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JOURNEYS TO HEAVEN AND HELL
JOURNEYS TO HEAVEN AND HELL
Tours of the Afterlife in the Early
Christian Tradition

BART D. EHRMAN

Yale
UNIVERSITY PRESS
New Haven and London
Published with assistance from the Louis Stern Memorial Fund.

Copyright © 2022 by Bart D. Ehrman.

All rights reserved.
This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in
any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S.
Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written
permission from the publishers.

Yale University Press books may be purchased in quantity for educational,

business, or promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected]
(U.S. office) or [email protected] (U.K. office).

Set in Janson type by Newgen North America.

Printed in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021942673 ISBN 978-0-300-25700-7

(hardcover : alk. paper)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of

Paper).

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
 To Radd
Who shares my name, my birthday, and my love of antiquity
Contents

Acknowledgments
INTRODUCTION: The Well-Trodden Paths
1. The Realities of Death and the Meaning of Life I: Journeys to
Hades in Homer and Virgil
2. The Realities of Death and the Meaning of Life II: Jewish and
Christian Journeys
3. Incentives from the World Beyond: Christian Ethics and
Evangelism
4. The Afterlife of Afterlives: Editorial Interventions and Christology
5. The Justice and Mercy of God in Textual Conflict
6. The Power of Christ and the Harrowing of Hell
AFTERWORD
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments

I HAVE SPENT A good deal of my life thinking about heaven and

hell; these past four years have been especially intense. I thank the
institutions and individuals who have helped me reach the happy
end of this particular literary adventure, a virtual katabasis. As the
Sibyl says, going into the under world is easy—no effort required.
“But to retrace your step and escape to the air above, this is the toil,
this the labor” (hoc opus, hic labor est; Aen. 6.128–29).
At an early stage of my work, I applied for funding and am highly
grateful to have received it. In 2018–2019 I was awarded a
fellowship at the National Humanities Center. This is one of the great
institutions supporting the humanities not just in the country but in
the world. My thanks to Robert Newman, President and Director of
the NHC; to all the staff, who were helpful beyond words; and to my
fellow fellows for the year, with whom I enjoyed hours of food, drink,
and dialogue, intellectual and otherwise, intercalated among long
periods of research solitude.
That same year I was also awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, and
the administration of the foundation kindly allowed me to defer it for
twelve months so that I could accept the offer from the NHC as well.
The Guggenheim, obviously, is one of the truly great fellowships
available to academics in an enormous range of fields. I know of
none better. I am deeply thankful for having received it.
Finally, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, my beloved
home institution, generously allowed me to accept both fellowships,
giving me two solid years of relief from teaching and administrative
duties to devote to research. In particular, I thank Terry Rhodes,
Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; Elizabeth Engelhardt,
Senior Associate Dean of Fine Arts and Humanities; Barbara
Ambrose, our long-suffering chair of the Department of Religious
Studies; and all of my colleagues in the department, an impressive
array of scholars and teachers with whom I am proud to be
associated.
Special thanks go to individuals who helped me with the research
and writing of the book. Because of the wide range of texts and
traditions involved I asked well-established experts in various fields
to read appropriate sections for suggestions and comments. They
did so with enthusiasm, both improving the book and saving me
from numerous faux pas. Some of these I’ve known for a long time;
all of them, now, are friends for life:
• Janet Downie, Associate Professor of Classics, University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill
• Mark Goodacre, Frances Hill Fox Professor of Religious Studies, Duke
University
• Zbigniew Izydorczyk, Professor of English, University of Winnipeg
• Sarah Isles Johnston, College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of
Religion, The Ohio State University
• James O’Hara, George L. Paddison Professor of Latin, University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill
• David Reeve, Delta Kappa Epsilon Distinguished Professor of Classics,
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Loren T. Stuckenbruck, Professor, Evangelisch-theologische Fakultät, Ludwig-
Maximilians-Universität München
Two of my oldest and dearest friends who have broad expertise in
New Testament studies but have never (till now) been heavily
invested in ancient katabasis performed a work of supererogation by
reading the entire manuscript with the eyes of highly trained
professionals in a cognate field. This was a significant labor of love.
On the other hand, they owe me, since I introduced them over two
decades ago:
• Jeffrey Siker, Professor of Biblical Studies, emeritus, Loyola Marymount
University
• Judy Siker, Vice President and Professor of New Testament, emerita, San
Francisco Theological Seminary
In addition, five seasoned scholars with deep expertise in the
broad range of this material generously read and shared their
knowledge in comments on the entire manuscript, making numerous
suggestions to improve the work and help me save face.
• Harry Attridge, Sterling Professor of New Testament, emeritus, Yale Divinity
School
• Jan Bremmer, Professor of Religious Studies and Theology, emeritus,
University of Groningen
• Tobias Nicklas, Professor of New Testament Studies at the Faculty of Catholic
Theology and—of particular importance for this project—Director of the Beyond
Canon Centre, University of Regensburg, Germany
• Pierluigi Piovanelli, Professor of Classics and Religious Studies, Faculty of Arts,
University of Ottawa
• Zlatko Plese, my colleague and friend, Professor of Religious Studies,
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
I also thank my current PhD student and research assistant,
Michelle Freeman, who undertook a number of investigative projects
connected with the work and made helpful comments on the
chapters. Michelle is industrious and insightful; you will be hearing
more from her.
In addition I thank the members of a reading group I have been
running for lo these many years. The group is named Christianity in
Antiquity and so, of course, we call it the CIA. It comprises graduate
students and faculty from both UNC and Duke working in (or
around) New Testament studies and early Christianity. Once a month
we spend an often intense evening over assorted beverages to
discuss a paper one of us has produced. On two occasions over the
past year the group has engaged with selections from my book;
each time I survived the onslaught, and the book emerged better for
it.
I am especially grateful to Jennifer Banks, my editor at Yale
University Press, whom I’ve known for years but now, at last, I have
had a chance to work with. It has been a very pleasant experience
indeed. Jennifer was excited about the book when she first heard of
it, she enthusiastically pursued the possibility of publishing it, and
throughout the process she has been inordinately helpful. May her
editorial tribe increase.
 Finally, two of my readers have long been part of my life. First is
Sarah T. Beckwith, Katherine Everett Gilbert Distinguished Professor
of English at Duke University, not only my beloved partner but also
an inordinately passionate intellectual and the best reader of texts I
know. Sarah has yet again made unusually insightful comments on
my work and helped me see things I never would have seen on my
own.
Second is my brother, Radd K. Ehrman, Professor of Classics at
Kent State University, who has been reading Homer and Virgil since I
was playing Little League and has never refused a plea for help on
philological obscurities. Radd has thought about katabasis since
taking a graduate seminar on the topic back in the 1970s, and he
has a personal interest in visionary experience in general, as the
translator of three volumes of Hildegard of Bingen (Oxford University
Press). I dedicate the book to him.
JOURNEYS TO HEAVEN AND HELL
Introduction
The Well-Trodden Paths

SCHOLARS HAVE PAID surprisingly little attention to the “journeys to

the afterlife” in the early Christian tradition.1 The oldest surviving
account is the Apocalypse of Peter, first circulated in the early part
of the second century CE; the most famous is the late-fourth-century
Apocalypse of Paul, probably known to Dante. Important as well are
two near death experiences narrated in the Acts of Thomas and
Christ’s descent to hell in the Gospel of Nicodemus, one of the most
theologically influential narratives from outside the biblical canon. All
these visits of the living to the realms of the dead informed Christian
imagination and played significant roles in Christian theology, ethics,
and evangelism. It is difficult to explain their relatively sparse
treatment.
This book engages in a series of comparative analyses of these
texts, situating them in relation to otherworldly journeys in select
Greek, Roman, and Jewish traditions as well as to one another. Many
other comparanda could be considered, but my goal is not to provide
an exhaustive analysis. I also explore the transmission histories of
two of the Christian accounts, showing how their texts were
changed over time by editors and scribes who apparently did not
fully appreciate their original claims. In every case I work to show
how each account’s historical, cultural, religious, and intellectual
contexts affect and illuminate its meaning. Most important, I assess
how each journey, Christian and non-Christian, uses the realities of
death to explore the meaning of life, promoting distinctive
perspectives, attitudes, behaviors, and, at least for Christian
iterations, beliefs for those who have not yet reached the end of
their mortal existence.
 These have not been the typical goals of research in this field.
Modern scholarship on early Christian otherworldly journeys began
almost immediately after the publication of the editio princeps of the
Apocalypse of Peter by U. Bouriant in 1892, five years after a Greek
version had been discovered by a French archaeological team in a
cemetery in Akhmim, Egypt.2 The text was part of a sixty-six-page
manuscript, Codex Panopolitanus, which also contained portions of
three other texts: the Gospel of Peter, 1 Enoch, and the Martyrdom
of Julian of Anazarbus. The Apocalypse, oddly, was sewn into the
codex upside down. It was a text that had been mentioned by early
Christian writers, some of whom considered and quoted it as sacred
Scripture, but it had fallen into disrepute and disappeared from sight
for well over a millennium.
The publication raised a number of important questions pursued in
scholarly publications that appeared with unusual rapidity: Was this
“the” Apocalypse of Peter mentioned in the Muratorian Fragment
and by Clement of Alexandria? How did it relate to the other work
ascribed to Peter in the codex? What were its connections with other
Petrine pseudepigrapha, and, most especially, with the canonical 2
Peter? Among the various puzzles, it was the issue of origins that
rose quickly to prominence. The account described a guided tour of
the realms of the dead, a description that celebrated the blessed
eternity enjoyed by saints in heaven, and, in far greater detail, the
horrific torments endured by sinners in hell. This was the earliest
Christian forerunner of Dante’s Commedia, the first known instance
of a Christian katabasis—a journey to the afterlife. Scholars of
classics, biblical studies, and early Christian apocrypha immediately
became intrigued with where such a notion came from.
All the participants in the debate were naturally familiar with a
range of katabaseis in other ancient writings: Homer’s Odyssey 11;
Virgil’s Aeneid 6; Aristophanes’ The Frogs; Plato’s eschatological
myths; accounts in Plutarch, Lucian of Samosata, and others; not to
mention Jewish examples known from apocalyptic texts such as 1
Enoch. The best-known Christian account was the Apocalypse of
Paul. But now its predecessor and (evidently) major source had
appeared, a work assigned to Peter but almost certainly produced in
the early second century. That raised questions: How are all these
works related to one another, and where did the idea of a human
observation of the realms of the dead originally come from? What, in
short, was the ultimate source for this account in the Apocalypse of
Peter?3
German scholars in particular were absorbed by such questions.
Soon after the text’s initial publication, still in 1892, Adolf von
Harnack produced an edition and largely philological commentary,
and—as one might expect from the great Harnack—made the quick
observation that came to dominate the scholarship: the picture of
hell did not derive from Jewish tradition “but Greek-Orphic.”4 Early
the following year Eduard Norden advanced the view significantly in
an article whose title reveals its ultimate concern, “Die Petrus-
Apokalypse und ihre antiken Vorbilder” (“The Apocalypse of Peter
and Its Ancient Models”): the original, now lost, Vorbild, appeared in
Orphic-Pythagorean circles, and it is possible to trace its subsequent
development over the centuries. As impressive as these, and other,
learned discussions were—written nearly as fast as the authors could
think and appearing as fast as they could write—the most
remarkable achievement came in the full and learned monograph
that appeared already in 1893, Albrecht Dieterich’s influential
Nekyia: Beiträge zur Erklärung der neuentdeckten Petrusapokalypse.
Here was a full analysis, produced before Dieterich even had a
chance to lay his eyes on Norden’s shorter but comparable study.
Again, the driving concerns are to the fore, announced already on
the opening page: Dieterich seeks to solve “this question of the
origin and sources of the Apocalypse of Peter.”5 After three
preliminary chapters devoted to common Greek understandings of
the realms of the dead, and then the teachings of the mystery cults,
Dieterich draws his conclusions, based on hints provided in a range
of texts, starting with Plato (Republic 363c and Phaedo 69c), that
the idea of rewards for the righteous and punishment for the
unrighteous derives from the “Orphic mysteries,” especially as these
became known and embraced in the religious ferment of Athens in
the sixth century BCE. This Orphic tradition later came to influence
the katabatic ideas advanced by such figures as Empedocles, Pindar,
Lucian, Plutarch, and, of course, the newly discovered Apocalypse of
Peter. Dieterich devotes a brief penultimate chapter to arguing that
the rewards and punishments embraced in this tradition bear almost
no relation to Jewish apocalyptic thought. The genealogical line of
Christian journeys descended from Orphic circles.
Our various Forschungsgeschichten show that once this question
of origins had been resolved to the satisfaction of most concerned,
scholarly interest in the Apocalypse of Peter more or less
disappeared, almost as if there were nothing more to say—a rather
astounding and perplexing development in the history of
scholarship.6 Could one imagine such a thing in, say, the study of
Dante? That once scholars determined that Dante’s idea of a journey
to the realms of the dead in the Commedia could ultimately be
traced back to the Apocalypse of Paul, from there to the Apocalypse
of Peter, and ultimately all the way back to a lost Orphic-
Pythagorean myth, there would be little more to say about the work?
It was not until the 1980s that interest revived, starting with the
published Princeton dissertation of Martha Himmelfarb, Tours of Hell:
An Apocalyptic Form in Jewish and Christian Literature (1983). Here
was a fresh examination of the issues connected with early Jewish
and Christian katabasis traditions, groundbreaking because it
reached a different conclusion from its predecessors. Even so, the
driving questions—origins and genealogies—were the same.
Himmelfarb examines seventeen Jewish and Christian katabaseis in
five languages from over a period of a thousand years in order to
establish patterns of similarity, some of which suggest genealogical
relations and dependence. Her overarching thesis is that Dieterich
and those in his camp were wrong to posit a lost Orphic-
Pythagorean myth as the “origin” of the Christian tradition. On the
contrary, the Christian tradition arose out of the Jewish, which can
be traced back to the “Book of the Watchers” (1 En. 1–36). A key to
Himmelfarb’s argument is that the texts in this Jewish and Christian
line of tradition characteristically depict an angelic guide who uses
demonstrative pronouns to explain what the seer observes. In
response to a query about sinners suffering one torment or another
in hell, the angel replies, “These are those who. . . .” This then leads
to an explanation of what sin had been committed, warranting this
particular punishment. Though not found in Greek and Roman
accounts (Homer, Plato, Virgil, Lucian, and so on), such
demonstratives can be seen relatively early in the Jewish exempla,
such as the Apocalypse of Zephaniah. From there they moved into
the Christian texts. In short, the Christian otherworldly journeys
emerged out of a Jewish milieu.
The centrality of this question of origins and genealogies can be
seen in the important history of research on the Apocalypse of Peter
produced by Richard Bauckham in 1988.7 In his detailed seven-page
section on scholarship devoted to the “Descriptions of Hell and
Paradise” from 1892 to his own day, the one and only issue concerns
their point of derivation: Orphism? Egyptian religion? Other
“oriental” religions? Zoroastrianism? Judaism? Nothing else appears
to matter.
Somewhat remarkably, the same question still lives on. Probably
the general consensus now is a compromise position, as expressed
clearly by Pierluigi Piovanelli in a 2015 article with an unusually
informative title, “Katabáseis orphico-pythagoriciennes ou Tours of
Hell apocalyptiques juifs?: la fausse alternative posée par la
typologie des pêchés et des châtiments dans l’Apocalypse de Pierre”
(“Orphic-Pythagorean Katabaseis or Jewish Apocalyptic Tours of
Hell? The False Alternative Posed for the Typology of Sins and
Punishments in the Apocalypse of Peter”).8
This question of origins and genealogies is obviously important for
anyone interested in the social and religious contexts of the
katabatic literature and the history of its development as a whole,
which of course involves a large number of texts from Greek,
Roman, Jewish, and Christian antiquity. The difficulty comes only
when it is treated as the ultimate question, the answer to which
somehow resolves the difficulties and mysteries posed by these
texts. Such a focus may have made sense in the 1890s, given the
ongoing passion for “origins” inherited by Continental, British, and
American heirs of the Enlightenment, and especially the obsession
with genealogy across a swath of intellectual discourse at the time—
not just biology but fields as diverse as comparative linguistics,
anthropology, classics, and, of course, biblical studies. One naturally
thinks of the nineteenth-century focus on the oldest layers of the
Pentateuch and the sources of the Synoptic Gospels, the
determination to find the “original” text of the New Testament
through genealogical reconstructions of manuscripts, the “quest of
the historical Jesus” behind the legendary Gospel narratives, and
then the preoccupations of the religionsgeschichtliche Schule, some
of whose prominent members rubbed elbows with precisely such
classicists as the aforementioned E. Norden and A. Dieterich.9
For many of the investigators in these various fields, “origins” in
one sense or another clearly had explanatory force or was even
determinative of meaning. Even so, the significance of genealogical
derivation varied from one field of investigation to the next. For
some, it marked positive development and evolutionary
improvement. In religious studies one sees this in several
commonplace Darwinian schemas, such as supersessionist claims
that religion “advanced” from pantheism to pagan polytheism to
Jewish monotheism to the (supreme) Christian trinitarianism. But in
other fields derivation marked decline and degeneration. Thus, again
in religious studies, we have the “corruption” of the text of the New
Testament over the course of its transmission, the move to get back
to “original” doctrines and even polity of earliest Christianity, and, of
course, the push to return to the original teachings of Jesus,
unmarred by the bizarre atonement theory of the apostle Paul. One
might be tempted to see this stress on Christian origins simply as an
intellectual by-product of the Reformation, worked out over time;
but as I have been arguing, its intellectual history is much broader
than that.10
As interesting as matters of origins and genealogies may to be,
they are obviously not the only questions to be asked of literary
texts—whether canonical Gospels, eighteenth-century novels, or fan
fiction. Although it was a “slow train coming” with respect to the
literary tours of the afterlife, different foci have appeared in more
recent times, sparked in large part by the pioneering work of Richard
Bauckham and seen in a range of publications by scholars working
on disparate texts and with different goals, approaches, and
agendas, including Rémi Gounelle, Thomas Kraus, Tobias Nicklas,
Meghan Henning, Emiliano Fiori, and others, who are interested in
such matters as historical settings and interpretation, use and
function, and theological and cultural significance.11 But in some
ways the work has only begun.
In this book I am not principally interested in questions of origins,
sources, and genealogies but in historical analysis and interpretation.
Social history, broadly defined, will be essential. None of the texts I
discuss is or can be contextually detached. It is not possible to
understand the climax of Aeneas’s visit to Hades in Aeneid 6,
celebrating the eschatological significance of the civilizing power of
Rome, without situating it in Virgil’s sociohistorical context and the
occasion of his writing. So too the shifting emphases of hellish
torments between persecuting pagans in the Apocalypse of Peter
and sinful leaders of the church in the Apocalypse of Paul make no
sense apart from the relative positions of the accounts in the history
of the Christianization of the Roman Empire.
In addition to sociohistorical analysis, though, it is also useful to
consider intellectual history, the concomitant development of ideas in
different times and places—in this case, most obviously (but not
only) developing views of the afterlife itself. Understandings of
postmortem realities differed quite significantly from eighth-century
Ionia to fourth-century Athens; from Judaism in the second century
BCE to Christianity four hundred years later; from the embattled
Christian church of the early second century to the thriving church of
the late fourth. To be sure, these changes are intimately related to
social and cultural realia, but human thought and literary texts are
more than reflections of context. They need to be explored as
significant objects and producers of meaning. As part of the literary
analysis, it is helpful, in this case, to provide a comparative
assessment, not to the end of producing stemmata to demonstrate
origins and genealogical development but to understand more fully
the close inter workings of text, context, and meaning.
In the chapters that follow I engage in comparison on two levels.
Roughly speaking, the first three chapters consider a range of Greek,
Roman, Jewish, and Christian texts in light of the literary and social
worlds in which they appeared and in relation to each other. The
final three chapters explore textual traditions of two of the Christian
accounts to consider how later scribes and editors chose to alter the
texts in the course of their transmission in order to make them more
relevant, acceptable, or appealing to other readers, or even to
encourage their acceptance as part of canonical Scripture.
A casual glimpse at my choice of texts and topics will show that I
have no intention of presenting a comprehensive analysis of the
Christian tours of the afterlife, and certainly not of literary katabasis
as a whole throughout antiquity and late antiquity. I have chosen my
spots, fully cognizant that there are other spots to choose. Some
readers will find my choices uncomfortably limiting. Within the Greek
and Roman traditions, I have more or less restricted myself to
Homer, Virgil, two of Plato’s eschatological myths, and one of
Lucian’s dialogues. A complete analysis could not be done even in a
single volume but in any event would certainly require a sustained
analysis of the Orphic Golden Tables, Aristophanes’ The Frogs, the
other Platonic myths, the Dream of Scipio, other Lucianic dialogues,
Plutarch’s three eschatological myths, and so on. My goal in
examining the texts I do is to note their striking similarities and
distinctions to illustrate what each katabasis means and to consider
the work it does, but also to set the stage for an analysis of texts
deriving from Jewish and Christian traditions. For the latter, my
interests lie with the Apocalypse of Peter, the Acts of Thomas, the
Apocalypse of Paul, and the Gospel of Nicodemus.
Other texts and topics could easily have been chosen, and one
hopes they will be. Through the valiant labors of others, the study of
early Christian katabasis has begun to escape the dank prison below
into the fresh air of the world above. I hope this book will contribute
something to its full emergence.
 The various assessments I examine are all governed by an
overarching perspective. In no case, obviously, do literary portrayals
of an otherworldly journey merely serve to provide factual
information about what lies beyond to readers who might
understandably be curious. They consistently work even more to
other ends, in broadest terms, parenetic, that is, delivering advice,
exhortation, or instruction. They encourage certain ways of living in
the world in light of the realities of what lies ahead. That is, by
showing what happens after death, the texts emphasize what
matters in life, providing insight into the purpose, meaning, and
goals of human existence so as to encourage certain ways of being
and living in the world: attitudes, dispositions, priorities,
commitments, life choices, beliefs, practices, public activities,
relationships—in fact, almost everything involved with being a
sentient and conscious human being. In one way or another, in
theory at least, readers who realize what life will be after death are
driven to live, think, act, and be in certain ways before then.
CHAPTER ONE
The Realities of Death and the Meaning
of Life I
Journeys to Hades in Homer and Virgil

JOURNEYS TO THE REALMS of the dead constitute an important

corpus of Greek and Roman texts of ranging genre and date. I do
not provide here full coverage or even a generalized overview.
Instead, I focus on the well-known accounts of Homer and Virgil,
both to understand them on their own terms and to provide
instructive comparanda for the Christian exempla that appeared in
their wake. These are the two longest and most culturally significant
katabaseis to survive from classical antiquity. Their similarities strike
even first-time readers; their differences reveal widely disparate
conceptions of the afterlife and, as a corollary, profoundly different
understandings of the relevance of the intransigent realities of death
for life in the present. The Virgilian account provides particularly
instructive contrasts with the later Christian versions and therefore
occupies more of our attention.

Odysseus’s Journey to Hades

The oldest journey to Hades in the Western tradition comes to us in
Homer’s Odyssey, Book 11,1 where Odysseus travels to consult the
blind but far-sighted prophet Tiresias.2 To understand the account,
we need to set it in its broader literary context.
The Odyssey narrates the ten-year journey of Odysseus following
the sack of Troy to his home island and kingdom, Ithaca, to reunite
with his faithful wife, Penelope; their now-grown son, Telemachus;
and his aged father, Laertes. The epic is all about the “return home,”
nostos (νόστος), the first half dealing, roughly, with Odysseus’s ill-
fated adventures en route and the second with his adventures once
he arrives, as he confronts and eventually disposes of the suitors
trying to woo his wife and take over his rule.
The journey to Hades occurs as a flashback at the midpoint of the
epic, narrated by Odysseus himself near the end of his travels. At
this stage of the narrative Odysseus has lost all of his ships and
companions and ended up alone, shipwrecked, without a stitch on
his back, on the Island of Phaeacia, where he is welcomed and then
entertained by the local king and queen (Books 6–8). In the course
of a long dinner, he is asked to recount his adventures, and the
following four books (9–12), the Apologoi (= Tales) are told in the
first person as Odysseus describes his various traumas and narrow
escapes from such figures as the Lotus-Eaters, the Cyclops, Circe,
and Scylla and Charybdis.
All of Book 11 is devoted to the journey, but it is set up in the
preceding book by an episode with the bewitching goddess Circe.
Circe has used her magical powers to turn half of Odysseus’s men
into pigs, but when she tries the trick on him, he survives unscathed
because of a prophylactic provided by the god Hermes. Recognizing
Odysseus to be someone unusually special, Circe, in a somewhat
unexpected move, immediately takes him to bed. For the next year
she entertains both him and his (now restored) troops with wining,
dining, and, for Odysseus at least, sundry other pleasures. Odysseus
eventually persuades Circe to release them for their homeward
journey, but she instructs him that his first order of business is to go
“to the house of Hades and the fearful Persephone” (Od. 10.491) in
order to consult with the blind prophet Tiresias of Thebes about
what lies ahead.
The goddess indicates that Tiresias is unusual. Unlike everyone
else in the realms beyond, he has a full mental capacity—“his mind
is steadfast” (τοῦ τε φρένες ἔμπεδοί εἰσι; 10.493). This is because
“to him alone among the dead” Persephone has “granted reason”
(νόον); “he alone has understanding/has his faculties” (νόον οἴῳ . . .
πεπνῦσθαι). None of the others in the realms below has a satisfying
existence: “They are shadows, flitting around” (τοὶ δὲ σκιαὶ
ἀίσσουσιν; 10.495).
 Odysseus is not eager to make the trip—no one has ever yet done
such a thing (10.502)—but Circe gives him clear directions. He and
his men are to sail away to the other side of the river Oceanus and
then go on foot “to the moldy house of Hades” (10.512), where the
rivers Pyriphlegethon and Cocytus flow into the Acheron. Once
there, he is to dig a pit, pour a libation to the dead, and petition
them with promises of additional sacrifices when he later arrives
home in Ithaca, along with a special sacrifice to Tiresias himself; he
is to sacrifice a ram and a black ewe, apparently (we learn later)
letting them bleed into the pit. Many souls of the dead will then
come. When they do, Odysseus is to draw his sword to keep them
away from the blood until he has been able to consult with Tiresias,
who will tell him about his path ahead and his eventual nostos
(10.516–40).
Odysseus and his men immediately sail away, lamenting what they
must do, and bringing Book 10 to a close. The next book narrates
Odysseus’s journey to Hades, the so-called nekuia.

Nekuia and Katabasis

From antiquity Odyssey 11 has been called the nekuia (Diodorus
Siculus, Library of History 4.39.2), a term that is not altogether apt,
especially when taken to suggest that the account, or a portion of it,
involves an act of necromancy.3 As Sarah Isles Johnston has pointed
out, Odysseus does not conjure the spirits up to the land of the
living (contrary to how the account is often read) but goes to the
place of the dead. Moreover, unlike a necromancer he does not
compel the shades to speak; they do so of their own accord, or even
refuse to speak altogether.4 Even if nekuia is taken in the looser
sense to refer simply to “a magical rite by which ghosts were called
up and questioned about the future,” it scarcely applies here.5 To be
sure, Odysseus does perform sacrifices that attract several disparate
groups of shades out of Erebus: brides, unmarried young men, long-
suffering old men; “tender” young women who are recently
mourning; and men slain in battle (11.36–41).6 But these fade from
the story as quickly as they appear. In addition, only the brief
conversation with Tiresias concerns the future. Odysseus’s other
encounters focus on the terrible events on earth in the past and the
arguably more terrible realities of Hades in the present.
Nekuia is certainly an inappropriate moniker for later underworld
tours that follow in Homer’s wake, including the Apocalypse of Peter,
despite the title of the first full-length study devoted to it, the
German classicist Albert Dieterich’s Nekyia (1893). The vast majority
of these Greek, Roman, Jewish, and Christian journeys do not
involve consultation at all, let alone with souls called up to predict
the future; typically the accounts involve journeys of living persons
to the realms of the dead, not of the dead to the living; and the
travelers are almost always interested observers, not anxious
interrogators. As a matter of tradition and convenience I will
continue to refer to Odyssey 11 with the traditional term, nekuia, but
for the broader phenomenon I will speak of katabasis (a “going
down”—that is, to the realms of the dead), a term that admittedly
has its own problems.7

The Narrative Function of the Nekuia

The nekuia stands out among the narratives of the Odyssey. On one
hand, coming at the center of the epic, it is both the focal and the
turning point, as the protagonist, after random and hopeless
wandering from one ill-timed disaster to another, receives some
direction for his return home and a much-welcome prophecy about
what will happen once he arrives.8 Moreover, and yet more obvious,
it is completely unlike any of Odysseus’s other adventures: here he
travels beyond the normal world of human existence to the realm of
the deceased, a place of complete darkness, where, apart from
Hades and Persephone, not even the gods themselves go. It is a
place of ultimate reality in a rather terminal sense—the final destiny
for everyone who lives.
One would therefore expect the adventure to be centrally
important, encapsulating in some sense the message of the entire
epic, and the narrative does not disappoint.9 Some readers have
considered the episode symbolic: Odysseus, in a sense, dies and
rises again, reborn into a new outlook and given courage for his
ongoing mission, allowing him to move from his heroic past of glory
in war to a future life in Ithaca. There may be something to this
reading, but it is not the whole story. The desperate desire for
nostos has been very much alive from the outset of the narrative
and has already been set in sharp contrast with kleos (κλέος), the
passion for “fame” and “glory” at all costs, especially as it can be
attained through valiant effort on the battlefield, even to the point of
death. What matters for the entire Odyssey is instead coming home
—place, property, position, and the beloved people in life: wife, son,
father. The nekuia does not alter that emphasis or create it through
a rebirth into a new life or a new perspective. It does, however,
confirm it in a radical way, showing that the desire for home and
longevity is not merely a personal or idiosyncratic predilection of
Odysseus but is the only sensible approach to life, given the realities
of death.
This may come as a startling claim to anyone steeped in the world
of epic in general, and the world of the Iliad in particular. No longer
are τιμή (tîmé; honor) and kleos the ultimate desiderata. Of course,
honor and renown remain important to the living; but their
importance is relative, especially in comparison with values
associated with home and family. Odysseus does not first acquire
this understanding in his encounters with the dead, but he is
strongly confirmed in it, with insights beyond what is available to
earthbound mortals.

Odysseus’s First Encounters

Book 11 begins with the voyage across the river Oceanus to a place
where there is no light. An obvious narrative tension occurs
immediately, just one of the account’s many incongruities: everyone
in that land, including the newcomers, appears to see clearly in pitch
blackness.10
Once he arrives, Odysseus performs the prescribed rites, and after
the blood has flowed into the pit, a number of “souls of the dead”
arise “up out of Erebus” (ὑπὲξ Ἐρέβεος; 11.36–37). Partly because of
this statement, commentators often claim that Odysseus does not
actually go “into” Hades but only to its entrance, except possibly
toward the end of his journey.11 This is almost certainly a
misreading, however: the text repeatedly places him in Hades.12
Since the shades that rise up from the pit disappear from the
narrative as soon as they arrive, they are not of major importance
for our interests.13 But it is worth noting that they are aptly called
“powerless heads of the dead” (νεκύων ἀμενηνὰ κάρηνα; 11.29, 49).
These are pathetic shadows of what had been full-bodied humans.
Odysseus has to ward them off because they are eager to drink the
blood in the pit. Later we learn why: the blood will temporarily
restore their powers of recollection and speech. In their “normal”
state not only are the shades void of all strength, but they lack all
memory. And so the grim description of afterlife existence begins:
the dead dwell in complete darkness with no strength, memory,
intelligence, or speech—mere shadows of life. Much of the book
serves to reinforce these points.14
Odysseus first encounters his recently deceased but as yet
unburied colleague Elpenor, who desperately pleads for burial rites
but without indicating why. In the comparable case of Patroclus in
the Iliad, burial was a requirement for the deceased to enter Hades
(Il. 23.65–92). That may be the case here as well, but it is not clear:
Elpenor has already crossed the river Oceanus and appears to be in
Hades (Od. 11.65, 69), in the same location as, say, Anticleia and
Tiresias.15 Still, a reader might at least imagine a decent burial will
somehow improve Elpenor’s lot in the underworld. Given what
Odysseus is to learn later in this account, however, it is hard to see
how: the eternal state of those already buried could scarcely get any
worse.16 It may be that Elpenor simply wants a funeral to celebrate
him as the valiant hero he never was.17
One further narrative oddity is that whereas other shades need to
drink the sacrificial blood to regain their memory and power of
speech, Elpenor speaks coherently with full memory without having
done so. One could interpret this to mean that the unburied still
have their memories. Then again, later in the book Achilles also
engages with Odysseus without drinking the blood, as, to a lesser
extent, does Tiresias, although as a divinely inspired prophet he may
have been an exception to the rule. It is not clear whether
Agamemnon drinks the blood or not—it depends on the textual
decision at 11.390.18 However one resolves this issue, the internal
discrepancies remain, and the most frequently suggested options are
also the most obvious: maybe Homer simply wanted to avoid
needless repetition—although that would be an odd explanation for
the first omission (Elpenor). More likely, the account is simply
inconsistent.
Odysseus next meets the prophet Tiresias, the raison d’être of the
journey. As Circe had indicated, Tiresias does have a functioning
memory, and he immediately recognizes Odysseus, asking him why
he has left the light of the sun in order to “see the dead and the
place where there is no joy” (ἀτερπέα χῶρον; 11.94), a description
that heightens the foreboding of what is to come. Even though
Tiresias apparently does not require the blood to speak, he wants a
draught anyway, possibly to allow him better to make his
predictions, or possibly simply because he sometimes enjoyed a nice
drink. In any event, the conversation that follows strikes most
readers as anticlimactic.19 The prophet does tell Odysseus what will
happen to him during his return home, but he gives him only one
piece of advice: on no account should he and his men harm the
cattle and sheep of Helios when they land on Thrinacia, or all but he
alone will perish. In the event, the men ignore the warning and are
indeed all killed. Thus neither the description of the home journey
nor the advice has any effect on the wider plot or on Odysseus’s trip.
As to what will happen on the journey itself, Circe later provides the
same information, at least insofar as it unfolds in the Odyssey.
So what was the point of the trip to Hades? Surely it is a simple
narrative ploy, allowing the prophet not so much to see Tiresias as to
meet others and learn from them not just how they arrived in the
world below but, even more, what existence is like there.20 For our
purposes the three most important of these meetings are with his
mother, Anticleia, and his erstwhile colleagues in war, Agamemnon
and Achilles.

The Reality of Death: Anticleia

Anticleia had arrived at the pit before Odysseus encountered Tiresias
but had been kept from the blood by Odysseus’s sword. It is not that
she has been patiently biding her time; she is witless, unable to
recognize her son or to speak. Odysseus asks the prophet how her
memory can be restored, and Tiresias explains the function of the
blood: any of the shades who drinks it will speak truthfully (νημερτὲς
ἐνίψει; 11.148). Odysseus allows her to drink, she recognizes him
immediately, and they have their famous heart breaking reunion.
She cannot understand how he could be there, a living man in the
land of the dead; he, on the other hand, does not know how, when,
or why she has arrived.21 Their initial discussion is all about the
recent past: he explains why he has come, and she gives him
information about family life back in Ithaca, his wife, son, and father.
Part of what makes her report interesting for the reader is that she
reveals only what she knew up to the time of her death, for
example, that Telemachus was not having any problems but was
being treated with due respect by all (“Telemachus is peacefully
managing the estate”; 11.185). Odysseus has already learned from
Tiresias that all is not well on the home front, and the reader knows
from Books 1–4 that Telemachus in particular is not in a good
state.22
More grievous to Odysseus, though, is his mother’s revelation of
her own demise. She was not taken off by illness or the arrows of
Artemis, but out of unbearable grief for Odysseus himself: “It was
my desire for you and your counsels, glorious Odysseus, and for
your gentle disposition, that stole away my honey-sweet life”
(11.203–4). Odysseus responds to these gut-wrenching words with
deep compassion and rushes to fold his mother in his embrace. But
to no avail. She is a shade of no substance, and his arms pass
through her: “Three times I rushed to her and my heart ordered me
to clasp her; but three times she flew from my hands like a shadow
(σκιῇ) or even a dream (ὀνείρῳ)” (11.206–8). His failed embraces
deepen his grief, and he makes a pathetic plea: “My mother, why do
you not stay when I want to clasp you, so that even in Hades the
two of us can throw our arms around each other and at least take
pleasure in our cold mourning?” (κρυεροῖο τεταρπώμεσθα γόοιο;
11.210–12). The wording of that final clause is important. Tiresias
had already announced that Hades was “the land of no joy”
(ἀτερπέα χῶρον). Here we see it in its most pathetic and
pronounced form: Odysseus cannot even find a sliver of consolatory
joy (τεταρπώμεσθα) with his mother.
Out of frustration he wonders whether “dread Persephone” is
pulling a trick on him by showing him only an “image” (εἴδωλον) of
his mother rather than her real self. But Anticleia tells him the hard
truth, which, unbeknownst to him, he has come to Hades to find.
Everyone shares the same fate. After death there is no life; the body
is gone with all its strength. All that is left is a shadow of existence.
And so we have some of the key lines of the book: “My son . . .
Persephone, daughter of Zeus, is not deceiving you. This is what
happens to mortals (αὕτη δίκη ἐστὶ βροτῶν) when they die. The
sinews no longer hold flesh and bones together, but when life leaves
the white bones the blazing fire’s overwhelming force destroys the
body, and the soul (ψύχη) flies off, fluttering like a dream (ἠύτ
ὄνειρος ἀποπταμένη πεπότηται)” (11.216–22). The shades really are
shades, shadows of life. They are not physical entities; they can feel
no physical pain, pleasure, or joy; they have no more substance
than a passing dream. They are “powerless” and “witless,” epithets
common in the narrative.
Anticleia’s sad truth is confirmed by Odysseus’s subsequent
encounters with two of the mightiest men of his age who are now
without strength, power, honor, or status. Like everyone else, they
are simply dead.

The Once Mighty Agamemnon

After other episodes of less moment for our concerns (the Catalogue
of Heroines, 11.225–332, and the Interlude in Odysseus’s
storytelling, 11.333–84), we come to his meeting with Agamemnon,
the leader of the Greek armies in their ten-year war. Homer’s
audience, of course, would have been well aware of Agamemnon’s
horrible fate after the war, later immortalized by the fifth-century
tragedians. Once home from his heroic exploits on the battlefield,
the Greek armies’ commander-in-chief was mercilessly slaughtered
in his own home through the machinations of his wife, Clytemnestra,
and her lover, Aegisthus.
Most of Agamemnon’s conversation with Odysseus involves a
harrowing description of his betrayal and death (11.404–34), leading
to his hortatory conclusion: you cannot trust women (11.456). In
particular Odysseus himself needs to be wary when he reaches the
shores of Ithaca. Homer, of course, is using the tale as a study in
contrasts. Ever-faithful and persevering Penelope is no Clytemnestra,
and the stark differences serve to highlight the glories of Odysseus’s
own, joyful nostos.23 On the other hand, to be fair, unlike
Agamemnon, Odysseus had not slaughtered one of his own children
to propitiate a god who was frustrating his passion for a war of
revenge and honor. But that too is part of the point.24 Some
passions (war, vengeance) are not worth pursuing at any price, in
particular the sacrifice of home and (literally) family; failing to grasp
the point can bring utter disaster.
In any event, more germane for our purposes is the contrast
Homer draws between the power and renown of the once-mighty
Agamemnon and the pathetic state he is in now and forever. The
reader is not only struck by the contrast between his glorious life
and disastrous death, but also by the reversals brought by the
realities of death, which serve to instantiate Anticleia’s claims about
the “way of mortals” (δίκη . . . βροτῶν; 11.218). Agamemnon meets
Odysseus not as the intrepid, fearless, powerful commander of the
greatest army Greece had ever mustered, but as a pathetic,
enervated shade. He approaches Odysseus grieving and weeping
loudly and tries to touch him, reaching out his hands to grasp him in
sorrow and affection (11.385–91). But as happened earlier with
Odysseus himself, the attempt at physical contact comes to naught.
In this instance Homer does not stress the anatomical issue (sinews,
flesh, and bones) but its corollary: utter powerlessness: “He no
longer had the firm strength or vitality (ἲς ἔμπεδος οὐδέ τι κῖκυς) he
formerly enjoyed in his supple limbs” (11.393–94). Agamemnon can
no longer clasp hands, let alone bear arms, and Odysseus weeps at
the pathetic sight.
If that is what happens to the mightiest warriors of powerful
armies, what will happen to the rest of us? As it turns out, it will be
no worse; but the terrifying news is that it will be the same—the
same for everyone, ruler or peasant, valiant or cowardly, rich or
impoverished, powerful or decrepit, upright and godly or wicked and
godless. There are no rewards and punishments and no levels of
happiness and despair.25 It is all the same. That becomes yet more
clear in Odysseus’s next encounter, with the mightiest of the Greek
heroes, Achilles.

Choosing Life on Any Terms: Achilles

In Odysseus’s meeting with Achilles we find the clearest expression
of the wrenching and pathetic state of the dead and, thus, the
ultimate lesson of the account. The goals of life are not tîmé and
kleos at any price. The cost may be too high. Death shows that the
summum bonum of life is to continue living it.
As readers of Homer know full well, that is not the view of Achilles
in the Iliad. It is especially striking that the hero directly reflects on
the relative importance of renown and life in the earlier epic;
moreover, the reflection comes precisely in a conversation with
Odysseus. In Book 9 of the Iliad, the war is not going well, and
Odysseus has been sent to Achilles’ tent to persuade him to forgo
his wrath and return to battle before it is too late (Il. 9.179–306).
Characteristically, Achilles holds firmly to his grudge against
Agamemnon and refuses to yield. Near the end of his long reply
(9.307–429), Achilles says he has long known he must choose
between two paths—a glorious death in battle or a return to his
beloved homeland for a long life: “For my mother, the silver-footed
goddess Thetis, has told me that two kinds of fate are carrying me
to the end in death. If I remain here to do battle before the city of
the Trojans, my return home (νόστος) will perish, but my renown
(κλέος) will never die; but if I return home to my beloved homeland,
my noble renown (κλέος) will perish, but I will have a long life and
my end in death will not come to me soon” (9.410–16).
It is striking that in the immediate context of his deliberations in
Iliad 9 Achilles claims to prefer long life to renown, and he urges his
companions to pack up and return home with him. That changes,
though, with the death of Patroclus. At that point Achilles firmly
rejects a peaceful return home and chooses kleos (18.78–137).
Eventually (outside the epic) he will go down fighting.
Whatever Odysseus may have thought of the matter in Iliad 9, his
view is clear throughout the entire narrative of the Odyssey. He
seeks home above all else. On one hand, then, his encounter with
the shade of Achilles contrasts the paths taken by the two great
heroes. In the narrative world of Homer, however, the conflict is
much larger. It is the Iliad versus the Odyssey. On an even larger
scale, it is a conflict that threatens the entire epic tradition. Does the
reality of death undermine the traditional epic ideal ne plus ultra,
“renown” above all else?26
The conflict very much shapes the tone of the conversation
between the two heroes (Od. 11.473–537). Unlike Odysseus’s other
encounters in Hades, this one involves hard words, sarcasm,
disagreement, and reproof. It seems to start well enough. Achilles
recognizes Odysseus and weeps, addressing him with the well-worn
epithet “Born of Zeus” (διογενές). But then he maligns and suspects
him, addressing him as σχέτλιε—something like “you savage” or
“you wretched man”—and asks how he could come up with a more
audacious plan than to visit the dead while still living. It is so like the
“man of many devices” (πολυμήχανος), to “dare” to come down to
Hades (πῶς ἔτλης Ἄïδόσδε κατελθέμεν; 11.473–75).
Odysseus does not rise to the bait. Or at least he seems not to. He
greets Achilles with words of praise, calling him the “mightiest of the
Achaeans,” and informs him that he has come to consult Tiresias for
help to return home. But he then launches into a lament over his
own misfortune: he has not yet reached Achaea and has done
nothing but suffer hardship (αἰὲν ἔχω κακά; 11.482). It may seem a
little insensitive to complain about the difficulties of life to someone
who has already died, but Odysseus clearly does not see it this way.
“But you, Achilles,” he says, “no man was ever more blessed than
you, or ever will be” (11.482–83). He then explains why; Achilles
was the greatest mortal ever to have lived and is now the greatest
among those who have died: “For before, when you were living, we
Argives gave you honor equal to the gods (ἐτίομεν ἶσα θεοῖσιν), and
now that you are here, you rule the dead mightily (μέγα κρατέεις
νεκύεσσιν ἐνθάδ’ ἐών). So do not grieve at all about having died,
Achilles” (11.484–86).
To this point in the narrative Odysseus has shown that he knew
almost precisely nothing about the dead before he arrived in Hades.
And so his claim that Achilles is ruler of the dead appears to be
empty flattery, a captatio benevolentiae based on nothing. But more
than that it is a sarcastic vaunt. Odysseus knows full well that he
himself is a strong, vibrant, living warrior making a temporary stop
in a place that is not his own; Achilles is a pathetic shadow of a man
with no hope of ever becoming anything different. Even so, he has
retained his wit, and he annihilates Odysseus’s mock admiration and
self-pity with a withering response, the most memorable words of
the book: “Do not console me about death, O shining Odysseus”
(φαίδιμ’ Ὀδυσσεῦ, an epithet returning the sarcasm; 11.488). “I
would prefer to be a low-class serf attached to the soil, serving
someone else, a man with no property of his own who has barely
enough to live on, than to rule over all the dead who have perished”
(βουλοίμην κ’ ἐπάρουρος ἐὼν θητευέμεν ἄλλῳ, ἀνδρὶ παρ’ ἀκλήρῳ,
ᾧ μὴ βιότος πολὺς εἴη, ἣ πᾶσιν νεκύεσσι καταφθιμένοισιν ἀνάσσειν;
11.489–91).27
This passage has often been interpreted to indicate that Achilles,
the greatest of all shades, does indeed rule the dead but that, even
so, he would prefer life in the world above as an impoverished day
laborer slaving away in service of a peasant. But in fact that may not
be right. Achilles does not concede that he rules below; he simply
ignores the comment. Robert Schmiel has argued that he actually
denies the claim.28 There are serious problems with Schmiel’s
argument at this point,29 and even more with the unwarranted
conclusions that he draws, that in fact Achilles retains the same view
of kleos he had in the Iliad, does not regret his decision for it, and
given the choice would do it all again. This interpretation flies
completely in the face of Achilles’ forceful claim: he would rather be
alive as a man without any kleos whatsoever, a low-class field hand
with no power, authority, or reputation, working his fingers to the
bone in service of a lowlife peasant, another man with no kleos,
than to lord it over all the dead. He made the wrong choice. It is
better to be alive with no kleos than dead with all the kleos in the
(under)world. This is a stark reversal of the Iliad. Death does not
merely put the ideals of life in perspective, by, say, relativizing them.
It completely alters them. Nothing is worth death, not even eternal
renown. Life can mean ongoing existence, vitality, strength, mental
acuity. Death robs a person of all that. It means going to the “joyless
kingdom,” as a mere image of oneself, a powerless and mindless
shadow flitting around the realms of the dead forever. Odysseus has
taken the better path—not glory in battle but life in his native land,
at home with wife, son, and father. Nostos triumphs over kleos.
Even so, the end of the encounter with Achilles has been read by
other interpreters as calling that view into question, and for
understandable reasons. After the dead Achilles has schooled
Odysseus on the brutalities of underworld reality, he asks for news
of his son, Neoptolemus. On this Odysseus has first-hand
knowledge. Neoptolemus is one of the most handsome men on
earth, wise in counsel of war, brave and mighty in battle, and well-
rewarded for his feats. The news of his son’s renown brings Achilles
joy, and he departs by striding away through a “field of asphodel”
(ἀσφοδελὸν λειμῶνα; 11.539). Does this not show that kleos is in
fact the dominant virtue, that it is what really matters to Achilles,
even in the world below?
Several points need to be made. For one thing, Achilles is proud of
Neoptolemus precisely because he is living with kleos. He did not
have to sacrifice his life to receive it. What if he had done so? He
would be yet another empty shade longing to live the life of a
starving field hand. There is no telling how proud Achilles would be
of him then, or for how long. Moreover, the happiness that Achilles
temporarily feels is unrelated to his own situation in Hades, whether
he is ruling or not. He is still down there, forever, a powerless shade.
What has made him happy is news from the world of the living. Of
course it is better to be alive with kleos than without it, and Achilles
is proud that his son has it in spades. But that would not mean he
would want him to die on the battlefield to advance his renown yet
further. As he himself says, life on any terms is far more valuable
than renown in death.
Finally, the rosy picture most readers have of Achilles striding off
joyously through a field of freshly blooming flowers (“asphodel”) as
if in a summer meadow on a pleasant sunny day may not be the
image Homer was trying to create. Yes, Achilles is glad to hear the
news. But one recent study has argued that contrary to popular
imagination “asphodel” is not a bright, blooming flower. The word
may instead refer to dull grey ashes, such as the remains from
cremation. It was a dusty, gloomy meadow.30

Final Encounters
Odysseus encounters seven other individuals before leaving Hades,
six of whom do not say a word to him. First he sees one other
former colleague from the war, Ajax, who had committed suicide in
anger when Odysseus was awarded Achilles’ arms after the great
warrior’s death. Ajax harbors his resentment and refuses to answer
Odysseus when addressed (11.541–67). Also silent is Orion, seen a
bit later, herding a group of wild beasts he had killed in life (11.572–
75). Odysseus then sees Minos, who, in a role that became
traditional, was “rendering judgments for the dead” (θεμιστεύοντα
νέκυσσιν; 11.569) as they came to him pleading their cases (δίκας
εἴροντο; 11.570). It is hard to know exactly what this means, but it
appears to suggest that not all shades are treated equally, at least
when it comes to justice. Still, justice for what? Conceivably for what
had happened while they were still living, but more likely for slights
they received once dead. However one construes the matter, the
idea of differentiated treatment does not seem consistent with the
rest of the account.
A more obvious incongruity, frequently noted, comes next:
Odysseus sees three people being tortured. The giant Tityos is
stretched over nine plethora (about three hundred yards), helpless
to defend himself from two vultures devouring his liver. His sin is
specified: he had tried to rape Leto, the lover of Zeus. Tantalus
stands in a pool up to his chin, perpetually taunted, in thirst and
hunger. Whenever he stoops to drink, the water recedes from his
reach; above him are trees with luscious fruits within his grasp, but
whenever he stretches out his hand, the wind blows them away.
Sisyphus is perpetually rolling a huge stone up a hill to move it over
the crest; but as soon as he reaches the top, its weight turns it back
and it rolls to the bottom. So he begins again (11.576–600).31
Why these three sinners, in particular? Numerous interpretations
have appeared over the years, principally based on later myths
describing their heinous activities and respective punishments. Often
it is said that these three were especially vile offenders against the
gods. That may be so (the text gives no indication), but it bears
emphasizing that nothing suggests they represent types of humans
to be perpetually tormented. They are three exceptions.32 They do
show, however, that Homer knew of traditions involving
differentiated afterlives in which some have it much worse than
others, as also suggested in other places in his epics.33
Odysseus’s final encounter involves one other exception to the
rules of eternity—the demigod Heracles. Either because of his divine
lineage as the offspring of Zeus or in reward for his heroic deeds,
Heracles has a double life, or at least a simultaneous existence in
both life and death. Odysseus explains that when he encountered
Heracles, he actually saw his image (εἴδωλον). Heracles “himself”
(αὐτός) was enjoying (τέρπεται, again) a feast among the immortal
gods, married to Hebe, daughter of Zeus and Hera (11.601–4). And
so Heracles’ shade is with the other mortals in Hades while his real
self is reveling up in heaven, able to enjoy himself outside the
realms Tiresias had called “joyless.”
Yet even just Heracles’ image is a mighty presence in the world
below: the other shades flee that presence in terror of his menacing
arrow. When he addresses Odysseus, it is only to comment on the
similarities between them, pointing out that they both suffered
immeasurably in the world above and, while living, came down to
Hades. After recounting his own heroic deeds in the world below,
Heracles breaks off without expecting a reply.34
Odysseus ends his tale by indicating he had hoped to see some
others in the world below, but he fled in terror at the thought that
worse could come, that Persephone might send out the head of the
Gorgon. He escaped to his ship and with his crew embarked across
the river Oceanus to return to the world of the living.

Conclusion
The broader lessons of Homer’s katabasis are clear. Most important:
the nature of death puts into perspective the value of life. The world
of mortals may be hard and full of suffering; but whether it is the
constant dangers confronted by heroes desperately trying to return
home or the daily grind of field hands enduring a life of poverty, the
suffering of the present cannot be compared to the perpetual
banality of what lies ahead. The miserable existence of the living, on
any terms, is better than anything on offer in the realms of the
dead, where there is literally nothing to live for, since no one is alive.
Existence there is a mere shadow. There are no pleasures to
appreciate, no goals to achieve, no strength to enjoy, no memories
to relish, and no future to anticipate. It is a life of flitting shadows.
In the moving words of Erwin Rohde from more than a century ago,
in the Homeric picture, “Nothing is so hateful to man as death and
the gates of Hades: for when death comes it is certain that life—this
sweet life of ours in the sunlight—is done with.”35
Within the broader narrative of the epic, Odysseus’s journey to
Hades thoroughly validates his single-minded desire to return home.
Glory and renown are indeed worth striving for, but they pale in
comparison with the fact of life itself. Homer does not overly
sentimentalize the view. Not every homecoming goes well, as
Agamemnon so pathetically explains. But on balance, the greatest
good is life at home among property and loved ones. Even if that is
not a reality everyone can enjoy, no one should abandon life before
absolutely necessary, since after life is only death.

The Katabasis of Aeneas

To shift from Homer to Virgil is to move to a vastly different world:
separated by seven centuries; living in different parts of the
Mediterranean with correspondingly different social, cultural, and
political contexts; working in different languages; composing their
works for altogether different reasons and with vastly different
assumptions, commitments, ideologies, perspectives, and beliefs
about the world and the world to come.36 They do share a great
deal as well, of course, including similar inherited mythologies and
understandings of cultic practices. Most important they share a
genre, with Virgil quite deliberately modeling his epic on those of his
predecessor. Among other things, he places a katabasis of his
traveling hero, Aeneas, also at the center of a divinely guided but
fraught journey.
Since we do not know the actual circumstances of Homer’s
composition and his motivations—or even his identity—they provide
no hermeneutical purchase for reading his work.37 Not so, Virgil.
Scholars have come to doubt the claim of Servius that Virgil had
been commissioned by Augustus to produce an epic of the founding
of Rome to rival the greatest epics of Greece.38 But at the very least
Virgil did so on his own initiative. The Aeneid was neither conceived
nor designed as a disinterested history of the Roman past. It was
unapologetically an encomium on the glories of the world’s greatest
city and, in particular, a tribute to its greatest ruler.
But the encomium is not, in the end, unadulterated sycophantic
praise. As scholars such as Wendell Clausen and Adam Parry
recognized more than a half century ago, the Aeneid has a dark and
ominous side that casts the Roman achievement seriously into doubt
with some regularity, most stunningly in the katabasis of Book 6. As
Clausen put it, “It is the paradox of the Aeneid, the surprise of its
greatness, that a poem which celebrates the achievement of a
national hero and the founding of Rome itself should be such a long
history of defeat and loss.”39
The epic as a whole describes the toils of Aeneas, heroic warrior
of Troy up to its tragic end, who, with divine instructions, fled the
burning city with family, colleagues, and city gods to found the
Roman people who were later to build the city, and then the empire,
of Rome. The Homeric model is evident even on the level of
narrative structure: the first six books recount Aeneas’s journeys
with their gut-wrenching struggles and setbacks, closely related to
those of the Odyssey; the final six books describe his arrival in Italy
and the battles that ensued as he sought a permanent home for his
people, a new Troy, a war narrative comparable, in broad terms, to
the Iliad.
At the center stands the katabasis, whose parallels with Homer’s
nekuia are obvious even to a first-time reader. A hero’s interminable,
dangerfilled, but divinely guided journey is interrupted by a trip to
the realms of the dead where he is to receive guidance for what lies
ahead. While there, he encounters numerous people from his past,
beginning with a traveling companion who had unexpectedly died
but had not yet been buried; he sees fallen soldiers from the recent
Trojan War; he joyfully meets a parent, whom he three times tries to
embrace but to no effect. And on and on. The self-conscious
modeling of Aeneid 6 on Odyssey 11 gives us an interpretive
advantage over its predecessor, a comparative leverage unavailable
to the reader of Homer. In the broadest terms, as we will see, the
lesson to be drawn from the world below is no longer the same
except in the remotest sense. To be sure, on a very basic level,
Virgil’s portrayal is equally, if not even more, pessimistic about the
possibilities of existence after death, even though it has not usually
been read this way. Still, the fact is that for all except a very few
special and chosen individuals, the life to come is truly awful: not
because those who have died continue to exist as mere shadows of
their former selves, as in the nekuia, but because they are very
much alive and are subject to mental and physical pain, either for a
long period of purgation or forever.
Corresponding to this very different conception of the world to
come is the parenetic point derived from it: The goal of life is not to
enjoy the beauties of the world in the comforts of home and the
presence of family for as long as possible before meeting one’s
inevitable fate. Virgil’s account does stress the importance of life in
the world above rather than in the world below, but now it is not the
long life of the satisfied individual. Instead, ultimate earthly good lies
in national achievement. The realities of what comes after death
reveal that the most important feature of human existence is the
civilizing influence of the greatest empire the world has ever seen.
The significant “end” or “goal” of all things is the rule of Rome. This
is a presentist, realized eschatology.

Traditional Influences on Aeneid 6

Before proceeding with an analysis, it is important to stress that
traditions outside of Homer also significantly influenced Virgil. Much
of his account draws on subsequent Greek thought, most obviously
Platonic, concerning the nature of reality, the soul, and the life to
come.40 There is no need to summarize the major elements of
Plato’s philosophy here, except to say that his lengthy disquisitions
on the immortality of the soul function, in part, to establish its innate
superiority to the body, with the parenetic emphasis that true
philosophy, and so the best way of being, entails nurturing the soul
rather than yielding to the more natural inclinations/pleasures of the
body. The soul is the “real” person; the body is a prison. Yielding to
bodily desires both taints the soul and secures its trapping. Thus the
goal of life is to escape the body. That comes completely at death,
when the body ceases to function, decays, and is no more; but the
soul survives, tainted as little as possible, it is hoped, by its lifelong
material associations. That is why the business of philosophy is to
Another random document with
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prétexte de démocratie. La mère, intendante machinale, évoluant
des armoires à linge aux pots de confitures. Le fils, produit
hétéroclite du mariage sans amour d’un sanguin pillard et brutal
avec une lymphatique dont les sentiments affectifs s’étaient, dès
longtemps, dilués dans un gélatineux égoïsme. Le premier, ne
cherchant dans la vie que les moyens d’accroître une fortune mal
acquise et de satisfaire des ambitions louches. La seconde,
uniquement préoccupée d’éviter les bourrades du conjoint. Le
troisième, soupçonné de choyer des théories dont le seul énoncé fait
se figer d’effroi les moelles bourgeoises.
Entre eux nul lien fourni par une foi, nul idéal désintéressé, nul
souci d’avenir un peu noble.
— Si je coupais les vivres à Charles ? reprit Mandrillat au bout de
quelques minutes employées à constater qu’il est fort difficile d’agir
sur quelqu’un de qui l’on n’eut jamais cure.
Mme Hortense balança la tête comme pour indiquer que la chose
était scabreuse. Puis réfléchissant que les mille francs mensuels
économisés de la sorte lui reviendraient peut-être, entrevoyant un
horizon de marmelades fines et de pantoufles fourrées, elle se
permit une sourde approbation.
Mandrillat hésitait. Fermer sa bourse lui souriait. Car s’il se
montrait parfois généreux lorsqu’il lui fallait domestiquer un politicien
ou corrompre un fonctionnaire, il gardait un penchant à l’avarice dont
il ne se départait, d’habitude, que pour mettre en liesse et combler
voracement les plus grossiers de ses appétits. — D’autre part, son
orgueil et son prestige pouvaient souffrir si le bruit se répandait que
son fils traînait la savate.
— Enfin je verrai, conclut-il. Toi, puisque tu n’es pas capable de
m’aider, préviens Charles que j’ai à lui parler… Oui, écris-lui de venir
ici demain vers midi. Maintenant, ôte-toi de devant moi et tâche que
le déjeûner soit prêt à l’heure.
Mme Hortense obéit avec d’autant plus d’empressement qu’un
soufflé au fromage, dont elle voulait surveiller la réussite, l’attendait
à la cuisine. Entre ce fils, si loin de son cœur et ce mets savoureux
si cher à son estomac, le choix ne faisait pas doute : le soufflé avant
tout.
Resté seul, Mandrillat résuma ses incertitudes par cet
apophtegme défraîchi : — Il n’y a plus d’enfants.
Le démon aux yeux glacés qui veillait dans son ombre lui
répondit peut-être : C’est parce que, participant à ma stérilité, les
hommes de ton acabit ne sont pas de vrais pères.
Mais Mandrillat ne l’entendit point.
 CHAPITRE III

Parmi les ouvriers qui façonnent des matériaux pour construire

cette Tour de Babel : la société sans Dieu ni maître de l’avenir, il faut
compter plusieurs générations.
Ce furent d’abord les faux sages du XVIIIe siècle qui
préconisèrent l’aberration fondamentale dite, en leur patois,
perfectibilité de l’homme, entre autres, le fou bucolique et acariâtre
Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
Puis viennent les dévots à Sainte-Guillotine, les protagonistes du
drame burlesque et funèbre à la fois qu’on appelle la Révolution.
Suivirent les artisans des régimes bourgeois depuis cent ans.
Ceux-là prétendaient asseoir leur domination par le maintien de la
plèbe dans le respect du principe d’autorité. Comme s’ils ne lui
avaient retiré toute vertu efficace en niant son origine surnaturelle,
en développant le culte de l’individu, en favorisant la manie
égalitaire. Seule, l’Église pouvait donner la vie et la durée aux
institutions humaines. Or elle fut réduite aux fonctions d’un
mécanisme administratif dont le clergé dut huiler les ressorts sous le
contrôle de l’État.
Conséquence : les systèmes politiques essayés tous les trois
lustres tombèrent en pièces les uns après les autres, pareils à des
pantins dont un névrosé facétieux eût coupé les ficelles.
 Quand la société bourgeoise en fut arrivée à ce degré de
vermoulure où ses étais ne tenaient plus que par accoutumance, les
partis républicains se mirent sur elle comme des champignons
vénéneux sur une charpente humide. Et, en même temps, les tarets
du judéo-maçonnisme précipitèrent leurs sapes. Ces parasites
répandaient une puanteur telle que beaucoup d’âmes en furent
suffoquées. Mais à ceux qui réclamaient contre cette pestilence, il fut
répondu que c’était, au contraire, une bonne odeur de progrès dont,
faute de perfectibilité, ils ne savaient apprécier les baumes.
Alors la postérité des philosophes pullula.
Tout le monde, ou à peu près, voulut régénérer l’humanité. Il y
eut les socialistes qui cuisent des briques au foyer de l’enfer, pris,
par eux, pour un four intensif du modèle le plus récent. Il y eut les
anarchistes qui triturent le cambouis dont les gonds des portes de la
Géhenne sont graissés, croyant gâcher du mortier pour l’édification
du temple où l’homme s’adorera lui-même.
La Tour monta, elle monte encore, elle montera jusqu’à l’heure
où le souffle du Saint-Esprit renversera le sanctuaire dérisoire et
purifiera la face de la terre…
Écoutons parler quelques-uns de ces possédés qui ne se doutent
pas que le Mauvais affûte leurs outils et vérifie, en architecte
méticuleux, les plans de leur bâtisse.
Charles Mandrillat reçoit une fois par semaine, dans son
appartement de la Place Médicis, certains révolutionnaires venus là
aux fins de divaguer sans contrainte. Ce ne sont ni les disciples d’un
fabricant de panacée sociale, assemblés pour recueillir les
préceptes du maître, ni des politiques se concertant pour
l’élaboration d’un programme. Chacun d’eux demeure incarcéré
dans son orgueil, se mire dans ses seuls rêves, refuse de se
subordonner à qui que ce soit. Un lien toutefois les unit : la haine de
l’autorité, que celle-ci se formule dans un dogme ou qu’elle s’abrite
derrière un gendarme soigneusement nourri d’athéisme. Ils se
trouvent d’accord tant qu’il s’agit de souhaiter, avec rage, l’abolition
des idées religieuses ou la destruction du capitalisme, de vilipender
la famille ou de trépigner sur la patrie. Mais dès qu’ils ont cessé
d’exhaler leurs fureurs, ils ne pensent plus guère qu’à cultiver
l’hypertrophie de leur Moi. Affirmer l’excellence de leur personnalité,
tel est le soin presque unique auquel ils se livrent. Aussi leurs
colloques se ramènent-ils le plus souvent à une série de
monologues où le Moi s’enfle comme une montgolfière pleine de
fumées impétueuses. Les uns se montrent intelligents, les autres
bornés ; tous flottent parmi les nuages de l’abstraction et prennent
pour les accords précurseurs de l’harmonie future les ricanements
de la bise diabolique qui les emporte.
Un de ces anarchistes, inclus dans les bras d’un fauteuil, au coin
de la cheminée où du coke crépite, pérore en étirant les fils d’une
dialectique coriace :
— Moi, je pense qu’en aucun cas nous ne devons nous grouper
pour une action commune. Je n’admets pas que l’individu se
contraigne, même pendant une demi-heure, à une entente qui
restreindrait son initiative.
Cet homme libre, nommé Jean Sucre, s’est rendu l’esclave des
mille peines qu’il prend pour s’assurer que personne ne l’influence.
Une raie prétentieuse partage sa chevelure. Glabre et blondasse, il
parle d’une voix tranchante sans détourner les yeux de la cigarette
que pétrissent le pouce et l’index de sa main gauche.
Jules Greive, ex-cordonnier devenu l’apôtre du Rien dans une
feuille qui se veut le Moniteur de l’Anarchie, tête ronde et rase, face
adipeuse que coupe une moustache en brosse de caporal-clairon
trois fois rengagé, proteste. S’étant donné la mission de maintenir la
pureté de la doctrine, il n’admet pas qu’on empiète sur son domaine.
— Moi non plus, rétorque-t-il, je n’entends pas qu’on restreigne
les initiatives. Seulement, si plusieurs camarades se sont mis
d’accord pour un acte de propagande, qui les empêche de
manœuvrer ensemble, le temps d’obtenir un résultat ? Bien entendu,
personne ne commanderait, et aussitôt le but atteint, le groupe se
dissoudrait afin d’éviter tout ce qui ressemblerait à une organisation
permanente.
 Un troisième, maigre et long, serré dans une guenille, qui fut une
redingote noire, objecte :
— Et si pendant que le groupe agira, il vient à l’un de ses
membres une conception nouvelle touchant le moyen de réussir,
l’expulsera-t-on ou le suivra-t-on ?
— Pas du tout, répond Greive, ceux qui seront d’avis que son
idée est bonne l’aideront, les autres poursuivront le projet primitif.
Sucre ricane :
— Et si sur dix individus, supposons, dont se composera le
groupe, il y en a neuf qui, en cours d’exécution, changent d’avis, que
fera-t-on ?
— Chacun tirera de son côté, affirme Greive, mais il n’est pas
probable que les choses en viennent là.
— Oh si, au contraire, c’est très probable. Et nous en avons fait
l’expérience chaque fois que nous avons tenté de nous grouper. J’en
reviens donc à ce que j’ai dit : que chacun travaille de son côté, à
démolir la patraque sociale. Après, on verra… D’ailleurs, Greive, je
m’étonne que tu me contredises, toi qui passes ta vie à
excommunier quiconque parle d’organisation.
Désarçonné, Greive chercha une échappatoire :
— Dans la société future… commença-t-il.
— Pardon, laissons la société future en repos. Ni toi, ni moi ne
savons comment elle se comportera…
— Occupons nous du présent, s’écrie un quatrième interlocuteur
qui, trapu et hirsute, faisant clignoter ses petits yeux vairons bordés
de rouge, multiplie les signes d’impatience, depuis quelques
minutes.
Charles intervient :
— Vous rappelez-vous de quoi il était question ? demande-t-il du
ton le plus calme.
Tous durent faire un effort pour s’en souvenir. Il en allait toujours
de même. Ils commençaient par délibérer sur une donnée plus ou
moins positive. Puis leur penchant à l’abstraction reprenait bientôt le
dessus et c’étaient alors des bavardages infinis où chacun, sûr de
soi, visait au penseur.
Les voyant embarrassés, Charles ne put s’empêcher de sourire.
Éclaircie brève car sa physionomie reprit immédiatement
l’expression de tristesse qui lui était coutumière.
Cependant Jourry, l’homme aux yeux rouges, dit d’une voix
sourde et comme à regret :
— Il s’agissait de fabriquer des bombes.
Les autres se taisaient, évitant de se regarder comme si les
images de meurtre évoquées par cette phrase leur eussent causé du
malaise.
— C’est Chériat qui a proposé cela, dit Sucre avec une sorte de
répugnance.
Le maigre à la redingote minable se dressa. Avançant sa
mâchoire prognathe où se clairsemaient des dents ébréchées, il
proféra :
— Parfaitement, c’est moi. Voilà plus de dix ans que nous
n’avons fait danser les bourgeois sur l’air de la dynamite. Depuis que
les parlementaires ont voté leurs fameuses lois de répression, les
anarchistes se tiennent cois : ils ont peur. Mais moi, j’en ai assez de
crever de faim. Mourir pour mourir, je veux me venger de cette
ignoble société.
Or, les babillards de tout à l’heure gardaient de plus en plus le
silence. Cette invitation trop nette à l’assassinat les gênait. Ils
voulaient bien argumenter, à perte de salive, sur les bienfaits du
terrorisme. Ils n’éprouvaient point de scrupule à verser l’esprit de
révolte dans les cervelles obtuses de la plèbe. Mais tout acte décisif,
qui les aurait sortis du monde de chimères où ils se cloîtraient, leur
était importun. Puis des arrière-pensées, plus personnelles, ne
laissaient pas de les retenir.
— Tu vas trop vite, Chériat, dit enfin Greive, tu oublies qu’au
temps de Ravachol et de Vaillant, le peuple ne nous a pas compris.
Au lieu de se soulever comme nous l’espérions, il s’est mis contre
nous avec les bourgeois. Nous devons lui inculquer les principes…
Mais le maigre, plein d’amertume :
— Quels principes ? Je n’en connais qu’un seul : tout jeter par
terre. Et puis est-ce que tu te figures, par hasard, que les ouvriers
lisent tes articles ! Ah ! là, là, les boniments du compagnon Greive
sur l’individualisation de la solidarité !… Ils aiment mieux un bon de
soupe. Et toi, Jourry, avec ta manie de coller des étiquettes
subversives dans les vespasiennes, tu t’imagines préparer la
révolution ? Non, ce que je me tords quand je découvre un de tes
petits papiers ! Et toi, Sucre, qui donnes des conférences, à
l’université populaire de la rue Mouffetard, sur l’esthétique du Vinci !
Demande donc un peu aux chiffonniers et aux apprentis-tanneurs de
ton auditoire leur opinion sur le sourire de la Joconde. Ils te
répondront qu’ils s’en fichent éperdument. Paie-leur une absinthe —
sans sucre. Ce sera plus sérieux que de les scier avec tes tirades
sur « le relèvement du peuple par la compréhension des chefs-
d’œuvre ». Rien qu’à répéter cette baliverne dont tu te gargarises, si
volontiers, je sue, ma parole.
A cette apostrophe, Sucre haussa dédaigneusement les épaules.
Mais les deux autres se sentaient piqués au vif. Heureux du prétexte
que Chériat leur fournissait de jaboter, ils s’épandirent en un flux de
mots vagues. Greive soutenait que la théorie c’est de l’action. Il
préparait, disait-il, un agrégat évolutif où les besoins individuels se
proportionnaliseraient aux contingences communautaires. Trouant
cet opaque galimatias de cris vindicatifs, Jourry vantait ses travaux
et soutenait qu’il faut instruire le peuple par endosmose, vocable
qu’il avait cueilli dans un traité de vulgarisation à bon marché et dont
il aimait à s’emplir la bouche.
Naguère Chériat aurait pris part à la logomachie car bourdonner
dans le vide avait été l’un de ses plus intenses plaisirs. Mais la
misère l’éprouvait si fort depuis quelques mois que les hurlements
de son estomac lui avaient presque rendu le sens de la réalité. Il
détestait ses contradicteurs à les considérer gesticulant et lâchant
des cascades de niaiseries pompeuses. Surtout l’air de mépris
supérieur affecté par Jean Sucre l’exaspérait.
— Vous êtes des fantoches, déclara-t-il, tandis que Greive et
Jourry reprenaient haleine. Pas un de vous n’oserait appliquer la
doctrine qu’il prêche. Tant qu’il s’agit de déclamer sur des tréteaux
de réunions publiques, on vous trouve. Mais si l’on vous proposait
seulement de desceller un pavé pour construire une barricade, vous
vous enfuiriez par delà les antipodes… Eh bien, moi, je vous mettrai
au pied du mur. Oui ou non, êtes-vous disposés à fabriquer
quelques bombes et à me procurer un asile lorsque je les aurai
jetées dans des endroits que je sais bien ?
Ils ne répondirent pas tout de suite. C’est que les perspectives
ouvertes par ce frénétique ne les enthousiasmaient guère. Jourry et
Greive avaient goûté de la prison lors des explosions anciennes et
ils ne tenaient pas à réitérer. Le premier devenu propriétaire d’un
petit restaurant recommandé par la C. G. T. s’était fait une clientèle
d’ouvriers appartenant aux divers syndicats parisiens. Il vivotait
paisiblement parmi les ragoûts, les vins frelatés et les discours
emphatiques. Affronter les descentes de police, risquer la fermeture
de sa gargotte lui semblait superflu. Le second tirait des ressources
de son journal. Il ne voulait pas que des violences intempestives le
fissent supprimer. Puis il s’était arrangé une existence douillette
entre deux vieilles folles qui, le prenant pour un Messie, lui
prodiguaient les jus de viande et les gilets de flanelle.
Quant à Sucre, c’était un oisif, muni de quelques rentes. Il
trouvait amusant d’ébahir sa famille par ses propos libertaires. Il
jouait à l’anarchiste comme certains de ses pareils collectionnent
des timbres-poste ou pêchent à la ligne. Mais il se souciait peu de
subir les tracasseries et les perquisitions que lui attirerait cet agité,
s’il favorisait sa rage destructive.
Tous trois n’entendaient cependant point passer pour des tièdes.
Ils s’irritaient à l’idée que Chériat, ce pion chassé de vingt collèges
parce qu’il avait tenté d’inculquer l’anarchisme à ses élèves, ce fruit
sec de tous les concours qui posait au génie méconnu, allait plus
loin qu’eux dans la logique révolutionnaire.
 — J’ai fait mes preuves, dit Greive, j’ai passé trois ans à
Clairvaux. J’ai le droit de m’abstenir parce que je juge que le peuple
n’est pas encore mûr pour comprendre la beauté de l’action directe.
— Tu es gras et tu manges tous les jours, répondit Chériat, moi,
je passe souvent vingt-quatre heures sans rien dans le ventre. Mes
festins sont des fonds de gamelle aux portes des casernes ou des
épluchures aux halles.
Sucre pontifia
— Quand viendra le grand soir, je serai là. Je brandirai la torche
et la hache. Mais il est trop tôt : je me réserve pour parfaire
l’émancipation morale de l’individu.
Et Chériat riposta
— Tu t’emmitoufles dans des paletots rembourrés d’ouate. Moi je
grelotte sous des haillons troués.
Alors Jourry, soupçonneux comme un Jacobin de la bonne
époque, brailla :
— Tu n’es qu’un agent provocateur !
Chériat verdit sous l’outrage et leva la main pour frapper. Mais,
se maîtrisant soudain, il se contenta de désigner son corps réduit à
l’état de squelette et de dire d’un ton d’ironie amère :
— Oui, n’est-ce pas, ce sont les subventions de la Préfecture qui
m’arrondissent la panse ?
Un peu honteux de leur égoïsme, les autres blâmèrent Jourry
qui, sentant lui-même qu’il était allé trop loin, s’excusa d’une phrase
bourrue.
Charles, qui n’avait pris aucune part à la querelle et gardait
l’attitude lointaine d’un homme hanté d’une idée fixe, intervint :
— Que décidez-vous ? demanda-t-il comme s’il se réveillait d’un
songe.
Ils se regardèrent embarrassés, cherchant des mots lapidaires
pour se ménager une sortie sans conclure. Vidés par deux heures
de diatribes incohérentes, ils ne purent rien trouver.
 Enfin Greive : — J’étudierai la question.
Et Sucre : — Je verrai.
Et Jourry : — Je réfléchirai.
— Allez au diable, leur jeta Chériat entre deux quintes d’une toux
convulsive qui, depuis quelques minutes, lui déchirait la poitrine. Il
porta son mouchoir à sa bouche puis le montra teint de rouge.
Ils n’allèrent pas au diable, puisqu’ils y étaient déjà, mais ils
prirent congé à la hâte tant le spectacle de ce malheureux, pareil à
un reproche vivant leur était indigeste.
En tête-à-tête avec Chériat et sans écouter les injures que celui-
ci prodiguait aux fuyards, Charles alla vers une console encombrée
de bibelots. Il y choisit une sphère en bronze de la grosseur d’une
orange, puis revint à la cheminée où Chériat suffoquant s’adossait. Il
la fit sauter deux ou trois fois dans sa main comme si c’eût été une
balle d’enfant.
Cet étrange joujou intrigua le réfractaire :
— Qu’est-ce que c’est que ça ? demanda-t-il.
— Une bombe, répondit tranquillement Charles.
Puis comme l’autre qui parlait volontiers d’engins explosifs, mais
qui n’en avait jamais vu, écarquillait les yeux, il remit l’objet en place
et dit, sans paraître remarquer la surprise de son ami :
— Sortons ; je t’emmène dîner chez Foyot.
Chériat montra ses guenilles d’un geste qui signifiait qu’elles
feraient tache dans ce temple de la cuisine bourgeoise.
Mais Charles lui prit le bras et l’entraîna dans l’escalier :
— Peuh ! nous prendrons un cabinet, déclara-t-il.
Et tout en descendant les marches il fredonnait, d’un gosier
railleur, le refrain de la chanson que le rhapsode Paul Paulette
composa sur l’air de cette romance illustre, le Temps des Cerises :

Quand nous en serons au temps d’Anarchie,

La joie et l’amour empliront les cœurs…
 CHAPITRE IV

M. Auguste Mandrillat attendait son fils en réfléchissant aux

moyens de le remettre dans cette voie du radicalisme profitable où
lui-même florissait. Grâce à une contre-enquête menée par l’un des
jeunes arrivistes qui gravitaient autour de sa lourde personne, il
s’était assuré que Charles ne se compromettait pas au point qu’il
fallût le traiter en trouble fête dont on réprime les écarts. D’abord
Legranpan avait exagéré, sans doute dans le dessein de terrifier
méchamment le Vénérable. Charles avait, il est vrai, publié naguère
trois articles virulents dans la feuille que dirigeait Greive. Mais il
n’avait discouru qu’une seule fois devant un quarteron d’anarchistes.
Enfin, il n’avait introduit aucun révolutionnaire au domicile paternel,
puisqu’il habitait de l’autre côté de l’eau et que lorsqu’il venait, de
loin en loin, boulevard Haussmann, il était toujours seul.
Tout se réduisait donc à des fredaines de politicien en herbe, à
des pétarades de poulain qui caracole dans les prés défendus mais
qui, lorsque l’appétit lui viendra, se laissera docilement attacher au
col une pleine musette d’avoine budgétaire.
Et puis Legranpan avait-il qualité pour se montrer aussi
pointilleux ? Deux de ses ministres n’étaient-ils pas des socialistes
apprivoisés qui, la veille encore, préconisaient la crosse en l’air dans
l’armée et la grève générale dans les syndicats ? Ce couple
n’encombrait-il pas les bureaux de collectivistes chargés, pour toute
besogne, de maintenir la popularité de leurs patrons parmi les
faubourgs ?
Eh bien donc, si le président du conseil revenait à la charge,
Mandrillat ne s’interloquerait plus et saurait de quelle façon lui
retourner ses sarcasmes. Quant à Charles, il avait préparé, croyait-il,
de quoi le convaincre qu’il y a temps pour tout. Certes, il trouvait à
propos qu’un débutant dans l’art d’illusionner le travailleur se
badigeonnât de socialisme, la mode y portant. Mais prendre au
sérieux les déclamations sur la justice sociale que « le progrès des
lumières » oblige de servir à la foule, non pas. Si son fils montrait
quelque scrupule, il feindrait la bonhomie et le traiterait en cadet
sans expérience qu’une douce réprimande, enguirlandée de
promesses, ramènera dans le giron de la République d’affaires.
Dès que, prévenu par sa mère, le jeune homme entra, le
Vénérable prit une mine joviale pour lui serrer la main et entama tout
de suite le propos qu’il avait combiné :
— Ah ! Ah ! mon garçon, il paraît que nous faisons nos farces ?
Nous voilà bien vu par les citoyens de la Sociale et nous trépignons
sur ce pauvre ministère… Je comprends, je comprends. Moi, à ton
âge, je taquinais l’Empire et c’était le bon temps. Mais aujourd’hui,
nous tenons la République et il est bon de consulter les vétérans
pour savoir d’où le vent souffle, avant de hisser sa voile…
Et le papa Mandrillat t’a fait venir tout exprès afin de t’orienter
comme il sied. Tu comprends qu’il serait par trop bête de ne pas
nous entendre. Passe pour tes articles dans le Moniteur de
l’anarchie, passe pour ton discours au picrate de la salle Joblin — tu
vois que je suis au courant de tes équipées — mais il ne faut pas
que, sous prétexte de fusiller les préjugés, tu tires dans les jambes à
ton père.
Il s’interrompit pour vérifier l’effet produit. Or, Charles ne
bronchait pas. N’ayant jamais rien caché de ses actes, il ne
s’étonnait pas que le Vénérable en fût informé. D’autre part, il
connaissait trop son égoïsme pour admettre qu’une tendresse
anxieuse, une sollicitude réelle inspirassent ces effusions
papelardes. Ou l’on avait besoin de lui ou il entravait son père au
cours de quelque intrigue. Dans l’une ou l’autre occurrence, son parti
était pris. Aussi fut-ce avec le plus grand calme qu’il répondit :
— En effet, je suis anarchiste. Y voyez-vous un inconvénient ?
A part soi, Mandrillat s’ébahit de ce ton placide. Toi, pensa-t-il, tu
veux m’épater, mais tu n’es pas de force. Assurant son masque
d’indulgente cordialité, il reprit :
— Anarchiste, moi aussi parbleu ; au fond, nous le sommes
tous…
… C’est l’avenir, cela, le bel avenir. Un idéal superbe, je ne dis
pas le contraire. Mais il est besoin d’aller pas à pas et de ne pas
risquer la culbute par trop de précipitation. Nous voulons le bonheur
du peuple, c’est entendu, mais sans nous emballer. Ainsi, regarde
Legranpan ; ses livres sont des cantiques à la gloire de l’humanité
libre. Cela ne l’empêche pas de montrer de la poigne quand les
mineurs ou les vignerons se mutinent…
— Et d’incarcérer ou de faire sabrer ceux qui appliquent ses
théories, interrompit Charles.
— Oui, sans doute, c’est un peu vif. Mais que veux-tu ? La
politique a parfois des nécessités pénibles. Et puis il y a un tas de
meneurs qui voudraient bien nous chiper le pouvoir. Pas de ça,
démagogues, la place est bonne : nous entendons la garder.
Il éclata d’un gros rire qui tintait comme un sac d’écus remué.
Charles, cependant, restait impassible, n’estimant pas qu’il y eût lieu
de s’égayer. Puis comme son père reprenait son sérieux, il
demanda :
— Est-ce pour me dire cela que vous m’avez fait venir ?
— Non, non, c’était d’abord pour te mettre en garde contre les
imprudences de conduite et surtout pour te proposer quelque chose
de pratique. Je comprends bien quel était ton but lorsque tu t’es mis
à jouer de la révolution dans les milieux ouvriers. Tu visais, n’est-ce
pas, un mandat de député dans une circonscription rouge. Mais, je
te l’assure, cela devient de plus en plus difficile : il y a tellement de
concurrence ! Tu risques d’être évincé par un plus adroit que toi. Tu
me citeras Briais. En effet, il a réussi l’escamotage. Le voilà ministre
après avoir marivaudé, pendant toute sa jeunesse, avec les
anarchistes. Mais toi, ton cas est différent : tu es le fils de Mandrillat,
pilier du radicalisme. Si tu veux m’écouter, je me charge de te
procurer une position sans que tu aies besoin de te déguiser en
sectateur de Bakounine. Laisse-moi faire et je te garantis qu’il ne se
passera pas beaucoup de temps sans que tu palpes les quinze mille
balles. Une fois député, tu seras mon lieutenant et tu verras les bons
coups que nous ferons ensemble en roulant les imbéciles.
— Que faut-il entreprendre ? demanda Charles qui, pour des
raisons à lui connues, voulait que son père dévoilât entièrement ses
projets.
Mandrillat crut la partie gagnée. Il prit le ton confidentiel d’un
Clopin Trouillefou révélant à un néophyte les tours les plus propres à
berner les bonnes gens qui font confiance à la République.
— Voici comment nous allons procéder. D’abord, je te fais entrer
dans la maçonnerie. J’aurais dû y penser depuis longtemps, mais je
suis si occupé que, ma foi, j’avoue ma négligence. Donc je t’affilie à
la Loge que je préside : le Ciment du Bloc ; c’est une des plus
nombreuses et peut-être la plus influente. Dès que tu es initié, tu
prends connaissance des fiches que nous possédons non
seulement sur tous les fonctionnaires, mais sur le clergé, la
noblesse, les commerçants, bref sur quiconque nous paraît
susceptible de déterminer des votes dans un sens qui soit favorable
ou hostile à nos protégés. Tu choisis ou plutôt je t’indique un
département facile à aiguiller dans le sens qui nous importe. Il faut te
dire que nous avons institué des délégués qui surveillent la province
au point de vue électoral. Ce nous est très précieux pour maintenir
les populations dans le devoir républicain. Tu t’installes au chef-lieu
et tu t’y fais reconnaître par la Loge de l’endroit. Officiellement tu es
chargé de réunir des chiffres pour le service de statistique au
ministère du commerce. Je te ferai donner les pouvoirs nécessaires.
Tu interroges adroitement l’un, l’autre, tu tires les vers du nez aux
fournisseurs des gens riches, tu suis de près les manigances des
prêtres ; tu notes les zélés, les tièdes, les indifférents. Tu te défies de
tout le monde, même de nos frères, car il y en a beaucoup parmi eux
qui, se posant en anticléricaux fougueux, tolèrent néanmoins que
leurs femmes pratiquent. Tu gardes toujours l’œil ouvert sur les
officiers : rien de plus suspect que ces traîneurs de sabre, même
lorsqu’ils se disent radicaux. Tu relèves les conversations et les
mœurs publiques ou privées des réactionnaires les plus incoercibles
comme celles des énergumènes de la Sociale. Enfin tu vois tout, tu
te renseignes sur tout. Et, chaque semaine, tu nous adresses un
rapport où tu as consigné tes observations ; tu y joins les papiers
compromettants que tu tâcheras de subtiliser aux personnages qu’il
nous est utile de tenir sous notre coupe.
— En somme, résuma Charles, j’acquiers des titres à rédiger le
manuel du parfait mouchard.
— Mais non, mais non, tu emploies des mots vraiment
singuliers… Il ne s’agit pas d’une besogne policière. On te demande
seulement de remplir le devoir d’un bon citoyen en mettant ceux qui
gouvernent la République à même de déjouer les complots des
réactionnaires et des cléricaux.
— Soit, et après ?
— Lorsque tu as pris pied quelque part, tu poses des jalons pour
ta candidature à la Chambre. A ce propos, je t’engage à choisir une
région sucrière. Les électeurs y sont fort maniables, pourvu qu’on
leur parle sans cesse de protéger, d’encourager, de subventionner
l’industrie qui les fait vivre. Tu te voues donc à la betterave. La
betterave ouvre et ferme tous tes discours. Si tes concurrents
cherchent des diversions, tu leur clos la bouche en y introduisant la
betterave fatidique. Il faut que cultivateurs, gérants de râperies,
entrepreneurs de charrois ne puissent penser à toi sans te voir
occupé à serrer une betterave sur ton cœur. Ta profession de foi se
ramène à ceci que la betterave constitue le palladium de la France…
En outre, tu te présentes comme radical-socialiste. Cela c’est
essentiel : c’est comme si tu te disais à la fois conservateur en ce
qui regarde la propriété et révolutionnaire en ce qui concerne les
idées. Tu amalgames de la sorte la sympathie des bourgeois qui
souffrent tout à condition qu’on leur garantisse une digestion paisible
et les suffrages des ouvriers qui s’imaginent que ton étiquette
signifie la journée de deux heures avec des salaires monstrueux et
la course en quatrième vitesse vers le paradis terrestre. Si durant tes
tournées, tu tombes dans un endroit où le clergé garde, par hasard,
quelque prestige, tu lui assènes sur la tonsure une série
d’arguments des plus topiques… Oh ! tu n’as pas besoin de te
surmener l’intellect pour cela. Tu n’as qu’à déballer la ferblanterie
habituelle : les ténèbres du Moyen Age, Galilée, la révocation de
l’Édit de Nantes, les manœuvres des Jésuites pour rétablir
l’inquisition… Rien de plus facile et cela prend toujours. Ainsi ton
programme tient tout entier dans ces quatre points : vénérer la
betterave, affirmer aux propriétaires que tu resteras fixe dans la
défense de leurs intérêts, jurer au peuple que tu galoperas sur la
route des réformes et manger du curé. Et je réponds de ton
élection : une fois nommé, tu ne peux pas te figurer jusqu’où tu iras,
surtout étant dirigé par moi. Si je t’énumérais tout ce que nous
entreprendrons, j’en aurais pour jusqu’à demain.
— Donnez-moi quelques exemples, dit Charles.
— Hé, il y a cent rubriques ! Mais une démarche essentielle, c’est
de faire alliance avec les Juifs… Ah mon ami, la Juiverie, quelle
mère pour nous ! Elle tient l’or, comprends-tu, et l’or, c’est tout… Eh
bien, qu’en penses-tu, dois-je te mettre le pied à l’étrier ?
Il s’attendait à un débordement d’enthousiasme. Mais Charles se
taisait. Il s’était accoudé à un guéridon et baissait la tête comme
pour dissimuler au Vénérable l’expression de sa physionomie.
Tous deux formaient le plus étrange contraste. Le père, haut sur
jambes, ventripotent, exubérant, la figure gonflée d’astuce et comme
éclairée par un reflet de cet or divin dont il venait d’évoquer les
magies. Le fils, petit de taille, presque chétif, le teint mat et les lèvres
minces. Ses yeux très noirs demeuraient impénétrables sous un
front bombé que partageait la ride verticale des méditatifs et que
surmontait une sombre chevelure aux mèches désordonnées. Et
comme ses mains pâles qu’attachaient des poignets délicats
s’opposaient aux métacarpes velus et spoliateurs de son père ! Que
pouvait-il y avoir de sympathie entre ce gros homme remuant et
sonore et ce frêle garçon muré dans le silence ?
Cette réserve embarrassa d’abord Mandrillat puis ne tarda pas à
l’irriter. Depuis ses succès, il s’était accoutumé à ce qu’on pliât
devant lui et à ce qu’on approuvât ses dires les plus saugrenus. La
rêverie taciturne où se retranchait son fils lui parut l’indice d’une
rébellion. Déposant donc les formes captieuses auxquelles il venait
de s’astreindre à grand’peine, il dit brusquement :
— Tu te tais ! Ah çà, j’espère que tu ne prétends pas te galvauder
davantage en compagnie des voyous de la Sociale ? Je t’avertis que
je ne le tolérerais pas. Que décides-tu ? Fais-moi le plaisir de
répondre sans barguigner.
Charles voulut éviter une querelle. A quoi bon laisser voir à son
père que ses propositions l’écœuraient ? Témoigner du dégoût eût
été fort superflu, car une douloureuse expérience lui avait appris que
Mandrillat rangeait les scrupuleux dans cette catégorie d’honnêtes
gens qu’il appelait des imbéciles. Il n’aurait pas compris non plus
qu’on refusât d’entasser des sacs d’or ignominieux sous le
patronage des Juifs. Une seule chose importait : garder sa liberté,
en obtenant de son père qu’il se souciât aussi peu de lui que par le
passé.
— Vous n’avez plus à craindre, fit-il enfin, que je nuise à vos
opérations par mes rapports avec les socialistes. Il y a longtemps
que j’ai cessé de fréquenter leurs réunions et je n’ai pas envie de
recommencer. Je puis également vous promettre qu’on ne lira plus
ma prose dans la feuille révolutionnaire qui vous inquiète. N’est-ce
pas, ce que vous désirez avant tout, c’est que je ne compromette
pas votre nom ? Eh bien, vous serez satisfait.
Mandrillat se rassérénait :
— A la bonne heure, s’écria-t-il, mais tu ne me dis pas si tu es
disposé à travailler au bien de la République sous ma direction.
Voyons, faut-il que je mette les fers au feu ?
— Excusez-moi : je ne me sens pas apte à jouer le rôle que vous
désirez m’attribuer. Dispensez-moi de vous donner mes raisons ; je
crains que vous ne les admettiez pas. Nous n’avons peut-être pas la
même manière d’envisager la politique radicale, ajouta-t-il d’un ton
où, malgré lui, perçait quelque ironie.
Il se reprit immédiatement et continua :
— Je ne saurais me montrer pratique comme vous l’entendez.
Supposez que je suis un rêveur ou, tenez, plutôt, un homme qui
prend son temps pour agir mais qui, une fois déterminé, ira droit au
but avec la précision d’un obus dont un pointeur expert aurait calculé
la trajectoire.
Comme il articulait cette dernière phrase, un feu si lugubre
éclaira ses prunelles que Mandrillat eut presque peur. Quelles
pensées redoutables s’agitaient dans cette cervelle ? Il n’osa se le
demander. Une atmosphère tragique venait soudain de se créer
entre le père et le fils.
D’instinct le Vénérable tenta de réagir :
— En voilà une comparaison ! Ma parole, tu me montres une
figure… diabolique. Enfin, est-ce que tu as abandonné tes travaux
d’histoire ? A quoi t’occupes-tu en ce moment ?
Charles eut un sourire ambigu pour répondre :
— Je fais de la chimie… métallurgique.
A ce coup, Mandrillat s’épanouit :
— Très bien, très bien, s’écria-t-il, je parie que tu veux opérer sur
les machins, les choses, les moteurs ? Excellente idée. Tu peux
compter sur moi, le cas échéant, pour la commandite… Mais ne
peux-tu pas m’indiquer à grands traits, là, en trois mots, de quoi il
retourne ? Je te donnerais peut-être un bon conseil.
Charles secoua négativement la tête :
— Personne ne saurait me conseiller… Tout ce que je puis vous
dire, c’est qu’il s’agit d’une… projection qui fera beaucoup de bruit.
Mandrillat était tout à fait rassuré :
— Ah ! sournois, dit-il en se frottant les mains, tu crains que papa
te chipe ta trouvaille… A ton aise, à ton aise, garde ton secret. Tu