A Comparison of the Homeric Epics and the Book of Genesis Anonymous College

Defining boundaries of morality is no easy task, but it is one humanity must perform every day. The characters of The Iliad, The Odyssey, and the book of Genesis are no exception to this. Throughout all three literary works, the characters are faced with many trials in which they must choose to glorify themselves or the gods or God. They go through battle, famine, and much more throughout the course of each story, but they are not often left without the help of gods in their troubles. To better understand the meaning of specific passages in the epics of Homer and the book of Genesis, it is important to analyze how the characters define morality and what their relationship to the gods or God is. Granted, there is no way that a realistic time relativity between the texts can be referenced, but placing both the works of Homer and the book of Genesis in roughly the same literary era (quite broadly, millennia before today) can aide in the understanding of the texts on their own and how their implications can be interpreted today. The comparison and contrast of the Homeric epics and the book of Genesis can be of great use to one attempting to make sense of any of the three texts.

Throughout the book of Genesis from the Hebrew Bible...