In the time of Homer, around 750 and 650 BCE , Hesiod was a celebrated poet who is to our days still the major source about Greek mythology.
He is also described as “the father of Greek Didactic Poetry” and the “first economist “.
He himself attributed his poetic gifts to the Muses, who appeared to him while he was a simple shepherd in the peaceful countryside. The beautiful muses offered him a poet’s staff and endowed him with a poet’s voice to “sing about the race of the blessed gods immortal.”
Only two of his entire epics have survived :
The Theogony : narrating the genealogy, the power struggle and the lives of the gods and goddesses. He retraced the creation of the world and the different reigns of the gods, naming more than three hundred gods.
Many other authors have written on this subject over the centuries but The Theogony remains since the ancient times the most respected source..
Works and Days : is about the lives of farmers, peasants and shepherds , giving moral consideration and practical advice.
The poem is a farmer’s almanac in which Hesiod instructs his brother Perses in the agricultural arts.
For this , he is also considered as the father of economists : “Through work men grow rich in flocks and substance … 381] If your heart within you desires wealth, do these things and work with work upon work.
There are also practical advice:
“Never make water in the mouths of rivers which flow to the sea, nor yet in springs; but be careful to avoid this. And do not ease yourself in them: it is not well to do this”.
“Call your friend to a feast; but leave your enemy alone; and especially call him who lives near you: for if any mischief happen in the place, neighbours come ungirt, but kinsmen stay to gird themselves. A bad neighbour is as great a plague as a good one is a great blessing;”
and morals :
“Let the wage promised to a friend be fixed; even with your brother smile — and get a witness; for trust and mistrust, alike ruin men”.
“ Be friends with the friendly, and visit him who visits you. Give to one who gives, but do not give to one who does not give”.
And more importantly, the one that your mother keeps nagged you with :
“Do not put your work off till to-morrow and the day after;
for a sluggish worker does not fill his barn, nor one who puts off his work: industry makes work go well, but a man who puts off work is always at hand-grips with ruin”.
But there are also stories such as :
Pandora and the Jar
After Zeus realised that Prometheus had stolen the fire to give it the men …
“Zeus who delights in thunder did not see it. But afterwards Zeus who gathers the clouds said to him in anger:
[54] `Son of Iapetus, surpassing all in cunning, you are glad that you have outwitted me and stolen fire — a great plague to you yourself and to men that shall be. But I will give men as the price for fire an evil thing in which they may all be glad of heart while they embrace their own destruction”….
… “And he charged Hermes the guide, the Slayer of Argus, to put in her a shameless mind and a deceitful nature”…
… The messenger of the gods, to take it to Epimetheus as a gift. And Epimetheus did not think on what Prometheus had said to him, bidding him never take a gift of Olympian Zeus, but to send it back for fear it might prove to be something harmful to men. But he took the gift, and afterwards, when the evil thing was already his, he understood” …
… For ere this the tribes of men lived on earth remote and free from ills and hard toil and heavy sickness which bring the Fates upon men; for in misery men grow old quickly. But the woman took off the great lid of the jar with her hands and scattered all these and her thought caused sorrow and mischief to men. Only Hope remained there in an unbreakable home within under the rim of the great jar, and did not fly out at the door; for ere that, the lid of the jar stopped her, by the will of Aegis-holding Zeus who gathers the clouds. But the rest, countless plagues, wander amongst men; for earth is full of evils and the sea is full. Of themselves diseases come upon men continually by day and by night, bringing mischief to mortals silently; for wise Zeus took away speech from them. So is there no way to escape the will of Zeus”….
The Ages of man : the creation of mankind
Cronos first and then Zeus each created a race of mortals to populate the earth and to entertain the gods.
But even for the mighty gods, the results were so utterly disappointing that they had to erase them from the surface of the earth.
Zeus tried 4 times to create appropriate mortals, giving them each time different characteristics.
We, as human beings are his fifth attempt and the result as Hesiod described us is quite sad and dark but might it not be extraordinarily accurate ?
“And again far-seeing Zeus made yet another generation, the fifth, of men who are upon the bounteous earth…
…Thereafter, would that I were not among the men of the fifth generation, but either had died before or been born afterwards. For now truly is a race of iron, and men never rest from labour and sorrow by day, and from perishing by night; and the gods shall lay sore trouble upon them. But, notwithstanding, even these shall have some good mingled with their evils. And Zeus will destroy this race of mortal men also when they come to have grey hair on the temples at their birth. The father will not agree with his children, nor the children with their father, nor guest with his host, nor comrade with comrade; nor will brother be dear to brother as aforetime. Men will dishonour their parents as they grow quickly old, and will carp at them, chiding them with bitter words, hard-hearted they, not knowing the fear of the gods. They will not repay their aged parents the cost their nurture, for might shall be their right: and one man will sack another’s city. There will be no favour for the man who keeps his oath or for the just or for the good; but rather men will praise the evil-doer and his violent dealing. Strength will be right and reverence will cease to be; and the wicked will hurt the worthy man, speaking false words against him, and will swear an oath upon them. Envy, foul-mouthed, delighting in evil, with scowling face, will go along with wretched men one and all. And then Aidos and Nemesis [shame of wrongdoing and indignation against the wrongdoer], with their sweet forms wrapped in white robes, will go from the wide-pathed earth and forsake mankind to join the company of the deathless gods: and bitter sorrows will be left for mortal men, and there will be no help against evil”…