Prometheus: The Creative Impulse and Chain Reactions

Prometheus followed his bliss. And ended up chained to a rock, having his liver eaten out by an eagle. Every day. All because of his beliefs.

Beliefs take us places. It's important for us to know what those beliefs are. It could be that our creative impulse, our drive to live fully, our spirit in flight, didn't end with a celebration. It was fueled by and ended with passion, which is Latin for "suffering." But the suffering that Prometheus faced is everlasting torment, which speaks to the suffering of the soul as well as the body.

Prometheus, the immortal Titan of Greece created mankind. Humans weren't that well suited for Earth, being more vulnerable than animals to the elements. He suffered along with his creation, and this shared suffering agitated him into action. He was driven to relieve them of their cold and hunger and so, dared to steal fire from Mount Olympus, from the gods who had determined for themselves that only they should have it and control it.

This rebellion, more than a simple act of theft, is why Prometheus had especially angered them. He dared to believe differently from them and what they had pronounced. The gods believed that they were the only ones fit to keep fire, because of their supremacy, and also because fire is power, and any power not in their hands is a threat to their order. The gods are pure human ego, and ego doesn't put up with being challenged or held to account.

So it's important to remember the reason behind the theft on his side. He wasn't seeing what it felt like to steal. He didn't have a reputation as a thief to uphold. He suffered within himself the belief that he loved his creation more than those who were in power did. Had he not given fire to humanity, he would no longer know himself as Prometheus, and would live to regret his loss of self.  The fire would give mankind protection, light, civilization, and creative abilities. He wanted his people to have fire, he believed that they should have it, and he wanted to be the one to give it to them. And for this, he suffers.

Some people suffer just by coming into the world, like these first created humans. Perhaps there isn't enough to go around where and when they live. Or they're born to parents who are ill-equipped for parenting. Or they are sensitive to various plagues of existence. Some people actually go through experiences of having been cuffed or chained or exploited. These sufferings don't come from imaginary situations, just because they are ancient in their forms and complexities and come accompanied by hardened beliefs.

But we should examine our beliefs from time to time, just like our expectations, that can cloud our vision. Beliefs and expectations are twins who inform and transform each other. Prometheus believed his creation had a right to the same fire as the gods, and so he expected himself to provide it. Whether or not his belief was correct, or his expectation too great, could be argued. But the main concern is that his belief led him to a very concrete reality on the face of a cliff.

If we judge him to be a criminal who needs to be made an example of, then we might react to the story with moral satisfaction and keep our own creative impulses and blissful passions in check. Who wants continuous torment? A self-styled martyr perhaps, or a masochist, but mostly no one.

If we judge Prometheus to be a sacrificial hero that placed the needs of his creation above the prevailing law of the times, then we also might be settled with the thought that he ends up a martyr. We may believe his fate to be a terrible but just punishment, and again, we dampen down our spirits for our own good. There's not much inspiration to be found here.

If we believe that Prometheus actually existed and brought fire to us, then we might go so far as to honor him in some way, with a pang of sorrow for his plight. Perhaps someone could build a temple and others could offer something. Curiously, there is only one real temple to Prometheus, in Athens, and no cults sprang up around him, even though he is the creator of human beings in Greek lore.

I read this story as a child, and it has never set right with me, because it ends with ongoing defeat. Personally, I want the story to end with some sort of hope and not condemnation. Otherwise, if I can identify with Prometheus' desire to follow his bliss until his last days, then I feel bound up with Prometheus as that defeated martyr, emotionally. On the level of a story, nothing I could ever do to honor or serve him would be enough to equal his everlasting sufferings on my behalf, even if this is only a myth. It has a psychological weight that shifts itself down through Western civilization. It's one of the ageless tales that keeps us wondering why it was written at all.

This story didn't set right with Plato, either, so he wrote Hercules into the ending, having him unchain Prometheus, as one of his heroic deeds. But I don't find this entirely satisfying either. Prometheus was a Titan, one of the original beings that sprang from Mother Earth; all of them banished by Zeus when he and the other gods and goddesses came into power. This precedent of Prometheus being part of a long turf war seems important to the story, and so the idea that neither Zeus, nor his avenging eagle, nor the fate of humanity have any part of the resolution feels tacked on. Even though it's a story, I don't want to feel that my place in Western Civilization was influenced by a handy Greek action figure that made some sort of karate chops at the chains. I want to understand what this story is communicating from the original writer to me, the person reading it. Apparently, the writer didn't want me to leave this story satisfied, he wanted it to haunt me into a contemplation of it, if I dare.

As stated earlier in this blog, these tales let us know what sort of situation we're in as humans, and most of us have discovered that just wishing really hard doesn't bring about instantaneous magical salvation. The cliff doesn't suddenly become a wall of sand, the eagle doesn't lose its taste for liver, and the chains don't turn into something non-binding. The events of this story appear to me as an Act One and an Act Two, and I'm left wondering about Act Three. 

Plato, may have been a premier teacher of philosophy, but his interfering myth-editing needs some more development. He tried to provide us with an Olympian Gods reboot to feel good about the fate of Prometheus, the weakened Titan progenitor and screw-up, and Hercules, the Olympian Johnny-come-lately savior in a mash-up ending. With this, we are left with nothing more than a horror story, which is how Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus came into being. Her Romantic tale about a man of science taking the creative impulse too far, is based on Prometheus stealing the spark of the gods for mankind. Dr. Frankenstein is the Prometheus who has striven too far as a lone genius, whose passion for his Adam (the only name ever given to his monstrous creature) and his actions lead to ruin. I understand her argument, but it leaves me cold. Perhaps this was true for her husband, Percy, who wrote Prometheus Unbound a few years later.

Boris Karloff in The Bride of Frankenstein, Universal Studios 1935

The story is unsatisfying because life isn't static upon a cliff, and it requires a lot of problem solving. I don't want to wait for a hero while I curse whatever situations have me stuck in Act Two. I need to consider the possibilities available in Act Three. Whatever people come up with to solve their problems won't work for everyone. The solutions need to make some kind of sense at the level of the soul, because the soul is what Prometheus has given up in his predicament. If his body can't be ended, if his soul is trapped within it forever, then freeing his body is only restoring his physical health. It's not restoring his sanity, nor his faith in his own actions, nor his belief in the potential of humanity. He's only a shell of an immortal. He remains a released but alienated creature, like Shelley's "Adam", without a home, exiled from both Olympus and mankind. His passion must somehow free up his soul, or the story goes beyond a tragedy and becomes a doomsday play with a vilification of human creativity at its base.

There is so much more to consider about all three Acts, and how our beginnings, beliefs and expectations shape and strengthen the very real chains that may have us bound and discouraged from time to time. We aren't yet restricted to only look toward a deus ex machina, but can return to Act Three again and again in order to work out a soulful satisfaction.