Many Thoughts

Entry #3
Work: Philoctetes

I've become accustomed to literature classes filled with students hoping only to fulfill a humanities requirement. The class (as predicted by another student) was a little smaller the second day, but of those present, most contributed to the discussion.

Several comments caused me to drop back and think about Philoctetes a little differently. One student said that she felt that Philoctetes possessed admirable qualities, one being his willingness to accept Neoptolemus's friendship, to forgive with little hesitation yet another betrayal perpetrated against him. She also said she felt he had a good attitude considering the length of his exile.

In a peripherally related comment, she answered in the affirmative when Professor McCarthy asked the question: "Is a small evil justified in light of the greater good?" That surprised me, as I know this student to be very religious. I replied with the words of Joseph Campbell that "every action is evil to someone." The greater good is often times a relative and possibly political judgement.

Backing up and falling back on some backyard psychology, if a person were isolated from humanity for as long as Philoctetes, any kind of human contact might be met with a desire to endear it to oneself. Also, Philoctetes was still burning with his long-felt resentment. Once the betrayal of Neoptolemus was revealed (by his own volition), Philoctetes reassessed his view of N., lumped him together with the "do whatever it takes" Odysseus, and retreated to his cave to pout. Well, perhaps pout is too flippant a word.

But along the way...it occurred to me that Philoctetes could have no faith in the sincerity of N, could not abandon his resentment towards Odysseus and sacrifice for the "greater good," and not until a divine intervention could Philoctetes see that his resentment stood in the way of a purpose higher than his own personal feelings. His belief and faith in a power greater than himself may not have replaced his resentment without the deus ex machina--Heracles's appearance.

It raises the question: If we cannot see the manifestation of divinity, are we doomed to the lower human instincts?

Till later...