As The Gods Turn.

It was a quiet night. A handful of us were huddled around a fire, our stomachs only half filled with spoiled food. We were trying to keep our mind off the fact that tomorrow we go to battle. Tomorrow many of us will die, maybe all of us. But, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t shift my mind to different thoughts. I was wishing for a distraction when an old man finally broke the silence, “you know, several of you may die tomorrow, and I bet most of you don’t even know where you came from. Why our homeland is sacred and has to be defended from those damn Romans, do you?”

Zeus

The statue of Zeus in the temple at Olympia stood
more than 40 feet high.(Copyright Lee Krystek, 2011)

            We all looked to one another and shook our heads. “Not really,” I said, “I mean, I know it’s something about Zeus and Mt Olympus, right?”

            “Yes,” he chuckled, “It is something like that, but there is so much more to it. Greece is the birthplace of all the races of gods and men.”

            “In the beginning,” he continued, “there was only chaos, and out of this chaos was born Erebus god of darkness and Nyx goddess of the night. Erebus and Nyx had sex”

One of the boys interrupted “you didn’t say you were going to tell us a dirty story Uncle Homer.”

 “Yeah, well there is a lot of it.” Homer replied, “And if you interrupt me every time it comes up, we will never finish this story.

“That would be fine with me,” another boy said, “means we wouldn’t have to fight tomorrow.”

A Depiction of Gaia the Earth Goddes

Homer cleared his throat “anyways, Nyx then laid a giant, golden egg an egg she sat on for ages. Slowly, life began to stir in the egg, until one day it finally hatched and

Eros, the God of Love, was born. When his shell broke the bottom of it fell and became the Gaia (earth). The top became Uranus (heaven). Nyx and Erebus had several other children including Tartarus the God of a place of torment, and pain that exists beneath the underworld. When you die and are judged, if you are a wicked person of deserve divine punishment you will be sent to Tartarus. Then Eros made Uranus fall in love with Gaia, and from their union sprang many children. Their first three children were monsters with fifty arms on each side, and fifty heads. Uranus, who never wanted offspring to begin with, trapped them in Tartarus. They were the most hated of his children. Uranus and Gaia then conceived many other children  Oceanus, Coeus and Crius and Hyperion and Iapetus, Theia and Rhea, Themis and Mnemosyne and gold-crowned Phoebe and lovely Tethys. She delivered the Cyclopes, who were strong spirited and stubborn-hearted. They would be the ones to give Zeus the thunder and made the thunderbolt: in all else, they were like the gods. But they had only one eye, and it was set in the midst of their fore-heads. Uranus trapped all of his children in Tartarus. Last she conceives Cronos, the King of the Titans. Gaia conspired with her children against heaven but they were all gripped by fear. Only Cronos was willing to ambush his father. Gaia laid herself out and soon Uranus came along bringing night with him. Uranus spread himself upon her and Cronos sprung from his hiding place and castrated his father.  He flung the severed member into the ocean where a maiden grew from it, Athena goddess of fertility.”



“Whoa! So Cronos cut off his own fathers penis?” Someone asked. I looked up and noticed the size of our little group had grown slightly. About a dozen men standing around listening intently to this old man’s story.

“Yes, he did, and in doing so, he freed his brothers and sisters.” Homer answered. “Cronos then became the king over all the other titans which, which were all his brothers, sisters, and cousins. Because he was the one who had over thrown Uranus. Cronos takes his sister Rhea as his queen, and took to living on Mt Olympus, and all was well. But then Uranus decided to take steps toward his revenge. Cronos and Rhea are delighted in the news that Rhea is with child, Hades the god of the underworld. During the celebration Uranus told Cronos that it is his destiny that he be overthrown by his son, just like Cronos over threw his father (Uranus). These seeds of doubt grew in Cronos’ mind and he knew what he must do. As soon as Hades, was born Cronos ate him.”

“Cronos did what?!” exclaimed another new audience member. The number of people listening had nearly doubled in the last few moments.



Replica of the Omphalos stone. It is located in Delphi.

“He ate baby Hades.” Homer replied, now having to speak a bit louder for everyone to hear. “Now where was I? Oh yes, Cronos ate Hades because he was afraid of his child rising up against him. Now, just like we have seen with past the first generation of gods, just because they don’t want kids doesn’t mean they stop having sex. Cronos and Rhea conceived four other children that Cronos also ate Hera, Poseidon, Hestia and Demeter. At this point, Rhea is distraught - she desperately wants to have a child that she could watch grow up. So, she conspired against Cronos with Gaia and Uranus. Rhea was pregnant with her sixth baby, Zeus. Uranus and Gaia agreed to help Rhea conceal the child. When Zeus was born, before Cronos saw him, Gaia switched the baby with a special stone. The same stone that we have in our home city at Delhpi.”

 “I wish we could eat rocks” mumbled a soldier near him as his stomach growled.

Homer sighed and continued “Rhea swaddled the stone in baby blankets and presented it to Cronos, who ate it without giving it a second look. Gaia raised Zeus in a cave on Mt Ida, far from where Cronos would look for him. Years passed and young Zeus grew strong, he was often reminded of his brothers and sisters still living and growing to adult hood in his father’s stomach. Uranus helped sow seeds of hate, towards Cronos, in Zeus. Zeus formed alliances with Cronos’ brothers the Giants, the Cyclopes, and Cottus, Briareos, and Gyes the beasts with fifty arms and heads. Together with his uncles, Zeus stormed Mt Olympus and brutally defeated Cronos and the other Titans. Zeus took a blade and split his father’s belly, releasing his trapped brothers and sisters. Zeus took the defeated Titans and cast them deep into Tartarus, and took the throne as King of The Gods.”

“Zeus is great” exclaimed an excited listener. I looked up to see the crowd was still growing.

“Now, Gaia didn’t exactly like how roughly Zeus had treated the Titans because, after all, most of the Titans were her children. So to punish him for his deeds, she sent two of her other children to fight him, the monsters Typhon and Echidna. It was a magnificent battle, ending with Zeus standing victorious. After Zeus defeated Typhon, he trapped him in a mountain, but he allowed Echidna to live. As the newly crowned King of The Gods, Zeus needed a queen. So, he married his sister, Hera. Together they had several children, And Zeus ha many more childeren without Hera, but that is another story. Zeus saw that the world was far too empty now that the Titans had been locked awaty in Tartarus. So, together, with two other gods Prometheus (fore-thought) and Epimetheus (after-thought), Zeus started working on the races of the world. The Gold men came first, followed by the the Silver men, the Bronze men were third, and finally the Iron men. The Gold men lived in a paradise. Crops grew wildly everywhere, meat and fish was plentiful. Everyone was peaceful and they never fought any wars.” Homer sighed wistfully, “if only we had the fortune to live in those days, huh?”

“Unfortunately all good things end, and one day, for no known reason, the gold men disappeared. Zeus soon replaced them with the Silver men, but these men were a weak race. They spent most of their lives as infants, they had a short time of healthy adulthood and then they had a long, agonizing period of old age. Zeus didn’t take much time in replacing them with the bronze men. But, these men were too vicious and very quickly killed each other off. Zeus finally found the right ingredient when he made us, the Iron men. He made us after multiple failed attempts and finally got it prefect.”

Bust of Homer (British Museum, London)

Homer stood up, and looked out at his audience. Now there were too many heads for me to count in such low light. “So you see men, you need not be scared of the battle tomorrow. For we are the men made of Iron, nothing is stronger than Iron!” He yelled. His statement was met with thunderous applause. "With the true Gods on our side, we cannot lose!"

“Now men, it’s late and we all have something we have to do tomorrow,” he chuckled. “But, I’ll tell you what, for those of you who are brave enough to survive, tomorrow night I’ll tell you about the first women, Prometheus bringing fire to the humans, the many children of Zeus, and the trials of Hercules. Goodnight men.”

Too Long; Didn't Read? Fine, just watch the video.

This is an exert from the documentary Greek Mythology: God and Goddesses Documentary

SPECIAL THANKS TO: Sagatom Saha for uploading to youtube

Additional Resources:

Creation Myth

The Theogony of Hesiod

Greek Mythology: God and Goddesses Documentary

What is wrong with Atheists?

        I am an Atheist. In today’s society saying those words will, more often than not, make people think awful things. Atheists are the least trusted minority in America. In a recent Gallup poll Americans voted that they are least likely to elect an Atheist as president. I personally would like to see a president that has no religious affiliation and is open about it. Although, I am happy to see that seven of ten people would open minded enough to enough to elect a Gay or Lesbian president. Our leaders religious affiliation shouldn’t matter, neither should their gender or sexual preference. It is because of this closed-minded, ethnocentric thinking that our country is struggling, we worry more about the little things than we do about the actual intelligence level of our politicians.

            Another recent study by The University of British Colombia and The University of Oregon, detailed in an article on USA Today states that a majority of people believe Atheists to be less trust worthy than rapists. I don’t think I should have to point out the absurdity of this frame of mind. But, obviously, I am part of the minority and if people think I am less trustworthy than a rapist, then that will eventually cause some major problems in my life.

            Many people think this way because their pastors or other church leaders convince them of it. According to many different people like Heather Basher on Landover Baptist forums “All atheists believe in evolution, which means they don't believe in morality and think we should all act like animals.” She also states in the same post that “a lot of mass murderers were atheists, and all atheists, having no morality to guide them, are only a bad day away from going on a genocide spree. There have no exactly zero cases on Christian mass murderers throughout all of history.” First off I would like to point out that Ted Bundy was a mormon and a man named Burce Lee (no not THE Bruce Lee) killed twentysix people was a self proclaimed christian. And secondly, I would like to state that I do have morals. I argue that atheists, on the whole, are more moral than religious people. Atheists do not need promise of devine punishment to keep from killing, raping, or tortureing anybody. I refrain from doing these things because I feel personally that it is wrong. If the only thing keeping christians from going on a “genocide spree” is the fact that the will go to hell then there is something wrong with them, not me. I suggest you take the time and read the rest of her post, her views on the problems with Atheism are numerious and a perfect example of the ingorance that we deal with daily.

            Although, citizens can hardly be balmed for their hatred and bigotry. In August 1987 George Bush Sr said, “I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God.” He was trying to say that since he feels that our nation was founded on christian principles, non-christians have no place here. There are many problems with his statement. The first problem is that we are not “one nation under god” the phrase wasn’t even added to our Pledge of Allegence until 1954. The United States didn’t adopt the motto “in god we trust” intil 1956. Secondly, Most of our founding fathers were either Agnostic meaning they belive a higher power exsists but do not know which one or Deist which means they think there is a god, but he doesn’t interfere with man, they also didn’t believe the supernatural miricles in the bible and didn’t support the “trinity”. Some were even Atheists like Benjamen Franklin, George Washington, and James Madison. Our nation was founded by men who were trying to escape the religious oppression of the Church of England. They came here to find a freedom to worship or not worship how they wanted without fear of punishment. Once we decide that “Atheists aren’t citizens” we are destroying everything this country was founded for. The problem with people distrusting Atheists and saying the ignorant things they say is that it makes us out the be second class citizens. Most Atheists don’t want to fight with Christians, what you belive is entirely your choice and it has absolutely nothing to do with my life.

            Oh, and as far as “Atheists aren’t patriots” I would like to refer you to a picture that I found. It pretty much sums up how I feel.

In conclusion, what is wrong with Atheists? Nothing is wrong with us, we are human and therefore we have our own opinions. That doesn’t make us bad.