Walter F. Otto

Walter Friedrich Gustav Hermann Otto, also known as Walter F. Otto (22 June 1874 – 23 September 1958) was a German classical philologist particularly known for his work on the meaning and legacy of Greek religion and mythology, especially as represented in his seminal 1929 work The Homeric Gods.

Quotes

Theophania. Der Geist der altgriechischen Religion (Theophany: the spirit of ancient Greek religion) (1956)

Walter Otto, Theophany: the spirit of ancient Greek religion, edited by Giampiero Moretti, Adelphi, Milan, C.E.2021. ISBN 978-88-459-3491-9

• There is nothing [...] that can be said with greater certainty about these gods than the fact that they, indifferent to any happiness or pain in the world, live in the fullest bliss. Precisely this character brings us closest to the divinity of the Olympians. And precisely this spirit of celestial intangibility and silent bliss is what still breathes so happily and freely from the figures of the Greek gods today.
  • p. 48

• In the song of the muses the truth of everything resonates as a being filled with the gods, which shines from the depths, revealing the eternal magnificence and blessed intangibility of the divine even in the darkest darkness and suffering greater.
  This is how the message of the divine reached the Greeks: not as a categorical request or as salvation in this and the other world, but rather as that which is eternal and blessed, which consoles and makes us happy not through promises , but since it is. The spirit of song announces to them the nature of the gods. In fact, singing is essentially their voice.
  By participating in singing, man can therefore participate in the divine, albeit in his own way, with humility. That which the song elevates into his sacred kingdom belongs to the eternal, that is to say: to that which is timeless and is connected to God.
  • p. 51

• The gods then console even more when they come to meet man, they, who no pain touches. However, they do not console so much with what they give or promise, but rather with what they are.
  This is a miracle - and we can call it such - which we do not find only among the ancient Greeks , and yet among them it is among the fundamental characteristics of Hellenic religiosity and allows us to understand their entire spiritual attitude. For the high sensitivity of this type of man there is nothing more satisfying than the awareness that the eternally Blessed are, a knowledge that is already participation - human participation - in the bliss of the gods.
  • p. 54

• The world of Charites however completely reveals its nature only when it is understood that "grace", which is here a divine figure, does not limit itself to signifying that which fascinates with gracefulness, that which spreads happiness, but also the joy and gratitude of being blessed with gift and happiness. As is easy to understand thanks to the well-known linguistic phrases, it is the wonderful kingdom in which giving and thanking are one, lovable giving and lovable taking, where right and justice, claim and reparation, have no access: the kingdom of full grace. A world in which subject and object are truly one, included in the divine splendor of a superior being.
  • p. 114

• Apollo depicted in the Western pediment of the Temple of Zeus in Olympia The artist of the temple of Zeus at Olympia depicted his simultaneously powerful and spiritual superiority in the most grandiose and realistic way. In the midst of the wildest tumult, the god suddenly appears, and his outstretched arm imposes calm. It is impossible to bring to expression in a more compelling way the entrance of the divine with all its illuminating clarity and his omniscient gaze.
  • p. 147