mhm mm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I am thomas
Pangle, I'm a professor of government
and a co director of the thomas Jefferson
Center for the study of cortex and ideas,
which is the sponsor of This Lecture one
in our series of lectures. It's a undergraduate
great books program but with also uh programs
like this for the general public and everybody
at the university. On the table right
back. There are some brochures if you'd
like more information about the center
and if you're an undergraduate student
and don't know much about it, there's
a sign up sheet. You can get emails and
information uh learn more about the center
now. It's my great pleasure and honor
to introduce our speaker today. Professor
Peter Erin's Dorf of Political Science
and Classics at Davidson College. He is
an old friend and I'm proud to say a former
student who was my co author on a book
we published together a few years ago uh
entitled Justice among Nations on the moral
basis of power and peace Before that,
Professor Erin's Door wrote a book on Plato's
dialogue, the photo entitled The Death
of Socrates and the life of Philosophy
and his classic 1994 study of the proper
historical context in which to view the
political philosophy of Plato has become
must reading in our discipline. It's the
best synoptic discussion of the question
of the proper meaning of historical context
in plato studies that has yet been written
in english. A year or so ago, Cambridge
University Press published his book on
the theme in plays of Sophocles, a book
that I think is the most illuminating discussion
of the political philosophic teaching of
Sophocles that she had been written. And
now Professor Reinsdorf is at work on another
book, soon to be forthcoming from Cambridge
University Press on Homer, a book which
promises to be as illuminating of the great
epic poets teaching as was the book on
Sophocles, illuminating of the great tragic
poets teaching. And the lecture we're
about to hear reflects this current work
viewed in its broadest context. Homer
and classical civilization press their
in store. Mhm. I want to thank my teacher
and friend thomas Pangle also, my dear
friend, Lorraine Pangle and the jefferson
Center for inviting me here. It's a very
great honor and pleasure to be here. Um
The title of my talk is Homer and the foundation
of classical civilization. Um while Homer
has always been regarded as a poet of the
first rank, um it has forgotten today
that such political philosophers as facilities,
Plato and Machiavelli also regarded Homer
as a foundational moral, political and
philosophic thinker, according to Herodotus
facilities. And Socrates Homer was the
theoretical founder of greek civilization.
He uh guided the Greeks in their understanding
of the gods and of their relation to human
beings. He provided the Greeks with a
common moral understanding and he shaped
their imaginings of human and divine greatness
by reflecting on Homer. We can begin to
understand what was what set classical
greek civilization apart from other civilizations,
uh, and why and why Classical civilization
has inspired such intense admiration,
but also such intense hatred Over the last
2500 years. More specifically, as we
will see by studying Homer, we can recognize
the two most distinctive and fundamental
features of classical civilization. First,
it's humanism, it's celebration of human
excellence over divine greatness, and
secondly, it's philosophic rationalism,
that is its elevation of the contemplative
life of the mind over the political and
military life of action. Now, due to
the limits of time. Uh, the lecture will
deal exclusively with Homer's Iliad, but
I'd be happy to talk about the odyssey
in the question and answer period. Now
in this lecture, what I'd like to do is
address what seemed to me to be the two
greatest obstacles to taking homer seriously
as a thinker. The first is his seemingly
frivolous portrayal of the gods. How can
we take seriously a poet who presents the
gods as being such ridiculous beings?
Uh, for example, Homer present Zeus the
greatest of the gods as forgetting completely
about the climactic, tragic life and death
struggle between the chickens and the trojans
because he suddenly gets the hots for his
wife, Hera. Uh moreover, Zeus is not
only ridiculously out of control in his
sexual passion, but he's also amazingly
inept and unwise when overcome by erotic
desire for his wife Hera Zeus proceeds
to declare his love for his wife by referring
to love affairs he has had with seven other
goddesses and mortal women. Uh Zoo says
to his wife, Hera quote, But now let
us go to bed and turn to lovemaking for
never before has loved for any goddess
or woman so melted about the heart inside
me, broken it to submission as now. Not
that time when I love the wife of Dixie,
in who bore me parathas equal to the gods
and council. Nor when I loved Acrisius
daughter, sweet stepping DNA who bore
perseus to me preeminent among men. Nor
when I love the daughter of far renowned
phoenix Europa, who bore me nose to me
and write a mantis, the Godlike. Not
when I love simile or are Kkamini and Thebes.
When Al Kkamini bore a son Heracles, the
strong hearted While similes, son was
dying us dying. Isis the pleasure of mortals.
Not when I love the queen diameter of the
lovely tresses nor when it was glorious
lito. Nor you yourself so much as I love
you now. And sweet longing has taken hold
of me. Um You know, what can it mean
to worship such a comic figure? And how
can we take seriously a poet who presents
the greatest of gods in this way? The
second great obstacle to taking Homer seriously
is this presentation of Achilles as the
greatest hero of the poem. I mean, one
would think that a hero is supposed to
help his fellow human beings too benefit
his comrades in arms and countrymen. As
for example, Hector tries to defend his
family and his city. But Homer tells us
in the first lines of the Iliad that Achilles,
his anger caused terrible sufferings to
his fellow Akins to his fellow soldiers.
And throughout much of the Iliad, Achilles
seems stunningly and singularly savage,
selfish, and treasonous. So how can it
make sense for Homer to present this man
as a model of human greatness? So, in
this lecture, I hope to shed some light
on these, on these two questions. Homer's
poems occupied a place among the Greeks
comparable to that occupied by the Hebrew
scriptures. Among the Hebrews. We may
go so far as to say without too much exaggeration
that Homer's poems and especially his Iliad
were the bible of the ancient Greeks.
Yet if we compare the bible with the Iliad,
we cannot help but be struck by at least
one clear and startling contrast between
the two works. Uh while the bible clearly
and emphatically focuses our attention
on God and his doings. Um the Iliad emphatically
directs our attention and also our admiration
toward the speeches and deeds of its human
heroes. Now, to be sure, I mean, the
hebrew bible presents a galaxy of great
and unforgettable heroes and heroines.
Um Abraham Sarah, Jacob, Hester, Judith
and above all moses and David. But what
is characteristic of the heroes of the
Hebrew bible is that they attribute their
heroic deeds to God. Uh David who of all
biblical heroes most resembles Achilles.
No, I mean who like Achilles is a great
warrior, a great friend, a lover of music
and poetry, David declares to Goliath
just before he kills him. You have come
against me with sword and spear and dagger,
but I come against you in the name of the
lord of hosts. The god of the ranks of
Israel which you have defied. The Lord
will put you into my power this day. The
whole world will know that there is a god
in Israel. All those who are gathered
here will see that the Lord saves without
sword or spear. The battle is the Lord's
and he will put you all into our power.
Is, this example shows human heroism in
the bible tends to be dwarfed by the greatness
of a god who not only creates the heaven
and the earth, but also founds of people
rules over them, leads them into war and
vanquishes their enemies. I mean, God
engages in and dominates those political
and military activities that are usually
associated with heroism. God always comes
to cite as the true hero, the only true
hero of the bible. Uh, God is also uh,
he's not only all powerful warrior and
ruler, but he is by far the most righteous
and the most wise of rulers and warriors.
So his wisdom and his justice eclipse all
human virtues accordingly, the bible appears
to rule out the possibility of human heroism
as it is ordinarily understood. Uh, The
bible teaches that the greatest human excellence
is humility, the bowing down in all before
God. The awareness of human smallness
in the face of God, the full recognition
of God's towering greatness and perfection.
Now, if we turn to the Iliad, we find
that there to the gods play an absolutely
crucial role. Uh, as the opening words
of the poem show, it is a goddess who
ostensibly narrates the entire poem. The
story of the poem, moreover, it is Zeus
who ostensibly plans most of the action
of the Iliad. Uh, and it is the gods
as a whole who determine in large measure
who wins and who loses in battle, who
shall live and who shall die, who shall
win great glory and who shall suffer terrible
sorrow. As Achilles says to King Prime
in book 24 there are two urns that stand
on the dorsal of Zeus and earn of evils
and earn of blessings. If Zeus who delights
in thunder, mingles these and bastos them
on man. He shifts and moves now an evil
again in good fortune. But when Zeus bastos
from the urn of sorrows alone, he makes
man the victim of outrageous deeds. Nevertheless,
it is the human heroes of the poem, not
the gods who excite our interest in admiration.
Uh It is, for example, the human conflicts
between Achilles and Agamemnon uh between
the A key ins and the trojans. Uh and
not the divine conflict between Zeus and
Hera that move us and then gross us. Indeed,
in the light of the human conflicts of
the poem, the divine conflicts, for example,
the bickering between Zeus and Hera seem
petty and silly. Yeah. While the gods
of the Iliad are beings of great splendor
and considerable charm, they never seem
to achieve the nobility and dignity of
such characters as an drama key. Priam's
Hector Patrick lists or achilles. The
gods feelings seems shallower, their souls
thinner and their characters smaller than
those of the greatest heroes and heroines
of the poem. Now, as I suggested before,
this strange portrayal of the gods may
tempt us to dismiss Homer as a primitive
thinker whose understanding of the divine
was itself shallow uh and whose belief
in such gods was crude and and even bizarre.
Um yet Homers seemingly frivolous portrayal
of the gods, in fact reflects a coherent
and even a profound understanding of what
divine beings must be like. one may even
say that Homer's understanding of the divine
is in its own way as profound as the understanding
presented in the bible. And if we only
pause to consider why the human beings
of the Iliad interest us so much more than
the divine beings do, we can, I think,
come to see why Homer portrays the gods
as he does. The simplest reason that the
human characters in the Iliad naturally
engage our interest more than the gods
is that the humans in the poem suffer terrible
things, but the gods do not and cannot,
As Achilles says to pry um in book 24,
such is the way the Gods spun life for
wretched mortals that we live our lives
in grief. But the gods themselves have
no sorrows. The humans in the Iliad are
emphatically mortal beings, mortal beings
who are emphatically aware of their mortality.
As the trojan Ally Glaucus remarks to the
ackee and diabetes in the midst of battle,
as is the generation of leaves. So is
that of men, the wind scatters the leaves
on the ground, but the forest flourishes
with leaves again when the season of spring
returns, such is the generation of men.
one grows while another passes away. The
humans of the poem are beings who are always
aware that death may cut them down at any
moment and the death may snatch from them
their loved ones at any moment. And the
sheer fact that the humans are mortal beings.
The fact that they are so vulnerable to
death means that literally everything is
at stake for them in their choices and
their actions. Achilles, for example,
must choose between either bowing to the
overbearing and unjust, AKI and King Agamemnon
or withdrawing from the A key in army and
letting countless of his comrades die.
Hector's decision to attack the akin's
aggressively far from the great walls of
Troy means that he must run the risk of
letting his warriors be encircled and killed,
his city be destroyed and his wife be enslaved
more generally. Every warrior who fights
knows that he is putting his very existence
at risk. It is the very vulnerability
of these human beings that gives them a
certain dignity. It is paradoxically,
they're very imperfection that gives them
a certain capacity for nobility and greatness
for great courage, great love and great
understanding. Mhm. The gods of the Iliad
on the other hand, are emphatically immortal
beings. Their immortality is of course
a sign of their perfection and yet homer
suggests it is precisely because the gods
are such perfect immortal beings that they
are not and cannot be noble or profound
beings, beings with our human capacity
for courage, for love and even for wisdom
in the first place. And most simply,
the fact that the gods are immortal beings.
The fact that they are invulnerable to
death and to the sorrows connected with
death means that hardly anything is at
stake for them in their choices and in
their actions while the quarrel between
Achilles and Agamemnon leads to terrible
suffering. For all concerned. The quarrel
between Zeus and Hera uh leads to unquenchable
laughter and good cheer. No, I mean why
in the world should the Deathless Gods
make much of a fuss about a dispute among
themselves when they have been bickering
for millennia and will be bickering for
the rest of time? No, and why in the
world should the immortal gods quarrel
over human beings whose lives are but a
free brief moment in the eternal lives
of the gods as the God? Hephaestus remarks
to Zeus and Hera. This will be a disastrous
matter and not to be endured. If you two
are to quarrel over mortals, uh there
will be no pleasure in our noble feast
at all. It will ruin the dinner party
if you're going to quarrel about human
beings. Uh No. So similarly, it is,
Achilles is wonderful and terrible destiny
to choose between living a short but glorious
life if he continues to fight a troy and
living along, but in glorious life, if
he returns home to his father Throughout
the poem, Achilles is aware of the enormous
consequences of his choice for his friends,
his enemies, his family and himself,
and consequently he reflects on this choice.
He reflects on this decision with considerable
care and depth, but his is a choice that
only a mortal human being could face.
Uh no God, no immortal being can ever
face the choice between a short and glorious
life of war with comrades who need your
courage and along but sweet life of peace
with a family who needs your love by definition,
no immortal being can exhibit the courage
or nobility of immortal being, who deliberately
exposes himself to death. Um So Homer
suggests that the gods very immortality
and immortality, which is essential to
their nature, deprives their lives of
the drama, the dignity and the possible
nobility that are human lives possess by
virtue of our mortality. Furthermore,
and perhaps more shockingly, Homer suggests
that the immortal gods cannot love as deeply
as we human beings can to be sure the gods
of the Iliad often exhibit tender feelings
for individual human beings. Uh fetus,
for example, sheds tears for her mortal
son Achilles, and Zeus uh takes pity on
Hector and Achilles and he sheds great
tears of blood when his son Sar Peden is
slain by patrick lists. But his homer
indicates, for example, even those Zeus
feels affection for his son Sar Peden,
he allows him to die simply in order to
avoid squabbling with his wife Sarah.
I mean in this and other ways Homers suggests
that the very fact that the gods are immortal
means that they are fundamentally self
sufficient, that their happiness does
not depend on other beings and consequently
that they can never truly love other beings
as we human beings can. Achilles, for
example, loves his friend. Patrick lists
as much as life itself and more deeply
than the gods ever love anyone. Um Achilles,
his friend, until Lucas understands Achilles
love for Patrick. This perfectly when
until Lucas comes to tell Achilles that
Patroclus has been killed. Homer reports
that until Lucas held the hands of Achilles
as he grieved in his proud heart for he
feared that achilles might cut his own
throat with the iron, until cas fears
that achilles will respond to his friend,
Patrick Alice's death by committing suicide.
And rightly so because Achilles response
to that death by returning to battle,
even though he knows, or perhaps because
he knows that by returning to battle he
will certainly die. That his return will
mean certain death for him. So the human
Antill Ecus understands the power of Achilles
love for Patroclus perfectly. In contrast,
the goddess Thetis, Achilles, divine
mother, does not really understand her
son's love right after she learns both,
that Patrick List is dead and that Achilles
knows that Patrick Ellis is dead. She
asks Achilles, why, then, child do you
lament? She then tells him somewhat obviously,
that even though Patrick List has been
killed at least, Zeus has answered all
of Achilles prayers for the punishment
of Agamemnon. And the Akins, Achilles
answers. But what pleasure is this to
me since my beloved companion has perished?
Patrick lists who my honored beyond all
my companions as greatly as my own self.
He then tries to explain to his uncomprehending
divine mother that he would rather die
than continue to live without the companionship
of his friend. Similarly, in book six,
and drama key tells her husband Hector,
that her entire happiness depends on him
alone. After reminding him that Achilles
has killed her father and her seven brothers
in battle, she concludes Hector. Thus,
you are father to me and my honored mother.
You are my brother, and you. It is who
are my young husband. Please take pity
upon me. Then stay here on the rampart
that you may not make your child an orphan,
Your wife a widow. Consequently, in book
22, when Andra Mickey Learns that Achilles
has slain Hector, the news almost kills
her. In Homer's words, the Black Knight
covered her eyes, she fell backward and
gasped her soul away. But the gods never
grieve in this way because they never love
him this way. Consequently, their passions
always lack the depth and the beauty of
the greatest human passions. In the poem,
it is Homer's teaching that the capacity
to love is intimately bound up with the
capacity to die. Finally, Homer suggests
that in a certain important sense, divine
beings are less wise than human beings.
For, since the gods cannot ever feel for
themselves the terror of death or the misery
of losing to death a loved one on On whom
1's happiness depends. The gods cannot
genuinely understand that terror or that
misery when others feel it. For example,
in book one, when fetus asked Zeus to
punish the occasions for their outrageous
conduct toward Achilles by causing them
to suffer many deaths in battle, Zeus
answers, this is a disastrous matter when
you send me into hostilities with Hera
and she provokes me with words of reproach,
since even as things are forever among
the deathless gods, she quarrels with
me and speaks of how I help the trojans
now. I mean, amazingly, Zeus responds
here by expressing concern not for the
countless number of McKeon's who are to
die. Uh the sorrows of whom Homer devotes
the entire poem to describing nor to the
injustice that Achilles is suffering,
but rather expresses concern for the nagging
and the reproach that he must suffer at
the hands of his wife. Zeus simply doesn't
understand the sorrows of human beings.
He just doesn't get it and he doesn't get
it because of his own immunity from such
sorrows and hence because of his own divine
nature. I mean in this way Zeus is immortality
and his divine perfection paradoxically
render his understanding of human beings
shallow and imperfect and homer invites
us to wonder whether this imperfect understanding
is not a necessary consequence of being
a god. The Clearest examples of a human
understanding that surpasses divine understanding
may be found in book 24 of the Iliad.
In the characters of prime and achilles.
In that book, the God tell the Trojan
King Priam's, who is grieving for his
dead son Hector and who is grieving over.
Achilles is outrageous treatment of Hector's
corpse to go alone to the A key in camp
and ask Achilles to give him the corpse
of his son. Now, even though Prime knows
that the gods have commanded Achilles to
return the corpse of Hector to his father,
Prime also knows that Achilles hatred for
Hector may lead him to defy the gods.
So Prime faces the extremely delicate,
difficult and dangerous task of somehow
inducing Achilles to overcome his anger,
to feel compassion for the father of his
hated enemy and to return the corpse of
his son. Now the God Hermes advises Prime
quote, go in yourself and clasp the knees,
appeal leah's son Achilles and entreat
him in the name of his father, the name
of his mother of the lovely hair and his
child and so moved the spirit within him.
Prime, however, departs from the gods
advice in two crucial respects. First,
he not only clasps the knees of Achilles,
but he he kisses his hands the very hands
that killed his son. Secondly program
is silent about Achilles divine mother
and speaks to him only of his mortal father.
These are primes words mm. Achilles like
the gods. Remember your father one who
is of years just like mine. And on the
destructive door sill of old age and they
who dwell nearby encompass him and afflict
him. Nor is there anyone to defend him
against harm and disaster? Yet, surely
when he hears of you and that you are still
alive, uh He his heart, the heart within
him rejoices and all his days. He hopes
that he will see his beloved son come home
from the Trow ad. But I myself had no
such destiny for I have sired the best
sons in Why Troy? But I say not. One
of them is left to me. Have aw then for
the gods Achilles and take pity on me remembering
your father yet eyes, I'm still more pitiful.
I have endured what no other mortal on
earth has endured. I put my lips to the
hands of the man who killed my Children.
So he spoke says homer and stirred in achilles
belonging to grieve for his own father.
Prime understands that the only way that
he can melt Achilles his heart and overcome
his anger and hatred toward Hector and
Prime and all the trojans is by reminding
achilles of their common human sufferings,
their common human sorrows and their common
human fate. The only way that Prime can
inspire such humanity and pity and achilles
is by speaking to him of his human father
and not at all about his divine mother,
and hence by reminding achilles emphatically
of the mortal nature and condition which
he shares with Prime. Now this strategy
of problems is a complete success. Achilles
goes on to remark to pry um such as the
way the gods spun life for wretched mortals,
that we live our lives in grief. But the
gods themselves have no sorrows and Achilles
does proceed to return the corpse of Hector,
but it is important to see that prime strategy
is based on an essentially human wisdom,
which surpasses the wisdom of the gods.
For the God, Hermes does not recognize
the importance for Prime of reminding achilles
of their common human sorrows because the
God Hermes has never felt such sorrows,
can never feel such sorrows and therefore
cannot appreciate their importance. I
mean, no God can truly know the heart
of Achilles because no God can feel the
human passions that burn in that human
heart. Only a fellow human being who has
felt the hatred and anger that Achilles
feels can know how to move achilles to
overcome them. In book 24, Achilles two
exhibits and understanding which in an
important sense, surpasses that of the
Gods. In that book, the God's command
Achilles to return the corpse of Hector
to his father prime, and Achilles dutifully
obeys this commandment. Now, even though
the gods have ordered Achilles to do this,
this action of Achilles nevertheless exhibits
a certain nobility on his part. For Hector
was the man who killed his beloved friend
Patroclus. So it's hard for Achilles to
return the corpse by returning the corpse.
He has to, as he supposes, act in a way
that dishonors the memory of his friend
of his beloved friend, he has to return
the corpse of his worst enemy to the father
of his worst enemy and he has to overcome
the terrible anger that he feels. But
then Achilles goes well beyond merely returning
the corpse of Hector to premium. Achilles
expresses pity for prime. But most importantly,
he gives content to that pity by granting
prime and the trojans a 12 day truce so
that they may bury their beloved Hector
in peace. And Achilles grants this truce
completely of his own free will, without
any commandment from the gods. Now, this
is an act of human rather than divine compassion
for Achilles. Act reflects his understanding
of Priam's grief. But the gods cannot
know what it means to suffer as Prime has
suffered. Only a human being, can understand
that only a human being who has loved as
deeply as Prime has and who has suffered
a loss as heartbreaking as Primes loss
can genuinely feel for Prime and can genuinely
understand him. Homer suggests then that
in a certain sense, human wisdom eclipses
divine wisdom. He suggests that thanks
to our mortality, we human beings have
a certain nobility, a certain depth of
soul and a certain wisdom which divine
and immortal beings do not and cannot possess.
Therefore Homer suggests it is reasonable
and just for us to direct our attention
to the human tragedy rather than the divine
comedy of the Iliad and to focus our admiration
on the excellence of its human heroes and
heroines rather than on the doings of its
immortal gods and goddesses. And I would
suggest that as a result of Homer's influence,
two of the distinctive features of greek
civilization were to be. It's extraordinary
celebration of the beauty of the human
animal, body and soul as can be seen in
greek athletics, greek, sculpture and
greek nudity, and also it's singularly
questioning posture toward the divine as
can be seen in greek philosophy. In other
words, it is homer who made possible the
liberation from religious law and the proud
unabashed glorification of human excellence
of the intellectual moral and physical
excellence of mortal beings, mortal human
beings, which were to become the hallmarks
of classical civilization. But even if
we agree that it was Wise of Homer to focus
our attention on the human heroes of this
poem rather than on the gods. We may still
wonder why Achilles, uh, why of all the
great heroes of the Iliad? Is it Achilles
who is presented as the greatest hero of
them all? Um The hero of all heroes,
The simplest answer to this question is
that Achilles is the greatest warrior of
the poem. And Homer illustrates Achilles
greatness as a warrior in a number of ways,
when Achilles withdraws from the battle,
uh, the A key in start to lose. When
the Achilles rejoins the battle, the occasion
start to win furthermore. In book 18,
the mere appearance of the unarmed Achilles
on the battle field strikes terror in the
hearts of the mighty trojans. Uh and he
need only shout three times uh to drive
the entire trojan army away from the A
key in camp. Finally, in book 20, Zeus
says that unless the Gods Intervene, Achilles
will destroy troy singlehandedly uh and
will conquer it all by himself. So, Achilles
is without a doubt the toughest and the
most effective of all the warriors in the
Iliad. No one comes close to rivaling
his exploits on the battlefield. And consequently
it is tempting to believe that Homer focuses
our attention on Achilles because Achilles
is the greatest warrior of them all. There
are however, a number of compelling reasons
for resisting this temptation. For even
though Homer presents Achilles is amazing
exploits in battle. Homer also goes out
of his way to provoke our compassion for
Achilles victims. In book 20 we see the
enraged Achilles slaughter the helpless
Trojan soldiers and butcher two of Priam's
young sons as they beg for mercy. Then,
in book 22, we see prime hecuba and and
drama key go mad with grief when they hear
that Achilles has slain Hector and is defiling
his corpse. Finally, in book 23, We
see Achilles Behead 12 Trojan Children
and just more generally on virtually every
page of the Iliad Homer presents with sorrow
and with pity, the horrors and the ugliness
of war. Just to cite one example at the
climactic moment of the story of the Iliad
in book 22 when Achilles is chasing Hector
across the Trojan plain and is about to
kill him and thereby pave the way for the
destruction of Troy. Uh Homer interrupts
his narrative to describe two springs of
water. Um he then says, besides these
in this place, and close to them are the
beautiful washing Hollows of stone were
the wives of the Trojans, and they're
beautiful daughters washed the clothes
to shining in the old days when there was
peace before the coming of the sons of
the occasions. Even in the midst of the
high drama of heroic combat, Homer always
insists on reminding the reader of the
terrible price of war, of the sweet pleasures
of peace destroyed by the violence of war.
I mean, the man who wrote the Iliad could
not have regarded the capacity to kill
efficiently as the highest human virtue.
So consequently, Homer cannot have regarded
Achilles as the best of the occasions,
simply because he was the strongest and
the most warlike of the occasions. Furthermore,
and perhaps more importantly, Achilles
is far from being a loyal and dutiful warrior.
He is not at all a model comrade in arms.
In the very first lines of the poem, Homer
points out that the anger of Achilles led
to the death of countless numbers of his
fellow soldiers. In book one, we see
Achilles rebel against Agamemnon, his
commander, say his commander in chief.
We then see Achilles abandoned his fellow
warriors in the midst of a war to the tender
mercies of the Trojans. And finally we
see Achilles pray that Zeus bring disaster
and destruction not only to Agamemnon but
to all the Akins. So, Achilles seems
to be a shockingly disloyal warrior. He
is not semper fi. Ah and so we must ask,
why does Homer encourage us to admire this
traitor to his army and his people? I
mean, this question is reinforced by the
fact that in the Iliad there is seemingly
a seemingly shining example of a brave
but decent and dutiful warrior. Namely
Hector. Hector fights courageously and
doggedly in defense of his family and his
people. He never rebels. He never withdraws
from battle. He never curses his fellow
soldiers. Furthermore, Hector is not
a blind partisan of the Trojan cause.
In his very first words in the Iliad in
book three, Hector condemns his brother
paris as evil uh for having kidnapped the
Ackee and Queen Helen and for having thereby
provoked the Kenyans to attack Troy. So
Hector is acutely and painfully aware of
the moral ambiguity of the Trojan cause.
Nevertheless, he fulfills his duty to
his city, his family and his soldiers.
So Hector would seem to be the most obviously
admirable hero of the story uh in our society.
Perhaps in any society it is to citizens
like Hector, that all honors go. So why
does Homer encourage us to reflect on and
admire the disloyal and selfish Achilles
rather than the virtuous and dutiful Hector,
in order to see what may be admirable about
Achilles not withstanding his disloyalty
to the occasion. Cause let us consider
the genesis of that disloyalty. As we
learn in book nine, Achilles has always
known that it was his fate either to live
a short life with undying glory if he went
to fight at Troy or to live a long life,
but without the glory of being a noble
human being, if he remained at home with
his family. And such was Achilles dedication
to the warriors, noble life of virtue
and duty, that he went to Troy and fought
for the occasions without any apparent
hesitation For more than nine years. For
more than nine years, Achilles was as
dutiful a warrior as Hector. Even though
unlike Hector, he knew that he would certainly
lose his life as a consequence of his dutiful
nous. For more than nine years, Achilles
was willing to sacrifice his life in order
to help his fellow Akins and in order to
win their gratitude and honor for himself.
Nevertheless, the day arrived in which
Achilles came to question the wisdom and
the goodness of his devotion to duty and
honor. And it is that momentous day which
marks the beginning of the Iliad. As the
poem opens, we learned that the chickens
are suffering from a terrible, deadly
plague sent by the God Apollo. As punishment
for Agamemnon is refusal to give up his
captive mistress to her father, who is
a priest of Apollo. Now, it is important
to see that Agamemnon is behavior here
is truly outrageous. Ah after all the
kids have been fighting and dying far from
their homes for nine long years for the
sake of Agamemnon in order to get back
his kidnapped sister in law Helen. Yet
Agamemnon refuses to protect the occasions
from Apollo's wrath simply in order to
gratify his selfish desire for mistress.
Achilles, however, intervenes to save
the army from disaster. He calls an assembly.
He alone speaks out against Agamemnon selfishness,
and Achilles succeeds in inducing Agamemnon
to return his mistress to her father and
thereby brings the deadly plague to an
end. Agamemnon however, rewards Achilles
good deed by dishonoring him. He denounces
Achilles and then he humiliates him by
robbing him of his own mistress. And even
though Achilles has just saved the army
once again ah from disaster. No, not
a single man in the army speaks up on Achilles
behalf or intervenes in his defense. Now,
this whole affair demonstrates to Achilles
that when push comes to shove his king
and his comrades do not give a damn about
him and his dutiful nous Achille suddenly
sees that for the past nine years, the
akin's have simply been using him for their
own selfish ends, that they have been
using him as a kind of killing machine.
Uh, he sees that the occasion cause is
not worth worthy of his devotion, that
the Ackee and men are not worthy of his
sacrifice is, and that their honor is
simply not worth fighting for. Consequently,
Achilles curses the McKeon's withdraws
from the war and asked Zeus to punish them
for their injustice. We see then that
Achilles disloyalty to the occasion cause
is at least somewhat justifiable, but
further, more and more importantly, Achilles
is led by this incident to question the
whole way of life of the warrior. In book
nine, Achilles raises the following series
of questions Why must the warrior continually
risk his life and endure pain in his soul
for the sake of others? What good does
it bring to him? What difference does
such heroic sacrifice make? Don't hero
and coward alike eventually suffer the
same death? The common fate of all human
beings? Achilles also asks how desirable
our honor and glory when they only come
from selfish men and when we must all die
anyway gloriously or ingloriously, Achilles
also wonders whether the apparent apparently
noble life of war is truly preferable to
the quiet life of peace. He wonders whether
the life with loved ones, family and friends
is not ultimately better for such mortal
beings as ourselves, uh, than the warriors
painful devotion to duty and honor. Finally,
later in the poem in books 16, Achilles
wonders uh too late tragically, whether
the warriors pursuit of honor does not
ultimately destroy the possibility of such
friendship as that which he has with Patrick
lists since honor is not a good that can
be truly shared and consequently, those
who pursue honor are necessarily competitors
and rivals rather than friends. I mean,
in other words, aren't those who seek
to be honored as the best as number one,
uh necessarily at war with all other human
beings, since only one can receive the
highest honors. Now, it is true that
Achilles does not ultimately act on these
doubts about the warriors life. He does
not leave Troy with his friend Patrick
lists and return home to his father even
though he threatens to do so. And eventually,
Achilles returns with a vengeance to his
former life as a warrior. Still, Achilles
is the only character in the poem to raise
far reaching questions about duty and honor
and about life and death. He is the only
hero in the poem who truly wonders about
and who truly challenges the whole way
of life of the hero. Achilles is the most
thoughtful and the most questioning hero
of the Iliad. It is precisely because
Achilles comes closest to ascending from
the life of heroic action to the life of
heroic questioning. That Homer encourages
us to admire him as the best of the Akins
and indeed as the greatest hero in the
poem. Furthermore, Achilles is the only
warrior in the poem who appreciates the
finest pleasures of peace. At the beginning
of book nine, Odysseus Ajax and phoenix
find Achilles as Homer says, delighting
his mind with his lyre, delighting his
spirit by singing of men's fame. Achilles
is the only character in the poem who evidently
loves music and poetry. He is the only
character in the poem who shares this love
with the singer, Homer himself, moreover,
achilles cherishes a friend, Patroclus,
who means more to him than victory or glory.
A friend who means as much to Achilles
as Hector means to Andhra mickey, a friend
who is as dear to him as life itself and
whose death leads Achilles to kill himself
by returning to battle against the trojans.
So, Achilles is a warrior who sees and
feels for himself the limits of the life
of a warrior. Even in the midst of the
clamor of war, he cherishes the blessings
of peace, the beauty of song and the sweetness
of love accordingly. While Hector maybe
the more dutiful warrior, it is Achilles
who seems to be the more thoughtful and
the fuller human being. He combines,
you could say the bravery of Hector with
the heart and depth of soul of Andhra mckee.
Achilles has a humanity, a depth of feeling
and understanding which the more conventional
warrior Hector never displays. Achilles
raises questions about the warrior's life
of duty and honor, which Hector never
even comes close to considering so it is
not Hector, but Achilles who approaches
the life devoted to questioning the life
devoted to wisdom. Consequently, it is
fitting that Homer's should encourage us
to admire the questionable and questioning
Achilles even more than we admire the loyal
Hector. Now, as I have already mentioned,
Achilles does return to the life of the
warrior. Despite all his doubts. Once
Hector kills Patroclus, Achilles returns
to battle and commits all the horrible
deeds which I've described deeds which
culminate with the killing of Hector and
the outrage mint, outrageous treatment
of Hector's corpse And so savage is achilles.
His anger at the dying Hector so fierce
is his hatred that in book 22, Achilles
goes so far as to tell him as he's dying
no no more in treating of me, you dog
by knees or parents. I wish only that
my fury and spirit would somehow drive
me to hack your flesh away and eat it raw
for the things that you have done to me.
Yet. At the very end of the poem, Achilles
performs the greatest act of compassion
in the Iliad again. He not only returns
Hector's body to his father problem as
the gods commanded him to do, he also
freely grants program and the trojans a
12 day truce. 12 days of peace during
which they can bury Hector undisturbed.
And what is so beautiful about this act
is that it's so unselfish. I mean, there's
nothing, there's no need for Achilles
to do this. There is nothing in it for
him. He does this because he pities prime
because he understands his sorrow and because
for one fleeting moment, Achilles divines
the common humanity which he shares with
the father of his most hated foe. Now,
the very ending of the Iliad reminds us
just how brief this moment of reconciliation
between Achilles and Priam is for. The
poem ends with the completion of Hector's
burial, and hence with the resumption
of the Ward, We may presume then that
Achilles will return to the war and there
with to his life of duty and of honor,
of anger and of killing. So even though
Achilles transcends the horizon of the
glory seeking warrior, even though he
rises above his warrior spirit and anger
and ambition, he eventually returns in
some fashion or other to the glorious and
miserable life of the warrior. Now, the
example of Achilles invites us to ask the
following questions. Is there anyone in
the Iliad who displays the understanding
and the compassion of Achilles without
ever displaying any trace of his savage
anger and inhumanity? Is there anyone
who feels for both sides in this conflict
without taking either side? Is there anyone
in the poem who appreciates the grander
and the horror of war while also cherishing
and even living the life of peace? I would
suggest that there is one such character
namely Homer himself. After all, it is
Homer who presents the drama of the war
with an unsure, inking, piercing clarity,
but also with understanding and pity.
It is Homer who makes us feel for who makes
us admire, but who also makes us question
the heroes and heroines of the poem? I
mean the heroes and heroines of the Iliad
are beings of unforgettable nobility and
humanity. But in my experience, the more
you read the Iliad, the more you come
to admire the wisdom, the heart and the
humanity of Homer himself. So I conclude
my lecture with the following suggestion
that the true hero of the Iliad is not
the God Zeus nor the warrior Hector nor
even achilles himself. The true hero of
the Iliad is the philosophic poet Homer
the wise, the compassionate and above
all the human poet of this emphatically
human poem. No. Yeah. Mm. Yeah. Yeah.
Yes. Yeah. Mm. Yeah. Mhm.