Week VII: Accepting Death and Limiting Vengeance

Civilization from Humanity or by Divine Command

November 4, 6:00 PM - 7:30 pm

Reading: Iliad, 22.1-24, 22.248-411, 23.1-110, 23.134-153, 24.1-140, 24.471-691.

Both the Odyssey and the Iliad end with gods having to restrain the bloodthirsty vengeance of heroes. The demand of his friendship with Patroklos leads Achilles to insatiable vengeance against Hektor for killing him (24.592-594).

  • Does the bitterness of Patroklos’ death for Achilles arise also from the bitterness of seeing his own death (e.g. 19.328-339)?

  • Achilles kills Hektor and repeatedly mutilates his body, but Zeus commands the return of the body to his father Priam (24.113-116). Without a divine command, would common humanity alone—like the sympathy of Achilles for Priam’s suffering in losing his son Hektor, as Achilles imagines his own father Peleus suffers without him (24.503-512)—be sufficient to overcome the savagery of Achilles’ vengeance and loyalty to his friend?

  • Are the gods needed because decency and civilization is not natural (24.560-570, 24.582-586), or is common human sympathy alone sufficient to establish decent behavior between men of different clans or nations?

Reading