CHAPTER 2: ZEUS' RISE TO POWER

I. TITANOMACHY

    A. THE TITAN SIDE

        1. Kronos and his siblings

            a. but not Themis and Prometheus (son of two Titans)

    B. ZEUS' SIDE

        1. His siblings, the Olympian gods, freed by the emetic (salt, mustard, honey) given to Kronos by Metis

        2. The Cyclopes and Hekatonchires (100 hands)

    C. THE BATTLE IN HESIOD (MORFORD 50)

        1. Imagery of a storm

    D. VAE VICTIS 'WOE TO THE CONQUERED'

        1. Titans to Tartarus

        2. Atlas, the brother of Prometheus, must hold up the earth

        3. Kronos exiled to Italy

II. GIGANTOMACHY

    A. ENCELADUS

        1. Son of Ge and blood from the severed genitals of Uranus

        2. Overcome by rock thrown by Athena and buried under Mt. Etna in Sicily

    B. OTUS AND EPHIALTES (THE ALOIDAE)

        1. Sons of Poseidon

        2. They piled Mt. Pelion on top of Mt. Ossa to attack Mt. Olympus

            a.  Poseidon persuaded them to stop and promised them amnesty

        3.  Prophecy: no other gods or men could kill them

            a.  attacked Artemis; white deer took her place; they throw their spears and kill each other

III. TYPHOEUS OR TYPHON

    A. LAST SON OF EARTH (AND TARTARUS)

    B. THE BATTLE IN HESIOD (MORFORD 52)

        1. Imagery of the storm once again

IV. ASIAN PARALLELS

    A. THE BABYLONIAN EPIC ENUMA ELISH 'WHEN ABOVE'

        1. The gods struggle for dominance

            a.  Tiamat and Kingu killed by Marduk, the chief god of Babylon

    B. GENESIS 1

        1. Monotheism

            a.  Therefore thereis no struggle: is Genesis a polemic against Enuma Elish?

        3. Goodness of creation

        4. But there are remnants of earlier stories in the Bible

            a.  the Hebrew word tehom 'deep' (Gen. 1:2) = Babylonian Tiamat

            a. tehom in the flood story (Gen. 7:11)

            b. cosmic conflict in Isaiah 27:1 and 51:9-10

V. PROMETHEUS

    A. CREATOR OF "MAN"

        1. From earth and rain water: Ovid's Metamorphoses (Morford 54)

        2. Gift of fire (Morford p. 56)

            a.  fire belongs to the gods; Zeus hurls lightning bolts

        3. The sacrifice story: Why do humans get the best parts of animals sacrificed to the gods?

            a. Should Christians eat meat from animals sacrificed to the gods (Acts of the Apostles)

            b. Prometheus is the patron of clever marketing

    B. PUNISHMENT OF PROMETHEUS BY ZEUS

        1. Chained to a rock in the Caucasus and attacked by an eagle every day

            a. The Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus (Morford p. 61)

            b.  Hesiod says that Heracles killed the eagle and rescued Prometheus (Morford p. 64)

        2. Prometheus becomes a symbol in literature

            a. Christ figure: helps humanity

            b. 19th century rejection of religion: atheism and human freedom?

    C. PANDORA

        1. Hesiod: the primary source

            a. Theogony (Morford 58): no name; gifts from the gods; marriage is lesser of two evils

            b. Works and Days (Morford 59): marriage to Epimetheus; the jar: evils but hope

        2. Woman in oriental mythology: good or bad?

            a. Cf. Enuma Elish

            b. Cf. Genesis 1 and 2

VI. AGES OF MAN

    A. HESIOD, WORKS AND DAYS (MORFORD 54)

        1. Gold

            a. Kronos; no work; no old age

            b. our own childhood? (CW, Nov. 1980)

        2. Silver

            a. long childhood; short maturity; arrogance

        3. Bronze

            a. warriors; meat eaters

        4. Demigods

            a. generation of the Trojan War and the Seven against Thebes

        5. Iron

            a. hard work; disharmony; might is right; perjury; envy; sons against fathers; old age

    B. OVID'S METAMORPHOSES

        1. Only four ages

            a. merge of the bronze age and the age of the demigods

    C. BOOK OF DANIEL (2:31)

        1. dream of Nebuchadnezzar

            a. stature: gold, silver, bronze, iron, clay

    D. THEORIES OF HISTORY

        1. Degeneration

            a. Homer

            b. Genesis and paradise

        2. Evolutionary optimism

            a. Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound, (Morford p. 62)

            b. Lucretius, De Rerum Natura

            c. Darwinism

            d. Marxism

        3. Cyclic theory of history