The Golden Fleece

I am not certain if I read too broadly or not concisely enough. In thinking about the Argonauts, I recall the Golden Fleece, a ram’s skin of radiant gold, and immediately think of the golden calf that Moses cast down, and then to scapegoats, Jesus as the lamb. The narratives form a skein that demandsContinue reading “The Golden Fleece”

The Use of Myth

Hesiod stands at the beginning. He is the first to write down stories that had been circulating for centuries. His account is not a moral arc in the way the Hebrew tradition would later tell its story. Hesiod is part farmer’s almanac and part chronicler. This is how the seasons work, and this is whoContinue reading “The Use of Myth”

KAIROS AND THE GEOMETRY OF TIMING

Book Five of the Iliad contains the most outrageous act of combat in all of Greek myth: a mortal wounds a god. Homer opens the Iliad with the anger of Achilles and his retreat from the field of battle. His mother, Thetis, bargains with Zeus, and the war is no longer a simple contest ofContinue reading “KAIROS AND THE GEOMETRY OF TIMING”