Could the Gods of Ancient Greek Mythology Still Have Resonance Today?

[Bunyip]

Normally, if I thought I were dealing with someone who had some semblance of intellectual integrity, I would quote and cite from the specialist literature. You, however, confuse "imagination" with your ignorance and refuse to ever produce the basis for your position or your reasons for contradicting the experts in the field whom you dismiss.

Yes mate, you have covered all of those old insults ad naseum. Not interested.

 

[fiat lux]

Plato regarded these as so horrific that they should be banned. Greek and Roman comedy made these myths into jokes, as did poets such as Ovid. Most of these "wonderful, meaningful, instructive" myths you refer to were considered entertainment to Greeks and Romans (or were considered sacrilegious).

This is not true, the Greeks did find humour in the antics of the gods, but they did not turn them into "jokes", in fact the reverse was true; they considered themselves as the playthings of the gods.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

This is not true, the Greeks did find humour in the antics of the gods, but they did not turn them into "jokes",

"Laughter was not marginal in the Greek conception of their gods. Considering how it surfaces again and again in the context of myths and ritual, it must rather be seen as a defining characteristic of the divine world...People laughed at the exalted gods, at the crippled Hephaistos and at the amorous Aphrodite and her fierce lover. The gods had laughed first: all of Olympus roared with laughter at Hephaistos’ performance, and at least the males among them showed uninhibited delight at the torments of the lovers and the agony of the cuckold. Human laughter was mixed with that of the divine, demonstrating that it was permissible to laugh at the gods." (emphases added)
Gilhus, I. S. (1997). Laughing Gods, weeping virgins: Laughter in the history of religion. Routledge.

"For a different laughterless ritual..see Paus. 9.39.13...At the opposite extreme, some Greeks had no qualms about mocking religious practices themselves." (emphasis added)
Halliwell, S. (2008). Greek laughter: A study of cultural psychology from Homer to Early Christianity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

"the Eleusinian Mysteries in classical Athens made provision for multiple ‘official’ moments of ritualised scurrility and associated these with Demeter’s own delight at being (sexually) mocked by an old slave woman (Iambe)"
(ibid)
"Sexual adventures on the part of male gods can certainly be regarded on occasion in a comic light: Zeus’s many adulterous affairs receive this treatment in, for example, the mythological burlesques of Attic Middle and New Comedy" (ibid)

Even when certain Greeks were explicit about not mocking the gods, they testify to the fact that other Greeks did:
"A drunken Bacchus, like a philandering Zeus, a spiteful Hera, or a cheating Apollo, might be acceptable to an heroic age, or even in the fifth century, when people could make fun of their gods without losing respect for them; but it was not so easy for people to take this attitude since the days of Socrates. So Philochorus wrote: 'We must not regard Dionysus, as some people represent him, as a kind of clown and buffoon'"

in fact the reverse was true; they considered themselves as the playthings of the gods.

"Although the gods are portrayed as capable of laughing in several ways, from the affectionate to the bitterly caustic, from the conciliatory to the triumphalist, why is it that they never laugh at human beings (never, for sure, at the human condition), only at themselves"
Gilhus, I. S. (1997). Laughing Gods, weeping virgins: Laughter in the history of religion. Routledge.

 

[Kuzcotopia]

Most people don't know, and I'm kind of okay with that most of the time.

Especially when I think about the fact that while you'd be hard-pressed to introduce teaching Biblical mythology in public schools, most (perhaps all) public schools do some sort of unit on Pagan mythologies. There's all this freaking out about being secular in public schools, and yet we flagrantly discuss Pagan religion whenever we do a literary unit on Pagan mythologies. It's terribly, terribly amusing to me.

As a teacher who's covered Dante, Chaucer, Milton, and Shakespeare, you need to provide students with an understanding of both pagan and Christian mythologies as contextual background.

Remember, these are taught in Literature classes. . . Not Science classes. No one is saying any of it's true.

 

[Riverwolf]

As a teacher who's covered Dante, Chaucer, Milton, and Shakespeare, you need to provide students with an understanding of both pagan and Christian mythologies as contextual background.

Remember, these are taught in Literature classes. . . Not Science classes. No one is saying any of it's true.

My Senior English class in (public) High School did a Bible as Literature thing, and it was the first exposure I ever had to the text itself. I really appreciate that the teacher did that.

 

[Kuzcotopia]

My Senior English class in (public) High School did a Bible as Literature thing, and it was the first exposure I ever had to the text itself. I really appreciate that the teacher did that.

I kind of wish that could be the compromise in the evolution/creationism debate. As an atheist, I still see the bible as an influential piece of literature. I would not have a problem adding it the curriculum officially in that context.

I am of course adamantly opposed to its instruction as an alternative
scientific truth. Certainly Greek/Roman myths are not taught as such.

I actually remember my American History class in high school discussing the bible a little bit.

I learned that Jefferson kept a version of the Bible at his house in Montecello. He had edited it himself, to remove any reference to magic, miracles, or anything supernatural.

Too bad that didn't catch on.

 

[Riverwolf]

I kind of wish that could be the compromise in the evolution/creationism debate. As an atheist, I still see the bible as an influential piece of literature. I would not have a problem adding it the curriculum officially in that context.

I am of course adamantly opposed to its instruction as an alternative
scientific truth. Certainly Greek/Roman myths are not taught as such.

I actually remember my American History class in high school discussing the bible a little bit.

I learned that Jefferson kept a version of the Bible at his house in Montecello. He had edited it himself, to remove any reference to magic, miracles, or anything supernatural.

Too bad that didn't catch on.

As a Heathen (Germanic Polytheist), I certainly don't want the Edda lays taught as any kind of "alternative science", or even as history despite some of them having loose historical basis (and by loose, I've heard it said that Sigurd the Dragon Slayer may have been inspired by King Herman/Arminius who defeated the Romans in the Teutoburg Forest). I'd oppose any such thing just as fiercely as we both oppose Biblical stories taught in such a context.

 

[vaguelyhumanoid]

Absolutely. The myths of polytheistic Europe have as much to teach us as any monotheistic faiths, and are as ingrained in our culture. We divide "religion" from "mythology" based on political history. The fantastical imagery in polytheistic myth is no more "superstitious" or "irrational" than that of the Abrahamic scriptures. In a way, it is less so, because without the exclusivism of a "jealous God" there's no reason why a polytheist needs to see literal truth in their myths. Even when Christian Westerners were punishing homosexual behavior with imprisonment or death, even when they were putting "savage" polytheists to the sword in the colonies, the Greek myths still captivated artists and poets. No wonder Hellenismos is making a comeback.

As for this whole debate about Greek authors laughing at the gods, I see no reason why that should be incompatible with religious reverence. The notion that it's blasphemous to joke about one's gods strikes me as an Abrahamic mindset (and even then, I'm pretty sure Judaism has a lot of theological humor). There is no reason why a religion that affirms wordly existence would treat laughter as insulting or sacrilegious. Norse myth is full of humor, including sexual jokes and witty put-downs. This doesn't go against the spiritual lessons taught in the stories - it highlights them.