Homeric and Platonic elements

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For we have seen that this is the most crucial choice for a man living or dead. Indeed one must cling to this conviction even when he comes to the realm of Hades, so that here just as in the other world he may not be overwhelmed by wealth and similar evils and succumb to acts like those of a tyrant, committing many incurable evils and besides suffering still greater ones himself, and so that he may know how to choose a life that follows the mean in such circumstances, and to avoid the excess in either direction both in this life and in every future life, as far as he is able. For in this way a man becomes most fortunate and blessed. Then indeed Er, the messenger from the afterlife, reported that the prophet spoke as follows: "Even for the one who comes last there lies a life that is desirable and not evil, if he chooses intelligently and lives it unflinchingly. Let not the one who chooses first be careless, nor the last discouraged." After he had spoken, the one who had drawn the first lot immediately went up and chose the most extreme tyranny and he made his choice out of senselessness and greed and did not look closely at everything, and he did not notice that his life entailed the fate of eating his own children and other evils. And when he examined his choice at leisure he beat his breast and lamented that he had not abided by the warnings of the prophet. For he did not accept the responsibility for these evils but he blamed fate and the gods and everything rather than himself. He was one of those who had come down from the sky and had lived his previous life in a city with an orderly political constitution and adopted virtue through habit rather than wisdom. Generally speaking the number of those who came down from the sky and were caught in this kind of predicament was not small, since they were untrained in suffering. But many of those from earth, since they had themselves suffered and seen others suffer, did not make their choice on impulse. Because of this and because of the chance of the lot, for many souls there occurred a change from an evil or a good fate or the reverse. For if one always pursues wisdom with all his strength each time he takes a life in the world and if the lot of choosing does not fall to him among the last, it is likely from all that has been reported that not only will he be happy in life but also his journey after death from the plain and back will not be under the earth and hard, but easy and upward to the sky. Er said that to watch each soul as he chose his life was a worthwhile sight, piteous, laughable, and wondrous.

For the most part they made their choice on the basis of their experiences in their previous life. He saw the soul that had been that of Orpheus choose the life of a swan through hatred of the female sex because of his death at their hands, not wishing to be born again of woman. And he saw the soul of Thamyras select the life of a nightingale, and a swan decide to change to the life of a human, and other musical creatures make similar decisions. The soul that drew the twentieth lot chose the life of a lion; this was the soul of Ajax, son of Telamon, avoiding a human life because he remembered the judgment concerning Achilles' armor. After him came the soul of Agamemnon; he too through hatred of the human race because of his sufferings changed to the life of an eagle. The choice of the soul of Atalanta fell in the middle of the proceedings; she saw great honors attached to the life of a male athlete and took it, not being able to pass it by. He saw afier her the soul of Epeus, the son of Panopeus, assuming the nature of a craftswoman, and far away among the last the soul of the ridiculous Thersites taking the form of an ape. In his fated turn the soul of Odysseus, who had drawn the last lot, went to choose; remembering his former toils he sought to be free from ambition; he looked a long time and with difficulty found the quiet life of an ordinary man lying somewhere disregarded by the others, and when he saw it he made his choice gladly and said that he would have done the same thing even if the first lot had fallen to him. In the same way souls of wild animals exchanged forms or entered human beings, the unjust changing to savage beasts, the just to tame ones and all kinds of combinations occurred. When all the souls had chosen lives, they proceeded in order according to their lots to Lachesis. She gave to each the divinity (daimon) he had chosen to accompany him as a guardian for his life and to fulfill his choices. This divinity first led the soul to Clotho, under her hand as it turned the revolving spindle, to ratify the fate each had chosen after drawing his lot. He touched her and then led the soul to the spinning of Atropos, thus making the events on the thread of destiny unalterable.

From here without turning back they went under the throne of Necessity and passed beyond it. When all the souls and their guardian divinities had done this, they proceeded together to the plain of the river of forgetfulness (Lethe) through a terrible and stifling heat. For it was devoid of trees and all that the earth grows. Now that it was evening they encamped by the river of forgetfulness, whose water no container can hold. It is necessary for all to drink a fixed amount of the water, but some do not have the wisdom to keep from drinking more than this amount. As one drinks one becomes forgetful of everything. In the middle of the night when they were asleep there was thunder and an earthquake, and then suddenly just like shooting stars they were borne upward each in a different direction to his birth. Er himself was prevented from drinking the water. He does not know where and how he returned to his body but suddenly opening his eyes he saw that he was lying on the funeral pyre at dawn. Thus, 0 Glaucon, the myth has been preserved and has not perished and we should be saved if we heed it and we shall cross the river of forgetfulness well and not contaminate our souls. But if we all agree in believing the soul is immortal and capable of enduring all evils and all good, we shall always cling to the upward path and in every way pursue justice with wisdom, so that we may be in loving reconciliation with ourselves and the gods and so that when we carry off the prizes of justice, just like victors in the games collecting their rewards, both while we are here and in the thousand-year journey we have described, we may fare well. This vision of an afterlife written in the fourth century comes from various sources about which we can only conjecture, and of course we must allow for the inventive genius of Plato himself in terms of his own philosophy. The numerical intervals (e.g., the journey of a thousand years) are reminiscent of Pythagoras and the belief in the transmigration of the soul; reward and punishment with ultimate purification is usually identified as Orphic.

Problems abound in connection with the precise interpretation of this myth of revelation that concludes the Republic with proof of divine immortality. How much was intended to be accepted literally? Is Er's story an allegory filled with profound symbols hiding the universal truths it wishes to disclose? For the purposes of our sketch of the development of the Greek and Roman depiction of the afterlife, it is important to stress the fact that a heaven and a hell are clearly depicted for the soul of every mortal, and in addition to the upward and downward path that must be traversed, special tormentors exist and a special place of torment (Tartarus) in which the greatest sinners are placed forever. In such a conception lies the mythical and biblical basis for the mystery religions of antiquity, whether their god be Demeter or Dionysus and their prophet, Orpheus or Plato. Ties with Christian sentiments are not hard to see, despite the obvious differences. More specific links are provided by the identification of Er as an ancestor of St. Joseph, and the fact that the early Christians in their championship of free will seized upon the admonition of Lachesis: "This blame belongs to him who makes the choice; god is blameless." In Book 6 of the Aeneid, Vergil paints his sad and prophetic picture of the Underworld in shadowy halftones fraught with tears and pathos. His sources are eclectic but his poetic vision is personal and unique. Despite the centuries of oral and written tradition and the Roman chauvinistic cast of his depiction, Homeric and Platonic elements are often still distinctly evident. At Cumae in Italy, the Sibyl, prophetess of Apollo, tells Aeneas what the requirements are to visit his father in the realm of Hades.