preview

Life After Death In Life

Better Essays

Life After Death in the Antiquities Through centuries of disagreeing philosophies and schools of thought there is one idea that is constant. Even today, through the world is beginning to seem like it is more divided than ever, there is one idea upon which people generally believe. Even looking back on the works of the most influential writers of the antiquities, this idea was present and seemed to drive their philosophies and their characters. This is the certainty, even the indisputable fact, that at some point in a person’s life, they will no longer have that life. Death is such an innate part of the understanding of existence, that it is logical that through time millions of people have tried to answer that immortal question: what happens after we die? Most ancient writers addressed this question, attempting to answer it within the scope of how, according to their philosophies, judgement/justice is fulfilled in death. But, being writers they also attempted to sojourn any reader to live according to the knowledge of death. To examine the transformation of ideas four works will be examined: Myth of Er, “The Odyssey”, “The Aeneid”, and On the Nature of Things.

Myth of Er At the very end of the treatise of the nature of humans and the ideal state Plato’s “The Republic” includes the myth of the warrior Er. For twelve days after being mortally wounded in battle, Er returns from the dead so that he may report upon situation of souls after death. Er relates to his comrades

Get Access