How does the Homeric Hymn to Demeter position the goddess in the structure of the pantheon - Essay Example

As such, the story gives a character development that shows a supremely powerful deity who has cast herself down from on high in order to redeem her lost child. Though a great deal of time is not spent on defining what particular position Demeter holds in the Pantheon as related to the other gods – one can assume be the role that she interacts with them and the way in which she behaves as well as her lack of respect when dealing with the other gods that she is of prime stature within their ranks.

Homer relates of Demeter, But grief yet more terrible and savage came into the heart of Demeter, and thereafter she was so angered with the dark-clouded Son of Cronos that she avoided the gathering of the gods and high Olympus, and went to the towns and rich fields of men, disfiguring her form a long while. In this way, the reader can discern a messianic type figure that is cast down from the glory of the gods (albeit willingly) and seeks to redeem her lost child Persephone from the clutches of hell (sin).

As she walks tohe earth attempting to locate and rescue her own child, Demeter comes onto a group of young girls that are gathering water. Her conversation with them is a denouement as to who the character of Demeter truly is and how she related to the pantheon in actuality and within her own eyes. Says Homer of her encounter with the young girls at the well, “And she, that queen among goddesses answered them saying: ‘Hail, dear children, whosoever you are of woman-kind. [120] I will tell you my story; for it is not unseemly that I should tell you truly what you ask.

Doso is my name, for my stately mother gave it me’” (Homer 119-122) However powerful Demeter was, her power was of course secondary to that of Zeus. Like all of the gods, Demeter was beholden to the commands of Zeus lest she truly risk being cast out from the company of the Olympian pantheon. When Zeus saw that Demeter was on