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Looper's Delight
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On Mon, 13 Aug 2001 17:50:54 -0700, glenn <glenn234@pacbell.net> wrote: >intrigued by the name "Tiresias" from Genesis' "Cinema Show", sometime in >high school(late 70's) i went to the library and started reading through >Greek mythology and seem to remember that "Tiresias" was watching Athena >bathe and got caught and blinded, but them she or someone felt sorry for >him >and gave him the ability to foretell the future by reading the flight of >birds(which i was never clear on how he was able to do, not having sight >and >all) There's a branching myth. Tiresias was a blind Theban soothsayer. He was blinded for one of many possible reasons, the four most commonly repeated of which I will cover here... - Tiresias could see the future by reading the flight of birds, and revealed secrets of the gods to mortal men. The gods punished him with blindness, so he could no longer read the flight of birds, but he then used other methods of foretelling the future. OR - Tiresias saw Athena bathing, and she splashed water in his eyes and blinded him. Athena's handmaiden pleaded for mercy, so Athena gave him the power to see the future. OR - Tiresias saw Athena bathing, and a "law" created by Chronos caused him to be blinded. Athena thought this was too harsh a punishment, but could not undo it... so she gave him the power to see the future instead. OR - Zeus and Hera were arguing about whether men or women enjoyed sex more, and Tiresias was consulted. He reported that the woman has ten times the pleasure of the man, so one of them blinded him for saying this (accounts vary as to whether it was Zeus because he lost the argument, or Hera because he had revealed the greatest secret of women) and the other gave him the power to see the future. (Why was Tiresias consulted in this argument? Two other legends: when Tiresias saw Athena bathing, she turned him into a woman for seven years before her handmaiden convinced her to relent and turn him back into a man; OR Tiresias saw two snakes copulating and hit the female with a stick -- Athena was angered and turned him into a woman, and seven years later Tiresias saw the same two snakes copulating and hit the male with a stick, which for some strange reason struck Athena as fair so she turned him back into a man.) Tiresias also supposedly had the ability to understand the *speech* of birds, a magical walking stick which allowed him to walk as well as a sighted person (in some variants it's just a normal stick he uses, and carries no magical properties), and the gift of a very long life (seven or nine generations; accounts vary). Variants of the above myths sometimes account for these by various means; the gist of it is that Tiresias was blind, could see the future, lived as a woman for seven years, understood the speech of birds, carried a walking stick which some people believed was magical, and lived a very long life. All of these (with the possible exception of the walking stick) were gifts or punishments from the gods. It's a fascinating story, full of twists and turns and false starts and confusion. Complex. Just like me. Or at least, I like to think so. :)