Fate Vs Fate Essay

Is your fate already determined or do your decisions you make control your own fate? The Illiad questions are you in charge of the way your life turns out or was your future already chosen for you regardless of the decisions made in between your birth and death. It's unknown if this is true or not. In different ways it seems like man has no control over his fate and destiny, but in other ways it seems as if a man's fate lies in his actions and decisions. In these excerpts of The Iliad it will show you that man sometimes controls his destiny.

In conclusion, fate does control ones’ life. In Homers book of the Odyssey it shows clearly that fate draws limits around free will, because Odysseus went through so many battles the

Portions of modern society believe fate to be concrete and unchanging. However, in ancient times, it was believed to be influenced and guided by the actions of the gods. Similarly, in The Iliad by Homer, the actions of the gods influence the life, death, and fate of each and every individual. Gods such as Zeus, Athena and Apollo take great influence in human affairs in The Iliad. These actions cause life, death, sorrow, and triumph to befall various individuals of the story. Achilles’ fate results, solely, from these actions the gods undertake. In particular, the gods influence on Achilles’ fate shows when the gods keep Achilles from killing Agamemnon, staying out of the war, and holding onto his rage.

A main point of the contrast here is recognizing the fact that Hector has a family while Achilles only has Thetis, his mother and goddess of water, along with his companion Patroclus. Readers get a get a sense of this side as Hector returns to troy and sees his family along with his mother and Helen. When he finally is able to see his wife, Andromache, and his son the baby starts crying. The child is afraid of his father because of his helmet. As Hector takes off the helmet it could also be seen as some foreshadowing towards his death. Hector does try to help calm his wife’s thought by saying “Poor Andromache! Why does your heart sorrow so much for me? / No man is going to hurl me to Hades, unless it is fated, / but as for fate, I think no man has yet escaped it / once it has taken its first form, neither brave man nor coward.” (6.486-489) In that section of the poem Hector is essentially saying that he will not be killed, but if he were to be then it was fates doing. No one is able to escape their fate. Readers will receive an insight how much he loves his family and will do at all costs to protect them. It gives him more of a depth as he continues to fight for his love towards his family and Troy while Achilles is only fighting for his honour and glory. Once Achilles avenges Patroclus’ death by killing Hector. Before his death Hector begs to Achilles. But not for his life. He says “I beg you, beg you by your life, your parents— / don’t let

The death of Hector was inevitable. After Agamemnon insulting Achilles by having his men take Achilles' prize award (King Priam's daughter), Achilles contemplated if he should take revenge on the topic but sat on the shore line instead to think it over. While Achilles is deciding whether to destroy Agamemnon and his people the Trojans attack the Greeks and kill a lot of Achilles' men. This was a time I thought to myself that there was no way Achilles was going to sit back and do nothing about the deaths of his men. After Agamemnon discovers his idea to attack Achilles' people is not worth it, he begs Achilles to participate in the war so he can kill him off himself. Led by Hector, son of Priam, the Trojans still decide to fight after Achilles denies the invitation. Patroclus, Achilles' good friend, decides to fight the Trojans but in place of Achilles, so he wears the armor designated for Achilles.

The passage shows characteristics of animal agency. Patroclus had the intentions to charge into battle, hoping to push back the Trojans far enough for the Achaeans to be safe for another day, but he could not control the situation, as he did not intend for a god to attack him. As Patroclus is stunned in battle, Hector watches over him like prey. Hector is a warrior of the Trojans and so it is his duty to attack those who are a threat to his people. Hector shows animal agency by observing his enemy and waiting for an opportunity to attack Patroclus at his weakest point. “Hector waiting, watching the greathearted Patroclus trying to stagger free” (16.952-953) shows that he is watching Patroclus from a distance because he knows that if they fight up front, he will surely lose. Hector is “watching” Patroclus like a predator watches its prey. Patroclus tries to “stagger free” is showing us that he is frightened and is trying to reach out to escape or find help.

Before the battle, Hector tells Achilles that if Hector dies, to return his body back to his comrades and that he will do the same for Achilles if he wins. Not only does Achilles win, but he wins quickly and with seemingly no problems. In The Iliad, Homer doesn’t spend very much time on the battle between Hector and Achilles. I am not exactly sure why he does this, but one of my thoughts is that it was fate that Achilles was going to win the battle and that Hector was going to die. In an act of pride again, Achilles doesn’t honor Hector’s wishes and is still angry and sad that Patroclus died.

Zeus contemplates interrupting the fate of Hector being killed by Achilles. Zeus’s daughter Athena, is angered at the thought of her own father trying to interrupt the death of Hector as his fate has already been decided to be killed at the hand of Achilles. Athena angrily reminds her father that Hector’s fate is out of his control, after Athena dissuades her father from disrupting Hector’s fate, he relents on changing the fate that has already been

It is consistently difficult to understand in old world literature, from Homeric epics to Virgil's work, The Aeneid, what the relation of fate is to the Pantheon of gods. There seems to be an ongoing debate within the texts discussing whether "fate" is the supreme ruling force in the universe and the controlling element of the lives of men, or whether fate is the will of the king of gods, Jupiter. In, The Aeneid, several situations and instances of the use of fate are presented to the reader. The direction and destination of Aeneas's course are preordained, and his various sufferings and glories in battle and at sea over the course of the epic merely postpone his unchangeable destiny.

Fate is the development of events beyond a person's control. This philosophical idea has existed since the very start of human life. Although this idea has been believed by people for centuries, others have questioned whether people’s lives are controlled by fate or by free will. Humans have found multiple ways to express their feelings about this topic, one way is to write about it. One example of a person expressing their feelings about this idea is in the tragedy play Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare. Shakespeare’s story is about two star crossed lovers that are from rival families. These relations force them to never get married. The piece then ends in both of the characters dying of suicide. Throughout the play, the author addresses fate through his characters’ dialogue. Romeo is the character that addresses fate the most in this play. Along with Romeo, I too have been personally affected by fate. Fate does control our lives because humans cannot create the extraordinarily positive and negative events that happen during our lives.

In the Ancient Greek and Roman world fate was known to be an unalterable chain of predetermined events caused by a supernatural power. Hesiod personifies fate to be three very old women who spins the threads of people’s destiny. Everyone has a fate meaning that even the gods cannot escape these powerful forces from Atropos (1 of the 3 women) when she cuts the string, ultimately determining your destiny. Throughout Virgil’s Aeneid fate played an immense role from the beginning of the poem as Aeneas already knew what he was destined for leading him to Italy at the end. Virgil depicted fate to be an unstoppable power that leads one to their destiny.

Hector’s decision to fight Achilles displays the code of honor, a continuous theme throughout The

The “Iliad” begins with Zeus’ reflection of Greek’s belief that man is in the grip of forces that he cannot control. Book XXII shows that the Gods do in fact control the choice of life of mortals: “But once they reached the springs for the fourth time, then Father Zeus held out his sacred golden scales. In them, he placed two fates of death that lays men low- one for Achilles, one for Hector breaks of horses and gripping the beam mid-haft the father raised it high and down went Hectors day of doom, dragging him down to the strong House of Death (22. 248-254) Homer demonstrates in the beginning of the “Illiad” that the God determines their fate and they have no control of their fate. As the story goes on, Achilles comes to the realization that men control their destiny by their actions. Achilles chooses the short life with glory over a long life without glory.

Predetermination to the degree Greek mythology goes is not just fate. By most standards, predetermination infers that things happen for a dark reason that no one has any control over. Fate is a thought that has ruled various human progressions. The confidence in fate and the higher strengths are what drive mankind to their greatest limit. In any case, in the domain of Greek Mythology, predetermination does not just happen. The heavenly creatures engineer fate and they interfere to get things going that may not for the most part have happened.

After Achilles chases Hector around the gates of Troy for the fourth time, to make his decision, Zeus pulls out his scales and weighs the fates of Hector and Achilles. “The Father Zeus held out his sacred golden scales: in them he placed two fates of death that lays men low-- one for Achilles, one for Hector breaker of horses-- and gripping the beam mid-haft the Father raised it high and down went Hector’s day of doom (548)...” Hector is a very important person for the Trojan army and Zeus decides his death by simply weighing his fate with Achilles’. If the gods can control the fates of these characters, then they have the power to control the fates of all mortal