Fallible Gods.

WHEN WE HUMANS aren't squabbling among ourselves over who owns what, or who's good and who's bad, we tend to fret about the "Big Question"--who's in charge?

In the twenty-first century we are still tying ourselves into psychological knots over the possible answers to that question. Oh, we pretend that we want to be in charge. We even pretend that we already are, and then we're outraged by the stubborn unwillingness of natural phenomena to stop doing unpleasant things like volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, tornados, tsunamis, and so on.

It's now clear that in giving in to our own selfish desires, we humans have been killing off the essential diversity of the biosphere, overpopulating ourselves into famine and war, ruining the atmosphere we breathe and water we drink, and warming up the planet so that livable surface shrinks as the waters rise.

In response to the humanmade and natural disasters, many humans are retreating to simplistic answers to the question of who's in charge. This is not new, of course.

Back when the world was girding for World War II, Erich Fromm wrote one of the most important books of the twentieth century--Escape from Freedom--in which Fromm showed that people tend to be so afraid of being free to decide for themselves (and take responsibility) that they surrender their freedom. Desperation, hunger, thirst, and resentment all make it more likely that people will give in to a more powerful figure who promises help and/or salvation. This makes it easy for political dictators and religious cult leaders to take over. The most powerful leader of all, of course, is a supernatural deity who's in charge of everything.

In Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound, Zeus is supposed to be in charge of everything, but he has only recently become head god, thanks to the help of a lesser god, Prometheus. It's worth noting that the mother of Prometheus is Themis, identified as an earth goddess, and more commonly as a goddess of law, order, and justice.

Zeus is a typical dictator. According to Edith Hamilton's translation, "by new laws Zeus is ruling without law." Furthermore, Zeus--who is full of stupidity, narrow-mindedness, and lots of lust for possessions and power--doesn't like humans and plans to destroy them, begetting another race to replace them.

Prometheus feels a personal attachment to humans because in the past he pitied them for being mortal and helpless and then helped them become less so by providing them with an interesting assortment of useful traits, starting with hope. Then he gives them fire (stolen from Olympus, which does not endear him to Zeus), with which they "learn many crafts." Thanks to Prometheus, humans acquire technology, medical skills, agriculture, and mathematics. And humans can indeed learn because Prometheus gives them memory, knowledge, and the power to think.

Prometheus also infuriates Zeus because he knows the future, but won't reveal what may cause Zeus's downfall. The secret is that Zeus will have a disastrous marriage resulting in a son who could destroy him.

Prometheus believes that Zeus must learn from the "sons," the human creations of the gods, who are suffering under his rule. When he refuses to tell Zeus the secret about the dangerous marriage, Zeus says that Prometheus will suffer more agonies (tempests, earthquakes, an eagle eating his liver) if he doesn't give in. The friends who visit Prometheus urge him to surrender to Zeus but he refuses.

Hamilton calls Prometheus the great rebel--"his body helplessly imprisoned, but his spirit free and, unlike Job, he does not give in." All this with nails driven through his feet.

Aeschylus was born in Athens in 525 BC, but I think he would have been interested in a strange twentieth century play called Green Pastures which adapted a collection of black folk tales for a retelling of Old Testament stories. Boasting the first all-black Broadway cast, the play, written by a white man named Marc Connelly, won the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 1931.

In Green Pastures the character named "de Lawd" (God) starts out with some of the traits of Zeus. He brags that if something isn't perfect, he's got the power to "jest far back an' pass a miracle." He wants what he wants (lots of firmament) when he wants it. However, given the troubles caused by his creations Eve and Cain, and prayers coming from "poor little earth," de Lawd laments, "I wasn't any too pleased wid dat job."

One thing leads to another and de Lawd begins to say things like, "I only hope it's goin' to work out all right." He schemes again, but things don't work out exactly right in spite of Moses saying, "De Lawd'll take charge. He ain't never failed, has he?"

But de Lawd feels mocked by fallible humans and loses his temper, yelling about "nothin' but sin throughout de whole world," and declaring, "I repent of dese people dat I have made and I will deliver dem no more."

De Lawd--by now he's said to be "de God of wrath and vengence"--just keeps working at his desk, trying to ignore what's happening down on earth. Then it's pointed out to him that humans find mercy through suffering, and that "Hosea never would 'a found what mercy was unless dere was a little of it in God, too."

De Lawd has learned something he didn't know before, and at the end he wonders about mercy through suffering. Then he says, "Did he mean dat even God must suffer?"

The play ends with a nameless voice saying--about the crucifixion--"Oh, dat's a terrible burden for one man to carry." Connelly doesn't identify the voice but I like to think it's human.

De Lawd answers "yes," and Connelly adds the stage direction "as if in recognition."

Zeus doesn't learn, at least not in Prometheus Bound, and we'll never know if he does in the lost parts of the trilogy. But de Lawd does--and the lesson comes from humans.

Will we humans be like Zeus, not learning from the things over which we have power, or will we learn like De Lawd? Or will we continue to pretend that we can simply surrender to an all-powerful, all-knowing being who will take care of everything and who never has to learn a single thing or change in any way?

Aeschylus said that time in its aging course teaches all things, but I think we're running out of time.

Janet Jeppson Asimov is a working writer and a retired physician who thinks of herself as an environmentalist, a humanist, and an ardent New Yorker. Her latest book, Notes for a Memoir: On Isaac Asimov, Life, and Writing, was published by Prometheus Books last spring.