The Meaning Of Animals In Homer's The Odyssey

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In our bounded human history, the understanding of animals has been a puzzling endeavor. Since ancient times, we accredited creatures as messengers of divine deities or when guided by our natural instinct assorted as part of a balanced meal. A widely known example is the Zodiac used as a vanguard for our daily hesitant decisions. In many aspects of life we seem to think that a mortal’s destiny is contrived by divine intervention. This is true in The Odyssey, these messages are manifested in the book by means of birds alluding a predestine destiny, but they also occur in concealed references about the journey of human soul lived through the eyes of gods and many representations of life and death.

With good judgment, we can imply that many of the misfortunes were revealed before occurred. For instance, Halitheses, predict the soon to come slaughter of the suitors; message carried over the action of two eagles annihilating to each other. Surely, this is evident when Telemachus …show more content…

Odysseus who has suffered many ills and wandered much Will return homeward and do vengeance. Or else already He is at home and breeds evil for all the suitor. (165)
In some ways we clearly see that Odysseus was destined to fulfill a predetermined conclusion selectively chosen by the gods. Consequently, the birds played an important role providing the hints of information as messengers of death.

Another key point is the journey of human soul lived through the eyes of the gods. Throughout the text, we can perceive how in all major stages of Odysseus’s life the subconsciously presence of the divine power is manifested. This occurs in near in the climax of the epic when Athena, takes the form of a swallow while Odysseus victim’s corpses are piled together. Although this may be true, the gods do not agree, implying that humans have control of their own life