Re: The Odyssey - question for all!
Resumption of the Odyssey’s Negative Theoxeny
When the disguised Odysseus stays with Eumaios, as Athena directs, the
Odyssey initiates not only a hospitality myth, but a virtual theoxeny, as
noted above.
Eumaios is the good host within the impious community.
He has the same low economic means as Baucis and Philemon, and prefigures
Christianity’s concern with similar types. A herdsman, Eumaios, is
in charge of Odysseus’ swine herds, the males of which currently total 360
(Od. 14.20). The number suggests thematic parallels with the cattle of
Helios on Thrinakia, which are 350 in number (Od. 12.129–30). Both
numbers figure the days in a year, and may reflect Indo-European material.
In the Rig Veda cows are likened to rays of the sun or dawn.36 On Thrinakia,
Helios’ herds are an extension of himself, an embodiment of
the sun with its roughly 360 days (further discussion in Chapter 13). The
corresponding numbers imply parallels between the suitors’ violation of
Odysseus’ herds and the crew’s of Helios’.
The suitors plundering the flocks Eumaios oversees instantiates the Odyssey’s thematic concern with
improper consumption, the medium through which its characters display
their lack of self-control.37 As the crew perished, destroyed by the gods for
consuming Helios’ herd, so will the suitors, who command the sacrifice of
another of Eumaios’ herd (Od. 14.26–8).
Approaching the enclosure around Eumaios’ quarter, the disguised
Odysseus is threatened by two hounds. Within the virtual theoxeny, a
level of violence is threatened against the disguised guest similar to that
directed against the angels in Genesis 19. Intervening to call off his hounds,
Eumaios passes the initial hospitality test, calls Odysseus xeinos (Od. 14.56–
7), as Telemachos did Athena (Od. 1.123), and ushers him in, offering a full
meal, which he himself prepares. In these particulars, the episode suggests
not only a hospitality scene, but a theoxeny.
The rest of Books 14–16 employ other genres of myth and are less concerned with theoxeny.
Telemachos’ reception of the fugitive prophet Theoklymenos (Od. 15.223–86) has much
in common with the cycle of myths associated with the prophets Elijah
and Elisha (1 Kgs. 17–19, 21; 2 Kgs. 1–8). Odysseus’ recognition scene with
Telemachos (Od. 16.156–320) will be considered in Chapter 3 as romance.
But in Book 17 the Odyssey offers its most overt treatment of theoxeny.
Book 17, the Odyssey’s key presentation of “Virtual” Negative Theoxeny
Though Melanthios’ assault (Od. 17.204–54) does not technically fall under
the rubric of theoxeny, since the outdoor setting allows for neither host
nor guest, the episode uses several motifs that recur when Antinoos hurls
his stool at Odysseus, serving as transition into the Odyssey’s crucial virtual
negative theoxeny.
Telemachos having gone ahead to meet with Theoklymenos
and Penelope, Eumaios leads the disguised Odysseus to the palace.
Before they reach it, they arrive at a fountain where Ithakans draw their
water, with an altar of the nymphs, so wayfarers can sacrifice (Od. 17.210–1).
Into this sacred site, comes the goatherd Melanthios, driving his goats to
provide dinner for the suitors. Unprovoked, he insults and verbally abuses
them (Od. 17.217–32), claiming Odysseus will spoil the suitors’ feasts.
Not content with verbal abuse, he strikes Odysseus, kicking him in the hip
(Od. 17.233–34).
Eumaios here resembles Lot, who passed the hospitality
test, but is unable to shield his divine guest from the mob’s violence. In
response Eumaios calls on the nymphs of the fountain to make Odysseus
return, a god leading him, to scatter Melanthios’ arrogant glories.
In wishing a god would lead Odysseus home, Eumaios
adapts Melanthios’ earlier remark (Od. 17.243) that the gods see to it that “like leads
like.”
In irony very like that in Nestor’s positive theoxeny, who correctly
intuits that Athena could aid Telemachos, Eumaios wishes for precisely what
is happening, though he cannot perceive that it is.
When Odysseus enters the palace unaccompanied (after Eumaios has
gone in), Telemachos has a meal set out for him (as he did for Athena in
Book 1). But then Athena has him go among the suitors to test which are
reasonable and which are lawless (Od. 17.360–3). In doing so she defines
theoxeny, or, with Odysseus substituting for a god, what we are calling
virtual theoxeny.38
She specifies that a negative theoxeny is underway, “but
even so, she was not going to save any of them from destruction” (Od.
17.364).
Russo notes the apparent discrepancy (1992: 38), “we may wonder
why she encourages Odysseus to search for the distinction in the first
place.” But this misses the point. Athena has earlier witnessed their violations
of hospitality in Book 1, abuses that, within a theoxeny, merit their
destruction.
In the other negative theoxenies, Genesis 19, and Baucis and
Philemon, there are no survivors except the hosts (and their families).
In allowing the suitors another chance, though they will again fail, Athena
repeats her method from Book 2.39 She directs Telemachos to hold an assembly
even though it will be unsuccessful, the suitors easily thwarting his
requests.
But it is important that the assembly is held, that Telemachos
publicly airs his complaints. It is equally important that the door remain
open for the suitors to leave in Books 17–22, even if none does so. Both
Telemachos’ assembly in Book 2 and Odysseus’ testing in Books 17–21 help
legitimize the suitors’ destruction, in addition to the divine justice with
which a theoxeny is overtly concerned.
Following Athena’s directive, Odysseus begs from the suitors, initially
meeting with success from several (Od. 17.365–8, 411–13), until Melanthios
tells Antinoos about Eumaios bringing him to the palace. Antinoos,
much asMelanthios just before, then berates the swineherd, and
calls Odysseus a spoiler of feasts (Od. 17.377 = 17.220).
The audience knows he and the suitors are the spoilers of feasts,
as Athena earlier observed (Od. 1.227–9).
Ironically furthering this unintended
point, Antinoos now hurls a footstool at Odysseus. The Odyssey
teasingly extends this key moment by having Odysseus approach Antinoos
and speak with him after he first hints at his intentions with the footstool
(Od. 17.409–10), but before he throws it (Od. 17. 462–3). Though the
tale Odysseus tells him resembles that which he earlier told Eumaios,40
the different context gives it another purpose and meaning. Intended to
provoke sympathy when told to Eumaios, the tale now serves as a warning,
an exemplum for Antinoos, that Zeus can suddenly snatch wealth and
power away (especially Od. 17.424–6, 437–9). Refusing to give the beggar
anything, Antinoos hurls his footstool, striking Odysseus in the shoulder.
As with Melanthios in the sacred grove, Odysseus withstands Antinoos’
blow without flinching.41
It is at this point, Antinoos striking the disguised Odysseus, that the
Odyssey defines theoxeny in the shocked reaction of an unnamed suitor:
Antinoos, it is not well that you struck the unfortunate wanderer;
you are accursed if somehow he is one of the heavenly gods,
since the gods do go about the cities, seeming like strangers
from other parts, taking on all sorts of forms,
witnessing both the arrogance and good behavior of men.
Odyssey 17.483–7
The remark also confirms that the episode is a virtual theoxeny, with
Odysseus as a stand-in for a god.
Antinoos’ outrages do not stop here. After striking Odysseus, he threatens
to torture or mutilate him (Od. 17.479–80). The threat resembles
Laomedon’s threats to disfigure Apollo and Poseidon (Il. 21.455). Though
the Iliad’s elliptic references to this myth do not allow us to be certain,
in Apollodorus’ account it is clear that Apollo and Poseidon had assumed
human form in order to test Laomedon’s arrogance (II.5.9).42 Antinoos
aligns himself not only with Laomedon, but with some of the worst offenders
in Hades, those eternally punished for committing offences against the
gods. His violence, and threats of worse physical abuse of a xeinos, reveal
that the crisis is even more advanced, has reached a more critical stage than
the threats of the mob in Genesis 19. Here, the mob, in the form of the
suitors, has already taken over the palace, has committed violence against
“the disguised god,” and, though reminded of the consequences of such
acts, threatens to commit further atrocities.
{The connection of negative theoxeny to torture and violence against strangers is sobering. The Cs said that those that accept torture have taken "the Mark of the Beast". The description of the suitors - the violent, manipulative, ungoverned, rapacious, consumption-oriented, suitors having already taken over is another grim reminder of the conditions of our world as well as the likely outcome: apocalypse.}
Athena Against the Suitors, the Angels Against Lot’s Mob
In Genesis 19 the angels strike the mob with blindness to prevent them from
harming Lot’s guests or family (Gen. 19:11). Since the actual destruction
of the mob will come later, this earlier episode serves as an anticipatory
echo of the mob’s eventual destruction. The angels prevent the mob from
acting against the host and his guests by disabling them with blindness.
Westerman (1994: 302) assumes a temporary incapacity is intended, rather
than a permanent loss of sight, adducing the parallel when Elisha asks
Yahweh to immobilize the armed forces of Aram (2 Kgs. 6:18), “Strike this
host, I pray, with blindness,” yet their sight is restored shortly afterward.43
Twice in the Odyssey Athena acts against the suitors in a similar manner,
temporarily disabling them, anticipations of their eventual destruction, the
requisite climax of a negative theoxeny.
In Book 2, his crew and ship ready to visit Nestor and Menelaus,
Athena helps Telemachos leave in secret by
incapacitating the suitors:
She went on her way, into the house of godlike Odysseus
and there she drifted a sweet slumber over the suitors,
and struck them as they drank, and knocked the goblets from
their hands.
Odyssey 2.394–6
This is equivalent to what the angels do to the mob: both acts provide for
the safety of the respective hosts, Lot and Telemachos, by disabling the
respective mobs. The Odyssey uses the verb plazo “strike, drive,”
of the gods acting against mortals in much the way that the angels do
against Lot’s mob. The verb is used several times of the wrathful Poseidon
driving Odysseus on the high seas (Od. 1.74–5, 5.388–9, and, by implication,
1.2), expressing his wrath against Odysseus.44 The Odyssey also uses plazo
to depict Athena as the god wrathful against the suitors.
Athena incapacitates the suitors a second time, again articulated by the
verb plazo. Like the angels against the mob, this is Athena’s penultimate
move against the suitors, both episodes occurring just before the apocalyptic
destruction that concludes each negative theoxeny:
In the suitors Pallas Athena
stirred up uncontrollable laughter, and addled their thinking,
Now they laughed with jaws that were no longer their own.
The meat they ate was splattered with blood; their eyes were
bursting full of tears, and their laughter sounded like lamentation.45
Odyssey 20.345–9
Sexual Relations: Lot’s Mob and the Suitors
Having established specific parallels between some of Athena’s interactions
with the suitors and the angels’ with the mob, we now consider other
parallels between the two myths as a corrective to a prominent misreading of
Genesis 19.
Though popular culture assumes Genesis 19 is a condemnation
of homosexuality, responsible reading of the text and understanding of
theoxenic myth reveal that the story is not about sexual preference, nor
is the offence that brings on their destruction even a sexual act. The
wrongdoing for which the two cities are destroyed is attempted violence
against guests, the same reason for which Athena directs the destruction of
the suitors.
After Lot receives his guests hospitably, and all prepare for sleep, a mob
of men, young and old, surround the house, and demand to have sex with
Lot’s guests. Since Athena departs after she has finished speaking with
Telemachos, such a scene could not occur in the Odyssey. But as soon as
she has left, Antinoos presses Telemachos for details about his unknown
guest:
But I wish to ask you, best of men, about the stranger,
where is this man from, of what land does he claim
to be, where is his race and fatherland. . . ?
How quickly he departed, dashing off, and he did not wait
for us to know him. Truly he was not mean to look at.
Odyssey 1.405–11
Antinoos’ remarks are especially intriguing if juxtaposed with Genesis 19.
In claiming he was interested in getting to know the guest (Od. 1. 411),46
his inquiry suggests, if in smaller degree, the mob’s interest in Lot’s guests.
“To get to know” the guests is what the mob desires at Genesis 19:5.47
Antinoos’ word for “know,” can also mean “know carnally,”48
though the only recorded uses are later than Homer (Menander, the
Septuagint, Matthew, etc.).49
Responsible interpretation of Genesis 19 requires consideration of the
mob’s demand and Lot’s response. Since the myth allows no possibility
that the angels would consent to have sex with the mob, the narrative
clearly presents an instance of attempted rape, not an act of sex. When
the mob demands that he surrender his guests, Lot counters by offering
his daughters, “Look, I have two daughters, virgins both of them; let
me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them”
(Gen. 19:8).
Lot clearly assumes the mob will rape his daughters, as his
emphasis on their virginity seems calculated to increase their appeal to the
mob, while redirecting aggression away from his guests.50
But why does Lot offer up his daughters to be raped?
Of the three negative theoxenies we have, only in Genesis 19 do
the guests attempt to spend the night, and only here does the host have daughters.
By the implicit conduct illustrated in these myths, as well as the severe form of patriarchy upheld
in OT myth (in which, for instance, neither Lot’s wife nor daughters are
given names), Lot is seen as acting correctly in valuing his guests, who
are protected by the sacred tenets of hospitality, over his daughters.51
It is thus hospitality, not sexuality, with which the myth is concerned. Since it
presents the potential for both homosexual and heterosexual rape, the myth
can hardly be seen as supporting a position on sexual preference.52 Rather
it presents a condemnation of violence attempted against guests.53
But the angels intervene, in the manner we have already explored, disclosing their
identities in the process (Gen. 19:10 and ff.), preventing the rape of the
daughters, and violence against Lot.54
{Some footnotes to the immediately preceding paragraphs:
50 Cf. also the closely parallel episode at Judges 19:25 where a host offers up a woman to a similar mob,
which had earlier sought his male guest, and they rape her.
51 Cf. Speiser (1962: 143): “But true to the unwritten code, Lot will stop at nothing in his effort to
protect his guests”; Irvin (1978: 22): “Lot twice shows hospitality to his visitors; first, in inviting
them to spend the night at his house and in feeding them, and second in offering to sacrifice his
daughters to the men of Sodom in order to protect his guests.”
52 Cf. Noort (2004: 4): “When Genesis 19 speaks of rape and the violation of the duty of hospitality,
both homosexual and heterosexual relations are viewed as being perverted, the latter evident from
Lot’s offering of his two daughters to the mob.”
53 Cf. Irvin (1978: 22). Ovid’s negative theoxeny of Baucis and Philemon (Metamorphoses 8. 611–724)
offers indirect confirmation of such a view since sexuality plays no role whatsoever in this myth.
54 A related, if less dramatic, moment occurs in the myth of Baucis and Philemon. When the latter
prepares to sacrifice his gander, as the climax of the hospitality he can offer, Jupiter and Mercury
stop him, revealing their divine identities in the process (Metamorphoses 8.684–8). In both contexts,
when the host has demonstrated his hospitality, his divine guests prevent an act of violence and
reveal their identities at the same time.}
While the suitors do not attempt to have sex with Telemachos’ guest,
their sexual relations with the palace’s serving women offer parallels with
the mob’s violations of hospitality in Genesis 19. Several passages depict
some of the serving women, Melantho in particular, willingly having sex
with the suitors (Od. 18.325, 19.87–8, 20.6–16, 22.445; cf. 17.319). The night
before the suitors’ destruction, the disguised Odysseus observes the maids as
they leave to have sex (Od. 20.6–13). A few other passages, however, depict
the serving women as harassed by the suitors (Od. 16.108–9 = 20.318–19).55
The Odyssey thus presents a more complex, more variegated portrait of the
suitors than the comparably monolithic depiction of the mob in Genesis
19. Even by the double standards of ancient patriarchy, however, the suitors
who have sex with the serving women, whether willingly or not, are acting
improperly. Since their principal reason for being in the palace is to seek
marriage with Penelope, it does not follow that having sex with her female
servants could be in any way seen as a proper part of that process. All
mention of their doing so should be taken as critical commentary against
them. Like the mob in Genesis 19, they have imposed their sexual intent
upon the host’s house.
Violence Directed Against the Host
Though Athena is not threatened, as are the angels, by other indices the
situation in Ithaka is more critical, is at a fuller stage of development. The
suitors will attempt violence not against the guest, but against the host
in attempting to slay Telemachos (Od. 4.670–2, 16.364–406).
Genesis 19 briefly implies that the mob would attack Lot as well. When he denies
their demand for his guests, they threaten him, “‘We will treat you worse
than them.’ They crowded in on Lot and pressed close to break down the
door” (Gen. 19:9).56
The suitors adopt a subtler route. When they learn
that Telemachos has secretly gone, Antinoos proposes they lie in wait,
and murder him on his return (Od. 4.670–2). His suggestion is not only
adopted immediately (Od. 4.673), but soon the suitors, while in the palace,
make cavalier comments about their plan:
Truly now, our much-wooed queen prepares a
marriage, not at all aware that the murder of her son is ready.
Odyssey 4.770–1
Perhaps here the suitors most closely approach the wanton, dissolute atmosphere
of the mob in Genesis 19.
In Books 17–21 Odysseus is not only the god in disguise in the virtual
theoxeny, but he is also the actual host. Telemachos is now role-playing
as host, just as he is in his relations with “the beggar.” When Antinoos
strikes Odysseus in Book 17, he not only parallels the mob’s attempted
violence against the disguised angels, but against the host, Lot. In this
respect the Odyssey ratchets up the stakes by giving this disguised tester
a less than pleasant appearance. Unlike the guise Athena assumes in the
first part of the negative theoxeny, an aristocratic man of the world, who
leaves a positive impression, Odysseus as a beggar presents a stranger less
likely to be warmly accepted. The Odyssey emphasizes how unpleasant are
his clothes (Od. 13.434–5, 14.342–3) and knapsack (Od. 13.437–8). That he
is now bald further lessens his stature, in terms of visual impressions, and
opens the door for additional abuse (Od. 18.354–5) of a sort that would
not have been directed against the disguised Athena. In such ways the
Odyssey anticipates some of the meaning and modality of Christian myth,
as discussed in Chapter 12.
The Suitors/Lot’s sons-in law ignore warning of the apocalypse
In both myths the host attempts to warn others that the gods are preparing
destruction. But in each case they are ignored. Lot, after the angels have
told him of the coming destruction of the city, warns his sons-in-law:
So Lot went out and urged his sons-in-law to get out of the place at once. “The
Lord is about to destroy the city,” he said. But they did not take him seriously.
(Genesis 19:14)
Alter (2004) renders the end of 19:14 as “And he seemed to his sons-in-law
to be joking.” Little else is said about the sons-in-law.
{I would like to note that the appearance of sons-in-law is puzzling considering that Lot's daughters have just been described as virgins.}
In the Odyssey the disguised Odysseus approaches Amphinomos, earlier
singled out as the least offensive member of the suitors (Od. 16.397–8),
to warn him what awaits them if they continue their outrageous behavior
(Od. 18.125–50). Odysseus elaborates at some length on the topic of how
precarious is a mortal’s existence, how dependent upon the gods’ will.
Claiming to have once been on his way to becoming a prosperous man, he
implies that the gods reduced him to his present state of poverty because he
committed reckless acts. As commentators have noted,57 the termOdysseus
uses for reckless acts, atasthala, serves in the Odyssey as a marked term,
an index of characters who commit acts the gods find offensive.
After implying that his own dire circumstances
result from the gods having punished him for such acts, he describes the
suitors with the same term, as having committed atasthala (Od. 18.143).
But instead of continuing, as we might expect him, with the warning of
divine punishment, the beggar instead asserts that Odysseus will return
soon, and punish the suitors. His formulation thus continues the Odyssey’s
presentation of virtual theoxeny, with Odysseus playing the role of the
god in disguise. His trenchant remark near the beginning of the speech,
“the earth breeds nothing worth less regard than man” (Od. 18.130), also
suggests a divine perspective. In the Iliad Zeus makes a very similar remark
when Hektor dons Patroklos’ armor (Il. 17.446–7),58 an act of reckless
behavior offensive to the gods. Zeus and Odysseus both use their parallel
observations to describe a mortal who, because he has committed an offence
against the gods, is shortly to meet his doom.
Like Lot, Odysseus presents his addressee opportunity to heed his warning
and escape the coming destruction. But the narrator describes Amphinomos
as unable to leave, though aware of the coming destruction, because
Athena bound him to be killed by Telemachos (Od. 18.154–6).
Yahweh’s treatment of Pharaoh in Exodus offers a relevant parallel to Athena’s procedure.
Moses performs miraculous act after miraculous act, each of which
shows Pharaoh he is favored by god, as he claims. But each time Yahweh
himself prevents Pharaoh from acquiescing, “But the Lord made Pharaoh
obstinate” (Exod. 9:12). Both contexts should be understood as instances
of Dodds’ (1960) overdetermination, in which a mortal and an immortal
share responsibility for causing an act. Since Lot has to leave his home to
speak with his sons-in-law, some commentators conjecture that they may
have been part of the mob in the earlier scene, which, if correct, strengthens
their parallels with Amphinomos.
Negative theoxenies conclude in an apocalypse, in the Odyssey, Genesis
19, and in Ovid’s myth of Baucis and Philemon. I postpone discussion of
the destruction of the suitors and the mob outside Lot’s house until the
final chapter.
Virtual Theoxeny in OT myth
OT myth also has narratives that may be considered virtual theoxenies.
The Elijah cycle of myths as a group offers the most parallels to Homeric
epic of any one connected group of OT myths. He parallels the Iliad’s
Kalkhas in his quarrel with a king (Louden 2006: 158–9); he shares a heroic
motif with Akhilleus (ibid., 168–70); he participates in a comic theomachy
that offers parallels with the Iliad (ibid., 221–2). In a general way, Elijah’s
status as a fugitive prophet (1 Kgs. 17) offers parallels with the Odyssey’s
Theoklymenos (Od. 15.223–78). Because of the drought that serves as its
general background, the Elijah cycle begins with a hospitality myth when
Yahweh sends him to stay with a woman in the Sidonian (that is Phoenician)
village of Zarephath (1 Kgs. 17:8–24). Reaching her house, Elijah asks her
for water and bread. When she replies that she has no food, except a handful
of flour and a little oil, Elijah tells her to bake him a cake, for her oil and
flour will not run out until Yahweh ends the drought.
Though the episode lacks some of the usual motifs (Yahweh has told
the woman that he is coming), it features several details typically found
in theoxenies. Yahweh specifically directs Elijah to the woman’s house
(1 Kgs. 17:8–9), as Athena instructs Odysseus to go first to Eumaios’ hut
(Od. 13.404–11), where he initiates his virtual theoxeny. The woman bakes a
cake for Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:15), as Sara does for Abraham’s divine guests (Gen.
18:6–7). Her stock of oil and flour becomes miraculously self-replenishing,
just as the wine bowl in the myth of Baucis and Philemon (Metamorphoses
8.679–80). Elijah predicts the miracle of the self-replenishing stock of oil
and flour (1 Kgs. 17:14) as the disguised angels predict the miracle of Sara’s
conception (Gen. 18:10).
The basic underlying structure of a theoxeny
remains clear: the host demonstrates hospitality and receives a miraculous
reward.59
Elijah, like Odysseus in Odyssey 14–22, functions both as a god’s
agent and as a mortal who performs the role theoxeny normally assigns
to an immortal.60 When the woman’s son becomes ill, she blames Elijah,
“You came here to bring my sins to light and cause my son’s death” (1 Kgs.
17:18), ironically an accurate description of the function of the disguised
immortal in a negative theoxeny. Taking him up to the roof-chamber where
he has been staying, Elijah revives him, prompting the woman to declare
she now knows him to be a man of God, much as the host in a theoxeny
typically realizes the work of the immortal guest after the fact.
Elijah’s successor, Elisha, whose myths often suggest thematic parallels
with those of his predecessor, appears in a few virtually identical episodes.
Again, the tradition places a hospitality episode near the beginning of his
cycle of stories in the account of the well-to-do woman of Shunem who
repeatedly gives Elisha extensive hospitality (2 Kgs. 4:8–17). Afterward
Elisha prophesies that she will give birth to a son (2 Kgs. 4:16), as do
divine guests in two theoxenies, the angel to Sara (Gen. 18:10), and in
Ovid’s myth of Hyrieus (Fasti 5.493–544). Immediately before this episode
Elisha performs the miracle of the oil flask that keeps replenishing itself
(2 Kgs. 4:1–6), just as Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:16),61 again reminiscent of the
self-replenishing wine bowl in Ovid’s negative theoxeny (Metamorphoses
8.679–80). Later the Shunammite woman’s son dies, and Elisha revives
him (2 Kgs. 4:18–35), as Elijah revives the widow’s son.
To sum up, not only do both Homeric and OT myth employ theoxeny,
but the parallels extend even to the three specific subtypes, positive,
negative, and virtual.
Both traditions employ theoxeny as moral indices
illustrating positive characters’ proximity to their deities, and negative
characters’ distance, and as illustrations of the miraculous powers of their
gods for rewarding or punishing the behaviors depicted therein. In spite
of significant differences between the two traditions (e.g., the monotheism
or monolatry of OT myth, and its thematic polemics to support Yahwist
religion), the constituent elements of theoxeny remain remarkably stable.62
Theoxeny in New Testament myth
Theoxeny survives as a mythic type into Christian myth, though with less
developed narratives than those in Genesis 18–19. Much as the Odyssey,
NT myth uses hospitality episodes as indices of characters’ morality. The
admonition in Hebrews is a typical instance, “Do not neglect to show
hospitality; by doing this, some have entertained angels unawares” (Heb.
13:2), which could serve as a tag line for Genesis 18 or 19. Most important,
andmost unexpected, however, is the central position theoxeny occupies in
Jesus’ prophecy of the Second Coming or Day of Judgment in the Gospel
of Matthew.
When the Son of Man comes he will separate mortals into two groups,
as a shepherd separates the goats from the sheep. A key criterion for his
doing so is how they earlier treated him:
For when I was hungry, you gave me food; when thirsty, you gave me drink; when
I was a stranger, you took me into your home. (Matthew 25:35)
The mortals who will be judged favorably are those who extended hospitality
to him. For those mortals who will not receive favorable judgment,
the criteria are the same:
For when I was hungry, you gave me nothing to eat; when thirsty, nothing to
drink; when I was a stranger, you did not welcome me. (Matthew 25:42–3)
The passage functions as a shorthand version of theoxeny, positive and
negative. Christ, a god, cast in the role of a guest (xenos) in need of hospitality
here instantiates full theoxeny, simultaneously positive and negative.
A host’s reception of his guest remains an index of his morality, but now
the difference in outcomes, between moral and immoral behavior, is even
greater than it is in the two opposite types of theoxeny in Genesis 18–19
and the Odyssey. In a considerable expansion of a traditional motif, as is
characteristic of Christianity, the outcomes of both types of theoxeny are
extended into eternity. Those who were hospitable, a positive theoxeny,
will receive not merely a miraculous reward, but eternal life. While those
who failed to be hospitable, a negative theoxeny, will not only be destroyed,
in an apocalypse, but will receive eternal punishment (Matt. 25:46).
In an additional expansion of the mythic genre, Christ declares that anyone who
acted this way toward one of his followers will be so judged (Matt. 25:45).
In so doing, he figures all of them in a virtual theoxeny, mortals playing
the role of the disguised immortal to test a host’s hospitality and morality.
Jesus’ first miracle, or sign, in the Gospel of John also suggests connections
with theoxeny. Since Jesus, his mother, and his disciples are guests at
the wedding at Cana-in-Galilee, the episode is a hospitality myth. When
Mary tells him that the wine has run out, Jesus has servants fill six huge
stone jars with water. They then take the jars to the master, who, tasting,
proclaims that the groom saved his best wine for the last (John 2:1–10).Only
the servants know of the miraculous transformation of water into wine.
The miracle, amid the hospitality setting, suggests the traditional motif
of the self-replenishing vessel found in three theoxenies: the wine bowl in
Ovid’s negative theoxeny (Metamorphoses 8.679–80), and the oil jars in the
virtual theoxenies with Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:16) and Elisha (2 Kgs. 4:1–6).63
However, considerable differences between this narrative and those suggest
that the Gospel of John is adapting the traditional motifs of theoxeny,
putting them to a different purpose. The ties with hospitality are here less
crucial: Jesus has no direct contact with either host or groom. Only the
servants, and presumably the disciples and Mary, are in on the miracle,
which remains secret from everyone else. The real focus is not, then, on
the morality of the host, as in a theoxeny, but on Christ in performing the
miracle and thereby earning the belief of his disciples (John 2:11).64
The intriguing tale in Acts 14:8–20 should also be considered an adaptation
of theoxeny. In the Roman colony of Lystra, Paul, accompanied by
Barnabas, heals a lame man while speaking to a public assembly. The crowd
proclaims that they must be Zeus and Hermes in human form (Acts 14:11–
12). But when the priest of Zeus is about to lead the crowd in a sacrifice of
oxen to them as gods, Paul and Barnabas prevent them from doing so and
proclaim their own faith. Though this myth lacks any overt connection
with hospitality, with neither guest nor host, it is nonetheless suggestive of
Ovid’s theoxeny of Baucis and Philemon in a number of specifics. In Zeus
and Hermes it features the same two gods assuming human form. In both
narratives the two “gods” prevent the others from sacrificing an animal
and offering it to them. But even more than John 2, Acts 14 employs these
traditional motifs to further a very different agenda, serving as a polemical
corrective to, perhaps even constituting a parody, of such myths.65
We conclude this chapter by adducing Jesus’ allusions to Sodom and
Gomorrah in Matthew and Luke. Both gospels present versions of the
same basic episode, Jesus instructing his disciples how to approach a city to
spread his gospel. They are to take no money with them, but to depend on
the welcome the inhabitants offer (Matt. 10:9–13; Luke 10:4–9; cf. Mark
6:8–13). It is when he considers the towns that will not receive
his disciples that Jesus thinks of Sodom and Gomorrah, “on the day of
judgment it will be more bearable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah
than for that town” (Matt. 10:15; cf. Luke 10:12). Making no reference to
sexuality of any kind in his mention of Genesis 19, he focuses entirely on
hospitality, whether a community receives his disciples or does not. The
word he uses for receive, dekhomai, is one of the standard Homeric
verbs for “receive hospitably.”66 He thus not only affirms our reading of
Genesis 19, but his own references to Sodom and Gomorrah (Matt. 10:9–15
and Luke 10:4–12) also function as virtual theoxenies, very like his shaping
the Day of Judgment around the issue of hospitable reception in Matthew
25. Those cities that fail to receive his followers, who come in his name,
will receive apocalyptic destruction, just as the inhabitants of Sodom and
Gomorrah did. In a significant change, however, Jesus implies that hosts
will be among those who fail to receive, and thereby demonstrate their
failings, whereas in the earlier negative theoxenies the hosts pass the tests,
but the surrounding communities (suitors, mob) are those who violate.
Resumption of the Odyssey’s Negative Theoxeny
When the disguised Odysseus stays with Eumaios, as Athena directs, the
Odyssey initiates not only a hospitality myth, but a virtual theoxeny, as
noted above.
Eumaios is the good host within the impious community.
He has the same low economic means as Baucis and Philemon, and prefigures
Christianity’s concern with similar types. A herdsman, Eumaios, is
in charge of Odysseus’ swine herds, the males of which currently total 360
(Od. 14.20). The number suggests thematic parallels with the cattle of
Helios on Thrinakia, which are 350 in number (Od. 12.129–30). Both
numbers figure the days in a year, and may reflect Indo-European material.
In the Rig Veda cows are likened to rays of the sun or dawn.36 On Thrinakia,
Helios’ herds are an extension of himself, an embodiment of
the sun with its roughly 360 days (further discussion in Chapter 13). The
corresponding numbers imply parallels between the suitors’ violation of
Odysseus’ herds and the crew’s of Helios’.
The suitors plundering the flocks Eumaios oversees instantiates the Odyssey’s thematic concern with
improper consumption, the medium through which its characters display
their lack of self-control.37 As the crew perished, destroyed by the gods for
consuming Helios’ herd, so will the suitors, who command the sacrifice of
another of Eumaios’ herd (Od. 14.26–8).
Approaching the enclosure around Eumaios’ quarter, the disguised
Odysseus is threatened by two hounds. Within the virtual theoxeny, a
level of violence is threatened against the disguised guest similar to that
directed against the angels in Genesis 19. Intervening to call off his hounds,
Eumaios passes the initial hospitality test, calls Odysseus xeinos (Od. 14.56–
7), as Telemachos did Athena (Od. 1.123), and ushers him in, offering a full
meal, which he himself prepares. In these particulars, the episode suggests
not only a hospitality scene, but a theoxeny.
The rest of Books 14–16 employ other genres of myth and are less concerned with theoxeny.
Telemachos’ reception of the fugitive prophet Theoklymenos (Od. 15.223–86) has much
in common with the cycle of myths associated with the prophets Elijah
and Elisha (1 Kgs. 17–19, 21; 2 Kgs. 1–8). Odysseus’ recognition scene with
Telemachos (Od. 16.156–320) will be considered in Chapter 3 as romance.
But in Book 17 the Odyssey offers its most overt treatment of theoxeny.
Book 17, the Odyssey’s key presentation of “Virtual” Negative Theoxeny
Though Melanthios’ assault (Od. 17.204–54) does not technically fall under
the rubric of theoxeny, since the outdoor setting allows for neither host
nor guest, the episode uses several motifs that recur when Antinoos hurls
his stool at Odysseus, serving as transition into the Odyssey’s crucial virtual
negative theoxeny.
Telemachos having gone ahead to meet with Theoklymenos
and Penelope, Eumaios leads the disguised Odysseus to the palace.
Before they reach it, they arrive at a fountain where Ithakans draw their
water, with an altar of the nymphs, so wayfarers can sacrifice (Od. 17.210–1).
Into this sacred site, comes the goatherd Melanthios, driving his goats to
provide dinner for the suitors. Unprovoked, he insults and verbally abuses
them (Od. 17.217–32), claiming Odysseus will spoil the suitors’ feasts.
Not content with verbal abuse, he strikes Odysseus, kicking him in the hip
(Od. 17.233–34).
Eumaios here resembles Lot, who passed the hospitality
test, but is unable to shield his divine guest from the mob’s violence. In
response Eumaios calls on the nymphs of the fountain to make Odysseus
return, a god leading him, to scatter Melanthios’ arrogant glories.
In wishing a god would lead Odysseus home, Eumaios
adapts Melanthios’ earlier remark (Od. 17.243) that the gods see to it that “like leads
like.”
In irony very like that in Nestor’s positive theoxeny, who correctly
intuits that Athena could aid Telemachos, Eumaios wishes for precisely what
is happening, though he cannot perceive that it is.
When Odysseus enters the palace unaccompanied (after Eumaios has
gone in), Telemachos has a meal set out for him (as he did for Athena in
Book 1). But then Athena has him go among the suitors to test which are
reasonable and which are lawless (Od. 17.360–3). In doing so she defines
theoxeny, or, with Odysseus substituting for a god, what we are calling
virtual theoxeny.38
She specifies that a negative theoxeny is underway, “but
even so, she was not going to save any of them from destruction” (Od.
17.364).
Russo notes the apparent discrepancy (1992: 38), “we may wonder
why she encourages Odysseus to search for the distinction in the first
place.” But this misses the point. Athena has earlier witnessed their violations
of hospitality in Book 1, abuses that, within a theoxeny, merit their
destruction.
In the other negative theoxenies, Genesis 19, and Baucis and
Philemon, there are no survivors except the hosts (and their families).
In allowing the suitors another chance, though they will again fail, Athena
repeats her method from Book 2.39 She directs Telemachos to hold an assembly
even though it will be unsuccessful, the suitors easily thwarting his
requests.
But it is important that the assembly is held, that Telemachos
publicly airs his complaints. It is equally important that the door remain
open for the suitors to leave in Books 17–22, even if none does so. Both
Telemachos’ assembly in Book 2 and Odysseus’ testing in Books 17–21 help
legitimize the suitors’ destruction, in addition to the divine justice with
which a theoxeny is overtly concerned.
Following Athena’s directive, Odysseus begs from the suitors, initially
meeting with success from several (Od. 17.365–8, 411–13), until Melanthios
tells Antinoos about Eumaios bringing him to the palace. Antinoos,
much asMelanthios just before, then berates the swineherd, and
calls Odysseus a spoiler of feasts (Od. 17.377 = 17.220).
The audience knows he and the suitors are the spoilers of feasts,
as Athena earlier observed (Od. 1.227–9).
Ironically furthering this unintended
point, Antinoos now hurls a footstool at Odysseus. The Odyssey
teasingly extends this key moment by having Odysseus approach Antinoos
and speak with him after he first hints at his intentions with the footstool
(Od. 17.409–10), but before he throws it (Od. 17. 462–3). Though the
tale Odysseus tells him resembles that which he earlier told Eumaios,40
the different context gives it another purpose and meaning. Intended to
provoke sympathy when told to Eumaios, the tale now serves as a warning,
an exemplum for Antinoos, that Zeus can suddenly snatch wealth and
power away (especially Od. 17.424–6, 437–9). Refusing to give the beggar
anything, Antinoos hurls his footstool, striking Odysseus in the shoulder.
As with Melanthios in the sacred grove, Odysseus withstands Antinoos’
blow without flinching.41
It is at this point, Antinoos striking the disguised Odysseus, that the
Odyssey defines theoxeny in the shocked reaction of an unnamed suitor:
Antinoos, it is not well that you struck the unfortunate wanderer;
you are accursed if somehow he is one of the heavenly gods,
since the gods do go about the cities, seeming like strangers
from other parts, taking on all sorts of forms,
witnessing both the arrogance and good behavior of men.
Odyssey 17.483–7
The remark also confirms that the episode is a virtual theoxeny, with
Odysseus as a stand-in for a god.
Antinoos’ outrages do not stop here. After striking Odysseus, he threatens
to torture or mutilate him (Od. 17.479–80). The threat resembles
Laomedon’s threats to disfigure Apollo and Poseidon (Il. 21.455). Though
the Iliad’s elliptic references to this myth do not allow us to be certain,
in Apollodorus’ account it is clear that Apollo and Poseidon had assumed
human form in order to test Laomedon’s arrogance (II.5.9).42 Antinoos
aligns himself not only with Laomedon, but with some of the worst offenders
in Hades, those eternally punished for committing offences against the
gods. His violence, and threats of worse physical abuse of a xeinos, reveal
that the crisis is even more advanced, has reached a more critical stage than
the threats of the mob in Genesis 19. Here, the mob, in the form of the
suitors, has already taken over the palace, has committed violence against
“the disguised god,” and, though reminded of the consequences of such
acts, threatens to commit further atrocities.
{The connection of negative theoxeny to torture and violence against strangers is sobering. The Cs said that those that accept torture have taken "the Mark of the Beast". The description of the suitors - the violent, manipulative, ungoverned, rapacious, consumption-oriented, suitors having already taken over is another grim reminder of the conditions of our world as well as the likely outcome: apocalypse.}
Athena Against the Suitors, the Angels Against Lot’s Mob
In Genesis 19 the angels strike the mob with blindness to prevent them from
harming Lot’s guests or family (Gen. 19:11). Since the actual destruction
of the mob will come later, this earlier episode serves as an anticipatory
echo of the mob’s eventual destruction. The angels prevent the mob from
acting against the host and his guests by disabling them with blindness.
Westerman (1994: 302) assumes a temporary incapacity is intended, rather
than a permanent loss of sight, adducing the parallel when Elisha asks
Yahweh to immobilize the armed forces of Aram (2 Kgs. 6:18), “Strike this
host, I pray, with blindness,” yet their sight is restored shortly afterward.43
Twice in the Odyssey Athena acts against the suitors in a similar manner,
temporarily disabling them, anticipations of their eventual destruction, the
requisite climax of a negative theoxeny.
In Book 2, his crew and ship ready to visit Nestor and Menelaus,
Athena helps Telemachos leave in secret by
incapacitating the suitors:
She went on her way, into the house of godlike Odysseus
and there she drifted a sweet slumber over the suitors,
and struck them as they drank, and knocked the goblets from
their hands.
Odyssey 2.394–6
This is equivalent to what the angels do to the mob: both acts provide for
the safety of the respective hosts, Lot and Telemachos, by disabling the
respective mobs. The Odyssey uses the verb plazo “strike, drive,”
of the gods acting against mortals in much the way that the angels do
against Lot’s mob. The verb is used several times of the wrathful Poseidon
driving Odysseus on the high seas (Od. 1.74–5, 5.388–9, and, by implication,
1.2), expressing his wrath against Odysseus.44 The Odyssey also uses plazo
to depict Athena as the god wrathful against the suitors.
Athena incapacitates the suitors a second time, again articulated by the
verb plazo. Like the angels against the mob, this is Athena’s penultimate
move against the suitors, both episodes occurring just before the apocalyptic
destruction that concludes each negative theoxeny:
In the suitors Pallas Athena
stirred up uncontrollable laughter, and addled their thinking,
Now they laughed with jaws that were no longer their own.
The meat they ate was splattered with blood; their eyes were
bursting full of tears, and their laughter sounded like lamentation.45
Odyssey 20.345–9
Sexual Relations: Lot’s Mob and the Suitors
Having established specific parallels between some of Athena’s interactions
with the suitors and the angels’ with the mob, we now consider other
parallels between the two myths as a corrective to a prominent misreading of
Genesis 19.
Though popular culture assumes Genesis 19 is a condemnation
of homosexuality, responsible reading of the text and understanding of
theoxenic myth reveal that the story is not about sexual preference, nor
is the offence that brings on their destruction even a sexual act. The
wrongdoing for which the two cities are destroyed is attempted violence
against guests, the same reason for which Athena directs the destruction of
the suitors.
After Lot receives his guests hospitably, and all prepare for sleep, a mob
of men, young and old, surround the house, and demand to have sex with
Lot’s guests. Since Athena departs after she has finished speaking with
Telemachos, such a scene could not occur in the Odyssey. But as soon as
she has left, Antinoos presses Telemachos for details about his unknown
guest:
But I wish to ask you, best of men, about the stranger,
where is this man from, of what land does he claim
to be, where is his race and fatherland. . . ?
How quickly he departed, dashing off, and he did not wait
for us to know him. Truly he was not mean to look at.
Odyssey 1.405–11
Antinoos’ remarks are especially intriguing if juxtaposed with Genesis 19.
In claiming he was interested in getting to know the guest (Od. 1. 411),46
his inquiry suggests, if in smaller degree, the mob’s interest in Lot’s guests.
“To get to know” the guests is what the mob desires at Genesis 19:5.47
Antinoos’ word for “know,” can also mean “know carnally,”48
though the only recorded uses are later than Homer (Menander, the
Septuagint, Matthew, etc.).49
Responsible interpretation of Genesis 19 requires consideration of the
mob’s demand and Lot’s response. Since the myth allows no possibility
that the angels would consent to have sex with the mob, the narrative
clearly presents an instance of attempted rape, not an act of sex. When
the mob demands that he surrender his guests, Lot counters by offering
his daughters, “Look, I have two daughters, virgins both of them; let
me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them”
(Gen. 19:8).
Lot clearly assumes the mob will rape his daughters, as his
emphasis on their virginity seems calculated to increase their appeal to the
mob, while redirecting aggression away from his guests.50
But why does Lot offer up his daughters to be raped?
Of the three negative theoxenies we have, only in Genesis 19 do
the guests attempt to spend the night, and only here does the host have daughters.
By the implicit conduct illustrated in these myths, as well as the severe form of patriarchy upheld
in OT myth (in which, for instance, neither Lot’s wife nor daughters are
given names), Lot is seen as acting correctly in valuing his guests, who
are protected by the sacred tenets of hospitality, over his daughters.51
It is thus hospitality, not sexuality, with which the myth is concerned. Since it
presents the potential for both homosexual and heterosexual rape, the myth
can hardly be seen as supporting a position on sexual preference.52 Rather
it presents a condemnation of violence attempted against guests.53
But the angels intervene, in the manner we have already explored, disclosing their
identities in the process (Gen. 19:10 and ff.), preventing the rape of the
daughters, and violence against Lot.54
{Some footnotes to the immediately preceding paragraphs:
50 Cf. also the closely parallel episode at Judges 19:25 where a host offers up a woman to a similar mob,
which had earlier sought his male guest, and they rape her.
51 Cf. Speiser (1962: 143): “But true to the unwritten code, Lot will stop at nothing in his effort to
protect his guests”; Irvin (1978: 22): “Lot twice shows hospitality to his visitors; first, in inviting
them to spend the night at his house and in feeding them, and second in offering to sacrifice his
daughters to the men of Sodom in order to protect his guests.”
52 Cf. Noort (2004: 4): “When Genesis 19 speaks of rape and the violation of the duty of hospitality,
both homosexual and heterosexual relations are viewed as being perverted, the latter evident from
Lot’s offering of his two daughters to the mob.”
53 Cf. Irvin (1978: 22). Ovid’s negative theoxeny of Baucis and Philemon (Metamorphoses 8. 611–724)
offers indirect confirmation of such a view since sexuality plays no role whatsoever in this myth.
54 A related, if less dramatic, moment occurs in the myth of Baucis and Philemon. When the latter
prepares to sacrifice his gander, as the climax of the hospitality he can offer, Jupiter and Mercury
stop him, revealing their divine identities in the process (Metamorphoses 8.684–8). In both contexts,
when the host has demonstrated his hospitality, his divine guests prevent an act of violence and
reveal their identities at the same time.}
While the suitors do not attempt to have sex with Telemachos’ guest,
their sexual relations with the palace’s serving women offer parallels with
the mob’s violations of hospitality in Genesis 19. Several passages depict
some of the serving women, Melantho in particular, willingly having sex
with the suitors (Od. 18.325, 19.87–8, 20.6–16, 22.445; cf. 17.319). The night
before the suitors’ destruction, the disguised Odysseus observes the maids as
they leave to have sex (Od. 20.6–13). A few other passages, however, depict
the serving women as harassed by the suitors (Od. 16.108–9 = 20.318–19).55
The Odyssey thus presents a more complex, more variegated portrait of the
suitors than the comparably monolithic depiction of the mob in Genesis
19. Even by the double standards of ancient patriarchy, however, the suitors
who have sex with the serving women, whether willingly or not, are acting
improperly. Since their principal reason for being in the palace is to seek
marriage with Penelope, it does not follow that having sex with her female
servants could be in any way seen as a proper part of that process. All
mention of their doing so should be taken as critical commentary against
them. Like the mob in Genesis 19, they have imposed their sexual intent
upon the host’s house.
Violence Directed Against the Host
Though Athena is not threatened, as are the angels, by other indices the
situation in Ithaka is more critical, is at a fuller stage of development. The
suitors will attempt violence not against the guest, but against the host
in attempting to slay Telemachos (Od. 4.670–2, 16.364–406).
Genesis 19 briefly implies that the mob would attack Lot as well. When he denies
their demand for his guests, they threaten him, “‘We will treat you worse
than them.’ They crowded in on Lot and pressed close to break down the
door” (Gen. 19:9).56
The suitors adopt a subtler route. When they learn
that Telemachos has secretly gone, Antinoos proposes they lie in wait,
and murder him on his return (Od. 4.670–2). His suggestion is not only
adopted immediately (Od. 4.673), but soon the suitors, while in the palace,
make cavalier comments about their plan:
Truly now, our much-wooed queen prepares a
marriage, not at all aware that the murder of her son is ready.
Odyssey 4.770–1
Perhaps here the suitors most closely approach the wanton, dissolute atmosphere
of the mob in Genesis 19.
In Books 17–21 Odysseus is not only the god in disguise in the virtual
theoxeny, but he is also the actual host. Telemachos is now role-playing
as host, just as he is in his relations with “the beggar.” When Antinoos
strikes Odysseus in Book 17, he not only parallels the mob’s attempted
violence against the disguised angels, but against the host, Lot. In this
respect the Odyssey ratchets up the stakes by giving this disguised tester
a less than pleasant appearance. Unlike the guise Athena assumes in the
first part of the negative theoxeny, an aristocratic man of the world, who
leaves a positive impression, Odysseus as a beggar presents a stranger less
likely to be warmly accepted. The Odyssey emphasizes how unpleasant are
his clothes (Od. 13.434–5, 14.342–3) and knapsack (Od. 13.437–8). That he
is now bald further lessens his stature, in terms of visual impressions, and
opens the door for additional abuse (Od. 18.354–5) of a sort that would
not have been directed against the disguised Athena. In such ways the
Odyssey anticipates some of the meaning and modality of Christian myth,
as discussed in Chapter 12.
The Suitors/Lot’s sons-in law ignore warning of the apocalypse
In both myths the host attempts to warn others that the gods are preparing
destruction. But in each case they are ignored. Lot, after the angels have
told him of the coming destruction of the city, warns his sons-in-law:
So Lot went out and urged his sons-in-law to get out of the place at once. “The
Lord is about to destroy the city,” he said. But they did not take him seriously.
(Genesis 19:14)
Alter (2004) renders the end of 19:14 as “And he seemed to his sons-in-law
to be joking.” Little else is said about the sons-in-law.
{I would like to note that the appearance of sons-in-law is puzzling considering that Lot's daughters have just been described as virgins.}
In the Odyssey the disguised Odysseus approaches Amphinomos, earlier
singled out as the least offensive member of the suitors (Od. 16.397–8),
to warn him what awaits them if they continue their outrageous behavior
(Od. 18.125–50). Odysseus elaborates at some length on the topic of how
precarious is a mortal’s existence, how dependent upon the gods’ will.
Claiming to have once been on his way to becoming a prosperous man, he
implies that the gods reduced him to his present state of poverty because he
committed reckless acts. As commentators have noted,57 the termOdysseus
uses for reckless acts, atasthala, serves in the Odyssey as a marked term,
an index of characters who commit acts the gods find offensive.
After implying that his own dire circumstances
result from the gods having punished him for such acts, he describes the
suitors with the same term, as having committed atasthala (Od. 18.143).
But instead of continuing, as we might expect him, with the warning of
divine punishment, the beggar instead asserts that Odysseus will return
soon, and punish the suitors. His formulation thus continues the Odyssey’s
presentation of virtual theoxeny, with Odysseus playing the role of the
god in disguise. His trenchant remark near the beginning of the speech,
“the earth breeds nothing worth less regard than man” (Od. 18.130), also
suggests a divine perspective. In the Iliad Zeus makes a very similar remark
when Hektor dons Patroklos’ armor (Il. 17.446–7),58 an act of reckless
behavior offensive to the gods. Zeus and Odysseus both use their parallel
observations to describe a mortal who, because he has committed an offence
against the gods, is shortly to meet his doom.
Like Lot, Odysseus presents his addressee opportunity to heed his warning
and escape the coming destruction. But the narrator describes Amphinomos
as unable to leave, though aware of the coming destruction, because
Athena bound him to be killed by Telemachos (Od. 18.154–6).
Yahweh’s treatment of Pharaoh in Exodus offers a relevant parallel to Athena’s procedure.
Moses performs miraculous act after miraculous act, each of which
shows Pharaoh he is favored by god, as he claims. But each time Yahweh
himself prevents Pharaoh from acquiescing, “But the Lord made Pharaoh
obstinate” (Exod. 9:12). Both contexts should be understood as instances
of Dodds’ (1960) overdetermination, in which a mortal and an immortal
share responsibility for causing an act. Since Lot has to leave his home to
speak with his sons-in-law, some commentators conjecture that they may
have been part of the mob in the earlier scene, which, if correct, strengthens
their parallels with Amphinomos.
Negative theoxenies conclude in an apocalypse, in the Odyssey, Genesis
19, and in Ovid’s myth of Baucis and Philemon. I postpone discussion of
the destruction of the suitors and the mob outside Lot’s house until the
final chapter.
Virtual Theoxeny in OT myth
OT myth also has narratives that may be considered virtual theoxenies.
The Elijah cycle of myths as a group offers the most parallels to Homeric
epic of any one connected group of OT myths. He parallels the Iliad’s
Kalkhas in his quarrel with a king (Louden 2006: 158–9); he shares a heroic
motif with Akhilleus (ibid., 168–70); he participates in a comic theomachy
that offers parallels with the Iliad (ibid., 221–2). In a general way, Elijah’s
status as a fugitive prophet (1 Kgs. 17) offers parallels with the Odyssey’s
Theoklymenos (Od. 15.223–78). Because of the drought that serves as its
general background, the Elijah cycle begins with a hospitality myth when
Yahweh sends him to stay with a woman in the Sidonian (that is Phoenician)
village of Zarephath (1 Kgs. 17:8–24). Reaching her house, Elijah asks her
for water and bread. When she replies that she has no food, except a handful
of flour and a little oil, Elijah tells her to bake him a cake, for her oil and
flour will not run out until Yahweh ends the drought.
Though the episode lacks some of the usual motifs (Yahweh has told
the woman that he is coming), it features several details typically found
in theoxenies. Yahweh specifically directs Elijah to the woman’s house
(1 Kgs. 17:8–9), as Athena instructs Odysseus to go first to Eumaios’ hut
(Od. 13.404–11), where he initiates his virtual theoxeny. The woman bakes a
cake for Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:15), as Sara does for Abraham’s divine guests (Gen.
18:6–7). Her stock of oil and flour becomes miraculously self-replenishing,
just as the wine bowl in the myth of Baucis and Philemon (Metamorphoses
8.679–80). Elijah predicts the miracle of the self-replenishing stock of oil
and flour (1 Kgs. 17:14) as the disguised angels predict the miracle of Sara’s
conception (Gen. 18:10).
The basic underlying structure of a theoxeny
remains clear: the host demonstrates hospitality and receives a miraculous
reward.59
Elijah, like Odysseus in Odyssey 14–22, functions both as a god’s
agent and as a mortal who performs the role theoxeny normally assigns
to an immortal.60 When the woman’s son becomes ill, she blames Elijah,
“You came here to bring my sins to light and cause my son’s death” (1 Kgs.
17:18), ironically an accurate description of the function of the disguised
immortal in a negative theoxeny. Taking him up to the roof-chamber where
he has been staying, Elijah revives him, prompting the woman to declare
she now knows him to be a man of God, much as the host in a theoxeny
typically realizes the work of the immortal guest after the fact.
Elijah’s successor, Elisha, whose myths often suggest thematic parallels
with those of his predecessor, appears in a few virtually identical episodes.
Again, the tradition places a hospitality episode near the beginning of his
cycle of stories in the account of the well-to-do woman of Shunem who
repeatedly gives Elisha extensive hospitality (2 Kgs. 4:8–17). Afterward
Elisha prophesies that she will give birth to a son (2 Kgs. 4:16), as do
divine guests in two theoxenies, the angel to Sara (Gen. 18:10), and in
Ovid’s myth of Hyrieus (Fasti 5.493–544). Immediately before this episode
Elisha performs the miracle of the oil flask that keeps replenishing itself
(2 Kgs. 4:1–6), just as Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:16),61 again reminiscent of the
self-replenishing wine bowl in Ovid’s negative theoxeny (Metamorphoses
8.679–80). Later the Shunammite woman’s son dies, and Elisha revives
him (2 Kgs. 4:18–35), as Elijah revives the widow’s son.
To sum up, not only do both Homeric and OT myth employ theoxeny,
but the parallels extend even to the three specific subtypes, positive,
negative, and virtual.
Both traditions employ theoxeny as moral indices
illustrating positive characters’ proximity to their deities, and negative
characters’ distance, and as illustrations of the miraculous powers of their
gods for rewarding or punishing the behaviors depicted therein. In spite
of significant differences between the two traditions (e.g., the monotheism
or monolatry of OT myth, and its thematic polemics to support Yahwist
religion), the constituent elements of theoxeny remain remarkably stable.62
Theoxeny in New Testament myth
Theoxeny survives as a mythic type into Christian myth, though with less
developed narratives than those in Genesis 18–19. Much as the Odyssey,
NT myth uses hospitality episodes as indices of characters’ morality. The
admonition in Hebrews is a typical instance, “Do not neglect to show
hospitality; by doing this, some have entertained angels unawares” (Heb.
13:2), which could serve as a tag line for Genesis 18 or 19. Most important,
andmost unexpected, however, is the central position theoxeny occupies in
Jesus’ prophecy of the Second Coming or Day of Judgment in the Gospel
of Matthew.
When the Son of Man comes he will separate mortals into two groups,
as a shepherd separates the goats from the sheep. A key criterion for his
doing so is how they earlier treated him:
For when I was hungry, you gave me food; when thirsty, you gave me drink; when
I was a stranger, you took me into your home. (Matthew 25:35)
The mortals who will be judged favorably are those who extended hospitality
to him. For those mortals who will not receive favorable judgment,
the criteria are the same:
For when I was hungry, you gave me nothing to eat; when thirsty, nothing to
drink; when I was a stranger, you did not welcome me. (Matthew 25:42–3)
The passage functions as a shorthand version of theoxeny, positive and
negative. Christ, a god, cast in the role of a guest (xenos) in need of hospitality
here instantiates full theoxeny, simultaneously positive and negative.
A host’s reception of his guest remains an index of his morality, but now
the difference in outcomes, between moral and immoral behavior, is even
greater than it is in the two opposite types of theoxeny in Genesis 18–19
and the Odyssey. In a considerable expansion of a traditional motif, as is
characteristic of Christianity, the outcomes of both types of theoxeny are
extended into eternity. Those who were hospitable, a positive theoxeny,
will receive not merely a miraculous reward, but eternal life. While those
who failed to be hospitable, a negative theoxeny, will not only be destroyed,
in an apocalypse, but will receive eternal punishment (Matt. 25:46).
In an additional expansion of the mythic genre, Christ declares that anyone who
acted this way toward one of his followers will be so judged (Matt. 25:45).
In so doing, he figures all of them in a virtual theoxeny, mortals playing
the role of the disguised immortal to test a host’s hospitality and morality.
Jesus’ first miracle, or sign, in the Gospel of John also suggests connections
with theoxeny. Since Jesus, his mother, and his disciples are guests at
the wedding at Cana-in-Galilee, the episode is a hospitality myth. When
Mary tells him that the wine has run out, Jesus has servants fill six huge
stone jars with water. They then take the jars to the master, who, tasting,
proclaims that the groom saved his best wine for the last (John 2:1–10).Only
the servants know of the miraculous transformation of water into wine.
The miracle, amid the hospitality setting, suggests the traditional motif
of the self-replenishing vessel found in three theoxenies: the wine bowl in
Ovid’s negative theoxeny (Metamorphoses 8.679–80), and the oil jars in the
virtual theoxenies with Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:16) and Elisha (2 Kgs. 4:1–6).63
However, considerable differences between this narrative and those suggest
that the Gospel of John is adapting the traditional motifs of theoxeny,
putting them to a different purpose. The ties with hospitality are here less
crucial: Jesus has no direct contact with either host or groom. Only the
servants, and presumably the disciples and Mary, are in on the miracle,
which remains secret from everyone else. The real focus is not, then, on
the morality of the host, as in a theoxeny, but on Christ in performing the
miracle and thereby earning the belief of his disciples (John 2:11).64
The intriguing tale in Acts 14:8–20 should also be considered an adaptation
of theoxeny. In the Roman colony of Lystra, Paul, accompanied by
Barnabas, heals a lame man while speaking to a public assembly. The crowd
proclaims that they must be Zeus and Hermes in human form (Acts 14:11–
12). But when the priest of Zeus is about to lead the crowd in a sacrifice of
oxen to them as gods, Paul and Barnabas prevent them from doing so and
proclaim their own faith. Though this myth lacks any overt connection
with hospitality, with neither guest nor host, it is nonetheless suggestive of
Ovid’s theoxeny of Baucis and Philemon in a number of specifics. In Zeus
and Hermes it features the same two gods assuming human form. In both
narratives the two “gods” prevent the others from sacrificing an animal
and offering it to them. But even more than John 2, Acts 14 employs these
traditional motifs to further a very different agenda, serving as a polemical
corrective to, perhaps even constituting a parody, of such myths.65
We conclude this chapter by adducing Jesus’ allusions to Sodom and
Gomorrah in Matthew and Luke. Both gospels present versions of the
same basic episode, Jesus instructing his disciples how to approach a city to
spread his gospel. They are to take no money with them, but to depend on
the welcome the inhabitants offer (Matt. 10:9–13; Luke 10:4–9; cf. Mark
6:8–13). It is when he considers the towns that will not receive
his disciples that Jesus thinks of Sodom and Gomorrah, “on the day of
judgment it will be more bearable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah
than for that town” (Matt. 10:15; cf. Luke 10:12). Making no reference to
sexuality of any kind in his mention of Genesis 19, he focuses entirely on
hospitality, whether a community receives his disciples or does not. The
word he uses for receive, dekhomai, is one of the standard Homeric
verbs for “receive hospitably.”66 He thus not only affirms our reading of
Genesis 19, but his own references to Sodom and Gomorrah (Matt. 10:9–15
and Luke 10:4–12) also function as virtual theoxenies, very like his shaping
the Day of Judgment around the issue of hospitable reception in Matthew
25. Those cities that fail to receive his followers, who come in his name,
will receive apocalyptic destruction, just as the inhabitants of Sodom and
Gomorrah did. In a significant change, however, Jesus implies that hosts
will be among those who fail to receive, and thereby demonstrate their
failings, whereas in the earlier negative theoxenies the hosts pass the tests,
but the surrounding communities (suitors, mob) are those who violate.
). This relates to two points of interest for me these past few months: a fresh look at all the "fiction" references made in the C's material (Sherlock Holmes, Alice In Wonderland, Conference of the Birds, The Wizard of Oz, etc) with newly acquired eye for hyper-dimensional themes, etc, and also the cyclical organization of creative works as "feminine" and open ie not "reality collapsing." In college, I was primarily fascinated with the work of Samuel Beckett in this light. Also, Brian Wilson's SMiLE cycles. I never really connected it back to our goddess origins at the time. It has always been a fascinating organizational approach, and I have been working with it as a structure for a rock album. 
getting myself lost like Odysseus
