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Single Idea 14827

[from 'Human, All Too Human' by Friedrich Nietzsche, in 29. Religion / A. Polytheistic Religion / 2. Greek Polytheism ]

Full Idea

The Greeks did not see the Homeric gods above them as masters and themselves below them as servants, as did the Jews. They saw, as it were, only the reflection of the most successful specimens of their own caste - an ideal, not a contrast.

Gist of Idea

The Greeks saw the gods not as their masters, but as idealised versions of themselves

Source

Friedrich Nietzsche (Human, All Too Human [1878], 114)

Book Reference

Nietzsche,Friedrich: 'Human, All Too Human', ed/tr. Faber,Marion [Penguin 1994], p.85