The Gods

The Olympians, from left to right: Hestia, Hermes, Aphrodite, Ares, Demeter, Hephaestus, Hera, Poseidon, Athena, Zeus, Artemis, Apollo (Wikipedia, Twelve Olympians)

The gods serve as a useful foil to compare to the drama facing the mortal heroes taking part in the struggle for Troy (and its aftermath). While the mortals are quite literally fighting for their lives and having to reckon with the new world their actions have created, the gods go on as they always have: aloof, relatively uncaring, and always self-centered. They are the same in the beginning of the conflict as they are at the end, and why should they change? The only thing they have to risk is a bruised ego. The only thing they have to lose is a temporary reduction in pride.

The war began over one such confrontation: a petty spat between Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite over the golden apple thrown by Eris, goddess of discord at the wedding of Thetis and Peleus, which she was not invited to (which in itself was, a way for a god- Eris to soothe her bruised ego).

When the goddesses asked Zeus to judge who was fairest between them, Zeus was curiously not too enthusiastic with the prospect, so he did what any intelligent man would do in such a position: find some fool to do it for him, that fool being Paris. After each goddess gave a well-placed bribe in which they demonstrated that they cared nothing for the mortals their promise would affect (Hera offers mastery of Asia to Paris- wealth and power beyond imagination, Athena's offer was great glory so that his name would never die, Aphrodite's was the most beautiful woman in the world, who happened to be married), Paris chose Aphrodite, ran off with Helen (along with other priceless treasures for good measure), and the events of the Trojan War were set in motion.

That the gods are unaffected in any significant way, that they have nothing important to lose in the conflict is illustrated by the scenes in which they appear. They are in essence, especially in the Iliad but also somewhat in the Odyssey, nothing more than comic relief.

The scenes in which they fight are more or less comical compared to the brutal killing and dying that the mortals fighting the war have to go through. When Athena impels Diomedes to wound Ares at the end of Book 5, Ares shouts out and returns to Olympus, his ego wounded more than anything else. He complains about how Zeus lets Athena do whatever she wants, and Zeus responds by berating Ares. Contrast that with the ending in Book 4, where Homer describes soldiers killing, being killed, lying face down in the dust.

Towards the end of the Iliad, when Achilles returns to the battlefield and rampages against the Trojan forces, we are given brief shots of the gods on either side in combat with one another, but this too is both unrealistic and totally out of place compared to the combat of the mortals, as if it were children that were fighting in a tantrum-induced spat.

Then of course, there is the infamous scene in Book 14 where Hera, in an attempt to assist Poseidon in interfering in the contest after Zeus had forbidden any such interference by the gods, comes down to Mount Ida to seduce Zeus, with assistance beforehand from Aphrodite, who apparently couldn't care less about Hera's support for the Greeks against her opposing support for the Trojans anymore (though Hera wisely did not mention to the Goddess of Love what her true intentions were).

Zeus, smitten with Hera's Aphrodite-assisted getup, mentions his longing for her in comparison to all the other women, both mortal and immortal, he's bedded over the years, apparently not caring that this was his wedded wife who had a particular penchant for jealousy.

The scene can only be described as an immortal comedy, and it is the best illustration of the gods' stake in the conflict: namely, that there isn't really any. It is just mere entertainment for them, a way to satisfy their egos and one-up each other.

When Zeus tells Hera that he might just crush cities that she loves in exchange for Troy, which he laments must be fated to die, Hera eagerly agrees and offers him, among others, Mycenae. It is truly as if she has nothing to lose, and she doesn't. Being ageless and deathless all her days, why should she care about mortals so?

Ask yourself the same question. Would you care if an ant colony in your backyard got into an all-or-nothing fight with another nearby ant colony, even if you somewhat enjoyed watching the little critters from time to time? The answer is probably not. It isn't in your nature. Hera's nature in relation to humanity is much the same.