# Hercules and gospel truth **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [December 5, 2022, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115 "2022-12-05T10:23:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/61 "2022-12-07T19:46:24Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > There’s a modern cynical tendency to approach ancient religion as though the people then didn’t really believe things themselves. As though they considered them merely stories. This could not be further from the truth. They believed. They believed _hard_. If you look at modern people and how they relate to modern religions, there’s a spectrum. There are secular people who don’t believe or practice at all, people who don’t really think about it much, but like the community and cultural aspects of practicing religion, people who are spiritual but don’t view the mainstream religions as getting things quite right, people who pretty much believe and follow some mainstream religion, and people who literally believe HARD the teachings of some offshoot cult. I assume that ancient peoples had a similar mix, with some people we would consider secular, lots of people who practiced (some with a lot of belief, and some without giving it much thought) and some who devoted their life to a deity and organized everything they did around their beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/62 "2022-12-07T19:47:35Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > > [@Kimstu](#): > > > > The vigor and persistence of the subsequent hijacking led the mod(s) to spin the discussion off into this CS thread. > > It was spun off as a separate thread at the OP’s request. Yeah, sorry, I should have been more explicit about that in my mod note. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/63 "2022-12-07T19:51:13Z")
I presume the same about a range of belief in Ancient Greece. There’s a good book, _Belief & Unbelief in Medieval Europe_, that takes pains to show this range for the very authoritarian Christian medieval period. What it looks like for Ancient Greece is that public participation in religion was more or less mandatory, and blasphemy strongly disallowed. So there is a lot of evidence for believe, and less evidence for unbelief. It also helps that there isn’t much in the way of doctrine, and none of the texts on myth are 100% consistent with each other, so there was clearly a wide tolerance for varying belief. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/64 "2022-12-07T19:58:02Z")
I don’t know about ancient Greece, but if you read, say, Ovid, I’m pretty sure he was not a devout follower of the gods he wrote about. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/65 "2022-12-07T20:01:34Z")
That is absolutely not a valid assumption. I think the problem comes from transferring the values of a hierarchical, text-based, doctrine-heavy monotheistic religion onto one that is also hierarchical but polytheistic, where oral tradition and in particular ritual weigh more heavily than any specific text, where doctrine is patchy and shifting. Ovid’s writing literature based on mythology, not documenting mythology. And this is a culture where the gods can be foolish or inept and have various other foibles and failing unthinkable in monotheistic Western religion, no lack of devotion required. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/66 "2022-12-07T20:04:40Z")
I think there’s an unconscious assumption that, because the pagan religions mostly didn’t go around butchering people for believing in different gods, they weren’t very serious about them. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/67 "2022-12-07T20:04:47Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > And this is a culture where the gods can be foolish or inept and have various other foibles and failing unthinkable in monotheistic Western religion, no lack of devotion required. Yeah, Christianity tends to be, “Think of the best person you know, the kindest, bravest, most generous you can think of. Yeah, God is a thousand, million, billion times better than that.” And Greeks tended to be, “Think of people you know, how they can be kind or cruel, brave or cowardly, generous or petty. Yeah, that’s our gods.” ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/68 "2022-12-07T20:06:28Z")
To give a little perspective: As a Jew, all of Christianity is heresy. And if you go back to the origins of Christianity, when Jews and Christians interacted on approximately equal terms, there was a LOT of concern among Jews that this heresy was being taught and was spreading. Now we mostly shut up and are polite about it, of course. I am secular enough that it doesn’t really bother me. But Christianity is deeply offensive to a significant fraction of believing Jews, in ways that Islam (which is actually quite compatible with Judaism) or Hinduism (which is just worshipping false gods, but not actual heresy) is not. So, on the one hand, I get that you don’t really like seeing heretical works. On the other hand, it’s hard to really feel bad for you for having to put up with that. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/69 "2022-12-07T20:06:42Z")
Re: Ovid, see Kaczor, Idaliana, “The Sacred and the Poetic: The Use of Religious Terminology in Ovid’s Words,” _Symbolae philologorum Posnaniensium Graecae et Latinae_ 29:2 (Dec. 2019), 17–35, DOI 10.14746/sppgl.2020.XXIX.2.2 . (The point of the article is that Ovid is extremely well-versed in Roman religion, but in the _Metamorphoses_ uses that knowledge toward literary aims, and in the _Fasti_ uses it for more pious purposes, though whether his own or (more likely) his patron’s is more of an open question.) ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/70 "2022-12-07T20:12:08Z")
Moderating: > [@Babale](#): > > > [@ekedolphin](#): > > > > You know, it would be nice if I could get just one person showing the least amount of support for my point of view. I feel like I’m being ganged up on. > > Great, maybe you’ll develop some empathy for members of religious minorities living in a Christian country. Despite having started in the pit, this thread is in Cafe society. It’s fine to disagree with the OP. But this is a place to treat each other with respect. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/71 "2022-12-07T20:12:52Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I assume that ancient peoples had a similar mix, with some people we would consider secular Not really. A handful, maybe. But generally not. Atheism just wasn’t a thing in classical antiquity. Even some of the people held up as precursor atheists, like Socrates, weren’t. They were more like impious than non-theist. And even if you were “secular” in you innermost thoughts, you practiced the rituals, or you risked your life. So the mix is _way_ more skewed to the believers than today. Although “belief” is perhaps not the best word to use here. [This article](https://acoup.blog/2019/10/25/collections-practical-polytheism-part-i-knowledge/) (first in a series) says it way better than I could. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/72 "2022-12-07T20:15:45Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I assume that ancient peoples had a similar mix, with some people we would consider secular, lots of people who practiced (some with a lot of belief, and some without giving it much thought) and some who devoted their life to a deity and organized everything they did around their beliefs. > **[20170531 - Least I Could Do](https://leasticoulddo.com/comic/20170531)** > > A daily webcomic series about the life of Rayne Summers. Created by Ryan Sohmer and Lar deSouza. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/73 "2022-12-07T20:23:42Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Although “belief” is perhaps not the best word to use here. [This article](https://acoup.blog/2019/10/25/collections-practical-polytheism-part-i-knowledge/) (first in a series) says it way better than I could. Yeah, that’s a good point. Most religions aren’t about belief, they are about rituals and practices and rules of behavior. And the ancients were careful to practice their rituals. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/74 "2022-12-07T21:07:00Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I don’t know about ancient Greece, but if you read, say, Ovid, I’m pretty sure he was not a devout follower of the gods he wrote about. Ovid had absolutely no problem screwing around with the myth, adding things and changing things as he saw fit. Nor was he alone in this. Read the works of Dionysius Skytobrachion for some REALLY big changes. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/75 "2022-12-07T21:14:04Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > The point of the article is that Ovid is extremely well-versed in Roman religion, but in the _Metamorphoses_ uses that knowledge toward literary aims Ovid didn’t simply make change for literary purposes. As far as I know, he’s the first one to asert that the Graeae had not only one eye, but also one tooth that they shared among themsewlves. He’s also the first writer I know of to tell the story that Medusa started out as a beautiful maiden who was seduced by Poseidon in Athena’s temple, and got turned into a monster. Prior to this, she was held to be one of three monstrous sistyers (with Stheno and Euryale), the daughters of Ketos the Sea Monster and Phorkys, the Ols Man of the Sea, and had always been a monster. Ovid’s story of Medusa changing into a monster is similar to another of the stories he (and only he) tells, about how the maiden Scylla spurned the sea-god Glaucus, who got Circe to make a potion to make Scylla fall in love with him, but the jealous Circe gave her a potion that turned her into a monster. That’;s in the _Metamorphoses_, too. In Home, Scylla was always a monster ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/76 "2022-12-07T21:18:36Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Medusa There’s a ‘What, you wrote the book on Medusa or something?’ joke here. I know there is. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/77 "2022-12-07T22:06:32Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > > [@ekedolphin](#): > > > > But people were more upset about White people wearing Maui costumes, to the point where they removed them from Walmart. > > Not a great example - the Maui costumes were literally a representation of a Polynesian’s _skin_. That’s beyond “cultural appropriation” and on its way to “blackface”. I’m not familiar with this particular case, but by any chance are you folks referring to the New Zealand aboriginals that we normally call Maori? I’m not aware that a particular Hawaiian island has culturally unique apparel. On the more general topic, the existence of this thread, and any controversy therein, mystifies me. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/78 "2022-12-07T22:16:32Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > I’m not familiar with this particular case, but by any chance are you folks referring to the New Zealand aboriginals that we normally call Maori? I’m not aware that a particular Hawaiian island has culturally unique apparel. No, they’re talking about the character Maui from the animated Polynesian-themed movie, _Moana_. Maui’s a big, shirtless guy with a lot of tattoos, and Disney licensed a Halloween Maui costume that was a brown body suit, colored to match Maui’s skin tone in the movie, with the tattoos drawn on it. They pulled it from stores after the backlash about it being adjacent to Black-face. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/79 "2022-12-07T22:46:18Z")
I’m a Christian, and have long been interested in Greek mythology, and enjoyed _Hercules_ despite the many, _many_ liberties it took with the aforementioned Greek mythology. I wasn’t bothered in the least by the use of the phrase “gospel truth.” C’mon, it’s the Muses reimagined as a gospel choir, for Zeus’s sake! ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2022, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115/80 "2022-12-07T23:00:49Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Islam (which is actually quite compatible with Judaism) or Hinduism (which is just worshipping false gods, but not actual heresy) Judaism does consider Islam to not be idolatry, but the notion that Muhammad is the ultimate prophet and the Quran the only truth absolutely renders Islam as a whole incompatible with Judaism. And the belief in multiple deities as in Hinduism is absolutely heresy in Judaic belief. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hercules-and-gospel-truth/976115.md?page=5)