Zeus

[porphyry]

I began to talk to A. (who will turn 5 in less than 5 weeks and is now walking again completely under his own power) about Zeus in connection with thunder. A. was remarkably afraid of thunder so I began to tell him that if Zeus did not send the rain the crops would fail and we would all starve and the thunder is Zeus’ announcement of his benefaction to us (his anxiety about storms is certainly rapidly growing less, though the power failure today did not help diminish it). What ought I to have told him, that there is no Zeus and vortex is responsible for thunder? In any case, that is all that I told him about the subject, except sometimes, when he is watching an old cartoon, to point out to him when Zeus is a character (I’ve also pointed out to him Persephone and Hades in the Disney Silly Symphony based on the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, but that has so far made no impression on him).

He knows that heaven is located in the sky. For a long time he believed it to be in the ceiling since, after one of the cats died, he asked his grandmother where it was and she pointed upwards: henceforth that became the white kitty that lives in the ceiling. He came to know generally from many old cartoons that people and animals, once they are dead, go to heaven—person-heaven, kitty-heaven, and dog- heaven, etc. Quite on his own, A. made the assumption that Zeus must be the ruling power in those regions. I have never once discussed with him matters of prayer, sacrifice, or worship.

This afternoon we went to the museum at the Cahokia Indian mounds. When we came out a bad wind storm with some light rain was ending (again, in connection with old cartoons that show the winds personified, I’ve mentioned to him that Boreas, Zephyr, etc. are Zeus’ servants). Without any discussion of Zeus for many days and absolutely no prompting from me, he looked up at the sky and said, “Thank you Zeus for sending the rain that waters the food that we eat. Today must be your birthday, so we should get you a present!” I told him that we don’t usually celebrate Zeus’ birthday, but I would certainly look up the modern dates of some of Zeus’ festivals for him. Then he looked down at the ground and thanked it for growing the food that we eat, and announced that it was the ground’s birthday too. Then he thanked the trees for bearing their beautiful flowers.

So far as I am aware, A. only knows ‘Jesus’ as a curse-word—that’s not quite true, last Christmas I told him the whole Christmas story (we have a crèche, of course) and emphasized that Jesus became a great teacher of social justice and, according to some (e.g. Hierocles, the governor of Bithynia ca. 300), a divine messenger. But that doesn’t seem to have made much impression on him and A. never mentions Jesus except in an oath.

Comments

[stefanie-bean.livejournal.com]

Great news, that Andrew is out of his cast and walking again.

Children have this beautiful sense of deity. I remember when I was quite young (probably 5-8 years old), the Greek pantheon was intensely real to me, but that faded as I moved into the teenage years.

[malkhos.livejournal.com]

It is nice to have him walking on his own power again, limping though he is. Now we just have to wait and see at his follow-up in August if there are any growth problems as the break occurred on a growth bone. The doctor informed us it's rare but happens. Keeping my fingers crossed for no problems!

By the way, your flower garden is beautiful!

[stefanie-bean.livejournal.com]

Thanks - I'll post some more pics when the day lilies all come out.

[himmapaan.livejournal.com]

Hehe, how wonderful.

[malkhos.livejournal.com]

I suppose Andrew's lack of the Christian ethic is entirely my fault, not because I don't think it's important but because I wonder what a good age is to begin speaking of such things... I think one ought to grow into belief rather than out of it as stefanie bean states her experience was above, if one chooses to grow into it at all, that is, which is what we've decided to do about the matter.

[petrusplancius.livejournal.com]

It could be, though, that Zeus was blasting someone who had annoyed him, perhaps by chasing after one of his mistresses.

[malkhos.livejournal.com]

Or through perjury--but then how could we explain Bill Clinton and Oliver North still walking about?

[malkhos.livejournal.com]

That's very kind of you to say at the end.

Sometimes I feel like I'm neglecting some terribly important parental duty by not insisting the children be "trained" into a faith. As I said, I do think it's important, but I also think it's a decision one must come to based on reason and desire for such... too many times I've seen people I know grow up to reject the faith of their upbringing, probably because it was more or less forced upon the person. In my own way, it's due to its very importance that for now I just leave it alone.

I remember before my confirmation when I was twelve, one of the things our priest did was to take us, every week, to a different church to experience their services and ways of worship--he told us that before we chose to confirm our belief in Catholicism, we needed to be certain it was what we wanted--he emphasized how important a decision that it was. I think this went over most of my peers' heads, but being born old, this had a profound impact on me--the fact that he wanted us to make this choice not because our parents wanted us to, but because we wanted to. I thought that was the right way to handle such a decision.

[malkhos.livejournal.com]

You were in the Church of Christ too? Poor Devil.

Most of the cities Alexander the Great founded or planned to found (later executed by his generals), were named after him--if I recall correctly there are 15 or so.

Have you seen The Man Who WOuld be King? The city they stumble onto in that film, though I don't think its named in the script, was called Alexandria-the-Farthest in Bactria, a bit north of Afgahnistan--though they would have read about it in Arrian, not 'Harry-odditus.'