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Comment
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Carrie
Unregistered User
(1/8/02 9:22:02 am)
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Gifts from the gods
Just a thought -- have the gods ever given anything to humanity? All I can think of are stories in which things are stolen from the gods -- such as fire. Can anyone think of gracious gifts from above -- ones that come without strings attached?
Carrie
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omarmorales
Registered User
(1/8/02 11:43:51 am)
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Re: Gifts from the gods
Winemaking given by Dionysus (roman: Bacchus) Wine was very important.
I think fire was given to us by Prometheus who stole it from the gods.
and misery. pandora's box was a gift.
Hope it helps
-Omar
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Helen
Registered User
(1/8/02 1:27:33 pm)
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Re: Gifts from the gods
The olive tree was a gift to the city of Athens from Athena (at that point, nameless; it might have been Poseidon's city, had they liked his gift of a saltwater spring more).
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Laura
McCaffrey
Registered User
(1/8/02 4:24:36 pm)
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Re: Gifts from the gods
The first thing that occured to me was life itself.
Lots of little half-god children. Some of these weren't gifts for the mother, as Zeus wasn't so picky about consensual sexual relations.
I'll have to think more.
Laura Mc
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BranwynElf
Registered User
(1/9/02 6:30:11 am)
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Re: Gifts from the gods
There's a Greek myth of a husband and wife who had nothing but still shared dinner and a place to sleep with two gods going around incognito. When the gods revealed themselves and said these two were the only ones in the whole village to offer hospitality despite having the least to share, they were given the gift of neither one dying before the other and turned into intertwined trees at the end of their lives. (And it was the gift they asked for instead of having a gift thrust upon them.)
Or did you mean gifts to humanity in general rather than specific people?
What about free will? Ok, sometimes it doesn't seem like a gift ... ;)
~ Ailsa
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Carrie
Unregistered User
(1/9/02 7:15:54 am)
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grace
I'm looking for stories of grace. The Athens reference might work. Isn't there an aboriginal tribal tale of the Rainbow that might work here? And then I suppose there is Changing Woman in the Navajo epic.
Carrie
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janeyolen
Unregistered User
(1/9/02 9:22:43 am)
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gifts
White Buffalo Woman brought many gifts to her people.
Jane
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Kerrie
Registered User
(1/9/02 9:39:27 am)
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Re: gifts
I seem to remember a Native American tale from my grandfather's old reader that was about a young man who wrestled a god (?) and when the god was thrown down, he gave the gift of corn.
Sugarplum dreams,
Kerrie
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Jess
Unregistered User
(1/9/02 6:04:41 pm)
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Hmm
That sounds a lot like the Biblical story of Israel - not corn of course. :-)
Jess
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Jess
Unregistered User
(1/10/02 7:19:08 am)
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benevolant?
Hi all,
This got me thinking. Is it a gift it is in exchange for "freedom" or does a gift from the gods need to be strictly benevolent?
Jess
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bardichaun
Registered User
(1/10/02 8:43:33 am)
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Re: benevolant?
I think it would depend on how you view the gods? And sometimes gods are like parents..they think a gift is best when earned,eh?Not that I would still overly trust anything loki offered,as an example
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Robin
Unregistered User
(1/10/02 9:01:53 am)
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Liquor!!
Odin seduced a giant maid in order to steal a mouthful of mead, which was brewed by her father. He changed himself into an eagle and flew away with the mead, which he then gave to humankind. I thank him for that EVERY DAY. ;o) Mead was considered by the Norse/Germanic peoples to be a source of divine inspiration.
He also hung on the World Tree for nine days and nine nights, pierced by a spear, in order to win the wisdom of the runes, which he also gave to humankind.
Pretty generous guy, all in all.
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allysonrosen
Registered User
(1/11/02 5:11:02 pm)
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Not just misery...
Omar...
The optimist in me doth protest...
the gods didn't just fill misery in Pandora's box, remember?
At the bottom of the box was the greatest gift the gods could give to humanity...hope.
Just my 2 cents...
Allyson
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CoryEllen
Registered User
(1/11/02 5:30:48 pm)
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Rainbow Snake?
Carrie - re: Aboriginal tales, you may be thinking of the Rainbow Snake, but that wasn't a god. Aboriginal spirituality (pre-Christian-influence) does not include Gods, only Ancestors, to the best of my knowledge.
C-E
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Goddess
Registered User
(1/17/02 2:21:12 pm)
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Re: Rainbow Snake?
Poseidon gave us the horse. Some others too but I'm brain dead at the moment
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catja1
Registered User
(1/20/02 5:24:53 pm)
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Re: gifts
Bran the Blessed gave the Britons his head, to be buried on the site of the White Tower in London, to protect England from invaders. But King Arthur, in this instance possessed of more testosterone than brains, declared he didn't want anything but his own strength protecting his people, and so dug it up. Silly mortals...
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janeyolen
Unregistered User
(1/21/02 3:58:37 am)
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Actually
The whole head thing comes because the Celts believed that keeping the head of a powerful enemy (or powerful leader like Bran) was full of their version of juju. But the Romans and the Christians did not, thought it barbarous and disgusting. Arthur was more Roman and Christian than Celtic. (Despite his early reliance on Druids.) So it was not testosterone but religion that dictated the unnburying of that head.
I have just been reading about this very thing for a novel I am working on!
Jane
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