Myths 18th entry

Atalanta

This is the story of Atalanta that suffered from marriage. She was warned about marrying. The oracle told her, “Atalanta, do not marry, marriage will be your ruin. “ Pg 113

I’d read about this before but never evaluated it. Greeks and Romans strongly believed in destiny. Now, not all of us believe in destiny because we’ve discovered that we are the only creators of our destiny. I Think that the kind of faith they lived had to do with religion because destiny is supposedly controlled by the will of god. I don’t have much to say because I am no one to argue the roles of God or the gods in our lives. I personally do believe in god but believe that I’m the forger of my own destiny.

In my opinion life is better that way. You do what you do and life will do that to you. It kinds of relate to Karma but in a logical way. Cause and effect. For example, if decide to practice tennis weekly, you’ll be good at it but if you wait to be good at it but don’t do anything about it, there will be no chance for you at the sport. I’m not looking for an argument but I’m expressing my point of view, which I consider the right one, if not, why would I be following it?

Hercules

Hercules was a hero that did everything that was sent to him and at last gained the companion of the Gods. Hercules might’ve symbolized a city that surpassed all of them by conquering the surrounding territories and by travelling to all the different places and winning them over with flawless efficiency.

Maybe he wasn’t a city after all but he was simply an invented character to prove humans that if they tried, they could be better than the gods. This story might’ve encouraged many to do their own thing without attaching themselves to religion because after all, if Hercules did it, we all can.

This story is much different than the story I knew about him in which he was a great guy because you can see in the story that in fact, he had problems controlling himself but still made good deeds. I think that he didn’t do the tasks for the benefits of no one but for those of his own and although the tasks were meant to please others, he did them to prove he was better. I guess that that was his flaw and the reason why he wasn’t fully godlike (in a symbolical way).

Hebe and Ganymede

The only thing that this story says is that Hebe went with Ganymede instead of Hercules and this shows that myths might’ve been corrupted from their original version while they were told. There is nothing to do about it because that is expected to happen but I guess that there could’ve been different morals beneath some of the stories than those that were actually written in this book.