Product DescriptionExplains the operation and 1000 years’ fame of Apollo’s Oracle at Delphi.
100 selected prophecies on a variety of subjects act as a vehicle for introducing Ancient Greece, this extraordinary period in human experience (history, personalities, philosophy, drama, culture).
Includes prophecies dealing with city-states Athens and Sparta, Socrates and Pericles, the Persian and Peloponnesian wars, Oedipus and Hercules, the Olympic Games, medical cures . . .
Contains a fair amount of humor as well (e.g. a pilgrim’s “inability to laugh” or “inability to stop laughing”).
Examples of Prophecies:
4. King Croesus (2)
Background Information
Two years after testing the Oracle at Delphi, Croesus again sent emissaries, this time to predict the outcome of his projected war on Cyrus of Persia. The Oracle
Pilgrims. Emissaries representing Croesus.
Inquiry. “Should King Croesus make war on the Persians?”
The God’s advice. “If Croesus makes war on the Persians, he will destroy a great empire.”
Observation
Croesus did make war on the Persians, and his own great empire was destroyed.
25. The Persian Wars (3)
Background Information
Forget for a moment what would occur at Salamis. The mighty Persian army and fleet landed in northern Greece before descending on Athens. They posed a threat to Delphi and the immense wealth of the Temple of Apollo, as well as menacing all Greece.
The Oracle
Time. 480 BC.
Pilgrims. Delphians.
Inquiry. Surely a plea for help in an apparently hopeless situation.
The God’s advice. “Pray to the Winds. They will prove to be mighty allies of Greece.”
Observation
The Persian army assaulted Thermopylae, where the Spartans (notably “the 300”) and allies held the pass against them. The Persian armada sailed to nearby Cape Artemesium, where the Athenian fleet met them. The Athenian ships fought against great odds, but in three battles managed to hold their own.
It is a fact that a tremendous storm arose at Artemesium, with the most violent winds attacking the ships for 3 days. The Persians lost approximately 20% of their warships and perhaps the same number of transport vessels to the frightful storm. The raging winds and cascading waters did little harm to Athenian ships.
5. Frenzy and Death of a Pythia
Plutarch was a Greek living under the Roman empire. He is one of the finest writers in all literature, the best biographer, an unsurpassed essayist of moral wisdom, and a great stylist. An interesting man, he became a priest and served at Apollo’s Oracle in Delphi.
I quote from Plutarch’s Moralia (438a-b) the following very strange occurrence. It happened around 100 AD.
“Whenever, then, the imaginative and prophetic faculty is in a proper state for attempering itself to the spirit, inspiration in those who foretell the future is bound to come. And whenever the conditions are not thus, it is bound not to come; or when it does come, to be misleading, abnormal, and confusing, as we know in the case of the priestess who died not so long ago.
