‘The Odyssey’ and the End of the World
This article contains spoilers, about the end of the movie and about the end of time. The first may ruin your surprise; the latter may save your soul. The following is not a movie review or retelling of the epic, but rather an exploration of how the climactic scene of Homer’s epic tale anticipates the surprising end of all history in the real-life return of Christ. What resonates in one epic will actually come to pass in the other.
In the new motion-picture version of The Odyssey, one of the most successful directors of our generation pairs with an all-star cast and the GDP of a small nation to bring us into the Mediterranean Sea to journey home with Odysseus following the Trojan War (the one with the big wooden horse). After offending the god Poseidon, he sails through his various storms and combats brutal enemies, all to return home to a waiting wife and kingdom in Ithaca.
Like the book, the movie is violent (rated R) and unsuitable for children and some adults. Moreover, purists who recently read the epic poem to brush up on their Western Civ will surely notice discrepancies that provoke disappointment. Others will be unimpressed by a transgender actress playing a male soldier. Still others will decline to see an adaptation of a Greek epic featuring a smattering of African, Indian, and Asian actors and actresses. Some cannot look past these blemishes, and in an entertainment market inundated with progressive agendas, the fatigue is understandable.
Sailing on.
The Return of Odysseus
The climactic scene, as readers of Homer know, is the bloodiest.
Odysseus, twenty years gone, returns to his homeland alone. His fleet of ships is destroyed and his men have died, slain in the multifarious ways that only a Greek epic can record. But his problems have not come to an end. He has fought a ten-year war, has been hurled about by a provoked god of the sea, has faced giants and witches and sirens and goddesses all bent upon his never returning home. Still, at least one hundred more complications are in his house. Eating his food. Seducing his servant girls. Hunting his wife. Plotting against his son.
Suitors swarm Penelope, his bride, like flies on raw meat. They vie with one another for the hand of the queen. Odysseus’s allies are few in the kingdom now that he is presumed dead. His son is young and wears a target on his back. The greedy, ambitious, proud suitors are a small army bent on one ascending to the throne. Even the mighty Odysseus cannot simply walk into his home and take back his palace. It is infested with dangerous men standing in line for the crown.
Penelope has agreed to marry one of them once her burial shroud is complete. She weaves it during the day and secretly undoes it at night. She is waiting, still hopeful for her husband to return.
Disguised as a beggar, Odysseus finally enters his own palace and observes. He is patient. He takes his time with his reconnaissance, as a general maps out enemy terrain. Some suitors abuse him, mock him, and patronize what they take to be an old, defenseless man. He risked his life on foreign battlefields to protect such men — he literally went to Hades and back — and this is the thanks he gets? Suitors slaughtering his cattle for their own bellies; men in the grass watching every movement of his woman? These ingrates have defiled his female servants; these tumors want to murder his beloved son.
But things change when the challenge for Penelope’s hand begins.
Odysseus has a bow that none but he can string. Penelope says that the man who can string it and shoot an arrow through a path of axes to a target will be her husband. Each man tries, and fails. A frail voice rises that he might try. In humor the suitors hand the despised old man the great bow.
To the shock of all, he strings it and strikes the target. To their greater provocation, he turns and shoots another arrow, slaying the chief villain among the suitors. Homer writes that at the beginning of the outpouring “slaughter [was] the last thing on the suitor’s mind: who could dream that one foe in that crowd of feasters, however great his power, would bring down death?” (22.11–14).
They think the old man must have killed the lead suitor by accident. The hive agitates. “Stranger,” the living ones say, “shooting at men will cost your life! Your game is over — you, you’ve shot your last! You’ll never escape your own headlong death! You killed the best in Ithaca — our fine prince! Vultures will eat your corpse!” (22.27–31). They were “blind to the fact that all their necks were in the noose, their doom sealed” (22.33–34).
Then a voice speaks as from the grave. “You dogs!” says the stranger. “You never imagined I’d return from Troy — so cocksure that you bled my house to death, ravished my serving-women — wooed my wife behind my back while I was still alive. No fear of the gods who rule the skies up there, no fear that men’s revenge might arrive someday — now all your necks are in the noose — your doom is sealed!” As he spoke, “terror gripped them all” (22.36–43).
The doors are locked. Most of the weapons have been removed. Vengeance commences. Some plead for their lives based upon their good deeds, and die. Others, who dealt well with his son, live. The rest fly or fight. After a mighty struggle, most of the 108 suitors lie slain or kneel.
The Return of Christ
Watching this scene play out on the big screen sent awe, like an ocean wave, over the audience. The crowd manifestly loved to watch these prideful men, beards stained with another man’s wine, fingernails long and dirty with his meat, vanquished. The bad guys get what they deserve, even when it is bloody.
That’s when it hit me: Most here celebrating vengeance have no idea they themselves await an even more severe judgment at the end of time. They are the suitors, feasting on the Master’s bread and wine, indifferent (if not hostile) to his Son, ruled by their appetites. They do not honor God or give him thanks. They breathe his air, live on his land, sleep around with his rebellious servants — there is no fear of God before their eyes.
They pretend to have no king but themselves because the true king is off in a distant land, or presumed as good as dead. Whether for twenty or two thousand years, these unfaithful suitors eat his food, drink his drink, and make themselves merry from his estate, asking in their stupor, “Where is the promise of his coming?” (2 Peter 3:4).
History, even now, races toward the final chapter when his bride shall be liberated, the kingdom restored, and the wicked slain by the King with an everlasting death. Will the scene be rated R for violence?
This King, the only one able to take the scroll and open its seals, will reveal himself in his glory at a time when the proud have no thought of death. The once-dirty cloak of a homeless Galilean will be thrown aside, along with the tattered sandals. All will see what John saw:
Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems, and he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God. And the armies of heaven, arrayed in fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords. (Revelation 19:11–16)
“Dogs,” will call the voice of justice, “did you think that I should not come back? You have wasted my substance, have forced my maidservants to lie with you, and have wooed my wife while I was still living. You have feared neither God nor man, and now you will die.”
Horrified, the villains who refused his rule will confess their guilt but try to pay him off with good works or flee from his wrath. But “they will not escape” (1 Thessalonians 5:3). Some will cry to the mountains to crush them rather than face the righteous wrath of the King (Revelation 6:16). Mountains will not obey. The wicked will be weaponless. Exposed. Trembling.
The rightful King will have his righteous bow, one he alone can string and shoot. Every knee will bow. Every deed of treason shall be announced. Executions will commence.
The great winepress of God’s wrath will be trodden — blood as high as a horse’s bridal will flow for miles and miles (Revelation 14:20). The little suitors of his throne, the rebels to his cause, will be gathered and thrown — kicking and screaming — into a lake of fire. “The smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night” (Revelation 14:11). Their soundtrack will ever be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And all the holy ones and angels will celebrate the King’s return and his final triumph over the wicked.
Will You Turn?
It is brutal to watch men die on screen. But if we get squeamish watching the pretend vengeance of one incensed man, what shall it be like to face the righteous wrath of Almighty God in real life? And if we sense something of justice in man’s imperfect vengeance, what excuse shall we make when perfect judgment descends to render to the wicked their due?
The wrath of God is coming. One far greater than Odysseus is on his way. He waits only to give time for traitors to kneel and be spared. He will arrive sooner than you think. Even now he watches. Flee from God’s wrath by pleading now for his mercy. He will forgive all who turn from sin and trust in his atonement. He has scars of glory from his great victory on the cross, where his love and mercy spilled forth as his own blood. Why would you die when such a King offers a total pardon of all your crimes and a perfect reconciliation with him in his kingdom? Today is the day of salvation — you are not promised another. “Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him” (Psalm 2:12).
