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- [00:00]
Faith Moore
Hello and welcome to Storytime for Grown Ups. I'm Faith Moore and this is Summer Session. Normally on Storytime for Grown Ups we read classic literature a few chapters at a time with a few notes along the way. Like an audiobook with built in notes. But during the summer we switch things up a little. From now until September, we will be in Summer Session, which is sort of like a college class, only fun. This summer we're exploring fairy tales and their relationship to the books we've read this year on storytime and storytelling more broadly. We'll do this in once a week episodes which will drop on Mondays. If this doesn't sound like your thing, don't worry. Storytime will be back with a new book in September, but for now, brew a pot of tea, find a cozy chair and settle in. Class is in session.
- [01:07]
Spencer Clavin
Hi everyone. Welcome back. So like I said last week, I am away at the moment and I have an interview for you today. I'm really excited about it. I hope that you're going to enjoy it. But it means that all of your amazing comments and questions about Sleeping Beauty are going to be on hold until next week. But please do keep those coming. I'm getting your comments and questions, you're getting your emails and I love them. I'm thrilled and I'm really excited to talk to you about Sleeping Beauty next week. So keep those coming. Remember, it's Faith K. Moore.com and click on Contact or just scroll into the show notes and click on that link. And after today's interview, if you have other things that you want to say, I hope that you will. I hope you will ask questions and send me comments about the interview as well and we can talk about all of that when I am back next week. I'll actually be back before next week. I'm just not here right now, but this week, this Wednesday. So two days from today on the 30th of July at 8pm Eastern is tea time and I will be back for that. So I hope that you're planning to join us for tea time. If you don't know what I'm talking about, scroll into the show notes and click the link that has to do with our online community which is called the Drawing Room and you will learn more there. But basically it is a voice teacher chat, like a group phone call where we get to talk to each other. We're going to be talking about the fairy tales that we've read so far. You can ask me anything. So I answer questions there. People are posting in the drawing room, what questions they want to ask. But you can also just come prepared with questions to ask. And we will talk about all of the things that we've been talking about here, but you will get to share your thoughts in real time with me and I will respond. So I hope you will join us. It's not too late to join to sign up for the drawing room, so just scroll into the show notes and click on the link there. And I hope to hear some new voices in our Tea Time chat this month, which, as I say, is this week, Wednesday, July 30, 8pm Eastern. I hope to see you there. All right, so let me introduce our guest. Today's guest is my brother, Spencer Clavin. So earlier in the summer we had my dad, Andrew Clavin. We talked about the book the Women in White, and that episode is still there. If you missed it, you can just scroll down in your podcast feed and find that. But now we are having my brother, Spencer Clavin on the show and he is here to talk to us about Greek mythology. So we're going to be talking in this interview about the connections between fairy tales and the stories that we've been talking about so far this summer, and the stories that we will continue to talk about all the rest of the summer and their connection to basically other oral traditions of storytelling, other folklore, other stories that get passed to down. And Greek mythology is another huge one, and it's another one of these building blocks, right?
- [03:53]
Faith Moore
We've been talking about how fairy tales.
- [03:55]
Spencer Clavin
Are building blocks for just stories in general, particularly here in the west, and Greek myths are another one of those building blocks. And there's a lot of connections between myths and fairy tales. And so we're going to be talking about all of that in this interview coming up. So let me just tell you a little bit about Spencer, and then we'll get right into the interview. So Spencer Spencer is the publications director at the Claremont Institute. He's also the host of the Young Heretics podcast, which, by the way, if you're not listening to that and you enjoy this show, that's another one to check out. He talks all about basically the Western canon and all of this literature and the stories that come out of that. And so you should check that out if you haven't already. So the Young Heretics podcast, he's the host. He's also the author of two books. One is called how to Save the Ancient Wisdom for Five Modern Crises, and.
- [04:46]
Faith Moore
The other is called Light of the.
- [04:48]
Spencer Clavin
Mind, Light of the Illuminating Science through faith. So those are his two books. He has a sub stack which I mentioned when we had my dad, Andrew Clavin on the show because it's their substack together. It's called the New Jerusalem. It is letters back and forth between the two of them and they talk about faith and they talk about technology and they talk about culture, and it's great. And it often ties in with some of the things that we're talking about on this show. So if you haven't signed up for that substitute stack either, you might want to check that out. And he can also be found at his website, which I have linked to in the show notes. I've also linked to all of the things that I just said. His books, his substack, his podcast. All of those things are in the show notes. So after you've listened to this episode, if you want to check out any or all of those things, it's all there in the show notes for you. Very easy to check out. So without further ado, I am going to now play you our interview. The interview between me and Spencer Clavin talking about Greek mythology and its connection to fairy tales. So please write in with questions and comments about this interview and also keep those questions and comments about Sleeping Beauty coming and I will be back again next week to talk about all of that with you. And I will be here on Wednesday to chat with you in the drawing room if you are signed up for that. So I can't wait to be back with you again. But until then, please enjoy this interview with my brother, Spencer Clavin. Hi Spencer. Welcome back to Storytime for grownups.
- [06:18]
Summer Session Co-host
Hi, Faith. I can't believe it's summer again. I feel like we were just doing.
- [06:22]
Andrew Clavin
This and now summer break has returned.
- [06:24]
Spencer Clavin
I know summer has returned. It is summer session. It is very exciting. We're actually, for those of you listening, we are pre recording and at least right now it is actually cold and raining. But we're gonna pretend that it's beautiful summer weather because I am sure that when this goes out into the world, that's what it will be like.
- [06:42]
Summer Session Co-host
This podcast is all about the power.
- [06:44]
Andrew Clavin
Of imagination, investing yourself in a story.
- [06:48]
Summer Session Co-host
We in Tennessee have been having baseball sized hail.
- [06:54]
Spencer Clavin
What?
- [06:55]
Summer Session Co-host
I'm. I thought that was like made illegal in 1875. It just feels much too biblical and.
- [07:02]
Andrew Clavin
Apocalyptic to be a real thing.
- [07:04]
Summer Session Co-host
It actually happens 70 mile an hour baseball sized hail. They send people home, kill you. Oh yes, it very much could. It's quite lethal.
- [07:16]
Spencer Clavin
Excellent. Well, I hope that you. I Hope that this is the not, not the last time that we ever hear from you because you're going to step out and get hit by a baseball sized.
- [07:23]
Summer Session Co-host
My imaginative work is going to be.
- [07:26]
Andrew Clavin
Pretending that I live in a world where there's no such thing as baseball sized hail. That does not.
- [07:29]
Spencer Clavin
Fantastic. So we are all engaged in an act of imagination. I'm pretending that it is not freezing. You're pretending you're not going to face imminent death when you go outside. And the rest of us are just going to engage in imagining that we never heard any of this. So let's move on. So, okay, so the reason you are here is this, aside from the fact that you're wonderful and I would like to talk to you all the time, is that this summer on Story Time, we have been talking about fairy tales kind of as foundational texts for Western literature. But of course there are others and we have touched on some of them. But I think of kind of Greek mythology as kind of the other big pillar in terms of like foundational stories. Like the stories that are kind of passed down. I think of. I think of them as a kind of companion to fairy tales in a lot of ways. And so, so that's what I want to talk about with you today because I feel like you are much more of an expert on this than I am. But let us kind of be very broad to begin with. Can you just tell us what are we talking about? What is Greek mythology like Greece? When what was going on? What did these stories mean to people? What is it?
- [08:50]
Summer Session Co-host
Right? Who are these people? Why do they talk so funny?
- [08:54]
Andrew Clavin
Why are all their stories so weird?
- [08:56]
Summer Session Co-host
Yeah, well, it's a really good comparison actually because when we talk about Greek.
- [09:03]
Andrew Clavin
Myths, I think most people, if they know anything about Greek myths at all, they're like me and that they had a. When they were a kid they had like a book with a bunch of stories in it. Mine was the still incredible Do Layers companion of mine too, which I like anytime.
- [09:22]
Summer Session Co-host
Yep, I think we that probably was.
- [09:24]
Andrew Clavin
Your copy that I probably stole or something and read in my room.
- [09:28]
Summer Session Co-host
And anytime a kid, a friend has.
- [09:31]
Andrew Clavin
A kid, that's the present that I send them because I just just like still completely slaps.
- [09:37]
Summer Session Co-host
But one thing about that that is.
- [09:39]
Andrew Clavin
Probably similar to fairy tales is that it creates this impression that there was a book like Dolaire's Greek Myth, like.
- [09:48]
Summer Session Co-host
A compendium of these official stories sitting.
- [09:51]
Andrew Clavin
Around somewhere in a library in ancient Greece times.
- [09:55]
Summer Session Co-host
And people think therefore that this maybe is almost like our Bible, like where.
- [09:59]
Andrew Clavin
We have a set scripture and they would, you know, tell these versions, the same version of the story over and.
- [10:05]
Summer Session Co-host
Over again, and none of that is true. It's actually much more like the fairy.
- [10:11]
Andrew Clavin
Tales where we have the Brothers Grimm. I mean, you can tell me much more about this, but as I understand it, we have the Brothers Grimm and we have the Disney movies, and we have all these different versions.
- [10:21]
Summer Session Co-host
And behind it all, somewhere there are, like, peasants sitting around their hearth just entertaining each other and talking about, like, the different kinds of magical things that.
- [10:34]
Andrew Clavin
Might be out there in the world.
- [10:35]
Summer Session Co-host
And expressing their experience and the ancestral.
- [10:39]
Andrew Clavin
Experience of their families and their larger traditions. That's what Greek myths are for.
- [10:46]
Summer Session Co-host
The Greeks who live More than 2,000 years ago, the ancient Greeks, Greek period.
- [10:54]
Andrew Clavin
Or what we mean by ancient Greece.
- [10:55]
Summer Session Co-host
Is actually a really long period with lots of different kinds of times in history. So what we call the Archaic period.
- [11:03]
Andrew Clavin
Which is back in, like, you know, 8th century B.C. and, and before, so 1200s to 7002 B.C.
- [11:12]
Summer Session Co-host
And thereabouts, that's when we think Homer.
- [11:16]
Andrew Clavin
The poet who wrote the Iliad or composed sang the Iliad and the Odyssey.
- [11:19]
Summer Session Co-host
That's when he was putting his stories together.
- [11:22]
Andrew Clavin
And some people think that those poems, them which are our earliest Greek literature, those are already kind of compilations of.
- [11:29]
Summer Session Co-host
Different stories that people were telling.
- [11:31]
Andrew Clavin
Your mileage may vary.
- [11:32]
Summer Session Co-host
People argue very loudly about this, but, you know, the same sort of thing. We have to imagine that before our.
- [11:40]
Andrew Clavin
Curtain rises, before the tape starts rolling for us in history and people start.
- [11:45]
Summer Session Co-host
Writing things down, there's this huge, huge.
- [11:49]
Andrew Clavin
Vast space of, like, unrecorded generations of people telling these stories again and again.
- [11:55]
Summer Session Co-host
And that goes on into what is.
- [11:58]
Andrew Clavin
Called the Classical period, which is probably what most people think about when they think about Greece. When you picture, you know, the nice white marble, fluted columns and all sorts of, you know, young boys and maidens.
- [12:11]
Summer Session Co-host
Like, throwing discuses around, like, whatever your picture is of classical Greece, this probably.
- [12:15]
Andrew Clavin
Comes from athens in the fifth century B.C. that's when they beat the Persians, this big invading eastern empire. The Athenians and the Spartans banded together.
- [12:26]
Summer Session Co-host
And they won this totally improbable victory.
- [12:29]
Andrew Clavin
And created this amazing cultural flowering.
- [12:32]
Summer Session Co-host
And there was also a period under.
- [12:34]
Andrew Clavin
The general and statesman Pericles when Athens went through this big cultural revival after kind of the ravages of the war there. There were, you know, new building projects, and there was tragedy, and there were all sorts of forms of.
- [12:47]
Summer Session Co-host
Of art coming into being that were.
- [12:49]
Andrew Clavin
Refining themselves, et cetera, et cetera.
- [12:51]
Summer Session Co-host
And so that was going on. And so you do have, from that.
- [12:54]
Andrew Clavin
Point at least onward, you have projects kind of like the Brothers Grimm, where different people will come and they'll stitch these stories together.
- [13:02]
Summer Session Co-host
That especially becomes a big deal in.
- [13:05]
Andrew Clavin
The Library of Alexandria, another famous place that is not actually in Greece, it's in Egypt, but it's part of the Hellenistic period, which is kind of the next period after the classical era.
- [13:16]
Summer Session Co-host
And it's not as well known, but.
- [13:18]
Andrew Clavin
It does give us Cleopatra. It gives us all the great stories of the foundation of the Roman Empire.
- [13:23]
Summer Session Co-host
And it gives us these little nerds.
- [13:26]
Andrew Clavin
Right. The invention of the nerd is happening also during this period. People are like, you know, category categorizing and stitching the myths together.
- [13:33]
Summer Session Co-host
And there are other epics besides Homer.
- [13:35]
Andrew Clavin
That they kind of put together into what's called a Ku Klas, an epic cycle.
- [13:39]
Summer Session Co-host
And so, you know, what's kind of awesome about this is there are all sorts of fanfic alternate versions of the.
- [13:48]
Andrew Clavin
Greek myths that you might already know. There's a version of the Trojan War myth where actually Helen of Troy, the most beautiful woman in the world, never went to Troy. She was secretly abducted and carried off to Egypt.
- [14:00]
Summer Session Co-host
And the version that the Greeks fought for at Troy was just, like a ghost copy thing.
- [14:05]
Andrew Clavin
There's all sorts of weird and wild, like, alternate versions. And I always tell people to, like, compare it to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, where you've got, like, the comic books, but then you've got the other timelines.
- [14:15]
Summer Session Co-host
And all of that. But at the same time, many of these stories, even if the details change, have these sort of primal patterns in.
- [14:25]
Andrew Clavin
Them, some of which are even similar to some of the things that we find in fairy tales, like the theme of the God or the princess or the king in disguise. Right. That seems to be one of the things that everybody everywhere kind of tells that story. There's even stuff, you know, from the same time as the Greeks, but that was happening elsewhere, like in Mesopotamia, Babylon, Assyria, where you see. Oh, some of this stuff is. Is really kind of keeps repeating the descent into the underworld, the Katabasis, where the hero has to go down and get some piece of wisdom or, like, trophy or like in a video game, it's the master sword that he has to get, like, you know, from.
- [15:06]
Summer Session Co-host
From this dark region that comes up a ton. And so you. One kind of really fun thing, besides.
- [15:12]
Andrew Clavin
Just how awesome these stories are as.
- [15:14]
Summer Session Co-host
Stories, is to see how there are all of these different, like, local varieties to everything.
- [15:19]
Andrew Clavin
But then there's also, like, certain Things that are just primal. And like, certain stories that we, for.
- [15:24]
Summer Session Co-host
Some reason, we keep telling again and again.
- [15:26]
Andrew Clavin
It's fun to think about why that is.
- [15:28]
Spencer Clavin
Yeah. And I want to come back to that in a second, but I think one kind of quick follow up to this is, are these, though, stories that people believed were true? Like, are these sort of religious myths? So the people the disc is throwing guys and the maidens with the columns and everything, did they believe that, for example, you know, Orpheus went down into the underworld to rescue his wife Eurydice? Did they believe that Zeus was up there, kind of like ready to, you know, run after every girl that needed to turn into a tree? I mean, was this. Did. Were these the stories of their religion or were they more like fairy tales, which I think were sort of more symbolic, kind of just stories to tell. You know, they might have tied into religion in some way, and we might get to that in a minute. But they weren't like, as you. As you were saying, the Bible. They're not like the stories that we believe were literally true. So did they believe these stories were true or no?
- [16:26]
Summer Session Co-host
Confusingly, the answer is yes to basically.
- [16:29]
Andrew Clavin
Every question you just asked?
- [16:30]
Summer Session Co-host
Yes to all of these.
- [16:32]
Andrew Clavin
Well, can we have both?
- [16:33]
Summer Session Co-host
Can we have all of it? So, like, part of that is because.
- [16:36]
Andrew Clavin
As I said, there were different little cities that had different traditions. And, you know, your peasants would have thought differently than your philosophers would have thought differently than your kings and your politicians and all of that. And that is probably true also of, like, the German folklore that we read, right? That some people really, really maybe did believe there were little people running around in the woods, and some people thought they were more kind of like, you know, spirits of the air and so forth.
- [17:03]
Summer Session Co-host
And there's one mistake that we make.
- [17:05]
Andrew Clavin
I think, is we think like, well, now we have this very sophisticated distinction that we like to make.
- [17:11]
Summer Session Co-host
We can see what was really going.
- [17:12]
Andrew Clavin
On because we divide between fact and fiction, right? We have this, like, clear dividing line between real, like, measurable things that you can film with a video camera and put on a chart. And that's on one.
- [17:26]
Summer Session Co-host
On the one hand, those are facts, and then everything else is a nice.
- [17:29]
Andrew Clavin
Invention, but it's not real in the same way. It's like a sort of imaginary fairy story that we make up.
- [17:36]
Summer Session Co-host
And we were very, very proud of.
- [17:37]
Andrew Clavin
Ourselves for having come up for the first time in history with this distinction.
- [17:42]
Summer Session Co-host
In fact, this is actually kind of a like, really simplistic distinction that doesn't.
- [17:48]
Andrew Clavin
Quite get at the heart of all.
- [17:51]
Summer Session Co-host
The different possibilities here, right?
- [17:53]
Andrew Clavin
There's a lot of different ways that stories can relate to our lives and to quote, unquote, reality. Right? Stories are part of reality because we are real and we tell them, but.
- [18:04]
Summer Session Co-host
They also reflect the reality that's out.
- [18:07]
Andrew Clavin
There in all sorts of different ways. So just a few different possibilities that we could list. Right.
- [18:14]
Summer Session Co-host
You might actually say I. I really did, honest to goodness, see a man.
- [18:21]
Andrew Clavin
Walk out of the tomb. Right. I mean, that's the claim that Christianity makes about Jesus. And so that makes Christian scripture distinct. And. And that's not something that you would have had to believed to be a faithful Greek. Or, you know, there. There weren't even the same kinds of barriers to entry is much more fluid. And, you know, different times, different things happened.
- [18:43]
Summer Session Co-host
But you know that. But that is a possibility. You could say, I actually think there's like a really, really beautiful girl sort of like swimming in the river and.
- [18:52]
Andrew Clavin
That she'll turn you into a. Like a frog if you look at her wrong or all that stuff.
- [18:57]
Summer Session Co-host
You could also say there is that it's as if that were true. And that's the clearest and plainest language I can use to convey the fact.
- [19:07]
Andrew Clavin
That there is a spirit of the forest or there is not just kind of.
- [19:11]
Summer Session Co-host
They. I mean, nobody in the ancient world.
- [19:13]
Andrew Clavin
Thought that there was just kind of gunk moving around, except for a few very obscure philosophers who in their day were kind of a minority. Right. Most people would have said, yeah, there's. There's something out there that's alive. And they, you know, maybe it doesn't look this way, but this is the best way we can represent it. This is our. The fancy word is theophany or epiphany. It's like our way of kind of making the gods manifest.
- [19:35]
Summer Session Co-host
Then you could have very much the kind of proto modern enlightenment skeptic who was like, all of this is basically.
- [19:44]
Andrew Clavin
Just a manner of speaking, or it's kind of a myth or it's actually.
- [19:46]
Summer Session Co-host
Even just like people. It was just great heroes who were.
- [19:50]
Andrew Clavin
Mortal that then got turned into gods. That's a view in the ancient Greek world called Euhemerism, because it's named after this guy Euhemerus, who would go around telling people like, you think that God.
- [20:00]
Summer Session Co-host
You think Zeus is a God?
- [20:01]
Andrew Clavin
Actually, he was just a very strong man. And his tomb is in Greek. This did not make him many friends or make him very popular, but it was something that they did right there. So.
- [20:09]
Summer Session Co-host
And the Greeks are kind of a special case here. Because for whatever reason, and to the.
- [20:15]
Andrew Clavin
Eternal annoyance of basically everybody who has.
- [20:18]
Summer Session Co-host
Ever engaged with them, they overthink things. Like that is sort of their calling.
- [20:22]
Andrew Clavin
Card as a civilization is that they're.
- [20:25]
Summer Session Co-host
Very, very quickly prodding, asking questions.
- [20:28]
Andrew Clavin
Famously, Socrates gets killed for asking the.
- [20:30]
Summer Session Co-host
Wrong questions in Athens, making things very uncomfortable. But this is one of the first.
- [20:35]
Andrew Clavin
Questions that they start asking is like, what do we mean when we tell these stories? And what level of reality do they exist at? What sorts of truths do they reflect?
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Summer Session Co-host
I don't see that happening as much.
- [20:49]
Andrew Clavin
In like Assyria and Babylon.
- [20:52]
Summer Session Co-host
And we do actually have a lot.
- [20:53]
Andrew Clavin
Of texts from some of those cultures.
- [20:56]
Summer Session Co-host
They, they, the Greeks didn't actually invent the nerd.
- [21:00]
Andrew Clavin
I made that. I joked about that, like, this is.
- [21:02]
Summer Session Co-host
You know, we, we have, we have.
- [21:03]
Andrew Clavin
Nerds in Assyria, Babylon too, who are.
- [21:05]
Summer Session Co-host
Like charting the stars. And so they were having some of these speculations, but really nothing like the.
- [21:10]
Andrew Clavin
Level of like granularity and specificity and kind of subtlety that the Greeks were, were capable of.
- [21:17]
Summer Session Co-host
And so very, very early on it became probably like a minority view among.
- [21:23]
Andrew Clavin
Intelligent people that these were simply descriptions of like physical reality. And, and there was much more variety of opinion on like, you know, there's a wonderful story that a king once asked one of the early poet philosophers what is a God? And he waited and waited, and basically the more the philosopher thought about it, the more he realized he had no idea.
- [21:45]
Summer Session Co-host
And so like this is a completely. There's, there's this like very Greek, it's, you know, they share this, I think.
- [21:51]
Andrew Clavin
Actually with, with the ancient Jews who are the source of the Jewish and Christian scriptures. And this is why they are kind of the two pillars of the west is like also in a different way.
- [22:00]
Summer Session Co-host
You know, Abraham's always arguing with God.
- [22:03]
Andrew Clavin
There are the, you know, rabbinic sages from as early as kind of we can find who are like speculating about the nature of God and so forth.
- [22:11]
Summer Session Co-host
But like the, the true believer, true blue, like Greek worshipper, who really just.
- [22:19]
Andrew Clavin
Didn'T think about this stuff too much at all and basically asked Demeter to give him a good harvest and then expected that he would get that if he did the right things. Like that was probably the majority of the masses were probably that way. But the intellectual classes were having exactly the kind of conversation we're having now basically from the, from the get go.
- [22:41]
Spencer Clavin
Right, okay, so that's interesting because I feel like that is a difference between fairy tales and these myths, which is that these myths are actually rooted in the religious practice of the people of the day. And so perhaps they were having these conversations, as we might have, about, you know, who are these gods and are they real and are there really spirits in the water and all of these things? But I don't think anybody at any time was saying, you know, is there really. Is Rapunzel really in the tower? No one's, no one's praying to Rapunzel or anything like that. But you're saying they're really are like, there really were like temples to Zeus, temples to Demeter, we pray to Demeter for our harvest, that kind of thing, right?
- [23:18]
Summer Session Co-host
Yes, totally. And most people thought that that was.
- [23:21]
Andrew Clavin
Effective, even if they thought there was like a kind of metaphorical nature to the prayer.
- [23:26]
Spencer Clavin
Exactly.
- [23:28]
Summer Session Co-host
I mean, I, I wonder like, that you would probably know, like, were there.
- [23:33]
Andrew Clavin
People again in like, say, medieval Germany who did think there were fairies out there and was that part of their Christian worship and all of that? Like, that might. That.
- [23:41]
Spencer Clavin
Yeah, I think, I think that's true. And that's a good distinction that there were. There was certainly a belief in the kind of spiritual realm that there were potentially fairies or brownies or, you know, those kinds of. Of creatures, but that the stories themselves were not kind of stories of, of true, quote, unquote, things that had, that had happened or. And the end. And I think when God shows up in these stories, it's a little bit more opaque. So I think there is that, that difference. But I also think since we don't practice Greek, ancient Greek religion anymore, like the similarities are, are clearer in the sense that these are. These stories that are passed down and they change and there's an oral tradition and you know, they, there are all these different versions because there are all these different, different places where they're being told. But one thing that I kind of wanted to hone in on is I tend to think this is not 100% accurate, but I tend to think of fairy tales as more kind of girl centric and then mythology, like particularly Greek myths and maybe even like Arthurian legends and that kind of strain of storytelling to be sort of the male counterpart. Because I think that fairy tales tend to sort of revolve around either like the princess or the young girl, girl and her journey or a child. So like, there's a lot of like, you know, Hansel and Gretel or like Jack and the Beanstalk or there are male protagonists, but they tend to be very young people. Whereas in Greek mythology there's this concept of the hero. And we don't have that in the fairy tales, there are princes, but they tend to be more sort of the princess counterpart as opposed to the riding off on his horse to go do some. Some act. So I'm wondering if a. If you think that this is valid, if there is a kind of masculine energy going on in. In the myths and also if that's completely wrong. Even so, I think that there is this idea of the hero, and I wonder if you could sort of talk about that, hone in on the hero and perhaps even if you think like, the hero's journey is relevant here. So I'm asking many things, but I think focusing on this idea of. Of heroes, this is there a male vibe. And if you want to get into the. The hero's journey, go for it.
- [26:09]
Summer Session Co-host
100. I mean, it's very good observation and.
- [26:13]
Andrew Clavin
I think it must be true. And one reason why it is true is because Christianity elevates women.
- [26:22]
Summer Session Co-host
And this is like a thing that I'm always saying to people. Not as like an advertisement for Christianity.
- [26:31]
Andrew Clavin
Although I think it is that.
- [26:32]
Summer Session Co-host
But like, even if you are not a Christian, this is something that you.
- [26:37]
Andrew Clavin
Need to recognize in order to have a proper understanding of the deep history of the world.
- [26:43]
Summer Session Co-host
Because we live in a world, whether.
- [26:45]
Andrew Clavin
You are Christian or not, we live in a world that has been shaped by the intervention of Christianity into what.
- [26:52]
Summer Session Co-host
Was previously a kind of Greek religion sort of world.
- [26:56]
Andrew Clavin
I mean, what I just described about these gods and people's beliefs in them and the stories they told and the arguments they had, like, that wasn't.
- [27:03]
Summer Session Co-host
That was particularly evolved in Greece, but.
- [27:07]
Andrew Clavin
The form of it was everywhere. Like I said, it was in Assyria, it was in Babylon, it was in all these other places.
- [27:13]
Summer Session Co-host
And, and Christianity. And Christianity as arising out of Judaism was different.
- [27:19]
Andrew Clavin
Right?
- [27:19]
Summer Session Co-host
That was the first thing about Judaism.
- [27:22]
Andrew Clavin
Is that it was different.
- [27:22]
Summer Session Co-host
The word holy in Hebrew, kadosh means set apart.
- [27:26]
Andrew Clavin
It means you're not like all of the other gods. You're not like all of the other peoples who worship all these other gods. You worship this one God and he's like this.
- [27:35]
Summer Session Co-host
And one of the ways that it is different is in this very distinct gender theory, just not the.
- [27:44]
Andrew Clavin
Like.
- [27:45]
Summer Session Co-host
That's sort of a funny word to use. But like this, this picture of how.
- [27:48]
Andrew Clavin
Men and women relate to each other that we get in Genesis 1 and 2 from the very beginning, that man.
- [27:54]
Summer Session Co-host
And woman are definitely not the same, but they have this like, complementary kind.
- [28:02]
Andrew Clavin
Of relationship to one another. The Hebrew term that is used in.
- [28:07]
Summer Session Co-host
The Bible, that's actually Kind of hard.
- [28:09]
Andrew Clavin
To interpret because it's so basic.
- [28:12]
Summer Session Co-host
Is connecto and it means like face.
- [28:15]
Andrew Clavin
To face and side to side. Like they, there's a way in which man and woman are like next to each other. They're the same, the same species.
- [28:22]
Summer Session Co-host
They're not the animals that, that Adam has just named when woman is created. They're also not gods, but they are, you know, perfect kind of fits for each other. And Eve is like no other heroine.
- [28:39]
Andrew Clavin
In the Greek pantheon.
- [28:41]
Summer Session Co-host
There are many, many heroines in, in the Greek world.
- [28:44]
Andrew Clavin
There's, I mean just, there's Penelope, right? The wife of Odysseus, who waits for him while he's off on his journey.
- [28:52]
Summer Session Co-host
There's, there's Helen of, of Troy.
- [28:54]
Andrew Clavin
If she's a heroine, she's at least a kind of godlike beauty for whom men die.
- [28:59]
Summer Session Co-host
There's all the goddesses, there are the Amazons, there's Dido in Virgil's Aeneid.
- [29:04]
Andrew Clavin
I mean there are lots and lots of like, if you want strong female characters, like they're, they're everywhere.
- [29:10]
Summer Session Co-host
But the way that they are strong.
- [29:13]
Andrew Clavin
The way that they are interesting is.
- [29:15]
Summer Session Co-host
Because they are like men. And this is basically a value system that organizes everything according to how like.
- [29:23]
Andrew Clavin
A man you can be.
- [29:25]
Summer Session Co-host
And there are obviously like some exceptions to that.
- [29:28]
Andrew Clavin
Women, womanly grace is something that's clearly.
- [29:30]
Summer Session Co-host
Desirable and something that's interesting, but it's like, you know, it should be seen and not heard, right? Like, to be, to be womanly is.
- [29:36]
Andrew Clavin
Essentially in, in the Greek and Roman mindset.
- [29:39]
Summer Session Co-host
Pericles says the greatest credit to Athens of the greatest credit to Athenian women.
- [29:46]
Andrew Clavin
Is that nobody speaks of them, nobody knows about them, nobody hears about them, right?
- [29:50]
Summer Session Co-host
So it's like there's that if you're a woman or you can attain glory by becoming.
- [29:56]
Andrew Clavin
The word that Aeschylus uses is man minded.
- [29:59]
Summer Session Co-host
And there is something like kind of.
- [30:03]
Andrew Clavin
Admirable about this because manhood and masculinity and courageous heroism are all admirable things.
- [30:07]
Summer Session Co-host
But there's also something kind of monstrous.
- [30:09]
Andrew Clavin
And dangerous and scary and like the.
- [30:11]
Summer Session Co-host
Same women who become so powerful and so manly are also the ones who can very, very easily veer off into.
- [30:19]
Andrew Clavin
Like child killing madness like Medea, Clytemnestra, like these are also the architect Dido.
- [30:26]
Summer Session Co-host
Herself doesn't end up killing her children.
- [30:28]
Andrew Clavin
But she does kill herself and she becomes totally unhinged by her desire.
- [30:31]
Summer Session Co-host
And so there is this like, I mean it's really too just like modern.
- [30:38]
Andrew Clavin
And simplistic to call it misogyny.
- [30:40]
Summer Session Co-host
Because it's different than that. It's like a value system that takes, you know, manhood for granted as like.
- [30:49]
Andrew Clavin
A kind of godliness. And womanhood is like this kind of alien category that is probably not even like, we're not as interested in describing it, right?
- [30:59]
Summer Session Co-host
And there is misogyny, right? There's, there's like a, a version of that.
- [31:03]
Andrew Clavin
So in Euripides play Hippolytus, the hero.
- [31:06]
Summer Session Co-host
Is punished because he has sworn off of sex.
- [31:10]
Andrew Clavin
He. He doesn't want to sleep with girls.
- [31:12]
Summer Session Co-host
And so the goddess Aphrodite punishes him. But before that, he makes this incredibly venomous speech where he says, he approaches Zeus and he says, Zeus, why did you, like, why did you burden us.
- [31:28]
Andrew Clavin
With this, this woman thing? Right? I mean, it's like the Pandora myth. And he said too, right?
- [31:32]
Summer Session Co-host
Why couldn't we just go to your.
- [31:34]
Andrew Clavin
Temple, bring precious metals and purchase offspring?
- [31:38]
Summer Session Co-host
Which is an amazing, amazing speech. Because it's like people want to do that now, right? Like, you see people like, wishing that they could not deal with, like, relationships and just kind of like, you know, create babies and pay for babies in artificial wombs, basically. And that's like, in there too. But like, Euripides doesn't think that's how.
- [31:58]
Andrew Clavin
You should feel, right?
- [31:59]
Summer Session Co-host
That's not Euripides not endorsing that.
- [32:01]
Andrew Clavin
He ends up, you know, hippologist ends up dead because the gods don't approve of this.
- [32:04]
Summer Session Co-host
But they do like, to answer your.
- [32:08]
Andrew Clavin
Question, a very long way, right? Like, they.
- [32:10]
Summer Session Co-host
This is a male. This is a male world, right?
- [32:12]
Andrew Clavin
This is a man's world described in.
- [32:15]
Summer Session Co-host
Male terms by men, for men and.
- [32:18]
Andrew Clavin
Kind of about manliness. And the women in it are like very much seen through, quote, unquote, the male gaze or they're seen.
- [32:24]
Summer Session Co-host
And you can make all these exceptions to this, but none of those exceptions.
- [32:27]
Andrew Clavin
Come close to Eve or Mary.
- [32:30]
Summer Session Co-host
Who are these two, like, totally revolutionary.
- [32:34]
Andrew Clavin
Figures in the Christian and the Jewish. In the case of Eve, the Jewish.
- [32:38]
Summer Session Co-host
Tradition, there's a wonderful story that relates.
- [32:42]
Andrew Clavin
Directly to this, what you're saying about like princesses and heroines, which is in some of the chronicles of Byzantium. So now we're like hundreds of years in the future. We're in Constantinople. The king, the sort of emperor of Constantinople, hosts a beauty pageant where his mother, who must have been a real.
- [33:02]
Summer Session Co-host
Piece of work, parades all these beautiful.
- [33:05]
Andrew Clavin
Potential queen's wives in front of the.
- [33:08]
Summer Session Co-host
King and is like strips, investigates them, like strip searches them and looks at.
- [33:13]
Andrew Clavin
Their bodies and like, you know, is.
- [33:14]
Summer Session Co-host
Basically and the king then starts to quiz them. He basically like interviews them as candidates for his wife. And one of them he presents with the riddle.
- [33:25]
Andrew Clavin
He says, all of mankind's woe came through woman. And he's referring to Eve.
- [33:31]
Summer Session Co-host
And she says, yes, but mankind's salvation.
- [33:34]
Andrew Clavin
Came through a woman as well. And she's referring to Mary. And so Mary is like this answer.
- [33:38]
Summer Session Co-host
That like, if, if women create this.
- [33:43]
Andrew Clavin
Sort of like weak link in the world, if they're like, you know, if they have all these feelings and if they get in the way of your big swashbuckling adventure, and if they are.
- [33:51]
Summer Session Co-host
Sort of like weak, physically weaker and all this stuff, like also, however they.
- [33:56]
Andrew Clavin
Bring something to the world that no man could ever bring. Like they also have grace and they also have beauty and intelligence and wit. I mean, obviously this woman is like.
- [34:05]
Summer Session Co-host
Very smart and funny and like responding. She didn't get the job, by the way.
- [34:08]
Andrew Clavin
And some. I would say she dodged a. I know.
- [34:10]
Summer Session Co-host
Well, I would say she dodged a bullet.
- [34:11]
Andrew Clavin
She went on to pursue a career in the art.
- [34:13]
Spencer Clavin
Like a terrible mother in law to have. She's going to constantly like strip you and look at your body and stuff.
- [34:18]
Summer Session Co-host
Exactly. No, there's a terrible mother in law.
- [34:20]
Andrew Clavin
Terrible, terrible husband who doesn't want you to be that.
- [34:23]
Summer Session Co-host
But, but like the point of the.
- [34:24]
Andrew Clavin
Story, right, is that she's introducing this new.
- [34:27]
Summer Session Co-host
And so there's an enormous tradition even.
- [34:30]
Andrew Clavin
In heroic literature in the European Christian nations, like in England for instance, and in France as well, these Arthurian romances.
- [34:41]
Summer Session Co-host
Where even the hero has a shield.
- [34:43]
Andrew Clavin
With the symbol of Mary on it.
- [34:46]
Summer Session Co-host
Because she is his motivation, she is his ideal. Like she's what it's all about.
- [34:50]
Andrew Clavin
Even though he's the one doing. This is Gawain and the Green Knight. This is the. They're called the chanson de geste, the like songs of, of great deeds.
- [34:59]
Summer Session Co-host
And I think it makes a lot.
- [35:00]
Andrew Clavin
Of sense that in that world, like there would be much more interest in like women as women for the sake of women. Like the, the world of women. The world of like the home and.
- [35:10]
Summer Session Co-host
The hearth, you know, it's contained in.
- [35:12]
Andrew Clavin
The Bible, it's in Proverbs 31. When she's, you know, the, the good wife is not just like sitting sweetly in silence like Penelope. And she's not just unheard of.
- [35:22]
Summer Session Co-host
She's like got strong forearms, she's kneading.
- [35:25]
Andrew Clavin
Bread, she's making business deals, she's getting.
- [35:27]
Summer Session Co-host
Up early in the morning, she's buying a farm, right? Like there's just There's a whole kind.
- [35:30]
Andrew Clavin
Of like domestic universe in the, in.
- [35:34]
Summer Session Co-host
The Bible and then in Christianity and.
- [35:37]
Andrew Clavin
And from there, I think probably into like, you know, the evil stepmother who wants to strip you naked and ask.
- [35:45]
Summer Session Co-host
You, quiz you about theology. And like, you know, all of that stuff is all. I think probably it's all part of this radical intervention.
- [35:53]
Andrew Clavin
I mean, the reason we even use words like misogyny is probably downstream of this intervention. It would, it would not, it is a Greek word, but it would not have occurred to the Greeks to think in those terms the way it does to us.
- [36:04]
Spencer Clavin
Yeah, and that makes sense. Why Then you would get, in the Greek myths, you would get the sort of the heroes going off to do whatever the deeds are that happen in the story. And then you get the, the women kind of just waiting, waiting around at home. And I, you know, I think that we, you touched on this at the beginning, the ways in which the commonality. So we've been talking for a while now about the differences, right. And we touched on this kind of male, female thing. But there are these commonalities that are, that do seem to be sort of basic to human storytelling and the need for, you know, some, some way of communicating these, these things. And I think that these, these Greek myths and fairy tales have a lot of these in common. I'm thinking about like full love and sort of lost love. Is one of them bad parents as we've been describing? Supernatural beings kind of intervening in the lives of, of people, people transforming into other things, needing to save women from crazy scenarios, that kind of thing. But I feel like a difference is that in a fairy tale the things usually come out right for the people that you want them to come out right for. So the princess is saved, Cinderella does go to the ball and, and meets the prince and gets out, get away, gets away from the horrible, the horrible stepmother and so she doesn't have to be strip searched or whatever. And you know it. And, and often that's kind of the point. It's a sort of morality tale like everybody gets their comeuppance that deserves to get that. Everybody gets their reward that deserves that. And there's often some kind of moral, like don't go into the woods alone because you might get eaten by a wolf or something like that. You know, don't talk to strangers because they might be a witch or whatever it is. But I kind of think, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but I kind of think often in a Greek myth things kind of turn out wrong or at least things are really complicated and very, very messy. Or like the guy doesn't get the girl, or he gets the girl and strands her on an island or like, you know, things, things are not quite right in the world of Greek mythology. And things don't get tied up with lovely bows the way that they often do in a fairy tale. Is there some reason for that, do you think?
- [38:29]
Andrew Clavin
There sure is.
- [38:30]
Summer Session Co-host
I mean, this is the point of tragedy, right?
- [38:33]
Andrew Clavin
This is why tragedy is the great Greek art form is because it drives.
- [38:36]
Summer Session Co-host
Home this vision that we don't feel.
- [38:42]
Andrew Clavin
Certain that our ideas about justice and.
- [38:46]
Summer Session Co-host
Morality are in any way necessarily like, hard coded into the world. And this is again, something that people make now say as they become less and less Christian. This is a Christian idea in some essential way.
- [39:02]
Andrew Clavin
I think it's related to the idea of the image of God and man.
- [39:05]
Summer Session Co-host
But however you slice it, right, the Christian worldview is that we have this.
- [39:11]
Andrew Clavin
These like systems, these moral intuitions, this very strong sense of right and wrong and fairness and justice.
- [39:19]
Summer Session Co-host
And you know, we don't think necessarily.
- [39:22]
Andrew Clavin
That God is sitting around talking about.
- [39:23]
Summer Session Co-host
This stuff in the same way way that we are. And we probably know a lot less about it. And you know, we are like kind.
- [39:29]
Andrew Clavin
Of coloring with like three primary color crayons. And God is probably like a great artist painting with all these chains of nuance.
- [39:35]
Summer Session Co-host
But essentially, right, if God is painting.
- [39:39]
Andrew Clavin
A beautiful, magnificent Renaissance picture of a.
- [39:43]
Summer Session Co-host
House in his idea of righteousness, we.
- [39:46]
Andrew Clavin
Are like finger painting a toddler's little.
- [39:49]
Summer Session Co-host
Square with a, with a roof on it, right? We have this simplistic human version of.
- [39:55]
Andrew Clavin
The law that governs the whole universe.
- [39:59]
Summer Session Co-host
It was possible, very possible for Greeks.
- [40:01]
Andrew Clavin
To speculate that that was true. They called it the Logos. And it's a major influence actually on, on Christian theology. The Stoics basically argued that this was how things worked.
- [40:14]
Summer Session Co-host
It's. It's an idea that a lot of people have had.
- [40:16]
Andrew Clavin
Confucians have a version of it, but.
- [40:19]
Summer Session Co-host
It was in no way guaranteed. In fact, many, many people thought and.
- [40:23]
Andrew Clavin
Suggested, and Nietzsche was very good at pointing this out.
- [40:26]
Summer Session Co-host
Like many people thought that actually that is like a total illusion, that there is some borderline.
- [40:31]
Andrew Clavin
Maybe it's where the moon orbits the earth, or maybe it's much closer to.
- [40:35]
Summer Session Co-host
Home where all of that just breaks down and you have like a tangle.
- [40:39]
Andrew Clavin
Of kind of chaos.
- [40:40]
Summer Session Co-host
And this is most powerfully reflected, I.
- [40:43]
Andrew Clavin
Think, in the difference between the creation story in Genesis. Another pattern of story that every culture has is a creation myth, right? A Story about how the world was made.
- [40:53]
Summer Session Co-host
And Genesis is very purposefully.
- [40:55]
Andrew Clavin
People don't necessarily realize this because now it's just our creation story. But people don't realize that it is.
- [40:59]
Summer Session Co-host
A purposeful intervention into the whole tradition of creation stories.
- [41:05]
Andrew Clavin
It's revisionist history about the origins of the world.
- [41:09]
Summer Session Co-host
Because every other culture has some version of, first there was, like, ocean, like, first there was sort of rushing waters. First there was Apsu and Tiamat, these two weird gods coiling together. And the. The Babylonian version even has this amazing line at the beginning, when in heaven.
- [41:26]
Andrew Clavin
And earth, there were no names, there was no language, right? So there was no speech and form.
- [41:31]
Summer Session Co-host
Compare that to the opening of Genesis.
- [41:34]
Andrew Clavin
God speaks, right? And there is light, and there's this.
- [41:37]
Summer Session Co-host
One mind that actually even precedes the waters.
- [41:39]
Andrew Clavin
And he makes the formless void and his spirit hovers over the waters.
- [41:43]
Summer Session Co-host
And so, like, this is an assertion. It's like a philosophical, metaphysical assertion that the creation story in Genesis makes.
- [41:50]
Andrew Clavin
That is part of this creation myth tradition. But it's also like a radical alternate version. It's.
- [41:57]
Summer Session Co-host
I mean, it's like akin to the.
- [41:59]
Andrew Clavin
Death of Superman, right? It's like, okay, we all know who.
- [42:02]
Summer Session Co-host
Superman is because we wrote a million comics about him.
- [42:03]
Andrew Clavin
We know his basic archetypes, we know his characteristics.
- [42:06]
Summer Session Co-host
And then the title, the Death of Superman, is so powerful because we know.
- [42:09]
Andrew Clavin
That Superman can't die.
- [42:10]
Summer Session Co-host
So it's like, whoa, galaxy, brain, total reshift. That's what. That's what Genesis is. And so the Greeks have their version of this.
- [42:19]
Andrew Clavin
It's recounted in Hesiod's Theogony, which is a poem kind of like Homer's epics.
- [42:24]
Summer Session Co-host
And it's about chaos. That's a Greek. The Greek word chaos, which is the same as our word, but it doesn't mean kind of confusion the way ours does. It just means void.
- [42:35]
Andrew Clavin
It means a chasm or an emptiness.
- [42:38]
Summer Session Co-host
And that's the kind of like, origin of the world.
- [42:41]
Andrew Clavin
It's just like nothing. And then you get.
- [42:44]
Summer Session Co-host
You get Earth, the.
- [42:46]
Andrew Clavin
The broad seat of all the gods.
- [42:49]
Summer Session Co-host
And then you get Eros, love, who.
- [42:52]
Andrew Clavin
Is sort of this driving, attractive force that brings things together.
- [42:56]
Summer Session Co-host
And then you start to get all these different gods, and it's not until very, very late, several generations on that, like, Zeus emerges.
- [43:02]
Andrew Clavin
And Zeus is the one who imposes, opposes the natural order that we currently see and experience.
- [43:08]
Summer Session Co-host
This, I think, help helps explain, like.
- [43:10]
Andrew Clavin
The cinematic universe in which the Greek.
- [43:12]
Summer Session Co-host
Myths take place and how wildly different.
- [43:15]
Andrew Clavin
It is from the cinematic universe in which the Fairy tales take place in.
- [43:19]
Summer Session Co-host
Tragedy and in some of these myths where as you say, like, it's very.
- [43:24]
Andrew Clavin
Unclear that we should endorse or be, be glad about the outcome of these things. Of like, you know, you mentioned the Ariadne story, the Medea story.
- [43:32]
Summer Session Co-host
There's a lot of like totally faithless.
- [43:34]
Andrew Clavin
Men who act like louts and we're not like exactly sure how we're supposed to.
- [43:40]
Summer Session Co-host
Are we supposed to condemn them or.
- [43:41]
Andrew Clavin
Are we supposed to think they're total chads? Or are we. And how are we supposed to feel about the women?
- [43:45]
Summer Session Co-host
Right? That is expressing this sense that like.
- [43:49]
Andrew Clavin
Our moral reactions, although they are important.
- [43:53]
Summer Session Co-host
And in some sense essentially human, they.
- [43:56]
Andrew Clavin
Might not be essentially cosmic, they might not actually have any answer in sort of like the ultimate kind of structure of things.
- [44:04]
Summer Session Co-host
And so there's a distinction here that is ancient, that is very useful and that kind of emerges out through the Christian tradition and that is the distinction.
- [44:16]
Andrew Clavin
Between reason and revelation.
- [44:18]
Summer Session Co-host
You can slice it up a bunch of different ways.
- [44:21]
Andrew Clavin
You can say that there's like natural reason and there's divine reason, there's natural.
- [44:25]
Summer Session Co-host
Law, there's divine law, whatever. But basically the, the key distinction is stuff that you can know about the.
- [44:31]
Andrew Clavin
World from within the world and stuff.
- [44:34]
Summer Session Co-host
That you have to learn with a.
- [44:36]
Andrew Clavin
Message from beyond, with like a beam, with like a transmission that comes from sort of outside the system, you know.
- [44:43]
Summer Session Co-host
And so what Christian philosophers and theologians basically came to believe is that, you know, because mankind was created good and.
- [44:52]
Andrew Clavin
Because we have this like kind of.
- [44:54]
Summer Session Co-host
Basic, you know, we're basically supposed to.
- [44:56]
Andrew Clavin
Exist and we're not just totally, you.
- [44:59]
Summer Session Co-host
Know, doomed to disaster. We are born with a starter pack. We're born with like certain kind of intuition and logic and reason, and we're born with a certain experience of the world. And this accounts for the fact that when you pull back the camera and.
- [45:16]
Andrew Clavin
You survey these stories in like a.
- [45:18]
Summer Session Co-host
Really 3,000 foot way and you squint.
- [45:20]
Andrew Clavin
They all kind of look the same, right? So like people have a general sense of the world.
- [45:28]
Summer Session Co-host
The claim of the Bible and of sort of the Christian and Jewish traditions is that like there's extra knowledge added.
- [45:36]
Andrew Clavin
In on top of that that corrects.
- [45:38]
Summer Session Co-host
Some of our misunderstandings, that shows the meaning of some of our previously inchoate thoughts. And that like draws and shapes it.
- [45:48]
Andrew Clavin
All into this whole.
- [45:49]
Summer Session Co-host
That makes sense because over the horizon where nobody yet can see, it does all make sense.
- [45:54]
Andrew Clavin
Like it all comes from a mind. It doesn't come from the coiling like ocean of chaos that's faith, right?
- [46:01]
Summer Session Co-host
That's why it's revelation, because we don't know that.
- [46:04]
Andrew Clavin
We can't prove that. We can't.
- [46:05]
Summer Session Co-host
Like, you know, people have tried, people will keep trying, but you can't really.
- [46:09]
Andrew Clavin
Make a mathematical proof that.
- [46:10]
Summer Session Co-host
That's the case for the Greeks, who are reasoning really to the height of natural reason, right? To the height of what, like, we.
- [46:19]
Andrew Clavin
Can accomplish on our own. That's what they're known for.
- [46:23]
Summer Session Co-host
There is no conclusive argument that that's.
- [46:26]
Andrew Clavin
Definitely how things shake out in the end. And the greatest Greek philosophers, Plato, Aristotle, you know, the names that we've all.
- [46:33]
Summer Session Co-host
Heard when they get to this point, they are, I think, really admirably honest and frank and say, you know, there's. There's a limit to human knowledge here. And there are certain questions that we will forever ponder, and here are some of our possibilities. Aristotle talks sometimes as if, like, our minds, our reason connect us to some sort of eternal principle, but other times.
- [46:57]
Andrew Clavin
As if, like, our bodies just kind of decompose, right?
- [47:00]
Summer Session Co-host
So there's like a real. Like, the best thinkers of the Greek.
- [47:05]
Andrew Clavin
World are very, like, forthright about the fact that they don't have the answers.
- [47:10]
Summer Session Co-host
And I think the best Christian thinkers.
- [47:13]
Andrew Clavin
Are forthright about the fact that we don't have the answers ourselves, but we take them on faith, right?
- [47:19]
Summer Session Co-host
And that faith sets the same stories that natural reason produces, takes many of those same story patterns and sets them.
- [47:27]
Andrew Clavin
In a wholly new cinematic universe where, in the end, like, even if there.
- [47:31]
Summer Session Co-host
Are still perplexities and mysteries, like, fundamentally.
- [47:35]
Andrew Clavin
Yes, the good people get their reward and the bad people get their comeuppance. And that is, I think, what's reflected maybe in those stories.
- [47:46]
Spencer Clavin
Yeah, that's really interesting. I feel like it's like, so all of humanity, through all of time, is dealing with the same issues, like, dealing with the same sort of baseline stuff and relationship stuff and the way that we interact with each other and with the world. But the way that you think about how it's all constructed kind of changes how you tell that story. And I think that's fascinating, and I think that's. That's absolutely right.
- [48:15]
Summer Session Co-host
So, yeah, I mean, take just.
- [48:16]
Andrew Clavin
Just one trope, right?
- [48:17]
Summer Session Co-host
Like, take one.
- [48:18]
Andrew Clavin
One of these examples, the one I mentioned, the hidden God, right? The God that comes in disguise.
- [48:23]
Summer Session Co-host
The God who is sort of testing you by concealing himself or herself from you. That obviously expresses.
- [48:31]
Andrew Clavin
Maybe not obviously, but I think the meaning of that myth, if.
- [48:34]
Summer Session Co-host
If it has a meaning, is like that appearances don't always reflect reality. That there's this disconnect that we can all see between, like, beautiful people might not be beautiful on the inside, like, ugly people might be really great. You know, all of this stuff is sort of like, expressive of a limit on human knowledge that makes it morally.
- [48:55]
Andrew Clavin
Difficult to navigate the world and, and.
- [48:58]
Summer Session Co-host
Inclines us because we're sensory. We're creatures of sense and sight and sound.
- [49:03]
Andrew Clavin
We. We can make these mistakes and we can misjudge people and we can write.
- [49:07]
Summer Session Co-host
Them off, and that can have all.
- [49:09]
Andrew Clavin
Sorts of unintended consequences.
- [49:12]
Summer Session Co-host
So that's the. The reality that we all can see. We can all see that that's true.
- [49:15]
Andrew Clavin
And we think it probably reflects something about, like, you know, what is purely true and good and divine often comes in. In disguise. And there are a million stories like.
- [49:25]
Summer Session Co-host
This in the fairy tales. You can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think, like, you always get.
- [49:32]
Andrew Clavin
Exactly what you deserve, right? You're being.
- [49:34]
Summer Session Co-host
You're being given a fair test, right?
- [49:36]
Andrew Clavin
You're supposed to know that this is true.
- [49:38]
Summer Session Co-host
You're supposed to know that, like, you.
- [49:40]
Andrew Clavin
Know, the poor and the meekest among us can also bear the image of God. You're supposed to know all of that.
- [49:46]
Summer Session Co-host
And so when you mistreat, I mean.
- [49:48]
Andrew Clavin
The opening of Disney's Beauty and the Beast, right, what happens? The. The ugly woman comes, she makes him.
- [49:53]
Summer Session Co-host
An offer, he spurns her, and he.
- [49:54]
Andrew Clavin
Gets turned into a beast.
- [49:55]
Summer Session Co-host
And like, we're very sad about this.
- [49:57]
Andrew Clavin
He needs to be redeemed.
- [49:59]
Summer Session Co-host
But he got exactly what he deserved.
- [50:00]
Andrew Clavin
It makes perfect sense. He was beautiful. He valued beauty. Physical beauty over. Over inner beauty.
- [50:06]
Summer Session Co-host
Sometimes. Again, sometimes that happens in the Greek myths. Sometimes it does not happen at all, right? Like, sometimes you are. There's no way that you should have.
- [50:14]
Andrew Clavin
Known that, like, this old woman was. Was a God. There's no way that you deserve the punishment that you.
- [50:20]
Summer Session Co-host
That you get. Sometimes you're just like. I mean, there's one where.
- [50:24]
Andrew Clavin
There's.
- [50:24]
Summer Session Co-host
There's one where Jason, the famous hero is. Or is it Jason or Theseus?
- [50:31]
Andrew Clavin
I guess it's Theseus is.
- [50:32]
Summer Session Co-host
Is coming home and a old woman.
- [50:34]
Andrew Clavin
Asks for help, and he, like, carries.
- [50:35]
Summer Session Co-host
Her over a river and turns out it's a goddess.
- [50:37]
Andrew Clavin
And he gets rewarded for this.
- [50:38]
Summer Session Co-host
So this fairly like kind of standard archetype. There's another where, you know, Actaeon wanders into a grove, completely unintentionally chasing after a. Like, he's hunting, he's chasing after stags with his dogs, and he accidentally looks.
- [50:59]
Andrew Clavin
Upon a woman, a beautiful Woman Bathing, who turns out to be the goddess Artemis, and she is the goddess of.
- [51:04]
Summer Session Co-host
Virginity from our moral standpoint, completely blameless. She turns him into a stag and.
- [51:11]
Andrew Clavin
He is dismembered by his. By his dogs. Right.
- [51:13]
Summer Session Co-host
So it's like, you know, there's just a randomness to it that it's like, it's actually in some ways more reflective.
- [51:21]
Andrew Clavin
Of, like, our immediate experience where things do happen that seem to have no explanation. And there are random chances and there are like, all of that stuff, but.
- [51:27]
Summer Session Co-host
It also is like, there's no guarantee.
- [51:31]
Andrew Clavin
In it that all of that somewhere down the line kind of shakes out and makes sense.
- [51:35]
Spencer Clavin
Yeah, I think that's fascinating, and I feel like that's why people need to read all of these things. Which brings me to this last question, since we're out of time, which is. Oh, yeah, are you able to perhaps recommend to people some. Some books or some places to go if they would like to read these myths? I mean, we talked about Dolairs, which is a great place to start, but it's. It tends to be the place that you start when you are a child. And so, you know, I think if people have never read any of these stories, this is probably. That is probably a good place to start. But are there places where adults who are interested in these stories can go to read them? And do you have a couple of favorites that maybe favorite myths specifically that maybe they should start with once they pick up whatever collection you're going to recommend to us?
- [52:20]
Andrew Clavin
Great.
- [52:21]
Summer Session Co-host
Yes. Okay, all of those. The answer to all that is yes, once again. So start starting with Dolores is great because it actually is one of those.
- [52:29]
Andrew Clavin
Kids books that adults can read with great pleasure. And, and there are very, like, it's.
- [52:35]
Summer Session Co-host
Beautifully illustrated, and it's also a really.
- [52:37]
Andrew Clavin
Good kind of summary of. Of the myths.
- [52:42]
Summer Session Co-host
Then there is like, you know, the highest level of difficulty would probably be somebody like Apollodorus or some of these.
- [52:51]
Andrew Clavin
Librarians who compiled basically just catalogs.
- [52:54]
Summer Session Co-host
And the reason I say they're difficult is because they're very dry.
- [52:56]
Andrew Clavin
Right. It's, it's.
- [52:57]
Summer Session Co-host
It's unfortunately more a reference work than.
- [53:00]
Andrew Clavin
It is an adventure, you know, and.
- [53:03]
Summer Session Co-host
And we want not just to hear.
- [53:05]
Andrew Clavin
About the kind of story beats or the, the storyboard kind of plot outlines we want to hear about.
- [53:10]
Summer Session Co-host
And so if you're interested at a really like, scholarly level, read like Apollodorus.
- [53:15]
Andrew Clavin
Library of Greek Myths.
- [53:17]
Summer Session Co-host
One step removed from that would be like, Hesiod is, is an epic poet.
- [53:22]
Andrew Clavin
He can be kind of difficult for People sometimes when. When they first encounter him, if you know.
- [53:28]
Summer Session Co-host
But the. The perfect, like Goldilocks to speak.
- [53:32]
Andrew Clavin
Speaking of fairy tales, the Goldilocks middle ground is Ovid's Metamorphoses, which is a Latin epic poem.
- [53:40]
Summer Session Co-host
And that means that you should know.
- [53:42]
Andrew Clavin
When you read it. It's much, much later than many of the sources.
- [53:46]
Summer Session Co-host
And in that way, it's kind of.
- [53:47]
Andrew Clavin
Like reading the Brothers Grimm, right? This is like a person who has compiled.
- [53:50]
Summer Session Co-host
He's.
- [53:51]
Andrew Clavin
He was an extremely witty and erudite kind of scholar poet. Was. Was Ovid, but.
- [53:58]
Summer Session Co-host
But not in the like way that.
- [54:00]
Andrew Clavin
That sounds like. That sounds a little boring. But he. He was not. He was full of, like, sex and weirdness and.
- [54:06]
Summer Session Co-host
And if you pick that up, you. You might want to skip to book.
- [54:12]
Andrew Clavin
Four to start, if you're just dipping in.
- [54:14]
Summer Session Co-host
It is a continuous narrative. A cool thing about the Metamorphoses is.
- [54:17]
Andrew Clavin
That he does stitch together. He attempts to give you the kind of unified cinematic universe from start to finish, which is something that the Alexandrian librarians also did. He starts with creation. He goes up to Augustus, the first emperor of Rome, which is when he was living.
- [54:34]
Summer Session Co-host
But there are fabulous stories in there. There's Apollo and Daphne and. I'm not sure, actually, I can't remember.
- [54:41]
Andrew Clavin
Which book Apollo and Daphne is in. But it's early. It's one of the earlier books, I think. And. And there's. Which is the story of the nymph, I think you alluded to it, like, chased by Apollo, gets turned into a tree. There's hermaphrodite. There's the origin of hermaphrodites, hermaphroditis.
- [54:59]
Summer Session Co-host
And there's the story of Narcissus, which.
- [55:02]
Andrew Clavin
Everybody knows because of narcissism. So that's another fun one.
- [55:05]
Summer Session Co-host
And the full story is actually very beautiful.
- [55:09]
Andrew Clavin
And Ovid tells it kind of, you.
- [55:11]
Summer Session Co-host
Know, in a subtle way, because it's not just narcissists.
- [55:14]
Andrew Clavin
It's Echo. Echo, the nymph who is cursed to become only a voice that repeats everything back.
- [55:19]
Summer Session Co-host
So it's this sort of horrible misconnection. Talk about things that don't work out well.
- [55:24]
Andrew Clavin
It's this, like, sad misconnection between two people who are, like, turned inward on themselves in two different ways.
- [55:32]
Summer Session Co-host
That whole sequence, like books one to.
- [55:33]
Andrew Clavin
Four, basically, of the Metamorphoses is probably a really good place to start. And if you like it, keep going. There's a translation by David Rayburn that's really lovely. Oh, my gosh. I Could go on forever.
- [55:45]
Summer Session Co-host
There's, like, Phaeton.
- [55:46]
Andrew Clavin
There's the son of the sun God who gets burned up because he basically wants to fly his dad's chariot.
- [55:54]
Summer Session Co-host
But those are, yeah, all terrific. There are also some popular summaries. There's like, Stephen Fry's Mythos. There's the Percy Jackson legend books, which.
- [56:04]
Andrew Clavin
Are kind of like, you know, I think they're really cool and fun interpretations of the. The Greek myths. Those are. Those are great. I really like 300. I mean, there's all sorts of pop culture stuff that you can. You can get into, but I. I think the gold standard is probably Ovid's Metamorphoses.
- [56:19]
Spencer Clavin
Yeah, I think that's a great recommendation. And I will say to storytime listeners who are here because they struggle with reading the classic books, I will say that I read Ovid, I think, as a teenager and understood it. So you. You can read that one. I think so.
- [56:35]
Andrew Clavin
I think that's.
- [56:36]
Spencer Clavin
That's a good pick. So thank you. This has been super illuminating and fun. Thank you for being here. Before you go, tell everyone. And I will put links in the show notes, but tell everyone where they should find you and where they should go to look for you if they want to know more about you.
- [56:51]
Andrew Clavin
Oh, thank you.
- [56:52]
Summer Session Co-host
This is, unsurprisingly, has been really, really fun. This is like the sort of conversation.
- [56:57]
Andrew Clavin
We would probably have just had anyway, so it's nice that it's recorded and people get to listen in.
- [57:03]
Summer Session Co-host
So the easiest place now to find.
- [57:05]
Andrew Clavin
Me is on substack. It's rejoice. Evermore.substack.com and I do put original content on there, like essays about ancient and modern issues, like applying some of this Greek stuff to stuff that's going on today.
- [57:20]
Summer Session Co-host
But also it's kind of a clearinghouse.
- [57:22]
Andrew Clavin
Where you will find. I do a lot of writing, you know, around and about, including. The other big thing is I have a book called Light of the Mind, Light of the. The World, Illuminating Science Through Faith, which is a history, not actually of your insights into science faith, although that would also be an interesting. It's not eliminating science through faith more.
- [57:41]
Summer Session Co-host
It's illuminating science through kind of the religious perspective.
- [57:44]
Andrew Clavin
And some of the stuff I was talking about about, like, order in the universe in Genesis is sort of like in. In that book, so people should get it.
- [57:51]
Spencer Clavin
Yes. And there will be links in the show notes to all of those things. And the book is fantastic. I have read it. We talked also a little bit more about that book, specifically last summer. So that episode is also available still out there in the world on this podcast feed. If you're not subscribed, you should be because then you'll get that episode as well. So it's all there and it will all be in the Show Notes to link to easily as well. So thank you so much for being here and steer clear of those baseball sized hail.
- [58:17]
Summer Session Co-host
Thanks. Yeah, and I will watch out also.
- [58:19]
Andrew Clavin
For ravenous gods of the underworld world that might want to take me down.
- [58:23]
Summer Session Co-host
Or God that want to descend as.
- [58:25]
Andrew Clavin
Eagles and lift me up into heaven.
- [58:27]
Spencer Clavin
And lift you up into heaven well before your time. So watch out for those as well. Thanks for being here.
- [58:36]
Faith Moore
Thank you so much for listening. Story Time will return in September with a new book read aloud in twice weekly episodes with a few notes along the way. Like an audiobook with built in notes. The new book will be revealed sometime in August. In the meantime, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this episode. Is there anything you'd like me to clarify? Did something particularly interest you? Please go to my website, faithkmoore.com, click on Contact and send me your questions and thoughts. Or you can click on the link in the Show Notes to contact me. I'll feature some of your thoughts as we go along. Speaking of links, please check out the other links in the Show Notes. You can learn more about me, pick up Storytime Merch, or become a member.
- [59:21]
Spencer Clavin
Of our online community.
- [59:23]
Faith Moore
Before I go, I'd like to ask a quick favor. This is an independent podcast. It's produced, recorded and marketed by me, so I need your help. Spread the word about the show by posting about it on social media or texting a link to your friends. Subscribe, tap those five stars and leave a positive review wherever you're listening. If you are able to support the show financially, there's a link in the Show Notes to make a donation. I would really, really appreciate it. Alright everyone, class is dismissed.
- [59:55]
Spencer Clavin
I'll see you next.