Determinism in Greek Poetry

Ancient Greek literature has an underlying trend of giving its protagonists very little choice in their journeys. Epics like Homer’s Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid are prime examples of this phenomenon: the hero of the epic is given facts from their future that the gods have decided beforehand, and they must then make their journey with these facts in hand. However, while both ‘The Odyssey’ and ‘The Aeneid’ contain deep-rooted themes of determinism, they do so at different levels comparative to each other. This, in turn, leads to very different perceptions of the two heroes they star, despite the similar setting they share. As we further our analysis, we will come to see that Virgil employs determinism far more holistically than Homer does and, as a result, paints Aeneas as a very different kind of epic hero than Odysseus. Both ‘The Odyssey’ and ‘The Aeneid’ are set in Ancient Greece with the interference of the Greek gods in the lives of mortals being a commonplace occurrence. When the overarching backdrop of both epics is the same, differentiating the two stories in terms of general style would be difficult if Virgil hadn’t taken a different route with ‘The Aeneid’ than Homer did with ‘The Odyssey’. Virgil’s epic takes the opportunity of providing carefully crafted references to certain plotlines from The Odyssey but through the eyes of Aeneas of Troy, such as the invocation of the Muses, the journey of a hero, and personal interactions with the gods. However, Virgil’s style veers completely from Homer’s by employing determinism as a tool to completely override the will of the characters in his epic.

In the progression of Aeneas’ story, we see more and more how duty-bound Aeneas is: his sole purpose in life is to establish the largest empire in the ancient world and the gods insist that he doesn’t forget what kind of responsibility rests on his shoulders. This narrative is particularly supported by an exchange in which Mercury conveys Jupiter’s message to Aeneas (The Aeneid, Book IV, lines 219-278), saying, “…Alas, forgetful of your kingdom and fate! The king of the gods himself, who bends heaven and earth to his will, has sent me down to you from bright Olympus: he commanded me himself to carry these words through the swift breezes. What do you plan? With what hopes do you waste idle hours in Libya’s lands? If you’re not stirred by the glory of destiny, and won’t exert yourself for your own fame, think of your growing Ascanius, and the expectations of him, as Iulus your heir, to whom will be owed the kingdom of Italy, and the Roman lands.” As Aeneas speaks to Dido before leaving for Italy, he mentions how he would not leave if he didn’t have to. He says (Book IV, lines 331-361), “…I do not take course for Italy of my own free will.” As readers, we tend to feel empathetic towards Aeneas’ position as he wishes to be with Dido and instead must fulfill his - literal - holy duty.

In ‘The Odyssey’, we see as we move through the books, a good chunk of Odysseus’ life is controlled by the gods. Whether his ship crashes on the rocks and he is killed, whether a monster will end his life, whether he can control his men from making life-threatening blunders: all these decisions seem preordained and are prefaced by discussions amongst the gods, some of whom aim to help Odysseus and others ruin him. In the following excerpt lies one of the few merciful favors granted to Odysseus by Zeus (The Odyssey, Book IV, lines 28-43) as he says

“Dear Hermes, you are my messenger. Go tell the goddess our fixed intention: that Odysseus must go back home—he has endured enough. Without a god or human as his guide, he will drift miserably for twenty days upon a makeshift raft, and then arrive at fertile Scheria. The magical Phaeacians will respect him like a god, and send him in a ship to his dear homeland, with gifts of bronze and heaps of gold and clothing, more than he would have brought with him from Troy if he had come directly, with his share of plunder. It is granted him to see the ones he loves, beneath his own high roof, in his own country.”

This is also the first clear indication about the general answer to the central question of ‘The Odyssey’ - whether Odysseus returns to Ithaca or dies trying. Zeus has ensured Odysseus’ survival but said nothing of what will ensue after he is reunited with his family. However, the comparison between ‘The Odyssey’ and ‘The Aeneid’ is where the difference in determinism factors in. Odysseus always seems to be given a choice when it comes to his fate, even though the big picture has been determined already. Circe tells Odysseus (Book XII, lines 115-123),

“No, you fool! Your mind is still obsessed with deeds of war. But now you must surrender to the gods. She is not mortal. She is deathless evil, terrible, wild and cruel. You cannot fight her. The best solution and the only way is flight. I am afraid if you take time to arm beside the rock, she will attack again with all six heads and take six more.”

It is made clear that Odysseus cannot circumvent his encounter with Scylla and Charybdis, and neither can he get through it without losing some of his crew. However, he is also given a choice: he can choose to steer towards Scylla and lose 6 men or pass Charybdis and lose everybody. This shows that Odysseus is granted some agency in his story, that an argument can still be made in favor of the characters of Homer’s Odyssey exerting free will. Free will is not something Aeneas gets to experience, however. He is deprived of agency in two ways: being told his entire story before it occurs and not being able to make large life decisions for himself.

Odysseus is told his future in pieces and the choices he makes are his, as seen in the book featuring Scylla and Charybdis. His future is unclear and Homer writes ‘The Odyssey’ as Odysseus’ struggle to get back to Ithaca. However, Aeneas is told his entire legacy by the gods before he even sets sail to enact it. As a result, we know Aeneas is going to succeed in founding Rome and it’s only a matter of exploring how he reaches his final destination and establishes the empire itself.

Another noteworthy point is the difference in how Odysseus and Aeneas communicate with the gods. The gods have a deeply involved role in Aeneas’ life: his destiny is in their vested interest and, thus, they treat Aeneas as the flagbearer of a new generation. They remind him continuously of his responsibility towards humanity, guide him on his journey, and ensure that he remains on the path he set out on. With Odysseus, the gods seem to care a lot less - he receives most of the advice regarding his journey from Circe and Tiresias of Thebes. Besides Zeus ensuring Odysseus’ return to Ithaca and Athena’s occasional veiled intervention, the gods don’t provide Odysseus with much guidance and helpful pressure. This difference in the behavior of the gods leads to a stark difference in the way Odysseus is allowed to behave versus how Aeneas must move forward. Odysseus is sidetracked multiple times on his journey, but he is allowed, time and again, to stray and remain in that situation for as long as he pleases. To illustrate, despite the sense of urgency Homer creates concerning Odysseus’ quest to get home, Odysseus still spends five years with Circe on her island before furthering his journey. Aeneas, comparatively, is robbed of these decisions: in his interaction with Dido, it’s clear that he would stay with her and focus on a future together if he was given the option to, but he can’t afford to entertain those thoughts for fear of his destiny being forgotten.

How Aeneas is denied the free will that Odysseus possesses provides serious implications for both Aeneas and the reader. Because we know that Aeneas is going to succeed in founding Rome, we have innate faith in his character and tend to scrutinize his mistakes less than we would Odysseus’, whose fate we don’t know. From lines such as those Mercury says to Aeneas, the respect that the gods treat Aeneas with is evident: Jupiter requires him to continue on his mission but sends Mercury to guide him, not reprimand him, for temporarily neglecting his duty. Odysseus, as mentioned before, got little to no helpful intervention from the gods and mostly not in their true forms - Athena visited Odysseus as a seagull multiple times. While this seems to only point to the decreased role of determinism in Odysseus’ life, it also has another effect. This subtle favoritism towards Aeneas shapes our perspective of him and tends to increase the respect we gain for Aeneas and his character. Because the gods treat Aeneas with the respect of an equal, almost, we tend to associate Aeneas’ character with high stature; similarly, because the gods treat Odysseus with heavy-handed negligence, we begin to characterize Odysseus as an outsider and as a man who is destined to fail despite being guaranteed success.

Yet, perhaps the most elusive way the difference in determinism between the lives of Odysseus and Aeneas affects our opinion of them is how our empathy for Aeneas drives a slight dislike for Odysseus’ repeated shirking of his duties. While we feel bad for Aeneas, his binding to his duty makes him the hero we expect from an epic of ancient literature. We expect an unwavering moral foundation to guide Aeneas on a quest like this and the role of determinism in ‘The Aeneid’ secures that expectation for the reader, regardless of whether Aeneas is like that by nature or not. By having the ability to exert free will, Odysseus undermines the sense of urgency that the rest of the characters in ‘The Odyssey’ portray and can be viewed as too human, possibly to the point of not being justifiable as a Greek epic’s protagonist.