I think that with relative ease it can be imagined how a mortal who may be understood as existing in the world of Hermes happens to meet someone who introduces him to the world of Aphrodite. Thus, there is a collapse of his former world. Also, Vycinas’ assertion that “gods as worlds dominate everything” is an idea present in ancient texts, such as Euripides’ The Bacchae or Aeschylus’ trilogy The Oresteia, but with the understanding that it is from the point of view of the mortal that such may be said to be true. Here, too, Telemakhos in Homer’s epic poems comes to mind. The notion that “gods as worlds dominate everything” makes sense with the unavoidable clash of fates that make up the stories that are the Greek tragedies, as well as much of myth.

In thinking of an individual mortal as being attuned to Being by virtue of the god or goddess being served and thus the world occupied, we see that something such as love could indeed be very different in two lovers or worlds. This makes sense when reflection is given to the phenomenological experience of meeting someone who introduces us to a new way of understanding an old concept. Worlds collide. One collapses and another emerges. A new world is disclosed. One vision dies and a new one is born.

P. 74-5

¶ 4:56 PM