Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, Frank Cole Babbitt (Translator), 26

Search the Perseus Catalog for:

← Previous Next →

[26] As we read Homer, we notice that in many different places he distinctively calls the good godlike¹ and peers of the gods² and having prudence gained from the gods,³ but that the epithet derived from the demigods (or daemons) he uses of the worthy and worthless alike⁴; for example:

Daemon-possessed, come on! Why seek you to frighten the Argives

Thus ?⁵

and again

When for the fourth time onward he came with a rush, like a daemon⁶;

and

Daemon-possessed, in what do Priam and children of Priam

Work you such ill that your soul is ever relentlessly eager

Ilium, fair-built city, to bring to complete desolation ?⁷

The assumption, then, is that the demigods (or daemons) have a complex and inconsistent nature and purpose; wherefore Plato⁸ assigns to the Olympian gods right-hand qualities and odd numbers, and to the demigods the opposite of these. Xenocrates also is of the opinion that such days as are days of ill omen, and such festivals as have associated with them either beatings or lamentations or fastings or scurrilous language or ribald jests have no relation to the honours paid to the gods or to worthy demigods, but he believes that there exist in the space about us certain great and powerful natures, obdurate, however, and morose, which take pleasure in such things as these, and, if they succeed in obtaining them, resort to nothing worse.

Then again, Hesiod calls the worthy and good demigods holy deities and guardians of mortals⁹ and

Givers of wealth, and having therein a reward that is kingly.¹⁰

Plato¹¹ calls this class of beings an interpretative and ministering class, midway between gods and men, in that they convey thither the prayers and petitions of men, and thence they bring hither the oracles and the gifts of good things.

Empedocles¹² says also that the demigods must pay the penalty for the sins that they commit and the duties that they neglect:

Might of the Heavens chases them forth to the realm of the Ocean;

Ocean spews them out on the soil of the Earth, and Earth drives them

Straight to the rays of the tireless Sun, who consigns them to Heaven’s

Whirlings; thus one from another receives them, but ever with loathing;

until, when they have thus been chastened and purified, they recover the place and position to which they belong in accord with Nature.

De Iside et Osiride. Plutarch. Frank Cole Babbitt (Translator). Cambridge, MA. 1936.

Sponsored by Perseus Project, Tufts University.

Funding provided by The National Endowment for the Humanities.

Current edition Perseus

Isis and Osiris (English) (Plutarch. Moralia, Vol. V. Babbitt, Frank Cole, translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1936 (printing).)

Editions (1)

Περὶ Ἴσιδος και Ὀσίριδος Perseus (Plutarch. Plutarchi Chaeronensis Moralia, Vol II. Vernardakēs, Grēgorios N., editor. Leipzig: Teubner, 1889.) — 26 focus

[26] ἀκούομεν δὲ καὶ Ὁμήρου τοὺς μὲν ἀγαθοὺς διαφόρως θεοειδέας ἑκάστοτε καλοῦντος¹ καὶ ἀντιθέους 5 361a καί θεῶν ἄπο μήδεʼ ἔχοντας· τῷ δʼ ἀπὸ τῶν δαιμόνων προσρήματι χρωμένου κοινῶς ἐπί τε χρηστῶν καὶ φαύλων,

δαιμόνιε σχεδὸν ἐλθέ· τίη δειδίσσεαι οὕτως

Ἀργείους;

10 καὶ πάλιν

ἀλλʼ ὅτε δὴ τὸ τέταρτον ἐπέσσυτο δαίμονι ἶσος·

³ καὶ

δαιμονίη, τί νύ σε Πρίαμος Πριάμοιό τε παῖδες

⁴

τόσσα κακὰ ῥέζουσιν, ὅ,τʼ ἀσπερχὲς μενεαίνεις 15

Ἰλίου ἐξαλαπάξαι ἐυκτίμενον πτολίεθρον;

ὡς τῶν δαιμόνων μικτὴν καὶ ἀνώμαλον φύσιν ἐχόντων καὶ προαίρεσιν. ὅθεν ὁ μὲν Πλάτων⁵ Ὀλυμπίοις θεοῖς τὰ δεξιὰ καὶ περιττὰ τὰ δʼ ἀντίφωνα τούτων 361b δαίμοσιν ἀποδίδωσιν. ὁ δὲ Ξενοκράτης καὶ τῶν 20 ἡμερῶν τὰς ἀποφράδας καὶ τῶν ἑορτῶν, ὅσαι πληγάς τινας ἢ κοπετοὺς ἢ νηστείας ἢ δυσφημίας ἢ αἰσχρολογίαν ἔχουσιν, οὔτε θεῶν τιμαῖς οὔτε δαιμόνων οἴεται προσήκειν χρηστῶν, ἀλλʼ εἶναι φύσεις ἐν τῷ περιέχοντι μεγάλας μὲν καὶ ἰσχυράς, δυστρόπους 25 δὲ καὶ σκυθρωπάς, αἳ χαίρουσι τοῖς τοιούτοις, καὶ τυγχάνουσαι πρὸς οὐθὲν ἄλλο χεῖρον τρέπονται· τοὺς δὲ χρηστοὺς πάλιν καὶ ἀγαθοὺς ὅ θʼ Ἡσίοδος⁶ ἁγνοὺς δαίμονας καὶ φύλακας ἀνθρώπων προσαγορεύει, πλουτοδότας καὶ τοῦτο γέρας βασιλήιον ἔχοντας. 361c ὅ τε Πλάτων⁷ ἑρμηνευτικὸν τὸ τοιοῦτον ὀνομάζει 5 γένος καὶ διακονικὸν ἐν μέσῳ θεῶν καὶ ἀνθρώπων, εὐχὰς μὲν ἐκεῖ καὶ δεήσεις ἀνθρώπων ἀναπέμποντας, ἐκεῖθεν δὲ μαντεῖα δεῦρο καὶ δόσεις ἀγαθῶν φέροντας, Ἐμπεδοκλῆς⁸ δὲ καὶ δίκας φησὶ διδόναι τοὺς δαίμονας ὧν ἂν⁹ ἐξαμάρτωσι καὶ πλημμελήσωσιν, 10

αἰθέριον μὲν γάρ σφε μένος πόντονδε διώκει,

πόντος δʼ ἐς χθονὸς οὖδας ἀπέπτυσε, γαῖα δʼ ἐς αὐγὰς¹⁰

ἠελίου ἀκάμαντος, ὁ δʼ αἰθέρος ἔμβαλε δίναις·

ἄλλος δʼ ἐξ ἄλλου δέχεται, στυγέουσι δὲ πάντες·

ἄχρι οὗ κολασθέντες οὕτω καὶ καθαρθέντες αὖθις 15 τὴν κατὰ φύσιν χώραν καὶ τάξιν ἀπολάβωσι. 361d

Translations (1)

Of Isis and Osiris, or of the Ancient Religion and Philosophy of Egypt. Perseus (Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals, Vol. IV. Goodwin, William W., editor; Baxter, William, translator. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company; Cambridge: Press of John Wilson and Son, 1874.) — 26 focus

[26] We also hear Homer often calling such as are extraordinary good Godlike, and God’s compeers, and gifted with wisdom by the Gods.¹ But the epithet derived from Daemons we find him to bestow upon the good and bad indifferently, as,

Daemon-like sir, make haste, why do you fear the Argives thus?

And then on the contrary,

When the fourth time he rushed on like a Daemon;

and again where Jupiter speaks thus to Juno:

Daemonial dame, what hath poor Priam done

To anger you so much, or what his sons,

That you resolve fair Ilium’s overthrow,

And your revengeful purpose won’t forego?

where he seems to make Daemons to be of a mixed and unequal temper and inclination. Whence it is that Plato assigns to the Olympic Gods dexter things and odd numbers, and the opposite to these to Daemons. And Xenocrates also is of opinion, that such days as are commonly accounted unlucky, and those holy days in which are used scourgings, beatings of breasts, fastings, uncouth words, or obscene speeches, do not appertain to the honor of Gods or of good Daemons; but he thinks there are in the air, that environs us about, certain great and mighty natures, but withal morose and tetrical ones, that take pleasure in such things as these, and if they have them, they do no farther mischief. On the other side, the beneficent ones are styled by Hesiod Holy Daemons, and Guardians of Mankind, and,

Givers of wealth, this royal gift they have.²

And Plato calls this sort the interpreting and ministering kind, and saith, they are in a middle place betwixt the Gods and men, and that they carry up men’s prayers and addresses thither, and bring from thence hither prophetic answers and distributions of good things. Empedocles saith also that Daemons undergo severe punishments for their evil deeds and misdemeanors: —

The force of air them to the sea pursues;

The sea again upon the land them spews;

From land to th’ sun’s unwearied beams they’re hurled,

Thence far into the realm of aether whirled,

Received by each in turn, by all abhorred;

until, being thus chastened and purified, they are again admitted to that region and order that suits their nature.

Notes on the current edition

Isis and Osiris

1. The word is found forty-four times in Homer.

2. Homer employs this expression sixty-two times.

3. See Homer, Od. vi. 12.

4. Cf. 415 a, infra.

5. Iliad, xiii. 810.

6. Ibid. v. 438, xiv. 705, xx. 447.

7. Ibid. iv. 31.

8. Plato, Laws, 717 a, assigns the Even and the Left to the chthonic deities, and Plutarch quite correctly derives his statement from this.

9. Hesiod, Works and Days, 123 and 253. Cf. Moralia, 431 e, infra.

10. Works and Days, 126, repeated in 417 b, infra.

11. Symposium, 202 e. Cf. also Moralia, 415 a and 416 c-f, infra, and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiq. i. 77.

12. Part of a longer passage from Empedocles; Cf. H. Diels, Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, i. p. 267, Empedocles, no. 115, 9-12. Cf. also Moralia, 830 f.

Plutarch De Iside et Osiride 26

Frank Cole Babbitt (Translator)

Search the Perseus Catalog for:

Current edition Perseus

Notes on the current edition

Stable identifiers