How does the Iliad characterize and judge lies and deceit? (Catherine Project 4)

 Catherine Project, Spring 2024, Homer -- Response 4, Il. 13-6

QUESTION: How does the Iliad characterize and judge lies and deceit?

Some thoughts on lies and guile in the Iliad:

  • The Iliad acknowledges the existence of lies and deceit. Odysseus is repeatedly characterized as a master of deceit (dolos), sometimes positively (3.202, 11.430) and sometimes as a reproach (4.339); similarly the Iliad occasionally alludes to the possibility of men waiting in ambush (lokhos) (8.522, 13.276-87), and stories of the past sometimes include ambushes (4.392, 6.189).
  • But so far in the battle we haven’t seen any ambushes or attempted ambushes, and direct lies are very rare. Despite his reputation, and despite his direct lie to Dolon at 10.383 not to worry about death, Odysseus has been pretty straightforward with people (rounding up the troops in 2, responding to Ag. at 4.350, his appearance in battle at 11.396-488, his response to Ag. at 14.83f). The lie to Dolon is the only lie I can think of by Odysseus or any mortal.
    • cf. the Iliad’s omission of the Trojan Horse, which is never alluded to.
  • By a mortal is an important caveat. We’ve seen repeated lies by gods (notably Zeus’ lie to Agamemnon at the beginning of 2), and concern by mortals about whether Zeus’ promises are lies (2.349, 9.19-21). In the scene of Hera’s seduction of Zeus, we see more and repeated god-on-god lies and deceit: Hera lies to Aphrodite and to Zeus with a made-up story about visiting Okeanos (“with false lying purpose” 14.197=300=329), and indeed the entire seduction is characterized as deceit (“beguile” 14.160), intended to distract Zeus from the battlefield. Hera’s seduction of Zeus clearly plays with misogynistic stereotypes of women as tricksters (cf. 3.405) – especially the description of the zone – but also distinctions that the Iliad appears to draw between mortals and gods. Generally in the Iliad mortals seem to look pretty decent in contrast to the deceitful, lying, and fickle gods.
  • So is Zeus just? In one surprising simile (16.385f), Zeus is said to flood the earth in anger at mortals who pass crooked decrees and drive out righteousness. Up to this point Zeus has not (to my eyes) displayed a lot of concern for how mortals behave to one another, and his actions seem rather to emerge from divine politics and personal affection to mortals (e.g. in his rather amoral discussion of destroying human cities with Hera in Il. 4.1-72). Do we glimpse in this simile another kind of Zeus?

OTHER QUESTIONS

  • Is the Iliad coherent? Achilles’ response to Patroclus seems to contradict important features of the earlier narrative: he says that he has heard no prophecy or word from Zeus from his mother (16.49-51; but 9.410-6); that he wants the Achaeans to offer him Breseis and gifts (84-6; but book 9); and that he prayed to Zeus to punish the Greeks, which Zeus heard (236; but Achilles spoke to Thetis, not Zeus, in 1). Can we explain away these apparent contradictions, or does the Iliad occasionally not entirely fit together?
  • Are repetitions in the Iliad meaningful? The Iliad repeats stuff all the time, from individual formulas (“lord of men Agamemnon”) to whole chunks of narrative (e.g. the list of gifts in 9). Does the text expect us to remember the earlier instances and see connections between them? Take for example the simile at 15.263f, where the horse breaks loose of its fetter and runs free across the plain. That simile is used of Hector here, but we saw that simile (word for word identical) before at Il. 6.506f used of Paris. Does the epic expect us to remember that earlier instance? Or does the text reuse a nice, prepackaged simile without expecting its audience to notice?
    • “with false lying purpose” (14.197=300=329) – a kind of refrain?
    • similarly Achilles uses the same “speak out” line at 16.19 that his mother used to him at 1.363: meaningful or coincidence?

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