HOMERIC Mevqodo~ IN PLATO’S SOCRATIC DIALOGUESmyth of these giants.^18 As recounted earlier, the original four-legged,
four-armed human beings challenged the gods. Zeus called a council of
the gods, and decided to punish this u{bri~ of the or ig inal human beings
by slicing them in two, a procedure that would both weaken them and
increase the number of sacrifi ces they would offer. Apollo takes on the
task of healing their wounds.
Here the original human beings are contrasted with these giants
most unmistakably. In the Homeric myth, Ephialtes and Otos would
have been successful in their quest to conquer Olympos had they been
permitted to grow to their youthful prime (h{ba). No doubt their pa-
ternal lineage gave them more power than other children of gods and
mortal women, but no account is given for this exceptional strength.
Further, as Dione explains to Aphrodite,
Many of us who have our home on Olympos endure things from men
when ourselves we infl ict hard pain on each other. (Iliad 5.383– 84)On the other hand, the original human beings in Aristophanes’
myth had no such divine lineage and no such divine squabbling to infl u-
ence their behavior. Therefore, they had no possibility of infl icting any
pain at all on the gods. The humans simply assumed that, by virtue of
their strength and speed, they were far more powerful than they really
were. Further, and far more important to the Aristophanic presenta-
tion, unlike Ephialtes and Otos who could be killed and represented no
loss, the Olympian gods needed human beings for what they had to offer
them, just as human beings needed the gods in order to be mindful of
the due measure appropriate to their status.
The subtle adaptation of the Homeric tale within Aristophanes’
speech reveals a philosophical opening in yet another way. Unlike Ephi-
altes and Otos, human beings “as they are now” are weak and needy of
another for wholeness and completeness. This is the defi nition of e[rw~
at which this speech arrives. Further still, they require reminders lest they
commit u{bri~ again and so must be halved again. In Aristophanes’ myth,
the wrinkles Apollo leaves around the stomach serve precisely as these
reminders (mnhvmai) of past sufferings. Their philosophical analogue is
the recollection of the way our desires (our stomach) may lead us be-
yond what is proper to a human being, but that when we are so mindful
even our weakness, our fl aws, and our needfulness do not preclude a life
of love and happiness.
Another giant who infl icted pain on the gods was “the strong son of
Amphitryon” (Iliad 5.392), namely Heracles. The giant’s “actual” father
was Zeus, his mother was Alcmene, whose mortal husband was Amphi-