The Homeric Gods: Spiritual Significance of Greek Religion (1954 English language edition)
Author
Walter F. Otto
Original title
Die Götter Griechenlands
Translator
Moses Hadas
Language
German
Subject
Ancient Greek religion
Publisher
Friedrich Cohen
Publication date
1929
Publication place
Germany
Published in English
1954
Media type
Print (Hardcover and Paperback)
Pages
371 (first edition)
The Homeric Gods: Spiritual Significance of Greek Religion (German: Die Götter Griechenlands. Das Bild des Göttlichen im Spiegel des griechischen Geistes, lit. 'The Gods of Greece: The Image of the Divine in the Mirror of the Greek Spirit') is a book about ancient Greek religion, published in 1929 and written by the philologist Walter F. Otto. Its main thesis is that the Greek religion was focused on the profundity of natural experiences, and therefore used less magical thinking than Asian religions, which tend to focus more on miracles. According to Otto, this reached its greatest expression in the works of Homer, where the Greek gods are portrayed as present in the natural world as particular forms of existence.
The book has both been praised for its insights and larger arguments and criticized for its approach and errors. Otto's ontological approach to polytheism had an impact on a number of scholars and influenced the structuralist study of ancient religions.
TheHomericGods: Spiritual Significance of Greek Religion (German: Die Götter Griechenlands. Das Bild des Göttlichen im Spiegel des griechischen Geistes...
of the underworld gods in his descent to Hades. When Hermes invents the lyre in theHomeric Hymn to Hermes, the first thing he does is sing about the birth...
gods. TheHomeric Hymn to Hermes (c. 500 BC) has the god Hermes divide a sacrifice of two cows he has stolen from Apollo, into twelve parts, on the banks...
the aims of Homeric studies have changed over the course of the millennia. The earliest preserved comments on Homer concern his treatment of thegods...
TheHomeric Question concerns the doubts and consequent debate over the identity of Homer, the authorship of the Iliad and Odyssey, and their historicity...
that there are not theHomericgods. In his 1953 essay, What Is An Agnostic? Russell states: An agnostic thinks it impossible to know the truth in matters...
that none of the events in Homer's works are historical. Others accept that there may be a foundation of historical events in theHomeric narrative, but...
The following is a list of gods, goddesses, and many other divine and semi-divine figures from ancient Greek mythology and ancient Greek religion. The...
W.F. (1954). TheHomericGods: The Spiritual Significance of Greek Religion. New York: Pantheon. p. 131. Rosivach, Vincent J. (1994).The System of Public...
drink of the Greek gods, and is often depicted as conferring longevity or immortality upon whoever consumed it. It was brought to thegods in Olympus by doves...
Dialogues of the Gods 2 Homeric Hymn 5 to Aphrodite 256 Hyginus, Fabula 160, makes Hermes the father of Pan. Karl Kerényi, Gods of the Greeks, 1951, p...
46; Homeric Hymn to Apollo (3) 334–339. Athanassakis and Wolkow, p. 140; Burkert 1985, p. 200, which gives the Titans as an example of "chthonic gods";...
TheHomeric Hymns (Ancient Greek: Ὁμηρικοὶ ὕμνοι, romanized: Homērikoì húmnoi) are a collection of thirty-three ancient Greek hymns and one epigram. The...
provides an argument against theHomericgods. Rather, Xenophanes begs the question and assumes that defenders of theHomeric worldview accept that there...
'Sun'; Homeric Greek: Ἠέλιος) is the god who personifies the Sun. His name is also Latinized as Helius, and he is often given the epithets Hyperion ("the one...
often communicate with thegods through prayer. Gods usually hear, often react to and sometimes grant human prayers. Homeric prayers, which often signal...
Hypnos (in the Iliad) makes Hera swear to him "by the inviolable water of Styx". Examples of oaths sworn by Styx also occur in theHomeric Hymns. Demeter...
Greek and Roman mythology, the primordial deities are the first generation of gods and goddesses. These deities represented the fundamental forces and physical...
found in theHomeric Hymn to Aphrodite (700 BC). Zeus assigned Hestia a duty to feed and maintain the fires of the Olympian hearth with the fatty, combustible...
Lesher, Presocratic Contributions to the Theory of Knowledge, 1998 U. De Young, "TheHomericGods and Xenophanes' Opposing Theory of the Divine", 2000...
to a common tradition. For example, the phrase for "everlasting glory" or "undying fame" can be found in theHomeric Greek as κλέος ἄφθιτον / kléos áphthiton...
thus speaking truth are described in theHomeric Hymn to Hermes, and the food of thegods is "identified as honey"; the bee maidens were originally associated...
Dialogues of theGods (Ancient Greek: Θεῶν Διάλογοι) are 25 miniature dialogues mocking theHomeric conception of the Greek gods written in the Attic Greek...
Odyssey were likely written down in Homeric Greek, a literary mixture of Ionic Greek and other dialects, probably around the late 8th or early 7th century BC...
constitute a criticism if the premises would be accepted by his opponents. Otherwise, Xenophanes is merely rejecting theHomericgods. In the Iliad, and elsewhere...
Homeric psychology is a field of study with regards to the psychology of ancient Greek culture no later than Mycenaean Greece, around 1700–1200 BCE, during...
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