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Gods And Goddesses Vs. Humans In Homer's Odyssey

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God’s and Goddesses vs. Humans
In times of difficulty who we choose to blame says a lot about our own disposition--whether we choose to blame ourselves for our own actions, or we choose to blame a higher force for putting us in difficult situations. In the classic tale “The Odyssey” by ancient Greek poet, Homer we see a lot of similar situations to this when the main character, Odysseus, is put in various difficult circumstances because of the Gods. After the Trojan war ends, it takes Odysseus 10 years to get back to his home partly because the Gods put up numerous obstacles in order to make his journey home prolonged and gruesome. Although the Gods were partly at fault for his journey being long and difficult they never controlled Odysseus, therefore what happened to Odysseus was ultimately because of his own actions.
Odysseus’ heroic journey was put to a screeching halt, when Goddess, Calypso seduced Odysseus and imprisoned him on her island because she was madly in love with him. The quote “...my wife Penelope is nothing like so tall or so beautiful as …show more content…

After composing a clever plan, Odysseus defeats the bloodthirsty monster and just as he is about to leave, his hubris gets the best of him and he begins to call out to Polyphemus mocking him, “If someone asks who did this, the name is Odysseus!” After Odysseus has finished mocking him, Cyclops cries out to his father, Poseidon to never let Odysseus get home. This results in Poseidon making Odysseus’ journey much longer. The events that transpired could have all been avoided if Odysseus wouldn’t have let his hubris get in the way. His actions were the reason his journey was prolonged because if he would have just left as he was initially planning to, he would have gotten home a lot sooner. Poseidon behaved fairly punishing Odysseus for his own actions to which he admitted

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Fulfilling one’s arête does not necessarily mean being the best there is at something, but merely being the best you can be at something specific. This could mean a warrior, a wife, a son, a dancer, really just about anything. Throughout Homer’s Odyssey, various characters fulfill certain arêtes of theirs, yet other fail miserably at it, the most important example perhaps being Odysseus himself. Some characters even fulfill one of their arête but fall considerably shorter of fulfilling others, like Penelope. Arête shapes much of the Odyssey, and the motivations of many characters are driven by the concept.

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At various times throughout the story, mainly through the trials, Odysseus made many decisions and forced his crew to go through many potentially lethal situations without preparing his own crew, or situations that were just a waste of time. This then leads to not only all of his crew being killed but the creation of many bad relationships. The first example of Odysseus mistreating his crew is when he and his crew went through the trails, “No more. Come, / let me tell you about the voyage fraught with hardship / Zeus inflicted on me, homeward bound from Troy...” 9.42-44.

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When the gods force Calypso into releasing Odysseus, she tries to manipulate and scare him about the challenges he will face, into staying with her on the island, but her tactics don't work on the ever loyal Odysseus and only increase his determination to reach home. Odysseus loves his home and his family to such a great extent that he will face life-threatening trials to reach them. Despite Calypso's beauty and her attempt to manipulate him with the things she says that would make a lesser person second guess their relationship with the knowledge of the power they could gain, Calypso’s attempt to make Odysseus second guess his relationship with Penelope remained futile, and because of this he remained loyal to his wife giving up powers and a chance to live forever with a beautiful goddess who was completely in love with him. Much to Calypso's disdain, Odysseus showed a strong resistance to her advances because Odysseus and Penelope have years of loyalty to each other and created a strong healthy relationship built on love and trust which will not break. So, undeterred by Calypso's advances, he never gave his heart to

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