Thursday, September 12, 2013
The Role of Fate in the Aeneid.
During class today I kept having flashbacks to latin class when we would debate the role of the gods in the Aeneid. As we discussed the role of fate I kept on thinking how little power the greeks figured they had in determining the outcome of their life. In the Aeneid, Aeneas is continually hindered by Zeus's wife after he offended her. Juno would try to stop Aeneas's fate of establishing the roman race, but was unable to stop his fate. But his mother, Aphrodite, usually was able to counteract her actions. These goddesses would plead with zeus to determine his final fate. As you can see, the gods have a limited control over the humans' fate, since they are very similar to human's themselves. The three muses have the power to cut the strings of one's life, but do they determine a person's fate? Do the god's have to gain Zeus's approval to control one's fate? Or is fate above the god's powers and they are only able to read it. The more I think about how flawed and human like the gods were, the sorrier I feel for the greeks since they believed that they were completely under their power.
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In the case of Oedipus, I do believe that the gods played a major role in determining or manipulating his fate. If Apollo never prophesied that Laius and Jocasta's son would eventually sleep with Jocasta and kill Laius, Oedipus would never actually fulfill this prophesy. The more they believe in the prophesy, the more likely they are to fulfill the prophesy. It seams ironic that by trying to avoid their fate they unknowingly come face to face with their fate. In this case, I believe that the gods determined their fate.
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