Herakles Ideological Analysis

Introduction

Myths survive because they operate at the highest ideological level and help create a unifying general ideology and address society as whole and not just a subgroup but it will include contradictions that arise from the opposed interests of the sub-groups These will be ambiguities, motives or ethics of the characters and mutually exclusive motifs

Freedom in Herakles

Freedom or Eleutheria is what separated the Greeks from their slaves. Freedom makes men truly human. Aristole even went as far as to say that freedom was a choice. Those governed by good character would never be enslaved. The ideology says those who cannot govern are slaves and this is to the benefit of the slaves as well as the free. This could be construed as a confusion of culture for nature. Slavs have no view point so no impact on cultural ideology.

To the aristocratic greek any paid work was akin to slavery. Gain drives the merchant the whip drives the slave. The aristocrat trained for competition and wars and did not to so by compulsion. To the working classes they saw the aristocrats as a type of social parasites. The working classes saw honor in virtue through industriousness. These are polar ideologies and Greek literature will declare a preference of one over the other.

Nicole Laraux says that Herakles is above politics because all Greeks claimed him yet Marxist Peter Rose says ideology can exist at above the City State level. Yet Herakles is not seen as purely an aristicratic hero.

As Greece developed they moved on from inter-family fights to more competition based feuds. In the Oddessy Eurylaos chides Odysseus for not taking part in the games and compares him unfavourable with the greedy merchant class. The ideas can be summarized as follows

Class

Aristocracy. Activity' was sports, Object was glory Motive was free choice  
Merchants.  Activity' was trade, Object was money Motive was greed
Labourers. Activity' was Agriculture, Object was food Motive was necessity

Herakles deeds are called athloi or contests. His feats not only being him glory Kleos but also immortality. In art he is depicted as victor the proverbial champion Kallinkos and looks very aristocratic let we are also presented with the myth of the Labours of Herakles. The Choice of Herakles is the hard road of, and to, virtue term:Arete

Aristotle calls him a serf. Aeschylus as a slave. His labours have no intrinsic value what mattered more was the conditons it was carried out under. Theseus seems to be a better aristocratic model performing nobel exploits. In contrast some of Herakles ae modelled after athletic contest while others such as cleaning the stables of Augeias are not and done under complusion and gain.

They are a curiuos mix of penance (for killing his children he does his twelve labours), slavery (sold to Omphale when he kills Iphitos glory, servitude (when [[character::Artemis finds him with the Kerynian hind he is let off when he says it is a necessity) and gain (cleaning of Augeias' stables) . The episode of Syleus and the vineyard the ambivalence here is that the ploughing is labor and a contest.

Sometimes there is an duty motive. (Clears Crete of wild animals), (Liberates Thebes) but he does not carry out deeds as debts of gratitude for past favours.

Herakles and frustration

The more meaningless the task the greater the heroism but there is an element of frustration. Monsters have many heads to decapitate, money for labor done is withheld. When he saves Hesione from a sea monster in return for an immortal horse is is cheated. Even when he saves Thebes and marries Megara as a reward he loses everyhthing when he is sent mad and kills his children. Eventually the frustration pays off and he is made immortal

We see the contradiction of laboring under free will and constraint. Burkett explains this by saying that even a common man working through drudergy can expect to enter the world of the gods. It also shows the pointlessness of labor in that you will always be cheated