Ancient Greek beliefs about the afterlife

Life After Death: Afterlife Within the Realm of Ancient Greek Beliefs

The question as to what happens after death is not fathomable within human reason. As such, it remains one of the biggest mysteries of life. The belief in life after death is what keeps the hopes of the human race intact even in the face of the tragedy of death. The concept 'afterlife' appears absurd in light of rational thought yet strangely familiar. Since time immemorial, numerous theories and beliefs have emerged in bid to work out this disarray. As for Christians, there is a mainstream belief that revolves around Heaven and Hell for rewarding righteousness and punishing evil respectively. In Hinduism, the belief is that upon death, the human soul deserts the body and reincarnates in a different form based on 'actions and consequences.' In Ancient Greek religion, there was a wide range of beliefs. As it appertains to this study, Ancient Greeks believed in life after death where the soul departed the body and moved into the Underworld. One of these beliefs was in life after death in an alternate universe where souls went for the afterlife. They held on to the faith that death merely marked the end of human life or human and not the existence of the soul. While the Ancient Greeks believed in the existence of the soul after death, they saw the afterlife as one that lacked purpose; according to them, life after death was meaningless.

Introduction

Some of the earliest references to Ancient Greek beliefs emerge from Homers accounts as documented in The Iliad and The Odyssey. In other historical accounts, the conception of the Afterlife had taken form in Ancient Greek beliefs dating back to the 6th Century BC

. There were no hints of progress in the Greek Underworld. The most attributable factor about the Greek Underworld is that it existed independent of the concept of time. Existence in the underworld took the form of infinity and continuity. For instance, Oedipus' destiny to kill his father and marry his mother was among the prophecies made, and in as much as he tried to alter his destiny, it became exceeding hard to alter the course of history. The most attributable factor about the Greek Underworld is that it existed independent of the concept of time but within the space continuum. Since existence in the afterlife beats the time continuum, the dead were always aware of the future making them able to predict and prophesy certain outcomes.

The first underworld identified as the Gates of Hades was a cold and dark real. Guarded by a deity going by the same name, Hades was the universal destination of the dead. Another underworld going by the title Tartarus emerges as the deepest region of the Greek Underworld. The Elysian Fields closely resembles Hesiod's Isles of the Blessed located in the western ocean as depicted in Works and Days. Elysium, otherwise referred to as Elysian Plain or Elysian Fields, was the Greek Underworld's equivalent to the Biblical 'heaven

.' According to Homeric references, the Elysian Fields was a paradise where only the righteous got to go; only the good souls and the pure hearts inhabited this Underworld. As it first appears in The Odyssey, the Elysian Fields, characterized by gentle breezes and located on the western ends of the earth, is the home of Menelaus

Afterlife

Afterlife refers to the concept of a realm -- or the realm itself -- where a person's essence / soul continue to reside after death. As a concept, -- whether in its transcendental or physical state -- the afterlife is also referred to as Hereafter or life after death. In some accounts, life after death may take place in the form of reincarnation, which refers to rebirth of the soul in a different form most likely without any memory of what transpired in their previous life form. In other accounts, existence in the afterlife takes a spiritual form.

As envisioned in numerous theories about Ancient Greek religion, afterlife connotes life after death in a parallel universe often identified as the underworld. The idea of life after death has sparked intense debate over the years since the dawn of science. Scientists believe that claims of life after death beat the logic of scientific method; there is no quantitative / empirical means of determining such claims and as such, they just do not make sense

. Echoing similar sentiments, top scientists from the University of Stanford have denounced the existence of the underworld arguing that such claims are not quantifiable and as such, the conjecture of there being life after death is uncorroborated. A section of scientists believe that there is nothing outside the realm of material existence in the physical world. In this view, such concepts such as heaven, hell, underworld, afterlife and intuition are non-existent. The scientific conjecture is that there is no parallel universe -- underworld -- where souls go upon departure from the body. In fact, the existence of the 'soul,' as a separate entity from the physical body, is in itself questionable within scientific logic. In view of this argument, life ends at death after which nothing else happens; there are no souls, underworlds or spirits that exist outside of the material world.

The dawn of science brought about an intellectual revolution in Europe. Scholars began to question some of the hitherto beliefs especially those about religion. For instance, Charles Darwin shocked the religious world by endorsing the evolution theory subsequently trashing erstwhile Biblical creation myths. The belief in life after death was one of the pillars of religion since time immemorial. For instance, Christians believed then -- as they still do -- that once a person dies, their soul either goes to heaven or hell depending on their actions during their physical existence on earth. Likewise, in Greek religion, as in other world religions, the belief in life after death is deeply entrenched in the religious dispensation. Even as the accounts of what exactly happens after death vary, the concept 'afterlife' remains constant throughout the religious divide. Even in the wake of the breakthrough in science, religious conservatives remained resolute in their belief in life after death. Looking at Ancient Greek religion, scholars have found that the belief in the afterlife was one of the most fundamental aspects of this religion. Ancient Greek belief in the underworld has become very popular in the contemporary media with the release of various movies such as Legend of Troy, Underworld, and Spartacus.

The Concept 'Afterlife' in Ancient Greek Beliefs

Spreading as it did over the centuries, Ancient Greek religion incorporated a great deal of diversity in terms of variety in belief. In most cultures, human life ends in death but the soul continues with the journey in the Underworld. After death comes the afterlife. Though there is no empirical evidence as to the existence of the Underworld or the afterlife, this consideration deeply reinforces itself in modern religious beliefs as it did in Ancient Greece. As Socrates once said, "Look death in the face with joyful hope, and consider this a lasting truth: the righteous man has nothing to fear, neither in life, nor in death, and the gods will not forsake him."

The fascination with the concept of life after death is one of the most distinct features of Ancient Greek beliefs.

Scholars and historians have described Ancient Greece as a notoriously mythological society. As it emerges in various literary pieces, -- i.e. Homeric epics, poems, journals, books and depictions in the mainstream media - the Ancient Greek society was quite a complex one

. The complexity of the Ancient Greek society has captured the interest of many learners and scholars alike as they seek to unravel the intricacy behind some of its mythological persuasions. As a result, accounts depicting Ancient Greek mythology often differ significantly given the varying interpretations by different scholars. Though interpretations vary, there are certain issues that scholars and historians have built consensus. Some of the agreements include Ancient Greek understanding of the afterlife; life in the underworld in which souls previously detached from the body through death reside. As a concept, afterlife often beats the logic of science; though logically unfathomable within the realm of science, the concept 'afterlife' appears strangely familiar within the contemplation of human beings not only in the ancient times but also in the present-day. Christians, Hindus, Muslims and even some non-believers often lean heavily towards the logic of there being some form of life after death.

Belief in the afterlife has kept the hopes of the human race intact even in the face of the tragedy of death. As for Christians, there is Heaven and Hell for rewarding the righteous and punishing the evil respectively. Along with the tragedy of death, the knowledge of the mortality of the soul helps human beings develop complex visions of life after death i.e. The afterlife. The tale of human dealings with death and life after death is the tale of the genesis of religion, an epic account recounted in various historic discourses such as Michener's The Source. Evidence retrieved from archaeological patterns suggests that while they originally abandoned their dead, human beings developed a sense of responsibility by assuming patterns that are more mournful. Echoing the same, Professor Godfrey Muriuki of the University of Nairobi notes, "From flower petals to flint, fetal positions to facing east, bare bones to goat horns, man started supplementing the basic corpse… From Neanderthal and especially Cro-Magnon times evolved an increasingly ritualistic approach."

Early references to Ancient Greek beliefs emerge from Homers accounts as documented in The Iliad and The Odyssey. In other historical accounts, the conception of the Afterlife had taken form in Ancient Greek beliefs dating back to the 6th Century BC. The Greek concept of the afterlife incorporates the 'underworld' depicted as an alternate universe where souls went after separation from the physical body after death. The mainstream belief was that souls of the dead, otherwise referred to as the living dead, resided in the underworld. Flittering about in the underworld with no sense of purpose, the souls existed insubstantially -- there was no material existence. As depicted in the Homeric Underworld, these souls were immaterial and insubstantial and therefore lacked menos (strength), which limited any material influence on the living

. Historical accounts concur with Homeric depiction of immaterial souls that lacked phrenes, or wit. Existence in the underworld lacked purpose; it was very neutral since there were no political positions or social status and the souls were not in control over life or destiny.

There were no hints of progress in the Greek Underworld. The most attributable factor about the Greek Underworld is that it existed independent of the concept of time. Existence in the underworld took the form of infinity and continuity. The psyche froze in experience and appearance upon death. Souls never changed in terms of age or in any other sense. Further inquiry into the nature of existence in the afterlife indicates that the spirits took the form of the individual upon death, for instance, the souls of soldiers who died in battle remained blood-spattered throughout their eternally in the underworld. As for those who died peacefully or in range and vengeance, their souls remained as such through eternity too

Largely, the dead in Ancient Greek beliefs were not malevolent or dangerous in any way since they lacked material existence rendering them incapable of exerting any substantial influence on life; the Homeric depiction of the afterlife is unpleasant and gruesome too. The souls grew angry upon feeling hostile presence at the places near their graves. In ancient Greece, there was a prevailing tradition through which people believed in appeasing the dead by offering fresh sacrifices. Most of the sacrifices offered were blood sacrifices due to the belief that, to become conscious and communicative again, the spirits needed the essence of life. The reference to this claim emerges in Homer's Odyssey in the scene where Odysseus offers blood sacrifice to appease the souls so that they may interact with him

As indicated by objects found in tombs such as game-boards and dice, one can reasonably infer that the most favorite pastime for the spirits in the underworld included playing games. Ancient Greeks buried their dead with various gifts and possessions such as jewelry, clothing, and foodstuff for use in the Underworld. Irrespective of Homer's depiction of the dead as not being capable consuming food or drinks, in some parallel historic accounts, there were numerous elaborate feasts and festivities in the Underworld. While it is not entirely clear, some accounts indicate that the spirits of the dead were capable of having sexual intimacy amongst them without procreation.

According to Lucian, the souls residing in the Underworld took the form of simple skeletons indicating that all of them looked similar; it was virtually impossible to tell one from the other since they were indistinguishable from each other. Sources further indicate that the Lucian view of the afterlife in the Underworld was not universal; Homer, for instance, depicts the dead retaining their familiar faces as portrayed in the scene with Achilles' ghost

As mentioned earlier, the most attributable factor about the Greek Underworld is that it existed independent of the concept of time but within the space continuum. Since existence in the afterlife beats the time continuum, the dead were always aware of the future making them able to predict and prophesy certain outcomes. In Homer's The Iliad and The Odyssey, it emerges that the living could not alter fate / destiny but the dead could bend time continuum to know what was about to happen. For instance, Oedipus' destiny to kill his father and marry his mother was among the prophecies made. The dead would reach out to the place beyond immediate perception and human time: the Underworld

The common belief was that the actions committed in one life determined where the soul went in the afterlife. As depicted in The Iliad, death was not glorious; the underworld was unpleasant due to the lack of purpose. The souls tormented themselves throughout eternity. The Homeric reference to this emerges in the following excerpt: "I'd rather be a day laborer on earth working for man of little property than be the king of the dead." These were the words uttered by Achilles' ghost. In other Homeric accounts, the afterlife occurred in different underworlds. The first underworld identified as the Gates of Hades was a cold and dark real. Guarded by a deity going by the same name, Hades was the universal destination of the dead. Another underworld going by the title Tartarus emerges as the deepest region of the Greek Underworld. According to the historic accounts of Hesiod, the estimated time for an anvil to fall from heaven to earth was nine days. An anvil would take another nine days to fall from earth to Tartarus. Tartarus, was the place reserved for punishing the worst and most wicked sinners. In Tartarus, there was Ixion, who murdered his father-in-law, Sisyphus, the murderer and thief destined to push a boulder up a hill for eternity, and where Tantalus awaits punishment for sharing with humans some of the secrets of the gods. Tartarus was also believed to be the place where the gods cast enemy combatants and other monsters after defeating them. It was the residence of, among others, the Titans, the Cyclopes, and Typhus

Elysium, otherwise referred to as Elysian Plain or Elysian Fields, was the Greek Underworld's equivalent to the Biblical 'heaven.' According to Homeric references, the Elysian Fields was a paradise where only the righteous got to go; only the good souls and the pure hearts inhabited this Underworld

. As it first appears in The Odyssey, the Elysian Fields, characterized by gentle breezes and located on the western ends of the earth, is the home of Menelaus. The Elysian Fields closely resembles Hesiod's Isles of the Blessed located in the western ocean as depicted in Works and Days.

Another aspect of Greek religious belief in the afterlife was reincarnation; the belief that while leaving the body after death, the human soul enters another body. The concept of transmigration of the soul through reincarnation first emerged in the works of Orphics and Pythagoreans. Plato and Pindar would later teach the same concept in The Republic and Olympian respectively. Pythagoreans espoused that the soul retained its identity throughout all of its lifetimes. As for the argument by Plato, the soul cannot reconstruct or remember previous experiences after reincarnation. Although a section of historians believe that the Greeks learned the concept of reincarnation from Egypt, Plato and Pythagoreans maintain that reincarnation developed independently in Ancient Greek religion

Predominantly conspicuous is the change, which currently portrays itself in the departure of the soul from the physical body upon death. The departed spirits, as mentioned earlier, leave the material world for the underworld where they continue to exist insubstantially. However, after severance and detachment from the material world, the physical existence of human beings came perforce to an end. Upon death, what came in the afterlife was insubstantial in terms of material existence. Dead people could not lift or perform any task; their existence was sorrowful and purposeless. They could not even carry away with them any possession, loved ones, social status, economic wealth or political position.

The afterlife, as discussed in the context of Ancient Greek mythology, culture and religious dispensation, emerges as a parallel concept of material existence as it is in our material universe. With the incorporation of the underworld, the idea of afterlife seems to occur in a different world parallel to our material world. Outside the realm of mythology, the idea of an afterlife seems like a fantasy since it beats the logic of science. However, science is a discipline best known for its notorious insistence of proof in form of empirical evidence. As such, by its very nature, scientific method dismisses qualitative analysis in favor of quantitative analysis. In quantitative analysis, only empirical evidence is tabulated. As for qualitative analysis, focus extends to immeasurable proof such as dreams, visions, nightmares etc. In this line of thought, the idea of being in an immaterial / insubstantial form of existence may not auger well with scientific method, according to which, there is no life after death. The scientific stance is that upon death, everything ends right there

The Underworld: A Physiological Perspective

In one of her psychological discourses dubbed Journeys to the Underworld, Christine Downing introduces a psychological perspective in the issue of life after death

. She bases her discourse on a series of lecturers conducted in major American universities such as Stanford, Columbia, NYU and Boston among others. Downing draws her claims from the premise that psychology, as a discipline, deals with such issues as the soul, psyche, intuition and personality. As such, issues relating to the soul are within the realm of depth psychology. As a depth psychologist therefore, Downing cites Sigmund Freud who scholars consider the father of depth psychology. In his runaway success going by the title Interpretation of Dreams, Freud begins with an epigraph from the Aeneid depicting Juno's resolution to return to the Underworld to seek the help that the heavens had remained adamant in their refusal to grant. In this book, Freud uses Hades as a privileged metaphor denoting the unconscious mind

Further psychological analysis indicates that Carl Jung describes the underworld as an inevitable metaphor, which he calls an archetype denoting a concept that keeps reappearing spontaneously in dreams, fantasies, legends, religious beliefs and myths but varies significantly respective of cultural context. Stories about the underworld and life after death, though persistent, seem to traverse the sense of reason and rational understanding. As Freud, Jung and Downing describe it, the underworld seems to be an uncanny and eerie realm; unfathomable to human reason yet strangely familiar. As such, the underworld invokes a wide array of feelings ranging from ambivalence, ambiguity, contradictory longings and fears.

Another psychological perspective of underworld as a concept is mental 'time out.' Many people experience mental time outs, at least once in their lifetimes, by feeling torn, alone or detached from their material existence. In psychology, this particular state of mind is an 'underworld.' Persistent feelings of failure, lack of purpose, estrangement, remorse, paralysis or even psychosis detaches people from reality into an underworld of fantasy. At times, it feels as though one's soul has died, or is lost somewhere in a parallel world. In this perspective, an underworld may refer to an 'under' world of either desolation or renewal; it may be a place when the soul dies or a place where it renews and rises again. Concepts and ideas from the underworld appear to individuals in form of visions or dreams.

Christine Downing's perception of this form of mental underworld allures to traditional journeys into the Greek underworld. She believes that in their frequent journeys to the underworld, human beings refresh and illuminate their minds as they try to interpret the dreams and visions. The visions and dreams from the underworld lead people to the depth of immaterial experience; the underworld grants human beings the willpower to face their feelings of purposelessness, fear, despair and pathological anxiety. The concept underworld extends its meaning to include spiritual journeys and meditation. Thus, according to Downing, journey to the underworld does not necessarily imply physical death; mental lapses and meditation also refers to the passage into a parallel world of immaterial existence as explained in her discourses.

When people undergo an 'out of body experience', depth psychologists often term this as a journey to the underworld since the mid is detached from the physical existence of the body into an 'under' world of insubstantial experience. Recent research taken from the findings of two discrete sets of experiments published in the Science journal dated August 24, 2007

indicated that through virtual reality technology, it is possible to create a very convincing illusion such that an individual perceives his/her body in a new perspective outside of their actual physical bodies. This series of experiments provided human subjects with a perception of disembodiment that was authentic to them. The researchers induced a touch sensation -- not an out of body experience -- that created a mirage that fooled the subjects so that the subjects understood it as a mere illusion while people who have an out of body experience consider such a mirage to be a real experience. This kind of illusionary experience may possibly account for some, if not all, out of body experiences that various people occasionally report in various medical conditions such as when experiencing sleep paralysis.

Under laboratory inducement, experts have not been able to replicate how a subject may have an out of body experience in which they acquire information otherwise not attainable. As such, there is no reason whatsoever to believe that an out of body experience can be, without it actually taking place. Out of body experiences, at times, occur in form of 'near death experiences.' Subjects have reported having left their bodies and taking mental journeys to some other world -- underworld -- where they observe certain events, which are out of range of their normal sensory perception.

Over the years, depth psychologists have engaged in extensive research in their effort to explain how the mind leaves the body to have experiences that would otherwise be unattainable through normal sensory perception. Out of body experiences, dreams, hallucinations and visions emerge as mental states of the underworld. This deeply contradicts the empirical notion in fronted by scientists where the belief is that the human mind, outside of sensory observation, is often in an empty state called tabula rasa. In this empty state, the human mind is virtually incapable, at least within the logic of empirical scientists, to know anything outside of their bodily experience. Proponents of empiricism have thus battled with those findings that suggest things like 'out of body experiences.'

In bid to explain these out of body experiences and journeys to the underworld, a section of philosophers who identify with the Rationalism school of thought believe that the human mind possesses a priori knowledge of ideas, notions and experiences in a parallel world outside of material world, as we know it. Such ideas then appear in form of dreams, visions, and out of body experiences. It is virtually impossible to fathom this through the eyes of empiricism since not everything is measurable explicitly through scientific method; there is always room for qualitative analysis.

Rivers Connecting to the Underworld

As discussed throughout this paper, there is no annihilation after death; the soul merely leaves the body to assume another form in the underworld; the notion of existence of the soul in a parallel universe is 'the afterlife.' Those dwelling in the heavenly underworld dubbed the Islands of the Blest or Elysium, but who are nevertheless dead in practical reference, are Immortals. Historians and mythologists are of the idea that even death is a quality of existence, not lack of it. According to Ancient Greek mythology, there are great rivers and dread streams connecting the world of the living and the underworld. To begin with, the greatest and outermost river is Oceanus. Characterized by nine rings, this river winds about the seas and the earth but is also a subterranean river. Another river identified as the River Styx -- the River of Hate -- is a branch of Oceanus allotting a tenth of Oceanus waters

. The river is primordial denoting Daughter of Oceanus. Greek mythologists believe that souls must cross River Styx to the other side; it offers the connecting link between both worlds. The consensus amongst historians and Greek mythologists is that the River Styx offers the bridge to the realm of the dead. Others contend that souls may as well cross the river of Woe -- River Acheron while navigating in vessels to the streams flowing into the Acherusian Lake

Attitudes and Beliefs

Information drawn from a wide variety of sources retrieved the annals of history indicate that Ancient Greeks had an elaborate set of beliefs. One of these beliefs was in life after death in an alternate universe where death was the journey to the underworld. They held on to the faith that death merely marked the end of human life or human and not the existence of the soul. While the Ancient Greeks believed in the existence of the soul after death, they saw the afterlife as one that lacked purpose; according to them, life after death was meaningless. The continued existence of the soul in the Underworld was merely a commemoration of the fact that a person once existed and upon death, the soul lived on but the person was inactive. In the Homeric accounts, death emerges as the worst thing to happen in human life; there is no reversal once it occurs. In other historic accounts, there is consensus that death is tragic and irreversible. In light of all this, Homer claims that the best possible means of existence for man is never being born at all since there is no equilibrium between the immensity of life and the price of death