E. The Meaning of the Iliad and Odyssey 3 page

Homer, on the other hand, depicts the gods at war with quite another truth in view, specifically the progressive fragmentation of the divine influences, which are unified at their source but become increasingly more divided as they proceed down to the level of angelic and demonic ranks in touch with the material universe and filled with strife.^[221] Proclus is more interested at this point in Homer's support for his own elaborate angelology and demonology than in his support (demonstrated elsewhere in any case) for Pythagorean dualism.

This fragmentation at our end of the scale of being is also related to the providential role of the lower gods—the angels and the demons. Proclus emphasizes the fact that, in the Iliad , Zeus does not enter the fighting.^[222] "The monad remains solidly fixed in itself"^[223] whereas the gods proceeding from the monad enter into the strife of the material world to watch over the fate of souls. Not all the gods do so: some, Proclus claims, remain "within Zeus,"^[224] which is to say, detached from the material world, transcendent. This is an interesting claim (hardly supported by the apparent meaning of the text of book 20) in that it seems to rest upon an implicit interpretation of sequential events (Zeus's summoning the gods to him and then sending them out to fight) as simultaneous. Proclus has used this principle elsewhere, but when he has done so, he has generally made it explicit. Here, on the other hand, he seems simply to assume that, when Homer says about the gods, "They did A and then

^[220]

[221] In Rep . 1.89.10-24.

[222] Contrast the theomachy of Hesiod (Theog . 617-885) where Zeus's role is active and decisive. Presumably this is an indication that Proclus's first theomachy interpretation applies in the case of Hesiod, and not the second. Proclus in fact says as much (In Rep . 1.93.13-24), citing the casual Homeric reference to the imprisonment of Kronos (Il . 14.203).

^[223][224]

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they did B, " he actually means that "A and B are simultaneously existing permanent conditions."

A peculiar aspect of Proclus's accommodation of his elaborate demonology to the "ancient theology" becomes central to the interpretation of the theomachy at this point.^[225] The Olympians are taken to be henads, unified transcendent beings immediately below the level of the primal monad and the generative dyad. When we refer to Athena or Hephaestus, then, we refer to a transcendent being. But the gods' names themselves are polysemous.^[226] They refer not only to the henad at the source of each procession, but also to all the members of that procession, down to the level of the demons immediately in touch with the fate of souls on earth:

For each chain bears the name of its monad and the partial spirits enjoy having the same names as their wholes. Thus there are many Apollos and Poseidons and Hephaestuses of all sorts, some of them separated from the universe, some distributed through the heavens; some preside over the elements in their totality; some have been assigned authority over specific elements.^[227]

This constitutes yet another inversion of the structures of meaning we have been led to expect: when Homer says "Apollo," a name most obviously having its referent in a higher reality and designating an entity commanding respect and awe, he may not mean that Apollo, but rather a lower Apollo, an angelic or demonic entity in touch with the fate of souls. The higher may stand for the lower. Proclus's emphasis is on the continuity of the chains or processions of the divine. Once time and conflict are removed, the paradoxical attribution of strife to the gods be-

[225] In Rep . 1.90.22-92.27.

[226] Proclus asserts the principle that a given linguistic sign may have different referents on different levels of reality. Cf. Trouillard, "L'Activité onomastique selon Proclos," pp. 241-42. The idea of countering accusations of impiety in the poets' attribution of various actions to the gods with the claim that the gods' names sometimes indicate entities other than their divine persons goes back to the time of Plutarch (De aud. po . 23a-24c) and Apuleius, and is rooted far earlier in the thought of Xenocrates in the fourth century B.C . (Sheppard, Studies , p. 54 with n. 40). Cf. DeLacy, "Stoic Views of Poetry," p. 258 and n. 58, where Cic. De nat. deor . 2.60 is also mentioned, though in that passage the concept is treated neither as defensive nor as pedagogic.

^[227]

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comes a description of one of the enduring wonders of Proclus's spiritual world: the gods are transcendent (hence their Olympian names), and yet they are concerned with the fate of beings in this world (hence the description of them at war).^[228]

Each pair of warring gods is interpreted separately, and each conflict is seen to represent some fundamental truth about reality.^[229] The idea was a time-honored one, and Proclus no doubt had numerous possible interpretations of the pairs to choose among.^[230] His selection ranges from adapted Stoic physical allegory to more characteristically mystical interpretations. The interpretation of Hephaestus and Xanthus as the contributors, respectively, of heat-and-dryness and cold-and-wetness, viewed as a fundamental tension maintaining the physical body, is quite close to the scholiast's more laconic physical interpretation: "Water against fire"

^[231] At the other extreme, the interpretation of the unopposed presence of Aphrodite as representing "love"

, present here because "all oppositions must end in mutual harmony,"^[232] goes beyond the fragmentary interpretations of the scholiasts and emphasizes an element insignificant in the text itself but that, in Proclus's contemplation of the total myth above and beyond the text, provides a redeeming coherence, a reminder of the unified, static reality lying behind the mythoplasts' turbulent

.

Later, in discussing Plato's debts to Homer, Proclus returns to Zeus's speech to the gods (Il . 20.20-30) to make the claim that this was Plato's source for the speech of the demiurge to the gods in Timaeus 41a-d.^[233] Thus the theomachy becomes Homer's true account of creation—more perfect, one might infer, than the account in Genesis, because the surface fiction is further removed from the reality it represents. This subtle truth is contained in the myth's representation of Zeus's gathering of the gods through Themis (Il . 20.4-6) and his subsequent injunction to them

[228] In Rep . 1.94.25-28.

[229] In Rep . 1.94.28-95.26.

^[230]

[231] The scholiast on Il . 20.73-74. Schol. in Il ., ed. Erbse, vol. 5, P. 18.

^[232]

[233] In Rep . 1.165.13-166.11.

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to go into the fighting (Il . 20.23-25), which represent, respectively, the transcendent monad (1) drawing all of the gods up to himself in isolated transcendence beyond the natural world, and (2) his (simultaneous) providential projection of the gods into the world. Providence is identified with the act of creation. This discussion throws some light on the observation, much earlier, that not all of the gods go into the fighting.^[234] Homer does not, in fact, describe any gods as remaining with Zeus on the lookout on Mount Ida, but Proclus, either from misreading or from a tacit act of interpretation, claims that some do. This means, we learn here, that effectively all both remain transcendent with Zeus and enter the universe to exercise creative providence.

In the discussion of the final books, Proclus's demonology and the principle that the name belonging to the henad serves as well for the

in its procession is applied several times. It serves most significantly to protect Achilles from the charge of disrespect for the gods when he chases and insults Apollo.^[235] The "Apollo" that disguised himself as Agenor and led Achilles astray, Proclus argues, was clearly not the henad but a lowly

watching over Hector, and in view of this fact Achilles' language was not blasphemous. Furthermore, the principle of continuity comes into play here. The very greatest of the heroes are contiguous in the chain of being with the very lowest of the

and there is no clear line of demarcation of powers. Therefore, if Achilles defeats a god (Xanthus), Homer is revealing that "the very first from the last classes are somehow equal to the very last from the first classes, especially when they are moved and protected by the gods themselves."^[236]

The portion of the Iliad that follows the last day of fighting receives many quotations and references in Proclus's discussion, but few touch on points that have not already been raised. The magnificent image of the two pithoi on the doorstep of Zeus (Il . 24.527-33) is the last passage singled out for special comment.^[237] It appears to attribute evil to the gods, something Socrates had absolutely forbidden in the myths to be used for the instruction of the guardians.^[238]

Proclus's defense turns on the meaning of the words "good" and "bad," and his procedure is reminiscent of the techniques of satire,

[234] In Rep . 1.90.25.

[235] Il . 22.7-20. In Rep . 1.146.17-148.24.

^[236]

[237] In Rep . 1.98-100.

[238] Plato Rep. 2.379c-d.

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undercutting preconceptions and accepted evaluations. There is a fundamental dualism in Proclus's world-view that is difficult to reconcile with Socrates's view of providence and his belief in human responsibility, yet Proclus sets out to reconcile these positions by arguing that Zeus's pithoi contain only apparent goods and evils, only those condition of the soul to which they are attached. Once again we catch a distant echo of the myth things dependent on fate, those externals that can be turned to good or to evil, depending on the of Er. This fate

is indeed in the hands of divine providence, but it does not in any real sense bring evil upon men.

In formulating this problem, Proclus reveals both his weakness and his strength as an interpretive critic, viewed from a modern perspective. He asks why Homer has chosen the image of the pithoi.^[239] It might, on the one hand, be because of the resemblance of the word

to the verb

(persuade), which Timaeus uses to talk about the way in which

influences necessity to turn most things toward the good.^[240] This etymological argument is quaint at best. But the other alternative emphasizes the physical quality of the image and strongly suggests that Proclus had entered imaginatively into it to assess its real impact: "or he might have been showing their vastness, their capacity to contain the whole enormous variety and complexity of human events."^[241]

The Odyssey

No comprehensive view of the meaning of the Odyssey or its associated myths is offered in Proclus's essay beyond the very broad interpretation of the Troy tale mentioned above, but since that general overview includes the story of the return of the Greek heroes, of which the Odyssey is, so to speak, the last chapter, we may take it to give an indication of Proclus's thoughts on the matter.

The Greeks represent souls lured into the warlike state of this exis-

[239] In Rep . 1.99.9-14.

[240] Plato Tim . 48a, cited by Proclus In Rep . 1.99.10-12. It is perhaps misleading to belittle this etymological fantasy without mentioning that later Platonism placed great emphasis on this passage of the Timaeus and on "persuasion" and "necessity" as constituents of reality. Calcidius (In Tim . 199 = Numenius fr. 52) says Numenius is said to have equated "matter and necessity": "eamque silvam et necessitatem cognominat; ex qua et deo mundi machinam constituisse deo persuadente, necessitate obsecundante." Calcidius had just made the point that for the Pythagoreans, including Numenius, evil is an inherent quality of matter.

^[241]

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tence, from which the "more intellectual" return successfully to the higher reality that is their true home. If one extends the image, Odysseus might represent a soul so drawn to, and fascinated by, this world that its return is exceptionally difficult. This interpretation does communicate some of the charm and uniqueness of Odysseus, but we can hardly attribute it to Proclus.

The Odyssey is far less interesting and suggestive to Proclus than the Iliad ,^[242] though he indicates his awareness of the tradition of allegorical interpretation of the poem. Moreover, he shies away from an allegorical interpretation in his defense of Odysseus against the charge of lack of moderation and of a generally positive disposition toward the pleasures of the flesh:

Now, with regard to the blame laid upon Odysseus, let it be said that, first of all, those who refer the wanderings of Odysseus to secondary, allegorical meanings and place the Phaeacians and the "good cheer" among them beyond the sphere of mortal nature, prefer to interpret these things more symbolically. Thus "banquet," "feasting," and "harmonious song" will be said, as far as they are concerned, in another sense and not the one recognized by most men. It should be emphasized, however, that those who interpret the poem literally are also able to answer such accusations.^[243]

Proclus goes on to build a conservative argument based on careful attention to the text and on the demonstration that Odysseus praises "good cheer"

, not "pleasure"

. It is the latter that Socrates (together with virtually the entire Greek philosophical tradition with the exception of the Epicureans) condemned as a goal in life, and that has the associations of indulgence in the appetites of the flesh.

[242] See the data in Appendix 3, which indicate only the presence or absence of references in four works by Proclus to the various books of the Iliad and Odyssey and give no information on quantity of references to a given book. A rough calculation of the use of the two poems in the Republic and Timaeus commentaries alone indicates 130 references to the Iliad as against only 73 to the Odyssey , or nearly 80 percent more for the Iliad . In the Timaeus commentary, where fewer citations are dependent on Plato, the imbalance is even greater, with more than twice as many references to the Iliad (51:23).

^[243]

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The Odyssey seems to present Proclus with a quite different critical problem from the Iliad . That the two poems belong to very different modes of storytelling is a cliché of modern criticism, but it would be interesting to have the testimony of ancient critics on their similarities and differences.^[244] For Proclus, after all, the two poems are decidedly the work of a single man, however distorted his biography may have become at the hands of secondary mythoplasts.

There are no positive signs of a perception on Proclus's part of the differences between the poems, beyond his general inclination to avoid the apparently prevalent allegorical mode of interpreting the Odyssey . There is nevertheless at least a possibility that there is an indication here of a general pattern of attitude toward the two poems against which Proclus is reacting.

It seems intuitively clear to most modern readers that the Iliad is to be read as mythically distorted history (i.e., as saga), and that the Odyssey , focusing as it does on the adventures of a single hero, has a structure of meaning that is quite deliberately manipulated, in a manner considerably closer to the modern novel, to make a generalized statement about the life of the individual. If we look at Chapman's Homer—taking it as a document in the recent history of the interpretation of Homer—it is clear that the two Homeric epics entered the English Renaissance tradition as a heroic saga and an allegory of man's conquest of himself respectively.^[245]

The two poems invite quite different kinds of critical analysis and the approaches taken in late antiquity would appear to have been different as well. Although Proclus is generally reluctant to react against tradition and to approach a problem in an innovative way, he appears in his attitude toward the two poems to be doing just that. Both, for him, are inspired utterances. They contain comparable structures of meaning, of great complexity. However, to judge by the pattern of Proclus's argument, the Iliad would appear to have been read most commonly as history or as physical allegory: Proclus (adhering, it is true, to an alternative tradition, and hardly breaking trail on his own) in most instances insists

^[244]

[245] Cf. Lord, Homeric Renaissance , p. 43.

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upon interpretations connecting that fiction to a reality that is anything but historical or physical. The Odyssey , on the other hand, would appear traditionally to have been read as allegory, most often moral allegory, but Proclus, fully aware of this tradition and quite willing to use it when it suits his purposes, responds in this important instance by insisting that, even in a literal reading, the Odyssey and its hero are defensible.

The alternative approaches to Homer, literal and "allegorical" interpretation, based respectively on views of the literary artifact as a simple system of meaning and as a polysemous structure, are at least as old as Plato. Nowhere before Proclus, though, do we see the two interact in such a way that conclusions may be drawn about their relative importance and uses. If we were to judge by the relative levels of attention to the two poems in the Homeric Allegories of Heraclitus, we would have to conclude that the efforts of the physical and moral allegorists were concentrated on the Iliad , but what we are seeing there is probably no more than a reflection of the traditional assessment of the Iliad as the superior poem. Proclus seems to give an indication (though by no means a proof) that our modem understanding of the differences between the two poems was anticipated in late antiquity by a general tendency to read the Iliad

and the Odyssey as a polysemous structure—a tendency against which Proclus reacts on both counts in his defence of Homer, though he does so in his characteristically gentle way. There is, further, the implication that, given the choice between an acceptable interpretation

and an unnecessary allegory, Proclus will choose the former: looking through the screen of the fictive surface is required only when the surface itself does not yield a satisfactory meaning.^[246]

An overall allegory of the Odyssey comparable to that expressed by Heraclitus^[247] is implied but not developed in a passage of the prologue to Proclus's commentary on the Elements of Euclid.^[248] He is discussing the relationship of geometry to the various levels of perception and ap-

[246] Servius in his Virgil commentaries also reacts against superfluous allegorical interpretation. Cf. Hahn, Allegorie in der antiken Rhetorik , pp. 78-80. The idea is expressed as early as Plutarch (De aud. po. ): see Daniel Babut, Plutarque et le Stoïcisme , p. 376.

[247] Heraclit. Quaest. hom . 70. For Heraclitus, the Odyssey is a coherent moral allegory.

[248] Proclus In Euc . 55.18-23. See n. 252 below for the text. The passage is cited by Werner Beierwaltes, "Das Problem der Erkenntnis bei Proklos," p. 161, n. 2, along with the following comparanda , discussed below: Proclus In Parm . 1025a.29-37; Herm. In Phdr . 214.19-24; Porph. De ant . 34 (= Numenius fr. 33).

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prehension of the soul.^[249] The geometrical figures conjured up in the mind (only one step removed from those actually drawn for purposes of demonstration) are used as tools by the understanding

, which is too weak to comprehend all the

it contains and so lays them out on its doorstep, so to speak, on the level of "imagination"

.^[250] This envisioning, then, is "a path to their true noetic essence"

,
but the goal would never be reached if the understanding did not first do an about-face and turn back inside itself:

Then it would see the essential, non-spatial, unfragmented

that are its true substance. And this very action of the understanding would be the highest goal of the discipline of geometry, truly performing the task of Hermes' gift, liberating the understanding from a Calypso and leading it upward to a more perfect and more noetic knowledge, freeing it from the partial perceptions of imagining.^[251]

Here, Odysseus seems (at least for the duration of the casual illustrative image) to be the understanding

; his true goal is union with the

, and he contains noetic

, but in order to understand them, he must descend into

and fabricate mental images of them. The final union, though, can be reached only through his turning back within himself, armed with the experience gained by envisioning these figures, to contemplate the noetic realities that lie behind them. This is accomplished only through the intervention of grace in the form of Hermes commanding

(= Calypso) to release him.^[252]

In the Parmenides commentary he again develops the general meaning of the figure of Odysseus:

[249] Proclus In Euc . 54-55.

^{[250][251][252]}

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Many are the wanderings and circlings of the soul: one among imaginings, one in opinions and one before these in understanding. But only the life according to

has stability and this is the mystical harbor of the soul to which, on the one hand, the poem leads Odysseus through the great wandering of his life, and to which we too shall draw ourselves up, if we would reach salvation.^[253]

As Porphyry suggests in the essay on the cave of the nymphs (34), the stable "mystical harbor" of the soul is indicated in the Odyssey myth by the central, but decidedly problematical, prediction of Tiresias that Odysseus will finally travel inland to a place where the sea is unknown (Od . 11.119-34). It is clear, in any case, that in the present passage, Odysseus represents the soul (and not the understanding), and the goal to which the poem "leads" him is still union with the

, far from the chaos of life as we know it. A passage in Hermias^[254] indicates that this was a current interpretation. It may have originated in the first or second century after Christ, found expression in the interpretations of Numenius and his circle, and been passed on to Proclus through Porphyry and others. By way of Macrobius it enters the medieval Latin tradition.^[255]

Though Proclus does not in any way deny the validity of such an interpretation of the Odyssey in his defense of Homer in the Republic commentary, he does not make any extensive use of it either. Only two passages, the Proteus episode (Od . 4.351-592) and the song of Ares and Aphrodite (Od . 8.266-366) are interpreted allegorically,^[256] though about a dozen other passages are brought up in various contexts.^[257]

The interpretation of the Proteus episode has already been mentioned, but the subsequent discussion of Proclus's demonology should make its significance clearer at this point. Like the myths of the the-

^[253]

[254] See n. 248 above for the reference.

[255] Macrob. In somn. Scip . 1.12.2-3. Cf. Flamant, Macrobe et le néoplatonisme latin , appendix 9.

[256] Heraclitus (Quaest. hom . 64-67 and 69)gives interpretations of both. The Proteus episode is viewed as an account of creation (65), and in this Heraclitus approaches the cosmic universality of Proclus's interpretations, but there is otherwise little similarity.

[257] E.g., Demodocus, Phemius, and Clytemnestra's nameless bard (Od . 3.267-68) are claimed 'to be symbols of different modes of poetry, as discussed above.

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omachy, this one is interpreted as presenting the lower phases of a divine procession, elaborated in space and time in the manner of the mythoplasts. An angelic

in the procession of Poseidon, Proteus "contains in himself the forms of all things in this world."^[258] Among the higher (disembodied) demonic souls placed immediately below him in the procession is Eidothea, who contemplates these forms through him. Her relationship to the numerous other "rational and eternal" souls in the procession is not entirely clear, but they are below her, represented by the mythoplasts as the seals. The clue in the "screen" of the fiction that points to their immortality is the fact that Proteus counts them: the number of things that come to be and pass away is infinite and cannot be calculated.^[259] When Proteus is perceived by a fragmented soul unable to grasp these forms simultaneously, he appears to pass from one to another, though in fact he simultaneously contains all of them. Though Proclus does not expand upon it, Eidothea's talk with Menelaus, her role as mediator between his fragmented, embodied soul and the angelic

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