Interview With Styx, the Greek Goddess of Hate
“Welcome to contemporary consciousness, O goddess.”
“Thank you. I like being a character in a contemporary story that honors my Greek heritage and presents a gentler side of me.”
“You can be a fearsome goddess according to the Greek poets. But I also wanted to emphasize you being a complex woman, albeit a divine one, and give you a very real physical presence. But it seems strange to me that hate can be embodied in a female persona.”
“I have heard that various of your monotheists like to say God is Love. Can you imagine their feelings if it also can be said that God is Hate?”
“That would be a fearsome deity indeed. I hesitate to think of what worship of it would be like. Perhaps the ancient Greeks were right in having love also embodied in a female persona?”
“There was precedence for that. The Great Ishtar of Babylon counted love among her attributes. But I find monotheism very strange in that so many qualities have to reside in a single deity. But then, perhaps the profusion of gods and goddesses in the ancient Roman Empire resulted in a yearning for simplicity that would simplify worship.”
“Especially by those in most need of a sympathetic superior being whose worship would be within their means and time.”
“Which means undesirable qualities like hate would be excluded. I like you also making me a goddess of solitude, a gift of independence.”
“I like independent women. You are an embodiment of one.”
“Not so much when I was married to Pallas.”
“Marriage can compromise independence.”
“Mine was an arranged marriage. I was a daughter of Titans and was expected to marry one. Pallas was first among many choices.”
“But you are considered an Olympian and ranked with the others.”
“Those of us who were born in your earthly realm are considered such. My parents and Pallas came from elsewhere. You would consider them to be old-world migrants and beholden to an alien culture, each having an elemental domain where their will was absolute.”
“Like some of our dictator-ruled nations. So, your children were also Olympians?”
“Yes. They sided with Zeus as I did. Being a transition hybrid, I also gave birth to the monster Echidna, the result of a love affair with Perias; who I now know was one of the Jinn-created male Jinn precursors and so his offspring were also Jinn chimera.”
“Who mated with Typhon, this mate giving birth to Cerberus?”
“Yes. That’s why I adopted the three headed one when its parents rejected this of my lineage as a dead-end chimera.”
“They were hoping for a true Jinn female?”
“Yes. Many monsters of antiquity are DNA manipulative attempts by the Jinn; they being aliens from another inhabitable planet who wanted to breed true here on your Earth.”
“Wow! So, Cerberus is related; a tribute to the goddess of hate! Thank you for what allowed me to write Serenade for Cerberus.”