The highest and most revered authority figures in Greek culture were, of course, the gods. Since other chapters in this volume take up the gods in tragedy (see Sourvinou-Inwood and Mastronarde, chapters 18 and 20), we need not consider all aspects of the topic here. Five main points need to be brought out, however:
(1) the authority exercised by the various Olympian and chthonian gods and goddesses (theoi, theai), and by sundry other spirits and supernatural powers ( daimones), tends to wax and wane during the course of a single play - that is to say, this source of authority may not be a consistent reference point, but may suddenly burst into view and as suddenly fade from consideration as other, human, perspectives come to the fore; (2) the basis and constituent elements of divine authority can be quite variable and questionable, sometimes involving a strong moral component (justice, respect for oaths and kinship-ties, concern for xenoi or suppliants, and so forth), but sometimes based on little more than the deity’s own sense of personal status and honor; (3) individual deities, with the occasional exception of Zeus, do not usually have final authority to determine the outcome of events - there is (or so it is intermittently asserted in Greek culture) a higher, or prior, order of impersonal necessity that the Olympian and chthonian divinities alike are obliged to recognize; (4) often the agents of divine intervention and involvement in the plays are not the gods themselves but human intermediaries; (5) divine authority may often be seen less as a radically separate sphere of authority than as an extension and mystification of one or more of the human structures of authorities that we have already considered.
(1) Although modern readers of Greek tragedy often wish to analyze divine versus human causations, and to determine just how much freedom and independence of choice the human characters may have, this distinction seems rarely to have been a matter of interest to ancient playwrights or theater-goers. Divine and human motivations and causes co-exist; and we often find the focus of attention shifting back and forth, as one or other character, or the chorus, addresses a prayer, utters a curse, or narrates an explanation that may open up a new dimension on the action. And even though rival speeches in an agon, or in speculative choral songs, may propose contradictory views of divine concern or disregard for human affairs, divine approval or disapproval of the same event, the audience is rarely able to arrive at any clear understanding of which view, if either, is correct.
(2) Human beings generally wish their divinities to be just and honest (and even, on occasion, merciful and considerate), and gods in Greek tragedy are often represented as being committed to such standards as the basis for their actions. But at the same time it is acknowledged that gods may have many possible reasons to act, that humans cannot always expect to understand the reasons for divine action, and that gods (like other powerful persons) can be - and have the right to be - jealous, intemperate, and vindictive. So, while a few divinities (notably Themis and Dike) may by definition always act ‘‘justly,’’ none can claim unfailing and complete moral perfection, and most can be suspected at times of being just as selfish and limited in their goals and desires as human beings are. Thus, even as divine authority must always be respected and feared, and may (if properly invoked) be a source of individual or collective strength and salvation, nonetheless the precise degree of divine involvement and interest remains all too often dubious during the play, and even at the end a sudden divine apparition or explanation may not fully resolve questions raised earlier about the indifference and/or immorality of the powers above: so Apollo’s oracle may after all have been ‘‘not wise’’ (Euripides, Electra 1246), and ‘‘there [is] nothing of these things that [is] not Zeus’’ (Sophocles, Women ofTrachis 1278).
(3) The capture of Troy (by Neoptolemus and with the help of Philoctetes and his bow), the killing of Laius by his son, and other such mythological ‘‘facts’’ are beyond the control of individual gods - even though the gods may act purposely to bring them about (or to try to forestall or postpone them). Thus, for example, Apollo’s predictions that Oedipus will kill his father, or Zeus’ ‘‘sending’’ (Aeschylus, Agamemnon 59, 61, 111) of the Atreidae to recover Helen and punish Paris and his family, do not themselves ‘‘authorize’’ (cause, originate) those events: rather, they guarantee or confirm an already-determined outcome. Nonetheless, the distinction between events that are fated and necessary (and thus beyond the gods’ control), and those that are caused by individual or collective divine decisions and actions, is rarely drawn with any clarity or consistency in Greek tragedy; and to the human participants in the tragic action, it may not make much difference. Often a character - even a god - will deflect argument about responsibility for an unpleasant outcome by stating either that it was ‘‘fated long ago’’ or that it was ‘‘Zeus’ will’’ (or both), with the effect of short-circuiting any further discussion of blame and responsibility.
(4) Some of the most explosive confrontations in tragedy occur between a polit-ical/military leader and an agent of the divine, especially a priest or seer. In such scenes, the disparity between mortal aspirations and divine authority lends itself to extensive irony and demonstration of human blindness and error (hamartia). Sometimes the agents of the divine are represented as being entirely reliable and authoritative (for example, Theonoe in Euripides’ Helen), but sometimes their reliability may be cast into question by another character (Tiresias in Sophocles’ Oedipus the King and Antigone, and Euripides’ Bacchae). Occasionally, too, a religious ritual may be manipulated for transparently deceptive effect (Helen and Menelaus’ ‘‘purification’’ ceremony in Euripides’ Helen) - a reminder that human cult practices may not always be authorized by a truly reliable divine source.
(5) As many of their names and cult epithets confirm, Greek (like most other) divinities represent to some degree personifications and mystifications of human power structures and emotions; and thus the engagement of‘‘gods’’ in tragic action, so far from introducing an extraneous or additional element separate from the human players, often amounts to an extension, or projection, of the humans’ personal and ideological conflicts onto an imagined higher authority.
Indeed, a fitting conclusion to this section will be a consideration of the figure of Zeus himself, the one Olympian deity never introduced on stage in Athenian tragedy, even though he often is imagined as the ultimate authority guaranteeing and, in some sense, justifying the final outcome of every play. Occasionally, such a recognition of
Zeus’ authority may sound accusatory (‘‘There is nothing in this that is not Zeus!’’: Sophocles, Women ofTrachis 1278); but usually it is resigned (for example, Euripides, Bacchae 1349: ‘‘My father Zeus approved all this long ago!’’), or reassuring, as if to remind the audience along with the characters that some kind of cosmic order has now been restored, and that the suffering and danger that they have just witnessed was not entirely pointless or random. Zeus is thus the ultimate projection of the most deeply traditional Greek family and political structures: father (pater, patrOios), husband and lord of the household (herkeios), protector of strangers (xenios), king (basileus), presider over public meetings and debates (agoraios) - as well as being the one who is routinely invoked at almost every dinner and sacrifice, as ‘‘the third, the savior’’ ( tritos sOtOr), and who finally brings all things to completion and perfection ( teleios). All these titles for Zeus are mentioned in the course of the Oresteia, a trilogy in which the characters and choruses ceaselessly turn to the supreme authority for help, for understanding, and for justification of the human conflicts and attempts at restitution that they see unfolding more or less chaotically around them.
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