, engaged in gargantuan projects against a background of gods who cannot safely be ignored.