A.
Nature worshipped for its
unpredictable force
B.
The explanations of nature
(e.g., why the wind blows) were appeals to anthropomorphic deities’ actions.
C.
Greek idea of order, necessary
for common welfare, necessitated that nature and gods not be seen as chaotic.
D.
Homer identifies Zeus as
chief god.
1.
The problem of conflicts of
polytheism is thus resolved.
2.
Aeschylus- tragic Greek poet identifies Zeus with
the universe. God of order = nature
II.
The role of myths in early
Greek history
A.
Myth- through conscious,
though uncritical, intuition we use our imagination to form insights into
nature and convey them through language and symbols.
B.
Hesiod’s (c. 8th
century BCE: shortly after Homer) Theogony-
inquires beyond sense-world to explain its origins: EROS (see Theogony excerpt in Supplemental
Readings section of website, and Plato’s Symposium
178b).
C.
Categories of Greek Myths
(from McLean and Aspell’s Ancient Western
Philosophy: The Hellenic Emergence)
1.
Divinity
a.
Homer (c. 8th
century BCE): gods are persons, physical realties (e.g. ocean), natural
fatalities (e.g. terror and death), Olympian gods who have a beginning but no
end.
b.
Hesiod: EROS is the oldest
and mightiest of the gods.
2.
Cosmos
a.
Hesiod: well before Titans
and Olympians, Chaos (“immeasurable abyss”) existed.
3.
Humans
a.
Homer: the soul that exists
in Hades is a shadow of the corresponding earthly soul. It is devoid of consciousness and vigor.
b.
6th century
religious movement, Orphism: Orphism claims that the soul is divine and thus
exists in that form in the afterlife, maintaining its divine essence.
4.
Ethics
a.
Homer: military ethics. Focus on the here and now.
III.
Philosophy
A.
Philosophers do not trust
the uncritical imaginations of the mythicists.
They ask questions about evidence (e.g. “what evidence is there for that
view?” and “what view does the available evidence support?”).
B.
But, Aristotle (in his Metaphysics I.ii) considers Homer and
Hesiod primitive philosophers because of their sense of wonder.
C.
The first philosophers were
concerned with the natural world and explanations of it. Philosophy, then, was really a scientific
enterprise.
1. In general, it was not until Socrates
(470-399 BCE) that Philosophy becomes concerned with internal questions of
virtue and the soul.