So up to book twenty we've seen Odyssey
making his way back into the external area of his own house.
Now he's gonna have to get himself situated inside of the inner peace of his
house and to do that he's gonna require some violence.
Now there's this whole pack of suitors between him and occupying his rightful
place in his own house and his only way to be able to deal with that is going to be
with a bow and arrow. Penelope has set up things such that
Odysseus will have a chance to have his bow in his hand.
The contest is there to get the according to Penelope's stated purpose to try to see
among the suitors who could earn a place with her, whoever is strong enough to
string the bow and send it through the axis.
No one of course is, they go around giving it a try, they all fail, at the end of
book 21 Odysseus is actually able to string it.
He strings it not just like someone who knows how to use bows well, but like
someone who makes bows, his intimacy with that object is so deep and it's like a
creator of the object, rather than just somebody even who knows how to use it.
He then plucks it like a lyre at which point the suitors start to take note.
All the signs that they've missed through the previous books remember book twenty
was coursing with signs. All the signs that they missed now that
you actually start to kind of get it. Oh my gosh, this guy can string the bow
maybe there is something to him. Odysseus then turns and nods but this time
it's not to Athena or to someone or, or, it's not to Athena, but it's to
Telemachus. Telemachus is now in on this inner circle
of knowledge. He's getting the secret sides from his own
father, it's time to pull the trigger and, and jump into action.
When he does Telemachus is there right next to him and Odysseus, Telemachus, and
Eumaeus form a kind of, small army and they operate just like a hero army should.
They're extremely effective, we see them practice their, you know war skills.
The, suitors give us an education in how not, to fight, in how to lose.
The first one to go down is that suitor Antinous, the biggest of the loudmouths,
page 439, or at the beginning of book 22. He's chugging down a glass of wine in a
wonderful poetic piece of justice. Homer has the arrow, the first thing I'll
would go right through that glass of wine, spilling red, gunk all down his chest, and
then cutting into his throat and the, the blood would spill out and mix with the red
wine. Next step, if you're trying to lose, is to
turn a blind eye to trouble. All the suitors kind of look around and
think oh, well that was probably just an accident, so we're all friends here.
Let's just go on with our business. But, no, of course that's not the case
wishful thinking does not make Odysseus go away, nor does it make it an accident.
He turns around and gets ready to fire at his next victim, Eurymachus.
At that point. Eurymachus gives us a next lesson on how
you should turn on your friends. Don't stick together, that's how to lose.
Eurymachus says oh, well you know, Antinous is dead.
And now that he's dead, well he's the one that started it none of us really you
know, wanted to do this anyway. So now that he's gone, we'll all be
friends. Ondysseus won't take that for a minute,
and down goes Eurymachuss. And from then on there's just wave after
wave of violence as the suitors get taken out and Odysseus, Telemachus and Eumaeus.
Clean house. It's ugly, it's nasty, the fighting is
very violent and brutal. It's shocking I think for us, for
maritimes as representative Iliad, we see violence like this, this is pretty
standard here. Guerrilla war stuff, it's nasty, it's very
gruesome and very, very graphic. There are a couple of people that get
spared, Telemachus urges that Odysseus should spare Phemius, page 450 and
Odysseus relents and say sure I'll let the poet live.
A lot of us look at this as Homer telling us they ought to be nicer poets.
It's a poet saving a poet. Then Telemachus also urges that Medon, a
loyal herald be spared. He runs out from under a chair and hugs
Odysseus. At that point Odysseus is talked about as
being a lion, spattered with gore. The, the nastiness of this all comes
through. In addition to sparing these couple,
Odysseus shows us mostly utter mercilessness.
In one scene in particular I think is worth calling out, this is that scene with
Leodes the seer. Leodes comes up and gets a hold of
Odysseus' knees. Now from all that we've learned in prior
books, and especially through Odysseus himself, on the island of Phiashia.
Getting a person's knees earns you instant suppling status.
It puts you under the protection of Zeus. And make the other person have an
obligation to treat you like a guest in their home.
You should get overwhelming hospitality once you make contact but, Odysseus does
not heed. Xenia, in this case he takes his weapon
and runs Leodes through. Leodes is sumerily killed.
And Xenia is overrun in this episode. It should be disturbing.
Homer spends no time though being disturbed by it.
And from this positioning of events what we have to conclude, the conclusion we
have to draw is that at certain times there are certain people.
So in extreme situations and with great heroes sometimes pieces of the social code
need to give way when other pieces of the social code that are more important
require that we cut corners in order to meet the end.
A justice that's dictated by the overarching social code.
Homer's telling us that there's no way that Odysseus should have spared Leodes
even despite of Leodes getting hold of his knees.
At this point Odysseus's need for revenge and the crimes of the Suitors are in
direct conflict with Xenia. And at this point the need for revenge and
the duty to avenge the wrong that's happening in his own house overrides even
such an important value as Xenia. And Odysseus.
Not done Leodes in. He would have been doing an even worse
wrong. By giving mercy where it was not due.
And therefore he runs Leodes through. It is still disturbing, it's not meant to
be explained away I think, but it is a marker, not of Odysseus' finality, but of
Odysseus recognizing the gravity of his situation and also not fearing to take the
steps to correct it. He punishes the unfaithful maids in an
awful violent scene executed by Telemachus.
They first have to clean up all the dead, and then they are killed at the end to
join them. Really disturbing, kind of coup de grace,
on this scene of carnage and killing. The, of confusion of the violence
represented in this lovely painting this painting behind me the confusion of the
violence is serious. It's profound.
Odysseus and his team are able to keep things together through their skill and
their sticking together through their ability to use all their crap as well as
their joining together. All this Odysseus has almost like a God.
He is like an invisible avenger that arrives deals out justice of a summary way
to these human beings they are all dead in a way that recalls Apollo in the Iliad for
those of you that have read book one of the Iliad.
Mowing down the great warriors with his arrows.
And the sulfur and the fire at the end as cleansing agents have a kind of further
sense of Odysseus as a kinda God. But he is careful always and also in this
case, to separate himself from the Gods. It's not, the Gods that have [inaudible].
His own to his own credit, that all of this is being done.
It's the will of the gods that needs to get worked out.
So he doesn't stand vaunting on them as a single individual having killed all these
people. He takes a step back in seriousness.
And says, now this is what the divine required in this particular circumstance.
And I'm not a divinity. I'm a human executing a divine will.
This comes out on page 452. There's also an earlier mention of such a
think set of thoughts by Odysseus on page 406 when he's talking to Eurycleia.
He talks about himself. As a hero jumping into these events and
you, the Gods will use his hands in order to execute.
Fate, this is what a great hero thinks the Gods and Fate all work together through
human agency to make things work. A far cry from Telemachus saying if only
the God would make me powerful Odysseus says the Gods have made me powerful and
that is why I am executing their will even in circumstances that are messy and nasty.
Now as harsh as this has all been it's not quite as hard as what Odysseus has to do
next. He has earned his way into the inner
courtyard of his house he belongs there. Now he's got to have to earn his way into
the inner rooms. And eventually into the bedroom and
eventually into the bed of his home. To get to that point it's going to require
even more of his skill.