It is occasionally intriguing how various elements ‘turn up’. I had been looking for a particular quotation on an unrelated matter (from G.K. Chesterton, as it happens), and had somehow happened across the following passages from Lucian’s “Zeus Tragoedus” (Ζεὺς Τραγῳδός) (often translated somewhat loosely as “Zeus Rants”). And, at just about the same time, a most important passage from the Shatapatha Brahmana and with a degree of corroboration from another portion to the Taittiriya Samhita (also) of the Yajurveda, as well.

Now, Lucian is, of course, a satirist – and especially given that which ensues, it should prove quite tempting to simply take it as just exactly that … non-serious writing making frivolous triviality if not wilful distortion for the most serious of things: the Gods, and in this particular case, our relationship with Them. Altogether producing something that – to put it charitably – should constitute almost the opposite for ‘useful theological materials’.

But art not so. Not in this particular case, at any rate.

Let’s take a look at that which I am referring to more directly:

Now, what I had run into were some choice excerpts from the relatively more recent Casson iteration (who’d gone – actually rather correctly, as it happens, for “Zeus the Opera Star” – via way of “Zeus Tragoedus” in translation for the title), which we shall quote from directly:

“Hera: Zeus all upset and not because of a love affair? How is that possible?

Zeus: Hera, the Gods’ situation is desperate. We’re on the razor’s edge, as the saying goes. It’s anybody’s guess whether We’ll continue to be worshiped and respected on Earth or be considered nobodies and be completely ignored.

Hera: You don’t mean to tell me the Earth is producing Giants again? Or that the Titans have broken their chains, overpowered the guards, and are at war with Us again?

Zeus: Cheer up. Our hold on Hades is secure.

Hera: Then what’s happened that’s so terrible? If it isn’t Titans or Giants that’s troubling You, I don’t see why You have to come before us as Polus or Aristodemus instead of Zeus.

Zeus: Listen, Hera. Yesterday somehow or other Timocles the Stoic and Damis the Epicurean got involved in a discussion of providence. It took place in front of a large group of important people, which particularly made Me unhappy. Damis insisted that Gods don’t exist and therefore exercise absolutely no supervision or control over what happens. Timocles – a very fine fellow – tried to defend Us. A big crowd collected and the discussion went on and on and on. Finally they broke off after agreeing to continue it some other time. So now everybody is on tenterhooks until the next session begins and they can find out which will present the stronger case and win. Can’t You see what a tight spot We’re in? How Our Fate lies in the hands of one man? There are two alternatives: either Damis convinces them We’re just an empty concept and We end up consigned to Oblivion, or Timocles wins the debate and We go on being worshipped as always.

Hera: This is terrible No wonder You went in for grand opera!”

[…]

[Zeus : ] Fellow Gods, this is why I have called You together – no small reason when You consider that Our honor, Our prestige, and Our revenues all depend upon men. If they’re convinced that Gods don’t exist or that, if We do, We take no thought for them, it means the end of sacrifices, gifts, and honors for Us from down below. We’ll sit around uselessly in Heaven and starve, since Our traditional holidays, celebrations, games, sacrifices, festivals, and parades will be taken away from Us.
[…]”

(One might, perhaps, observe the not entirely dissimilar consideration at Ovid, at Metamorphoses I 246-249, wherein the questions are raised prior to Jupiter unleashing His Deluge to wipe away a most grave impiety indeed, as to how the regimens of sacrifice might continue if Jupiter goes forward with wiping out the previous stain of that era’s humanity)

And at that point, we shall depart from Lucian.

Now, you can of course, see how this is a work of humour in various regards – but that renders its contents no less serious merely for their couching in amidst some ‘stock remarks’ and other such jocularity.

However, it would nevertheless prove all too easy to dismiss Lucian’s central thematic there as being the work of an imaginative human mind rather than an authentically pious point for ponderance.

Unless … we happened to have some measure of ‘corroboration’ drawn from another source-material.

Say … from the Shruti canon of the Vedas, perhaps.

Enter Shatapatha Brahmana I 2 5 24, and its Taittiriya Samhita correlate, TS III 2 9 7.

What do these say?

Well, to really abridgedly quote from the Eggeling translation as to the former:

“Then unbelief took hold of men […] No sacrificial food then came to the Gods from this world: for the Gods subsist on what is offered up from this world.”
[SBr I 2 5 24, Eggeling translation]

And, from the Taittiriya Samhita verse:

“In that he recites sitting, therefore the Gods live on that which is given hence; in that he responds standing, therefore men live on what is given thence.”
[TS III 2 9 7, Keith translation]

(Just to be sure, I had the translations checked by the learned Nyāyaratnasiṃha – his comment had been that “The translation is correct, and conforms to the Sāyaṇa commentary.” Nice.)