Humility: The theme for this section of The Odyssey is humility.  In the prophetic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), humility is a virtue because it implies the recognition that we are nothing & the divine is everything.  Pride is a sin because it implies that we have some autonomous power apart from the divine.  In the prophetic religions, pride is a vice & humility is a virtue.  This is not the thinking in Homer.  We considered what pride meant in the Homeric world in an earlier lesson.
     OD has every right to be proud of his accomplishments.  As we discussed earlier, these accomplishments define who he is.  Much of OD's humility is tactical.  It is a form of temperance that allows for cool-headed analysis of dangerous situations.  More than this is obviously at work.  Athena wants to humiliate OD.  Why?
18.389    Athena wished
              OD mortified still more.
 

Especially in the last half of the ODY, almost everything that occurs can be construed as advice about how to foster civic life.  This is the key context to explain why it is important for OD to feel powerless & be humble.  There are three positions marked out.  We might associate them with men, women, & children.  The first position is that of power that we saw illustrated in The Iliad by AK & AG.  AK destroys a city, Troy.  AG destroys his own city, Argos.  Neither of these warriors cares what anyone thinks or feels.  The second position is that of parity, symbolized by marriage, as illustrated by the relationship between Kirke & OD.  Respect is the hallmark of these relationships & we noted how OD's is saved time & again because he respects fellow citizens that he has no reason to fear, such as: Ino, Nausikaa, the awesome in pigtails, & Hermes as a 15 year old boy.  Respect is fine.  We can even be proud of respecting the powerless, leaving them untouched, innocent.  The third position demands more.  It is important for OD to not simply choose to respect the innocent, the children; he must know what it feels like to be powerless, because he as the leader of the polis will be the power that allows them to live in innocence.  In this section OD is kicked by the goat herd, Melanthios (17.265) & struck by a stool (17.537) thrown by Antinoos.  In the next section, OD is forced into a kind of buffoon version of a gladiatorial battle (doing violence to entertain the vicious) & is then threatened with another stool.  Eurymakhos:
18.435    had his foot-stool out: but now OD
              took to his haunches by Amphinomos' knees,
              fearing Eurymakhos' missile, as it flew.

Another translation avoids the word fear.  Allen Mandelbaum (1990) translates this passage:
             he grabbed a footstool; but OD
             foresaw that throw; he dodged it, ducking low
             beside the knees of lord Amphinomus.

In our translation (Fitzgerald), it is almost inconceivable that OD, the sacker of Troy, could fear a footstool thrown by a vicious delinquent who has never seen a battlefield.  The only way this scene makes sense is to recognize that it is the way in which "Athena wished OD mortified still more."  OD feels what it is like to be fearful & powerless to do anything but cower.  This culminating scene is actually in the next unit of our study (08), but the process of humiliation endured by OD, culminated in that scene, begins in the section we are studying here (07).

Authority: Notice how Antinoos increasingly presumes to rule, at least the events occurring in the palace, & to deal with TEL as a malicious step-father might.  Who does he resemble?  You haven't yet read Aeschylus' Agamemnon, but when you do, you should note the resemblance between Aigisthos (the man who sought to supplant AG) & Antinoos.  AG's son, Orestes, kills the man who presumed to replace his father.  You recall that in the early books of the OD, Orestes was recommended as a model for TEL to emulate:
3.210    like the son who punished
            Aigisthos for the murder of his great father.
            You, too, are tall & well set-up
1.336    Have you heard
            what glory young Orestes won
            when he cut down that 2-faced man, Aigisthos,
            for killing his illustrious father?
The parallel stops when we consider that the two women are opposites. Klytemnestra is the half sister of deadly Helen.  In contrast, PEN is the model of virtue & loyalty.

Gratitude: What do the gods want from human being?  Obedience?  No.  They expect gratitude from us for the blessing they shower on us & our world.  Citizenship reflects this.  As children we are the recipients of undeserved benefits.  The least we can do is to acknowledge these & express gratitude.  We can easily sort out a range of citizens in Ithaka, from:

• Eumaios
• Eurykleia
• Philotios (cow herd)
• Eurynome

• Antinoos (adopted by OD as something of a son)
• Eurymakhos
• Melanthios (goat herd)
• Melantho (the servant girl who sleeps with Eurymakhos)

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