CLASS102 Chapter Notes - Chapter 6: Agathon, Omnipotence, Oceanid

• School: University of Alberta
• Department: Classics
• Course: CLASS102
• Professor: Craig Taylor

Document Summary

This only is denied to god: the power to undo the past. Although the gods look and act like humans, very often their appearance and actions are to some extent idealized. Though they can embody and impose the loftiest moral values, they can morror the physical and spiritual weaknesses of humans: be lame, deformed, vain, petty, insincere, steal, lie, cheat, sometimes with a finesse that is exquisitely divine. There are numerous distinctions made to show that their upper air or upper world (olympus) is different from the chthonian (of the earth) world below: Their food is ambrosia and their wine is nectar. Their blood is a clearer type called ichor. The gods are more versatile than mortals. shape shift, move faster and with more dexterity, appear and disappear. (like in a dream) Yet gods are seldom omnipotent, except possibly zeus, but even he may be made subject to fate/the fates.