Sisyphus: Life?s True Meaning

Sisyphus, one of the biggest tricksters of all time lived like what seems as a seemingly short life, he was pursued by many Gods wanting to punish him for some trick or prank that he had pulled, but they never got him, finally Hermes captured him though and put him under the control of Hades. He lived life well though apparently taking the title as the King of Corinth, which to some he was the founder, and to others it was handed down to him by Medea. Their are many tales though, where he is clever, as he is described in Homer’s Odyssey. One tells how he came up with a way to find out who was stealing his sheep, he put a mark on them, in modern times known as a brand but, while he was retrieving his sheep he seduced Anticlia, which then became the mother of

Odysseus.

Other tales of him attacking and murdering travelers. Although all these stories are out there, there are also stories of a family man, stories about him, his brother

Athamas, his wife Merope, his two sons Odysseus and Glaucus, and his parents Aeolus and Enarete. There are other things he achieved besides trickery. He was said to have founded the Isthmian Games, in honor of Melicertes, whose dying body he found on the shore of Corinth. Sisyphus was also very crafty, as Homer described him to be.

Once when Zeus sent out Thanatos to punish him for revealing one of Zeus’s love affairs, Sisyphus managed to capture Thanatos and bind him in chains. Zeus then had to send Ares to release Thanatos because he is the God of Death and no one was dying while he was bound. Knowing that Thanatos would come back for him he told his wife not to bury his body, then when he died he begged Hades to allow him to go back to earth and punish his wife for not burring him, He then refused to return to Hades.

Here is where Hermes comes in, he captured Sisyphus and put him under the power of Hades, where he has to roll a heavy rock to the top of a hill, and every time he almost gets to the top of the hill , the rock’s weight pushes him back to the bottom and he starts all over again.

That was the mythology, now from a physiological point of view. Although,

Sisyphus is forced to roll a heavy rock up a hill for eternity, it is said that he is happy.