The Afterlife in the Classical and Italian Traditi

I may be misunderstanding part of what you said, in which case correct me, however:

I’m not certain your arguement for it being the will of the gods that prophets are margenalized it quite correct. Prophesy was generally a gift to those mortals whom the gods gave it. Apollo gave it to Cassandra becuase he was in love with her, the punishment was that no one would believe her (given because she rejected his love.) Tierises was given the gift of prophesy from Zeus because he was blinded by Hera. Therefore, the gods are not punishing them with being prophets and thereby forced into exile from the community.

However, the gods need some way to tell the mortals certain things, and I don’t think there is anyway you could make them happy to recieve some of those truths. Therefore, the prophets must exist and the community is going to push them away.

Though I do think it is interesting that they must accept them into the community on some occasions in order to gain knowledge from the one thing that noramlly causes them to push the prophets away.

I am really tired right now, but I think I understand what you are saying. But why would the Gods consider prophecy a gift, if they know that it will cause marginalization? By giving the ability of prophecy causes the marginalization. I guess I don’t know Cassandra’s story that well, since I thought she repelled him and she was given both the prophecy and the clause that no one will believe her at the same time, since she spurned Apollo’s love. And I wasn’t too certain of Teiresias’s history as well.

I guess my whole point was that I felt that thought prophecy is important for sharing information, I don’t think it’s a real great gift. It’s more of a useful tool for the gods to use. But maybe I am reading the texts wrong and am just pitying the prophets. I sometimes feel that it would suck to not be able to filter any of that information out, despite the fact that the Gods are all powerful and don’t have to let it be so.

I’ll try and read back over your reply more thoroughly when I’ve gotten some sleep.

I think you are both onto something interesting here, which is the ambivalence of prophecy–is it a gift or a curse?

As you both point out, Cassandra was given the gift of prophecy by Apollo (let’s not forget that the god’s voice penetrates her whole body–there is something very sensual about this, even if she remained a perpetual virgin), but upon her rejection of his amorous pursuits, Apollo gave her the punishment that no one would believe her. The story of Cassandra has parallels to Sibyl, another of Apollo’s unlucky female object of pursuits, to whom he gave the gift of eternal life and the punishment of no eternal youth to accompany it.

Tiresias, however, was struck blind by Hera, enraged by T.’s assessment of female sexuality; Zeus gave him prophecy as recompense.

One thing that one might notice is the gendered nature of this ambivalence. The prophetesses of Apollo refused A.’s sexual advances, so now they are possessed by him completely. Their whole bodies are filled up with the god.

Tiresias, by contrast, sees though he is blind and has some control over the process of revelation. Though he does not wish to reveal that which he knows to Oedipus, and though he ultimately does reveal because he must, he reveals much more slowly, cautiously, and in stychomachia (i.e., through dialogue) rather than as an outburst. Tiresias has control over language–the Sibyl does not. Cassandra does not.