Counter-Currents September 2010

Homer: The European Bible

Dominique Venner

Translated by Greg Johnson

Parts 1-3

François Julien, one of the most acute minds of our time, recalled:

When I was in school, people called me and a friend "the Homerists" . . . And I was more and more convinced that, if one seeks the decisive categories of European thought (categories of "action" as well as categories of "knowledge"), one should go to Homer or Hesiod far more than Plato. . . .  Unite [the Iliad and the Odyssey] and you obtain the fundamental outlines of Greek philosophy.[1]

Who was Homer? Let us set aside scholarly debates. All that matters is what the Ancients thought. For them, there was no doubt about the reality of the divine poet. Likewise, they never doubted his double paternity for the Iliad and the Odyssey.[2]

The Relevance & Transmission of Homer

The relevance of Homer was highlighted in 2007 by an exposition organized by the Bibliothèque nationale de France.[3] It presented for the first time the rich collections of its Cabinet des médailles.

As Patrick Morantin, the organizer of the exhibition, wrote:

. . . first we must be appreciate the fact that a work of this magnitude has survived 3,000 years. What veneration must have attended the work of the Poet, whatever the times, that this body of work survived the wars, vandalism, accidents, censors, ignorance! How many works of late Antiquity were lost while today we can read the Iliad and the Odyssey in their entirety!

And Morantin added: "The Iliad is perhaps, with the New Testament, the work which we know from the greatest number of sources."

Plato said that Homer was "the teacher of Greece." Thus he was also ours. His works, first passed down orally, go back to the 8th century before our era. Two centuries later, three Athenian statesmen, in particular Pisistratus, established the first written edition which thus dates back to the 6th century BCE. Later, the exhibition organizers add, between the 2nd and 3rd centuries before our era:

At the Library of Alexandria, Homer was the most-studied author; he was also the first to have a true critical edition. This critical edition began with Zenodotus of Ephesus in the first half of the 3rd century BCE and culminated with Aristarchus of Samothrace in the first half of the following century. . . . Beginning in the 2nd century BCE, the text becomes uniform. The work of the Alexandrian scholars had set a standard to which everyone referred from then on.

The common source was the edition established in Athens in the 6th century at the request of Pisistratus.

From the Middle Ages to the Renaissance

The memory of the poems had dimmed after the end of the Western Roman Empire, without however disappearing:

Although in the medieval West the bonds with the original texts of Homer were broken, the name of the Poet never ceased being venerated, and his heroes and their adventures were not forgotten. Homer indirectly continued to nourish the imagination of the Middle Ages through the traditional Latin poets like Virgil, Ovid, Statius, the Latin summaries of the Iliad, the apocryphal books of Dares the Phrygian and Dictys of Crete, the medieval romances like the Romance of Troy [of Benoît de Sainte-Maure] and their adaptations in prose . . . so that the heroes and subject of the epics were known to the educated public until the Renaissance, when the Iliad and the Odyssey were rediscovered in the original Greek.

Paradoxically, in spite of its Christianization, the Byzantine Empire:

. . . saw to the transmission of the old authors. The classical tradition was thus maintained in Byzantium where, from 425 to 1453, the schools of Constantinople remained its pillars. This is why it is unsuitable to speak about the "Renaissance" in the Eastern Roman Empire. In the West, on the other hand, the rediscovery of Homer was a striking fact for the first Italian humanists.

At the request of Petrarch, who did not read Greek, the first Latin translation of Iliad was made in 1365–66. The decisive event was the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Shortly before, many learned Byzantines had taken refuge in Italy. Thus in Florence in 1488 the first edition in Greek of the Iliad and the Odyssey appeared. The first French translation of the Iliad was done in 1577 by Breyer.

In an interview that opened the BNF catalog, Jacqueline de Romilly stressed that the Iliad and the Odyssey reveal a high degree of civilization in the sense of refinement of manners. The historian added: “My teacher Louis Bodin, a great specialist in Thucydides, told me just before his death: ‘Now, for me, there is nothing any more but Homer.’  And it is much the same for me now; one returns to the essential, to the completely pure.”

Always be the Best

In these poems circulates the sap of eternal youth. They are the source of our literature and an important part of our imagination. At first, their prodigiously inventive style can seem a little disconcerting, with the repetitive descriptions that were used as reference marks by the ancient listeners.[4] But once you get into the text, you become enchanted by it.

By composing the Iliad, Homer became the creator of the very first tragic epic, and with the Odyssey that of the very first novel. Both poems place the individuality of the characters in the center of the story, something one does not find in the tradition of any other civilization. As André Bonnard emphasized, the Iliad is a world populated by innumerable distinct characters. To bring them to life, Homer does not describe them. It is enough for him to lend them a gesture or a word. Hundreds of warriors die in the Iliad, but with a specific trait, the Poet gives them a singular life at the instant of death:  “And Diores fell into dust, on his back, his arms reaching out towards his comrades” (IV, 565). Just one gesture, and today were are touched by this unknown Diores and his love of life.

Death comes to the Trojan Harpalion, a brave man who cannot control a movement of horror: "Turning back, he rejoined the group of his comrades, looking around, so that bronze might not strike his flesh." He fell back in the arms of his companions and, on the ground, his body expressed its outrage while twisting "like a worm" (XIII, 654).

Almost all the characters of the Iliad, except women, children, and old men, are warriors. The majority are brave, but not in the same way. The bravery of Ajax, son of Telamon, first of the Greeks after Achilles in his impressive stature, strength, and cool, flinty, awe-inspiring bravery:

He went forth like great Ares [the god of war], when he goes into battle. . . . So the great Ajax, rampart of the Achaeans, charged forth, a smile on its savage face. And his feet took great strides, as he held high a spear whose shadow grew. At this sight, the Argiens [Achaeans] were in great joy. A terrible shudder shook every Trojan's limbs, and even Hector's heart pounded in his chest. . . . Ajax approached like a tower . . . (VII, 208–19)

A single combat, a duel, followed, full of fire, between Ajax and Hector who, after many assaults, was wounded in the neck. "The spear made black blood ooze." As the night fell, the heralds intervened to separate the two combatants. Homer shows us the point where combat answers to chivalrous rules. The two adversaries agree to suspend the fight until the following day, each returning to his camp, even exchanging their weapons (VII, 303–5). However stubborn, Ajax agrees, feeling that he has triumphed in this duel.

Different is the bravery of the young Diomedes. He has the ardor and dash of youth. He is the youngest of the heroes of the Iliad after Achilles. He is never tired. After a hard day of combat, he still volunteered for a perilous night expedition to the Trojan camp, in the company of Ulysses, a warrior as brave as he is crafty and circumspect.

Diomedes is also one of the chivalrous characters in the Poem. One day, ferociously fighting a Trojan, at the moment of striking with his lance, he suddenly learns he is Glaucos, son of a patron and friend of his father:

Then brave Diomedes was seized with joy, and, planting his lance in the nourishing earth, he addressed his noble adversary these words full of friendship: "In truth, you are a patron of my father's house, and our bonds are very old. . . . By your father and mine, let us be from now on friends." Thus spoke Diomedes . . . .

Upon this, the two warriors jumped from their chariots, clasped hands, and agreed to be friends (VI, 229).

Homer honors rooted individuality, not “individualism,” which is its perversion. With the respect of the adversary, in spite of implacable combat, they are bases of our tradition. One finds traces of this in the modern Iliad, Ernst Jünger’s In Storms of Steel. These living roots dominate the whole European psyche: tragedy and philosophy. They are engraved into art beginning with Greek sculpture; they sustain law and political institutions.

Homer does not conceptualize, as philosophers later did. He makes visible; he shows living examples, teaching the qualities that make a man a “kalos k’agathos,” noble and accomplished. “Always be the best,” Peleus told his son Achilles, “better than the rest” (Iliad, VI, 208). To be noble and brave for a man, to be gentle, loving, and faithful for a woman. The Poet bequeathed a digest of what Greece offered thereafter to posterity: nature as model, the striving towards beauty, the creative force that strives always to surpass, excellence as the ideal of life.

The Iliad, Poem of Destiny

The Iliad is not just a poem about the Trojan war, it is a poem about destiny as perceived by our Borean ancestors, whether they are Greek, Celtic, German, Slavic, or Latin.[5] The Poet tells of nobility in the face of the plague of war. He tells of the courage of heroes who kill and die. He tells of the sacrifice of defenders of their fatherland, the sorrow of the women, the farewell of a father to his son going forth, the despondency of the old men. He tells of many more things still: the ambition of the leaders, their vanity, their quarrels. He tells also of their bravery and cowardice, their friendship, their love and tenderness. He tells of the thirst for glory that raises men to the level of gods. This poem where death reigns tells of the love of life and of honor placed higher than life, to which they were devoted even more than the gods.

In 16,000 verses in 24 books, the Poet reports a brief episode at the end of the ten year siege of Troy, probably in the 13th century BCE.  Troy, also called Illion (hence Iliad) was a powerful fortified city built at the entrance to the Dardanalles on the Asiatic side of the Hellespont, the enduring frontier between West and East. Like modern historians, the ancients Herodotus and Thucydides, did not doubt the reality of the events that provided the framework of the Iliad. The Trojans were Boreans (Europeans), the same race as their Greek adversaries, the Achaeans “with the blonde hair,” also called Argives (originating in the Argolide) or Danaen (descendants of the mythical Danaos). Despite this small difference, the Trojans are associated with Asia, and not only for geographical reasons. Their army contained contingents of barbarians (foreigners to the Greek world), which was confirmed by archaeological discoveries in the 20th century of their relations with the very diverse Hittite empire.

According to tradition, the conflict had a mythic origin: the intervention of the gods who divided themselves between the two camps. Out of vengeance, Aphrodite (Venus for the Latins) gave Paris, the young prince of Troy, son of the aged Priam, the power to carry off Helen, the most beautiful of women, already married to "blonde haired" Menelaus, an Achaean, the king of Sparta.

The abduction of a royal spouse by a foreigner was a crime that shocked all the Achaeans. At their wedding, all the lords of Greece had sworn to respect the union of Menelaus and the terribly tempting Helen. Thus an army assembled in Aulis with its fast vessels, like the Viking ships to come, and departed toward the Asian shores of the Troad. They went to punish Troy and bring back Helen.

Thus the war began: "The whole earth, far and wide, flashed with the gleam of bronze . . ."

The founding poems also conceal the first expression of historical thought. At the beginning of The Peloponnesian War, Thucydides refers to the Iliad to paint in broad strokes the ancient history of the Greeks, thus recognizing that Homer laid the foundations.

But this merit was seldom recognized by others. Inspired by the gods and poetry, which are all the same, Homer bequeathed to us the hidden source of our tradition, the Greek expression of all the whole Indo-European heritage, Celtic, Slavic, or Scandinavian, with a clarity and formal perfection without equivalent. This is why Georges Dumézil read the whole Iliad every year.

Part 2

The Anger & Remorse of Achilles

After ten years of a very long siege, along with raids in the area, a quarrel opposed Agamemnon, chief of the Achaean coalition, and Achilles, the most famous hero of his camp. Abusing his power, Agamemnon seizes Briseis "with the lovely cheeks," the young captive loved by Achilles. Such is the pretext and the beginning of the poem: "Sing, goddess, of Achilles' disastrous anger . . ." This goddess who sings the epic is the muse, whose interpreter is the Poet, which underlines his bonds with the divine world.

In the grip of righteous indignation, after having copiously insulted Agamemnon, Achilles decided to abandon the battle and "retire to his tent" (a much imitated phrase) as did his followers (the Myrmidons).

This anger of Achilles, principal hero of the Iliad along with the Trojan Hector, is the pivot of the poem. His withdrawal with his men had very serious consequences for the Achaeans. Victory is abandoned. In the plain, under the walls of Troy, they will suffer three increasingly disastrous defeats. The attackers are put on the defensive. They must even build a fortified camp around their ships. This retrenchment was then attacked by the Trojans, led by Hector, the most famous son of Priam. The enemy managed to set fire to the Greeks’ vessels and push them to the sea.

Throughout these hard battles, which fill the poem with carnage and exploits, the absence of Achilles is nothing but a sign declaring his force and power. The bravest of the Achaean chiefs—massive Ajax, impetuous Diomedes, skillful Ulysses—vainly try to replace him.

One night of black tragedy, between two disasters, while Achilles, in his tent, putrefies in the inactivity to which he has condemned himself, he sees the approach of an embassy led by the two great leaders of the army, Ajax and Ulysses. With them is the aged Phoenix, who tries to make him hear the voice of his father. In the face of the danger, Agamemnon repented. He returned Briseis and offered sumptuous gifts in reparation. The embassy fails. Achilles, wallowing in resentment, put himself at fault in his turn (Book IX).

The following day, the Trojans forced the defenses of the Greeks. Hector set fire to a ship. At the other end of the camp, Achilles saw the rising flames. In spite of his obstinacy, he could not remain deaf to the pleas of his fried Patroclus, his other self. He sent his troops into battle, dressing Patroclus in his own armor. This counterattack drives back the Trojans. But Patroclus is killed by Hector. Achilles’ grief is terrifying. But it brings him back to life, unleashing a fury and rage of vengeance against Hector, murderer of Patroclus.

Thus there is a complete reversal of the dramatic action that had been frozen by the withdrawal of Achilles. Maddened by pain, the Achaean hero returned to combat: “Like a vast fire, raging through the deep valleys of dry mountains, burning the forest, driven in all directions by the whirling wind, Achilles leaped in all directions. He went forth, like the night . . .” (Book XVIII). After a fierce duel, he killed Hector, then stripped his body and dragged it though the dust behind his chariot.

Achilles & Helen Against Destiny

For Achilles, to the pain of the death of his friend was added the certainty of his own fate. An old prophecy warned that he would be killed as soon has he took Hector’s life. Achilles always knew it.  Unlike the other heroes killed in battle, he knew his destiny in advance and chose it. He does not submit to fate in Oriental fashion, he faces it. As a young man, he was offered the choice of a long and peaceful life far from strife, or an intense life cut short in the flash of battle. He chose the latter, bequeathing to the men of the future a model of tragic grandeur. Free of illusions, he knew that he will not have another life: “A man’s life,” he says in Book IX, “does not come again; one can never grasp or seize it again once it has escaped one’s clenched teeth . . .” It is a thought that speaks to us today.

Compared to the sacred texts of other peoples and cultures, the freedom and sovereignty of the heroes of Homer are unique. Admittedly, the gods intervene in the Iliad, at fortunate and unfortunate times, but without really canceling the autonomy of men. Their many interventions do nothing but precipitate what would have happened anyway. And it really seems that Homer does not take them completely seriously (except perhaps Athena), which scandalized Plato’s stilted and moralistic sensibility. In reality, the gods of Homer are allegories of the forces of nature and life.

The last Book of the Iliad is a drama of reversal: when the aged Priam comes to beseech the return of the body of Hector, his son, one sees Achilles allowing himself to become more and more susceptible to compassion. Transformed by his own suffering, the hero appears more complex than his wild violence let on.

There are more than heroes and warriors in the Iliad; there are also women (Helen, Hecuba, and Andromache), children (Astyanax), old men (Priam). There are more than just brave men. There is Paris, whose strange love of Helen is the origin of the Trojan War. Carrying out the will of Aphrodite, he was the seducer and the kidnapper of Helen. Unintentional author of the war, he also brings it to a close by killing Achilles with a treacherous arrow, an episode that the Poem does not report, which is suggested only by the prophecy formulated by Hector at the moment he dies (Book XXII, 359–60).

Paris, the often cowardly and conceited fop, is the opposite of his brother Hector, whom he deceives. Hector is the pure hero, the guardian of Troy, whereas Paris is the “plague of its fatherland.” Helen, the woman he seduced and abducted, scorns him and does not fear to rebuke him: “You have returned from battle! You should have died out there, under the blows of the strong warrior who was my first husband!” (Book III, 450–55). She detests him, but, by the will of Aphrodite, she is controlled by his sexual magnetism. Once again, Homer does not explain, he tells, and what he says is full of complex truth.

Helen is the opposite of Paris. She is moral, her lover amoral. She revolts against the physical submission to him imposed by Aphrodite. Her nature was made for order. She always regrets leaving her old life: “I left my bridal room, my close relations, my cherished daughter. . . . I languished in tears.”  Nothing predisposed her to take the role of adulteress, instrument of the ruin of two peoples. Nothing, except the intervention of the gods, in other words, fate.

With a great and moving truth, the Iliad thus shows several antagonistic natures, Helen and Paris, Achilles and Hector.

The Stoicism & Patriotism of Hector

Achilles is the incarnation of youth (he is not yet 30). He is also the incarnation of Force. It is the radiant and untamed Force before which everything submits. A Force subjected to passion. Achilles does not dominate anything, he suffers all, Briseis, Agamemnon, Patroclus, Hector.  Circumstances unleash in him one storm after another. Everything in him defies death. He never thinks of it, whereas he knows it is near. He loves life enough to prefer intensity to duration. Strange destiny! His love of glory, his impatience, and his anger keep him far from battle during the first 18 Books of the Poem, to the point of endangering his own. To save the army, he need only rise, which Ulysses says to him: "Rise and save the army . . ."

Awakened by the death of Patroclus, the Force rises: "Achilles rose . . . . A great brightness radiated from his head to the sky, and he strode to the edge of the ditch. There, upright, he let out a cry, and this voice caused an inexpressible tumult among the Trojans" (Book XVIII).

Homer implicitly sympathizes with Hector. This Poem of the Achaeans thus treats their principal enemy as an exemplar. Is there any equivalent to this nobility in our national epics or the holy books of the Near or Far East?  Though he is as brave as Achilles, Hector's courage is not blind. He is the very incarnation of stoic courage. He is not immune to fear. But he conquers it. Even though he knows that all is lost, he fights to the limit of his endurance.

Hector is also the incarnation of patriotism. For him, honor merges with duty. He is ready to die, not for its own glory, but for his country, his wife, and his child. He will defend them against all hope, because he knows Troy is lost.

Nothing is more carnal than Hector's love for his fatherland, of whom his woman and son are the concrete images.  He does not hide his fears for Andromache before leaving her for battle:

"I know that the day will come when holy Troy will perish, and Priam, and the people of Priam. But neither the future misfortunes of the Trojans, nor that of my mother, or king Priam and my courageous brothers, afflict me as much as a bronze armored Achaen taking your freedom and leading you away in tears. . . . May the heavy earth claim me in death before I hear you cry, before I see you snatched away from here . . ."  (Book VI, 447–65)

With these words, he stretches his arms towards his son. But the child bursts into tears, terrified by the gleaming helmet of his father. Laughing, Hector takes off his helmet and gives the child to Andromache, who takes him in her arms “with laughter in tears.” Here Homer’s poetic genius shines forth. Hector tactfully corrects his dark predictions: "Don't cry," he says to Andromache, "Nobody can send me beneath the earth before the appointed hour."

The moment before, Andromache begged Hector not to go. She does so no longer. She understands that he defends their freedom and mutual affection. In this last conversation of two spouses, there is something unique in all ancient literature: a perfect equality in love. One never ceases discovering the incomparable richness of the Iliad, which concludes with the preparation of Hector's funeral. The death of Achilles and the "Trojan horse" are briefly evoked only in the Odyssey (Books XI and VIII).

Part 3

The Odyssey: The Place of Man in the Cosmos

The second of the great Poems recounts, in 12,000 verses and 24 books, the difficult return of Ulysses to his fatherland. A return opposed by a thousand terrifying obstacles. The Odyssey is thus a poem of homecoming and of justified vengeance.

But the Odyssey is more than that. Under narrative pretexts different from Iliad, the second poem suggests the "worldview" suitable for Hellenes. It shows the place of man in nature and in relation to the mysterious forces that order it.

Putting mortals in harmony with the cosmic order is at the heart of the Homeric poems. But Homer's Heaven is placed beyond the primitive times of the foundation of cosmos evoked by the old myths, whose contents were formalized in Hesiod's Theogony: the confrontation of Ouranos and Cronos, the combat of the Olympian gods and their victory over the Titans. From all that, the Poet retains only the Olympian light, without worrying about building a coherent system. In Homer, the coherence is not in the discourse. It is in himself.

The departure from and return to the cosmic order form the framework of the Odyssey. Ulysses unintentionally provokes Poseidon's anger by blinding his son the Cyclops Polyphemus. This is the way of man's destiny. Unintentionally, we provoke the anger and the punishment of the gods (representations of the forces of nature). Thus we must fight and endure their torments to return to the harmony we have lost.

This is the fate of Ulysses. Facing the terrifying tests imposed by Poseidon, who plunged him into a world of chaos, monsters (Scylla and Charybdis), and of possessive or perverse nymphs (Calypso, Circe, the Sirens)—not to mention a visit to the realm of the dead—the navigator tirelessly fights to escape the traps and to find his place in the order of the world. Thrown into mortal peril, Ulysses will spend ten years returning home.

This is not merely the pretext for Homer to charm his audience with fantastic stories. The long voyage of Ulysses is drawn by the invincible desire of men, the "eaters of bread," to escape chaos and find an orderly cosmos. No doubt the love for Penelope and longing for Ithaca are at the heart of his desire to return. But they merely exemplify the hope to again fit in to the order of the world. Having found and reconquered his fatherland, Ulysses will be able to reestablish in the chain of generations, a fragment of eternity.

In the last sequence, every step of the reconquest of Ithaca is imprinted in the memory up to the massacre of the "suitors" (usurper of Ithaca). How the hero is recognized by his son Telemachus and how they weave a meticulous plan of revenge. How Ulysses arrives at his manor, disguised as a beggar, who is recognized only by his old dog Argos, who dies of joy. How he is recognized by his nurse, Eurykleia, who sees an old scar, a souvenir of a memorable boar hunt. And then there is Penelope, anxious, worried, inquisitive. Then comes the moment of just vengeance in an orgy of bloodshed. And reunion with Penelope is finally possible. Then Athena intervenes, which delays the arrival of "rosy fingered" Dawn, so that the night of the return lasts longer . . .

In the Odyssey, Homer does not only laud the memory of the heroes. He glorifies Eurykleia, Ulysses' nurse, and Eumaios, his swineherd, two subordinate characters who are nevertheless exemplars of intelligence and fidelity. Their role in the reconquest of Ithaca is capital. Thanks to Homer, they live on today.

The Poem of Womanhood Respected

Because of the marked presence of Penelope, the Odyssey is also the poem of independent and respected womanhood. When Penelope appears in the great hall of the palace of Ithaca, grand and beautiful, her brilliant veils drawn back on her cheeks, like golden Aphrodite, the knees of the "suitors" go weak and desire invades their hearts (Odyssey, Book XVIII, 249).

Lover, wife, and mother, Penelope takes charge of the small kingdom of Ithaca in the absence of Ulysses, a sign of the consideration given to womanhood. Many other women are present in Homer. In the Iliad, Helen, Andromache, Hecuba, and Briseis. In the Odyssey, Helen again, Calypso, and charming Nausicaa. But Penelope eclipses all, except perhaps Helen, who is in a class by herself.

Like women of our time, Penelope had to develop the knack of remaining feminine in a social world dominated by male values. She remains beautiful and desirable in spite of time. She also knows the importance of modesty to live in the company of men. When tormented too much, she takes refuge in sleep, under Athena's watch. Against the avid pack of suitors, she does not use masculine violence. She charms, smiles, and invents the stratagem of the perpetually rewoven shroud, turning to her advantage the cupidity of which she is the object, and that perhaps does not displease her.

However, with the return of Ulysses, the craftiest of men, she deceives him somewhat as well, pretending not to recognize him even after he massacred the "suitors" with the assistance of their son Telemachus. He will first have to prove his identity by the test of the secret of the conjugal bed, before she agrees to be given to him. In which sacred story of other cultures can one find the equivalent of Penelope and her radiant femininity?

The Political Order of the Shield of Achilles

Behind the story, there is also a vision of the world and life that awakens the memory of a lost wisdom. In Homer, the forests, the rocks, the wild beasts have souls. The whole of nature merges with the sacred, and men are not isolated from it.

If the cosmos is the model for Homer's world, the model of society is found in the allegory of Achilles' shield forged by Hephaestus (Iliad, Book XVIII). Depicted there are two cities, one in peace, the other in war, the two faces of life. One sees that the Greek city to come, with its citizens, institutions, and reciprocal duties, is already present in the Homeric world. Hector says explicitly that he dies for the freedom of his fatherland (Iliad, VI, 455–528).

The foundation of social organization and civil peace is the ethnic unity of the city and respect for the laws guaranteed by tradition. Men are happy in a happy society, one that always remains the same, where one marries as one's ancestors married, where one plows and harvests as one always plowed and harvested. Individuals pass, but the city remains.

As Marcel Conche stresses, a society that can read its future in its past is a society at rest, without concern. This permanence grounds a sense of security. But innovations, "progress" will bring disorder. When one dreams of the ideal city and better days to come, everyone's peace of mind is destroyed. Then dissatisfaction with oneself and the world predominates. What, on the contrary, is illustrated on the shield of Achilles, is a happy society, filled with love of life, as it has always been. The weddings are joyous, equity reigns, civic friendship is shared by all. When war comes, the city closes ranks and mounts the ramparts. The enemy has not a single ally in the place. What peace of mind!

Destiny Commands both Gods and Men

Homer's heroes are not, however, models of perfection. They are prone to error and excess in proportion to their vitality. They pay the price, but they are never subject to a transcendent justice punishing sins defined by a code foreign to life. Neither the pleasures of the senses or of force, nor the joys of sexuality are likened to evil.

In Book III of the Iliad (161–75), the too beautiful Helen is invited by old king Priam onto the walls of Troy, in order to show her the two armies, for a truce had just been concluded. Quite conscious of being the involuntary cause of the war, Helen groans, saying that she would rather be dead. Priam then responds with an infinite gentleness that surprises us to this day: "No, my daughter, you are not guilty of anything. It is the gods who are responsible for it all!" What delicacy and high-mindedness from the old king, whose sons will all be killed. But what generous wisdom also, which releases human beings from the guilt that so often overpowers other beliefs.

In placing these words in the mouth of Priam, Homer does not say that men are never responsible for the misfortunes that strike them. He shows elsewhere how much vanity, desire, anger, folly, and other failings can cause calamities. But in the specific case of this war, as in many wars, he stresses that everything escapes the will of men. It is the gods, fate, or destiny that decides.

History teaches us how judicious this interpretation is. How can one not be struck by its wisdom, when so many religions claim that human beings and their supposed sins are the cause of all the disasters of which they are victims, including earthquakes?[1]

But the words of Priam have a broader meaning still. They suggest that in the life of man, many of one's imagined faults are actually caused by fate. This distance regarding the mysteries of existences, this respect for others are constants in the Homeric poems. This goes to show the very high level of civility and wisdom of the world Homer describes, by comparison to which ours often seems barbaric.

Homer thus bequeathed us, in their unaltered purity, our models and principles of life: nature as foundation, excellence as goal, beauty as horizon, the mutual respect of man and woman. The Poet reminds us that we were not born yesterday. He restores the foundations of our identity, the paramount expression of an ethical and aesthetic inheritance that is "ours," that he held in trust. And the principles that he brought to life in his models never cease to reappear to us, proof that the hidden thread of our tradition could not be broken.

Notes Part 1

[1] François Jullien, interview with Thierry Marchaisse, Penser d’un dehors (la Chine). Entretiens d’Extrême-Occident, November 2000, p. 47. Philosopher and sinologist François Julien is professor at the University of Paris-7. He is member of the Academic Institute of France and director of the Institute of Contemporary Thought. In order to discover the authentic nature of European thought, he compared it with something completely different, that of China, which had developed in an autonomous way, without any connection with the Indo-European languages.

[2] Jacqueline de Romilly, Homère (Que Sais-je?) (Paris: PUF, 1985).

[3] The BNF exposition “Homère. Sur les traces d’Ulysse” [Homer: On the Trail of Ulysses] was accompanied by an excellent catalog published by Seuil, realized by its three organizers, Olivier Estiez, Mathilde Jamain, and Patrick Morantin.

[4] No French translation is really satisfactory. To soak up the Iliad, one should refer to the translation of Paul Mazon (Gallimard, Folio Traditional), to which the Foreword of P. Vidal-Naquet adds nothing. For the Odyssey, one should especially refer to the poetic translation of Philippe Jaccottet (La Découverte, 1982, Poche 2004). The Bouquin collection, Homère. L’Iliade et l’Odyssée [Homer: the Iliad and the Odyssey], translated by Louis Bardollet, includes a useful critical apparatus. One can also profit from the essay by Jacqueline de Romilly, Hector (Editions de Fallois, Livre de Poche, 1997). One should also consult Marcel Conche, Essais sur Homère (PUF, 1999). Finally, see Dominique Venner, Histoire et tradition des Européens [History and Traditions of Europe] (Le Rocher, 2004), chs. 4–6.

[5] The neologism "Borean" has a broader sense than "Indo-European," which is a linguistic category. It refers to the Greek myth of Hyperborean origins.

Note Part 3

[1] One thinks of the famous interpretations of the tidal waves that destroyed Lisbon in 1755, inspired by what the Bible says of Sodom and Gomorrah, destroyed, it is said, because of the immorality of their inhabitants . . .

https://www.counter-currents.com/2010/09/homer-the-european-bible-part-1/#comments