Cults of Gods: Is Hades Really Nice?

In modern days, with rise of various thoughts in philosophy, people who learn and Hellenic Polytheists started to repaint the image of the God of the Dead, Hades. They call him nice and good because by myths, he's mostly appropriate in relation to his divine family, and he's always faithful to his wife, Persephone. But how Ancient Greeks really saw him? Who he is? What he is? Let's find out.

Firstly, we need to understand that we shouldn't read myths plainly. Divine and World are vast and incomprehensible, so myths are way of telling finite humans what they are in understandable way. Even if this "understandable way" sounds strange and inconsistent.

With that, I'd like to break the first misconception about Hades and Persephone. He is faithful to her not because he is good, but because that is his nature, his domain. Death cannot expand or procreate; it cannot give new life like Zeus, only open the way for new life. It can touch life, but cannot create it.

Hades(Haides in Greek transliteration) is the Khtonic god of the dead, ruler of the realm Hades, dwelling of the dead. His etymology is uncertain, modern linguists trace it to Proto-Greek "*Awides", meaning "Unseen", while in an extensive section of Plato's dialogue Cratylus devoted to the etymology of the god's name, Socrates is arguing for a folk etymology not from "unseen" but from "his knowledge (eidenai) of all noble things". He was mostly honoured in funeral ceremonies and Mystery cults. He's also known as Haides Ploutôn (of Wealth), as god of underground wealth, be it fertile soil or minerals.

His main epithet was Theôn Khthonios(God of the Underworld), reflecting his main "job" as the God of the dead. Another mentionable epithet is Soter Nekron, Saver of the Dead. It doesn't mean saviour in Christian sense, but that he brings the dead into his world safely and keeps them.

Beyond this, Hades didn't have much of a cult. He was mostly called upon in funerals, beyond this he appeared only in handful of temples, and even they were not of his own. His most sacred site was "Oracle of the Dead", in the northern Greek town of Thesprotia, said to be near one of the entrances to the Underworld. Here, people would gather to commune with the dead. Another important temple of him is located in Elis in the Peloponnese, and even this was open only once a year.

This begs the question: why is the god of such a significant thing as death not worshipped like others?

The answer is tied to the way ancient Greeks viewed death and its relationship to it. According to Homer, Hades was described as "most hated by mortals among all the gods", and people back then did not like the idea of death. Talking about it openly was not socially acceptable as it is today. Here is a quote from Achilles in the Odyssey that explains what people thought about the afterlife:

Nay, seek not to speak soothingly to me of death, glorious Odysseus. I should choose, so I might live on earth, to serve as the hireling of another, of some portionless man whose livelihood was but small, rather than to be lord over all the dead that have perished.

Even in era of Homer, when Greek writers didn't know about Tartarus or Elysian Fields, it was not a place a person would want to go. It was a dark, gloomy realm where was no joy, no life. People would exist as shadows of their old self, wandering Hades eternally.

That's why people in the Ancient Greece didn't think of afterlife too much. They believed that life on Earth in itself is valuable, there was no some preparation to death. People focused on honor, heroism, achieving immortality in people's memory. Achilles was given a choice: to live a long but unremarkable life or live short but glorious life and be remembered in annals. He chose the second, and now he'll be in humanity's memory forever as a symbol of courage and excellence. Being accomplished in this life was more important than waited for some reward after death.

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