Hades

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Hades, Greek god of the underworld, depicted enthroned and bearing his bird-headed staff (image from a red-figure Apulian vase made in the 4th century B.C.E.).

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Hades (from Greek ᾍδης, Haidēs, originally Ἅιδης, Haidēs or Ἀΐδης, Aidēs, probably from Indo-European *n̥-wid- 'unseen') refers to both the ancient Greek underworld and to the god of the dead. This dual use was, however, a relatively late development in classical writing, as the term originally referred only to the god &ndash a usage attested to in the writings of Homer. In these sources, the only term used for the underworld itself was Haidou (the genitive of the word), which literally meant "the house of Hades". With time, the nominative case also came to designate the abode of the dead.

Hades and his brothers, Zeus, and Poseidon, defeated the titans and claimed rulership over the universe, ruling the underworld, sky, and sea respectively. Hades is depicted as a grim figure.

Hades was also known as Pluto (from Greek Ploutōn), and was known by this name, as "the unseen one", or "the rich one", as well as Dis Pater and Orcus, in Roman mythology; the corresponding Etruscan god was Aita. The symbols associated with him are sceptre and cornucopia.

The term hades has sometimes been used in Christianity to mean the abode of the dead, where the dead would await Judgment Day either at peace or in torment. See Hades in Christianity.

Hades, abode of the dead

In older Greek myths, Hades is the misty and gloomy abode of the dead, where all mortals go. There is no reward or special punishment in this Hades, akin to the Hebrew sheol. In later Greek philosophy appeared the idea that all mortals are judged after death and rewarded or damned.

There were several sections of Hades, including the Elysian Fields (contrast the Christian Paradise or Heaven), and Tartarus, (compare the Christian Hell). Greek mythographers were not perfectly consistent about the geography of the afterlife. A contrasting myth of the afterlife concerns the Garden of the Hesperides, often identified with the Isles of the Blessed, where the blest heroes may dwell.

In Roman mythology, an entrance to the underworld located at Avernus, a crater near Cumae, was the route Aeneas used to descend to the Underworld. By synecdoche, "Avernus" could be substituted for the underworld as a whole. The Inferi Dii were the Roman gods of the underworld.

The deceased entered the underworld by crossing the Acheron ferried across by Charon (kair'-on), who charged an obolus, a small coin for passage, placed under the tongue of the deceased by pious relatives. Paupers and the friendless gathered forever on the near shore. Greeks offered propitiatory libations to prevent the deceased from returning to the upper world to "haunt" those that had not given them a proper burial. The far side of the river was guarded by Cerberus, the three-headed dog defeated by Heracles (Roman Hercules). Beyond Cerberus, the shades of the departed entered the land of the dead to be judged.

Since Hades was the ruler of the Underworld, it makes sense to note one of the key features of this region - its myriad rivers. These rivers each had names and symbolic meanings: The five rivers of Hades are Acheron (the river of sorrow), Cocytus (lamentation), Phlegethon (fire), Lethe (forgetfulness) and Styx (hate). See also Eridanos. The Styx forms the boundary between upper and lower worlds.

The first region of Hades comprises the Fields of Asphodel, described in Odyssey xi, where the shades of heroes wander despondently among lesser spirits, who twitter around them like bats. Only libations of blood offered to them in the world of the living can reawaken in them for a time the sensations of humanity.

Beyond lay Erebus, which could be taken for a euphonym of Hades, whose own name was dread. There were two pools, that of Lethe, where the common souls flocked to erase all memory, and the pool of Mnemosyne ("memory"), where the initiates of the Mysteries drank instead. In the forecourt of the palace of Hades and Persephone sit the three judges of the Underworld: Minos, Rhadamanthys and Aeacus. There at the trivium sacred to Hecate, where three roads meets, souls are judged, returned to the Fields of Asphodel if they are neither virtuous nor evil, sent by the road to Tartarus if they are impious or evil, or sent to Elysium (Islands of the Blest) with the heroic or blessed.

In the Sibylline Oracles, a curious hodgepodge of Greco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian elements, Hades again appears as the abode of the dead, and by way of folk etymology, it even derives Hades from the name Adam (the first man), saying it is because he was the first to enter there.

Hades in Christianity

Like other first-century Jews literate in Greek, early Christians used the Greek word hades as the translation for the Hebrew word sheol. This use appears in Luke's story of Lazarus and the rich man. Both underworlds had originally been dark and gloomy with no relation to afterlife rewards or punishments. Since the writing of the Hebrew Bible, however, the popular concept of sheol had come to include particular judgment. Thus hades was seen as a place of comfort for the righteous (in the bosom of Abraham) and torment for the wicked. Here the dead awaited the universal resurrection on Judgment Day. Early church fathers defended this view of the afterlife against the view that the soul went immediately to heaven or to hell after the death of the body.

The doctrine of hades exists in substantially its original Christian form in the Eastern Orthodox Church. It also exists in its Old Testament form, as the abode of the unconscious dead, in certain other denominations, such as the Jehovah's Witnesses. In mainstream Western Christianity, however, it has largely been replaced by the concept of the soul going straight to hell, heaven, or (in Roman Catholicism) purgatory.

Hades, the lord of the Underworld

Template:Greek myth (Hades) In Greek mythology, Hades (the "unseen"), the god of the underworld, was a son of the Titans Cronus and Rhea. He had three older sisters, Hestia, Demeter, and Hera, as well as an older brother, Poseidon and a younger brother Zeus: together they accounted for half of the Olympian gods.

Upon reaching adulthood Zeus managed to force his father to disgorge his siblings. After their release the six younger gods, along with allies they managed to gather, challenged their parents and uncles for power in the Titanomachy, a divine war. Zeus, Poseidon and Hades received weapons from the three Cyclops to help in the war. Zeus the thunderbolt; Hades the helmet of invisibility; and Poseidon the trident. During the night before the first battle Hades put on his helmet and, being invisible, slipped over to the Titans' camp and destroyed their weapons. The war lasted for ten years and ended with the victory of the younger gods. Following their victory, according to a single famous passage in the Iliad (xv.187-93), Hades and his two younger brothers, Poseidon and Zeus, drew lots for realms to rule. Zeus got the sky, Poseidon got the seas, and Hades received the underworld, the unseen realm to which the dead go upon leaving the world as well as any and all things beneath the earth.

Hades obtained his eventual consort and queen, Persephone, through trickery, a story that connected the ancient Eleusinian Mysteries with the Olympian pantheon. Helios told the grieving Demeter that Hades was not unworthy as a consort for Persephone:

"Aidoneus, the Ruler of Many, is no unfitting husband among the deathless gods for your child, being your own brother and born of the same stock: also, for honor, he has that third share which he received when division was made at the first, and is appointed lord of those among whom he dwells."

Despite modern connotations of death as "evil", Hades was actually more altruistically inclined in mythology. Hades was often portrayed as passive rather than evil; his role was often maintaining relative balance.

Hades ruled the dead, assisted by others over whom he had complete authority. He strictly forbade his subjects to leave his domain and would become quite enraged when anyone tried to leave, or if someone tried to steal the souls from his realm.

Besides Heracles, the only other living people who ventured to the Underworld were all heroes: Odysseus, Aeneas (accompanied by the Sibyl), Orpheus, Theseus, and Psyche. None of them was especially pleased with what they witnessed in the realm of the dead. In particular, the Greek war hero Achilles, whom Odysseus met in Hades (although some believe that Achilles dwells in the Isles of the Blest), said:

"Do not speak soothingly to me of death, glorious Odysseus. I should choose to serve as the hireling of another, rather than to be lord over the dead that have perished."

—Achilles' soul to Odysseus. Homer, Odyssey 11.488

Hades, labelled as "Plouton", "The Rich One", bears a cornucopia on an Attic red-figure amphora, ca 470 B.C.E.

Hades, god of the dead, was a fearsome figure to those still living; in no hurry to meet him, they were reticent to swear oaths in his name. To many, simply to say the word "Hades" was frightening. So, a euphemism was pressed into use. Since precious minerals come from under the earth (i.e., the "underworld" ruled by Hades), he was considered to have control of these as well, and was referred to as Πλούτων (Plouton, related to the word for "wealth"), hence the Roman name Pluto. Sophocles explained referring to Hades as "the rich one" with these words: "the gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears." In addition, he was called Clymenus ("notorious"), Eubuleus ("well-guessing"), and Polydegmon ("who receives many"), all of them euphemisms for a name it was unsafe to pronounce, which evolved into epithets.

Although he was an Olympian, he spent most of the time in his dark realm. Formidable in battle, he proved his ferocity in the famous Titanomachy, the battle of the Olympians versus the Titans, which established the rule of Zeus.

Because of his dark and morbid personality he was not especially liked by either the gods nor the mortals. Feared and loathed, Hades embodied the inexorable finality of death: "Why do we loathe Hades more than any god, if not because he is so adamantine and unyielding?" The rhetorical question is Agamemnon's (Iliad ix). He was not, however, an evil god, for although he was stern, cruel, and unpitying, he was still just. Hades ruled the Underworld and therefore most often associated with death and was feared by men, but he was not Death itself — the actual embodiment of Death was Thanatos.

When the Greeks propitiated Hades, they banged their hands on the ground to be sure he would hear them. Black animals, such as sheep, were sacrificed to him, and it is believed that at one time even human sacrifices were offered. The blood from sacrifices to Hades dripped into a pit so it could reach him. The person who offered the sacrifice had to turn away his face. Every hundred years festivals were held in his honor, called the Secular Games.

Hades' weapon was a two-pronged fork, which he used to shatter anything that was in his way or not to his liking, much as Poseidon did with his trident. This ensign of his power was a staff with which he drove the shades of the dead into the lower world.

His identifying possessions included a famed helmet of darkness, given to him by the Cyclopes, which made anyone who wore it invisible. Hades was known to sometimes loan his helmet of invisibility to both gods and men (such as Perseus). His dark chariot, drawn by four coal-black horses, always made for a fearsome and impressive sight. His other ordinary attributes were the Narcissus and Cypress plants, the Key of Hades and Cerberus, the three-headed dog. He sat on an ebony throne.

In the Greek version of an obscure Judaeo-Christian work known as 3 Baruch (never considered canonical by any known group), Hades is said to be a dark, serpent-like monster or dragon who drinks a cubit of water from the sea every day, and is 200 plethra (20,200 English feet, or nearly four miles) in length.

Artistic representations

Hades is rarely represented in classical arts, save in depictions of the Rape of Persephone. Hades is also mentioned in The Odyssey, when Odysseus visits the underworld as part of his journey. However, in this instance it is Hades the place, not the god.

Persephone

The consort of Hades, and the archaic queen of the Underworld in her own right, before the Hellene Olympians were established, was Persephone, represented by the Greeks as daughter of Zeus and Demeter. Persephone did not submit to Hades willingly, but was abducted by him while picking flowers with her friends. Persephone's mother missed her and without her daughter by her side she cast a curse on the land and there was a great famine. Hades tricked Persephone into eating pomegranate seeds:

"But he on his part secretly gave her sweet pomegranate seed to eat, taking care for himself that she might not remain continually with grave, dark- robed Demeter."

Demeter questioned Persephone on her return to light and air:

"...but if you have tasted food, you must go back

again beneath the secret places of the earth, there to dwell a third part of the seasons every year: yet for the two parts you

shall be with me and the other deathless gods."

Thus every year Hades fights his way back to the land of the living with Persephone in his chariot. Famine (autumn and winter) occurs during the months that Persephone is gone and Demeter grieves in her absence. It is believed that the last half of the word Persephone comes from a word meaning 'to show' and evokes an idea of light. Whether the first half derives from a word meaning 'to destroy' - in which case Persephone would be 'she who destroys the light'.

Theseus and Pirithous

Hades imprisoned Theseus and Pirithous, who had pledged to marry daughters of Zeus. Theseus chose Helen and together they kidnapped her and decided to hold onto her until she was old enough to marry. Pirithous chose Persephone. They left Helen with Theseus' mother, Aethra and traveled to the underworld. Hades pretended to offer them hospitality and set a feast; as soon as the pair sat down, snakes coiled around their feet and held them there. Theseus was eventually rescued by Heracles.

Hercules

Hercules' final labour was to capture Cerberus. First, Hercules went to Eleusis to be initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries. He did this to absolve himself of guilt for killing the centaurs and to learn how to enter and exit the underworld alive. He found the entrance to the underworld at Tanaerum. Athena and Hermes helped him through and back from Hades. Hercules asked Hades for permission to take Cerberus. Hades agreed as long as Hercules didn't harm him, though in some versions, Hercules shot Hades with an arrow. When Hercules dragged the dog out of Hades, he passed through the cavern Acherusia.

Orpheus and Eurydice

Hades showed mercy only once: Because the music of Orpheus was so hauntingly good, he allowed Orpheus to bring his wife, Eurydice, back to the land of the living as long as she walked behind him and he never tried to look at her face until they got to the surface. Orpheus agreed but, yielding to the temptation to glance backwards, failed and lost Eurydice again, to be reunited with her only after his death.

Minthe and Leuce

According to Ovid, Hades pursued and would have won the nymph Minthe, associated with the river Cocytus, had not Persephone turned Minthe into the plant called mint. Similarly the nymph Leuce, who was also ravished by him, was metamorphosed by Hades into a white poplar tree after her death. Another version is that she was metamorphosed by Persephone into a white poplar tree while standing by the pool of Memory.

Epithets and other names

Hades, "the son of Cronos, He who has many names" was the "Host of Many" in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter. The most feared of the Olympians had euphemistic names as well as attributive epithets.

• Aides
• Aiidoneus
• Chthonian Zeus
• Haides
• Pluton
• Plouton
• The Rich One
• The Unseen One

Roman mythology

• Dis
• Dis Pater
• Pluto

External links

Maps of the Underworld (Greek mythology)

• Color map
• Ancient map
• Map of the Underworld

The God Hades

• Theoi Project, Hades references in classical literature & ancient art
• Greek Mythology Link, Hades summary of god

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