FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147  
148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   >>   >|  
s.] [Footnote 169: Mueller, "Science of Language," p. 434.] The Greek tragedians were the great religious instructors of the Athenian people. "Greek tragedy grew up in connection with religious worship, and constituted not only a popular but a sacred element in the festivals of the gods.... In short, strange as it may sound to modern ears, the Greek stage was, more nearly than any thing else, the Greek pulpit.[170] With a priesthood that offered sacrifice, but did not preach, with few books of any kind, the people were, in a great measure, dependent on oral instruction for knowledge; and as they learned their rights and duties as citizens from their orators, so they hung on the lips of the 'lofty, grave tragedians' for instruction touching their origin, duty, and destiny as mortal and immortal beings.... Greek tragedy is essentially didactic, ethical, mythological, and religious."[171] [Footnote 170: Pulpitum, a stage.] [Footnote 171: Tyler, "Theology of Greek Poets," pp. 205, 206.] Now it is unquestionable that, with the tragedians, Zeus is the Supreme God. AEschylus is pre-eminently the theological poet of Greece. The great problems which lie at the foundation of religious faith and practice are the main staple of nearly all his tragedies. Homer, Hesiod, the sacred poets, had looked at these questions in their purely poetic aspects. The subsequent philosophers, Plato and Aristotle, developed them more fully by their didactic method. AEschylus stands on the dividing-line between them, no less poetic than the former, scarcely less philosophical than the latter, but more intensely practical, personal, and _theological_ than either. The character of the Supreme Divinity, as represented in his tragedies, approaches more nearly to the Christian idea of God. He is the Universal Father--Father of gods and men; the Universal Cause (panaitios, Agamem. 1485); the All-seer and All-doer (pantopies, panergetes, ibid, and Sup. 139); the All-wise and All-controlling (pankrates, Sup. 813); the Just and the Executor of justice (dikephoros, Agamem. 525); true and incapable of falsehood (Prom. 1031); pseudegorein gar ouk epistatai stoma to dion, alla pan epos telei,-- holy (agnos, Sup. 650); merciful (preumenes, ibid. 139); the God especially of the suppliant and the stranger (Supplices, passim); the most high and perfect One (teleion upsiston, Eumen. 28); King of kings, of the happy, most happy, of the perfect,
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147  
148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
religious
 

Footnote

 

tragedians

 

theological

 

poetic

 
Agamem
 
Supreme
 

instruction

 
AEschylus
 

Father


tragedy

 

tragedies

 
people
 

perfect

 
sacred
 

didactic

 
Universal
 
Divinity
 

approaches

 

represented


character

 

Christian

 

developed

 

method

 

Aristotle

 

purely

 

aspects

 

subsequent

 

philosophers

 

stands


dividing

 
intensely
 

practical

 

personal

 

philosophical

 
scarcely
 

panaitios

 
justice
 

merciful

 
preumenes

suppliant
 

stranger

 
upsiston
 
teleion
 

Supplices

 

passim

 
pankrates
 

Executor

 
controlling
 

pantopies