Greco-Roman Pagan And Judeo-Christian Societies: A Comparative Analysis

Nature of Evil in Greco-Roman Pagan and Judeo-Christian Societies Greco-Roman pagan societies feature the belief in many gods and deities, with their immense power create phenomena such as thunderstorms and volcanoes. In these societies, when something positive occurs, you are to give praise and make a sacrifice to the gods. But when something negative occurs like a disaster, these societies believe that you have angered the gods and will suffer their wrath. But when looking at these two occurrences, neither one these events are seen as the right thing or the malicious thing. There is no concept of that idea in these societies. While looking at Judeo-Christian societies they do have the concept of good and evil. When you do something honorable
God will reward you and if you do something malicious God will punish you for it. When looking at Mr. Kahn’s quote it appears to mean that there is no concept of evil in Classical societies and there is in Christian societies, you can see that his claim is true because in Greco-Roman societies they didn’t have this understanding of will and in Judeo-Christian societies they did have this understanding of right and wrong. Since God is an omnipotent power, he was able to give them the power of judgement and will to humans and instill the nature of good and evil in them. To start, my interpretation of the quote is that the Classical Greeks did not have an understanding of the concept of evil because they lacked judgement and understanding. In Ancient Greek societies they acted out of power but they acted immorally toward their own people. A key example of this, would be in the Iliad when Odysseus publicly shames and beats Thersites. Thersites is tired of the war and speaks against Agamemnon on this issue “but noble Odysseus was soon at his side, and rage in his look…, Odysseus struck with his staff at Thersites’ back and shoulders, and the man cowered and shed a huge tear”. This was not viewed as an evil act, in fact quite the opposite that this was viewed as a very noble act because he was standing up for his king, Agamemnon, to continue this war. Since they do not have the judgement of evil and good, this act was based surely out of power, power that nature has provided. Even though Thersites was doing the best thing by saying that they are only in this war, because Agamemnon is greedy is viewed down upon. This was built upon the strong ruling over the weak, since Thersites was a common soldier and Agamemnon was the king, it was not his place to be questioning the king. Since the Greeks did not face judgement from an omnipotent God such as in Judeo-Christian societies. They did not think of the moral consequences of defacing Thersites publicly since there were no moral consequences.
In contrast, Judeo-Christians have this judgement and understanding of the difference of good and evil stemming from Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. When Adam and Eve were in the garden, a serpent enticed them to eat “The Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil” , once Eve was tempted, she gave it to Adam to eat and they both became aware of their decisions. They lie to God saying that they were pressured by another and had disobeyed him and now must face punishment for this evil act. They face harsh punishment for lying to God about who was to blame for eating the fruit, and get expelled from the Garden of Eden. Since now Adam and Eve have the understanding of good and evil, everyone born after the first two people on the planet, have this understanding of good and evil. This is the basis of the religion because with good and evil, there are choices that need to be made, and there are consequences stemming from the original actions. Since God knows all and sees all, if you act in pure faith and put your trust in God, you will experience in Salvation. But if you do sin and there is not an atonement for your act, then you will lose an opportunity of Salvation since you do not trust in God.
Moreover, in Greco-Roman society without the understanding of good and evil, an act of good can be mistaken for an act of evil. A key example of this is in Hesiod’s Works and Days, when Prometheus steals the fire from Zeus, to give to the humans. This is a good thing because Prometheus is the one who made the people, out of clay. They have fire to use because Prometheus had given it to them, but Zeus took it away from them because he did not the like the offering he chose because it was bones and fat. Prometheus upset by this, as protector, and the maker of people, felt obligated to get the fire back, so he stole it back from Zeus and gave it to the people. Zeus angered by this once he learns that the people have the fire, punished Prometheus and the people even though, they had no say in it if they got the fire back or not. Zeus, experiencing human emotions of betrayal and jealousy, objectively punishes anyone who gets on his bad side. In the eyes of God, this act would be seen as evil because the system the Greco-Romans adhere to do not concern themselves with intention, and this act had very good intentions but was punished because of Zeus’ personal feelings toward Prometheus. Zeus lacks morality since he doesn’t act in an ethical manner unlike God.
Additionally, another example of good and evil in Judeo-Christian beliefs is the story of Cain and Abel. In this story two brothers, Cain and Abel, who are children of Adam and Eve, are tending to what they have been given. Abel has been given the livestock and Cain has been given the soil, to tend to the fruits and vegetables. Both of them make offerings to the Lord. Abel gives fat from his first born livestock, while Cain gives to him the fruits from the soil. God looks in favor of Abel’s offering while does not with Cain’s. This infuriates him and is very jealous of Abel. In Genesis 4:6-7 God states “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it”. God tells him that if you do what is right, you will be accepted if not you will be overcome by sin and cast away from society. Cain still upset with Abel decides to kill him and then God wants to know the truth. Cain made the choice to commit this heinous act and lies to God as well, and he is severely punished for it. Cain knew what he was doing was not appropriate, but did not know that God was omnipotent and saw what he did, now must suffer the entire time. Cain disregarded God’s advice because he thought that God had wronged him by giving him the lesser of the two jobs, and he felt that he had to right the wrongs himself. He was not strong enough to fend off the sin and fell into the temptations of the devil.
Furthermore, the counterargument to this is that Mr.
Kahn’s quote does not accurately describe the Greco-Roman society. Which would be that persons of Greco-Roman society have the understanding between good and evil. An example would be in Cicero’s The Republic. Philus gives the hypothetical situation of a shipwreck where a strong man sees a weaker man on a piece of driftwood. He states the man would act justly if he does not push him off, but would act unjustly if he pushes him off to save himself. In Philus’ opinion, the strong swimmer acts out of necessity to save his own life, and this is not an inherently evil act. The man has the ability and the will to survive the shipwreck due to the circumstances that he’s been forced into. But as a society, Greco-Romans act in favor of the gods before their own wellbeing. They do not have the will to act for themselves in everyday society because the needs of the gods come before their own. This instance of the shipwreck was an exception because this was a life or death scenario and he had to act in a way to save his
life.
In summation, Mr.
Kahn’s quote does hold true about Judeo-Christian society and Greco-Roman societies. In the nature of Judeo-Christian society, nothing is already predetermined everything is up to the choices that you make and the outcomes of those choices you make. In the instance of Adam and Eve, once they ate the fruit, they became aware of the society around them and it made them realize what they had done. Cain and Abel, Cain realized what he did after God had found out and made him suffer the eternal punishment. While in comparison, it is important to realize that there is no good and evil in Greco-Roman societies. In the Iliad, Thersites is verbally and physically assaulted by Odysseus, for speaking against the king, Agamemnon. In Judeo-Christian society this would have been viewed as morally wrong for public shaming for someone who speaks the truth. In the case of Prometheus and Zeus, Prometheus was doing his job as creator of the humans to give them fire back and make sure they are able to survive. Zeus focused more on that Prometheus defied him rather than and punished all those involved because the gods did not focus on intention rather they believed in a rigid set of
rules.