“Whoso resisteth not Her dangerous lure, There is no herb of grace can work his cure, Nor any shift To hide the gleaming woe;”
~ ‘Agamemnon’ by Aeschylus (G. M. Cookson translation. p56. line 385)
It is almost halfway through the play, and the main character, Agamemnon, has yet to enter the scene. After Clytemnestra exits, the Chorus goes on to talk about divine justice, the folly of hubris, and the consequences of transgression, pinning the tragic events in Troy to Paris’ actions. They talk about how Helen’s abduction caused not only embarrassment but also communal grief and a sense of disillusionment. Finally, a herald arrives and announces the Greek victory. Then there is a conversation between the Chorus and the herald where herald talks about his relief and gratitude to gods for being back and bitterness about spending the last ten years in misery. Clytemnestra enters and chides the Chorus for not believing her earlier and is happy to have celebrarted when she got the beacon signal.
‘Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one’ is a daily prayer for many people. I think most religions focus a lot on resisting temptation and predicting doom or punishment for those who succumb to it. But what is temptation? Is it an extramarital affair? Is it overeating? Isn’t it different across cultures? Something that one culture feels is a sin could be viewed as a person’s right in another culture. Since religion is more tied to culture than something universal, ‘divine laws’ differ across religions. For e.g., consuming alcohol or eating meat (or certain type of meat) is strictly prohibited in some religions/cultures, while it is the way of life in others.