Macdonnald Marianne Philia Euripides Ifigenia in Aulis

Accademia Editoriale
Iphigenia's "Philia": Motivation in Euripides "Iphigenia at Aulis"

Author(s): Marianne McDonald
Source: Quaderni Urbinati di Cultura Classica, New Series, Vol. 34, No. 1 (1990), pp. 69-84
Published by: Fabrizio Serra Editore
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Iphigenia's Philia:
Motivation in Euripides Iphigenia at Aulis
Marianne McDonald
The word philos inGreek means both "friend" and "relative". This
ambiguity allows the paradoxical statement by Polyneices in Euripides'
Phoenissae, "My friend/ relative has become my enemy, but he is still my
friend/ relative". Agamemnon finds in his daughter Iphigenia both a
relative AND one who acts as a friend, as Aristotle defines philos in the
Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics: "one who wishes for another his
good, or what he thinks is good, not on account of himself, but for that
other" {E.E. 1240a). Aristotle also says, "It is true that the good person
{spoudaios)will do much for friends and country, even die for them if
necessary" {N.E. 1168b). Iphigenia does both and acquires immortal
fame in the process, the kleos aphthiton so prized by Homer's Achilles
(J/.9,413).
Aristotle sees Iphigenia as acting inconsistently {Poetics 1454a), and
many others have added their speculations about what motivates her to
act as she did l. I agree much more with those who see Iphigenia as
1
interprets sacrifice as a perverted marriage ritual, and as such
Foley Iphigenia's
meant to restore a cultural and communal which had been rent by stasis,
equilibrium
Ritual Irony: Poetry and Sacrifice in Euripides, Ithaca 1985, pp. 65-105. Cf. Vernant who
links and opposes philia to polemos, marriage to war, Mythe et pens?e chez les
specifically
Grecs, ?tudes de psychologie historique, Paris 1966, p. 33. In Iphigenia's case war repla
ces marriage, and Foley well notes the ritual mimesis. MacCary denies Iphigenia's
sees as "going to her death for the
heroism, rejecting Mellert-Hoffmann who Iphigenia
salvation of Greece from a barbarian threat", 'Review of G. Mellert-Hoffmann, Untersu
chungen zur "Iphigenie in Aulis" des Euripides', Class. Journ. 69, 2, 1973-1974, p. 171.
MacCary instead sees Iphigenia as "a character whom circumstances have she
perverted:
makes the wrong choice for the wrong reason, as if her myth her expe
pre-existed
rience", ibid. p. 172. Funke sees Iphigenia as a pitiable child taken in by her deceitful
70 M. McDonald
representing something positive and acting in a way consistent with her

own thinking. Iphigenia is both consistent and heroic, exhibiting what I
call a new heroism: no longer are Homeric heroes the sole repository of
virtue; now virtue is to be found in women, slaves and children 2.
Here I
agree with MacCary he says "it is this infusion of heroic motivation
when
into a non-heroic tableau best described by Webster as a story that
affects the whole family, a fifth-century family which creates the tension
so characteristic of late Euripidean plays: normal people pushed beyond
their limits
by the manipulation of gods and forces of circumstance
which belong to epic and non-Euripidean tragedy" 3.
Further, I suggest, contra Snell, that Iphigenia shows Aristotelian
virtue, a virtue rooted in her particular relationships rather than in a uni
versal abstract. Snell
instead interprets what Iphigenia did in terms of
Platonic philosophy: her act implies that "the poet still hoped somehow
to apprehend that which is fixed and permanent", and further, "Iphige
nia is the only one in the whole tragedy who finds away out of herself to
the universal...The legacy of tragedy assured that Platonic idea became
the 'idea of the good'" 4.
father's pretenses of patriotism, 'Aristoteles zu Euripides' in Aulis', Hermes

Iphigenia
92, 1964, p. 286-291. Herbert Siegel also sees Iphigenia as nonheroic, one who simply
didn't have a choice, but made the best of a bad situation, thus agreeing with Achilles'
comment that she aligned the good with the necessary (I.A. 1409), 'Self-Delusion and the
Volte-face of Iphigenia in Euripides' Tphigenia at Aulis", Hermes 108, 1980, pp. 300
321.
2
M. McDonald, 'Cacoyannis and Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis: A New Heroism',
in Euripides in Cinema: The Heart Made Visible, Philadelphia 1983, pp. 129-192. See
also Mary R. Lefkowitz's on martyrs in which she says, "Euripides also included
chapter
myths of human sacrifice in several of his plays, and it is noteworthy that with one excep
tion the victims are female", Women in Greek Myth, Baltimore 1986, p. 95. Loraux
noted the role reversal in the Alcestis where... "his [Admetus'] wife has left [the palace]
to join in death the open spaces of manly heroism", of Killing a Woman,
Tragic Ways
trans. Antony Foster, Cambridge 1987, p. 29. So also she sees Iphigenia's act is a case in
which "consent is turned into a free choice, and a death to which the victim submits
becomes a death, not to say a noble one", p. 43.
willing
3
Art. cit. p. 171.
4 'From
Tragedy to Philosophy: Iphigenia in Aulis\ in Greek Tragedy, ed. Erich
Segal, New York 1983, pp. 396-405, (rpt. of 'Euripides' aulische Iphigenie' inAischylos
und das Handeln im Drama, Philologus Supplementband 20, 1, 1928, pp. 148-160).
Others have noted the link between philosophy and tragedy. Mikalson concludes his
article on 'Zeus the Father and Heracles the Son in Tragedy' to the
by saying in reference
dichotomy between what the gods do and what man would expect them to do, "To find
this solution Euripides reaches beyond myth and even cult into the realm of recent and
contemporary philosophical speculation", Trans. Am. Philol. Ass. 116, 1986, p. 98.
Iphigenia's Philia 71
I see Iphigenia instead practicing the Aristotelian virtue of megalo

psychia which is a reinstatement of the arete that we see in Homer and
the early aristocracy; but besides this she practices philia (which Imain
tain gives the primary impetus to her action), a virtue which Adkins
would call cooperative, and can be construed as important in the bour
geois framework at the end of the fifth century5. Iphigenia proves her
self morally superior to the traditional Homeric heroes, Agamemnon
and Menelaus, and gains time, the aristocratic virtue characteristic of the
megalopsychor {N.E. 1123b-1125b), by her philia, loyalty to her family
and friends.
Agamemnon uses Iphigenia as a bourgeois commodity6. Also Cly
temnestra accuses Agamemnon of paying for Helen with his child's life,
5Merit and
Responsibility: A Study in Greek Values, Oxford 1960, p. 7. Adkins,
however, that Greek arete as "competitive" rather than
thought tragedy represented
"cooperative", while Aristotle represents it as "cooperative". See 'Basic Greek Values in
Euripides' Hecuba andHercules Furens\ Class. Quart. 16,1966, pp. 193-219. See also his
'Aristotle and the Best Kind of Tragedy', Class. Quart. 16,1966, pp. 78-102. It should be
clear now that I disagree with Adkins' theory, since I claim thatEuripides prefigures Ari
stotle in the way he shows the importance o? philia, a cooperative virtue. Simon Goldhill
says also, "For it is too simple, indeed, untrue, to assume that Homer does not know or
or that the Homeric
value 'quiet' or 'co-operative' virtues depiction of the search for
individual expression through personal fame and reputation is not seen throughout
Greek culture", Reading Greek Tragedy, Cambridge 1986, p. 146. James Tyler also refu
tesAdkins on the above point in his Philia and Echthra inEuripides, Diss. Cornell Univ.
1969, pp. 47-48 n. 20. See also p. 54 n. 37: "Amphitryon also criticizes Zeus in terms of
arete (342)...In context arete means no more than loyalty in apMos-relationship". In his
Justice of Zeus, Lloyd-Jones fiercely opposes Adkins (Berkeley and Los Angeles 1983),
and Gagarin tries to find a mean between the two positions, as a moral virtue
seeing pity
present in Homer, 'Morality in Homer', Class. Philol.
1987, p.300. A.A. Long
82, also
has an interesting answer to Adkins in 'Morals and Values in Homer', Journ. Hell. Stud.
90, 1970, pp. 121-139. In connection with decision in ancient see Rosen
making tragedy
meyer's sensitive and brilliant correction of Snell in 'Wahlakt und Entscheidungsprozess
in der antiken Trag?die', Po?tica 10, 1, 1978.
6 In his 'Sex and Violence inEuripides' Helen', Philoi. Ass. Pacific Coast Fall 1986,
MacCary says that Agamemnon uses as if she were his property: a form of
Iphigenia
exchange which gives him value and identity. Levi-Strauss corroborates this view, "In
any society, communication operates on three different levels: communication of
women, communication of goods and service, communication of messages", Structural
Anthropology, trans. C. Jacobson and B. G. Schoepf, New York 1963, p. 296. Agamem
non takes something which was private and exposes it to the public eye. As in fact Can
daules displayed his wife to Gyges, and she was an object
of his power,
symbolic
so Aga
memnon power in the public arena with his daughter's
life. As Farenga noted,
purchases
the treasure which used to be found in the private thalamos of the oikos, now is put on
display
as the public thesaurus of the state, 'La tirannide greca e la strategia numism?ti
ca', inMondo classico: percorsipossibili, Ravenna 1985, p. 49.
72 M. McDonald
literally "buying" that which is most hateful with that which is most
beloved, using a philia term (tachthista toisi philtatois onoumetha 1170).
Whereas her father betrays his closest relation (1314), and in fact acts as
her enemy, Iphigenia, on the other hand, maintains the aristocratic code
o? arete and offers her life freely to her father and her friends 7.Thucydi
des speaks of the loss of simplicity: "The simple way of looking at things,
which is so much the mark of a noble nature, was regarded as a ridicu
lous quality and soon ceased to exist" (III 83)8.
Many critics have found Iphigenia ridiculous in her simple nobility,
e.g. David Konstan, "She listened well, but got it all wrong". He notes
that "there is a tension in the play between the representation of Iphige
nia's character, which is a noble one, albeit in the city-state context ra
ther than the Homeric, and the overall political context, which seems so
corrupt as to call in doubt
the efficacy of heroism of any variety". Effi
cacy yes, but the nobility remains; Iphigenia as Ajax has outlived her
heroic context. I think Euripides sees Iphigenia's philia as an ideal, and
prizes her noble nature, although it is in an incongruous setting.
In a universe and flux, which
of chaos can be anthropomorphically
malevolent, hope man's

is to be found in himself and in the association
he forms with others, philia as described in the Nicomachean Ethics 9.
Scholars now see philia as a tool for interpreting Euripides, the only sta
ble value in Euripides' vision of chaos 10.Philia then constitutes a new
7
See Lefkowitz, p. 98: "Iphigenia has, in fact, now all the values of the
adopted
heroic world, in which honour and shame count more than family ties or even than survi
val". I agree that Iphigenia is practicing the values of the heroic world, but I think that
she is doing this BECAUSE of her family ties.
8
History of the Peloponnesian War, trans. Rex Warner, Middlesex 1954.
9
Nussbaum aligns herself more with the Aristotelian position as a realistic way of
coping in a universe where luck plays such a big role. She speaks of Aristotelian friend
ship in away which applies to Euripides work in general and to Iphigenia's sacrifice in
particular: "In his discussion of sacrifices for the sake of or love, Aristotle
friendship
stresses the fact that the person of excellence will think little of comfort or or
safety
money compared to the chance to do noble; but he goes on to say that love of
something
friends of country will sometimes call for a sacrifice more connected to good
intimately
a sacrifice of the opportunity to act well, or even of life itself (1169a The
living: 18-62)",
Fragility of Goodness, Cambridge 1986, p. 336.
10
Much work has been done on the notion o? philia, and
in Euriin particular
philia
pides. Seth Schein is working on this and says, forand philia
instance,
topic, "...philoi
provide some consolation and compassion, which makes the suffering not understanda
ble, for Euripides rarely allows that, but endurable", 'Mythical Illusion and Historical
Reality in Euripides' Orestes', Wien. Stud. N.F. 9, 1975, pp. 50-66. So also we have Ute
Schimidt-Berger, Philia. Typologie der Freundschaft und Verwandtschaft bei Euripides,
heroism, new in that it now is to be found inwomen, children and slaves

rather than the traditional adult male heroes, so that it is no longer a func
tion of birth and gender, but is based on worth. In the face of overpas
sionate irrational gods, corrupt and powerseeking leaders, new protago
nists are the repository of arete reborn (e.g. Makaria, Menoeceus, Iphi
genia, Polyxena, Praxithea in the Erechtheus, cf. also Alcestis).
Let me now illustrate some of these points. First of all, let us look at
the Aristotelian definition of megalopsychia. He says that this me galop sy
chos is one who "thinks himself worthy of great things .and is so in fact".
What are these
things? The greatest of these is honor {time, N.E. 4,
1123b), and
the greatest honor is that which is based on excellence
{arete, 1124a). So we are right back at the Homeric kleos aphthiton {II. 9,
413), so prized by Achilles and lauded by Sarpedon in his speech to
Glaucus (17. 12, 322-328). MacCary finds this "a clear statement of the
necessity for the hero to risk his life to prove his existence" H. Aristotle
also claims that this honor and virtue sought by the "great-souled" can
be obtained life at times of great need,
at the risk of one's thinking that
"life is not worth living at any cost" {N.E. 4, 1124b).
Aristotle ismore in the mainstream of popular Greek thought than
Plato, in that Aristotle
speaks of ethical action as based on acting natu
rally, and this action is not simply based on an intellectual apprehension.

One's character combines with one's judgement to make proper choices
{N.E. 1105a-b). Iphigenia acts naturally and nobly when she makes her
final choice.
Diss. Eberhard-Karls-Universit?t T?bigen 1973, James Tyler, cited in n. 5, and Samuel

Edward Scully, Philia and Charis in Euripidean Tragedy, Diss. Univ. Toronto 1973.
General studies of philia which have been useful are Jean-Claude Fraisse, Philia: La
notion d'amiti? dans la philosophie antique, Paris 1974, L. Dugas, L'amiti? antique d'a
pr?s les moeurs populaires et les th?ories des philosophes, Paris 1894 and Horst Hutter,
Politics as Friendship: The Origins of Classical Notions of Politics in the Theory and Prac
tice of Friendship, Ontario 1978. Articles which were particularly useful were, David
Konstan, 'Philia in Euripides' Electra ,Philologus 129,2,1985, pp. 176-185, and A.W.H.
and in Homer and Aristotle', Class. n.s.
Adkins, "Friendship' 'Self-Sufficiency' Quart,
13, 1963, pp. 30-46. thanks also to Thomas Rosenmeyer who directed me to the fol
My
lowingworks: Mary Whitlock Blundell, Sophocles: An Ethical Approach, Diss. Univ. Ber
keley 1984 and Catherine Ruggiero Freis, Goodness and Justice in Sophocles, Diss. Univ.
1981. These latter two also object to Adkins' claim that Greek tragedy repre
Berkeley
sented arete as competitive rather than cooperative, but Sophocles is their model, rather
than Euripides.
11
Childlike Achilles, New York 1982, p. 115.
74 M. McDonald
Philia can be a source of heroics. There are three main categories of

philia, that basedon the good, that on the pleasurable and that on the
useful. These need not be mutually exclusive {N.E. 8, 1156a). The best
of these is the one on the good. This good
based is then not simply
something one wishes

for one's friends, but instead something that one
practices. In certain cases this may mean giving one's life, for either
friends, or one's country {N.E. 9, 1169a). In this case "country" is an
extension of "friends": friend as community12. Friends also include
one's relatives, particularly one's parents whom Aristotle says one
should honor as one honors the gods {N.E. 1165a).
Aristotle distinguishes the love of parent for child and child for
parent: the parent considers the child as part of himself/herself, but the
child loves the parent as a source of his being {N.E. 1161b). This psycho
logically acute observation might explain how a child has more duty to a
parent than vice versa. The parent then can use the children-as property,
namely as an extension of himself (the child is considered equivalent to a
ktema, or "material
possession" in E.E. 1238b; in this same section Ari
stotle says that friendship between parent and child is like that between
ruler and subject).
One final point which has bearing on our interpretation of Iphige
nia's motives in the I.A. Aristotle makes activity a human priority, and in
fact happiness is defined as an activity of the soul performed in accor
dance with human excellence (1101a). So it also follow that in friend
ship, it is the doer/giver who benefits more than the one who receives.
Aristotle also said, the function of a friend is to do good, rather than to
be treated well. One sees the related Platonic maxim, "better to suffer
12 a clear
Forster made distinction between the public and the private, for
opting
the latter when he said, "I hate the idea of causes, and if I had to choose between
betraying my country and betraying my friend I hope I should have the guts to betray my
country", Two Cheers for Democracy, New York 1938, p. 68. Fortunately, Iphigenia
could align both and served Greece along with her friends (philoi), particularly her fa
ther and Achilles. However she gave up her own private role as wife and in this also
betrayed the private goal of her mother; in this case the conflict between Agamemnon
and Clytemnestra well emphasizes the conflinct between public and private interests.
One can see a contrast between the issues in Sophocles' vs. the issues in this
Antigone
play. The former had Antigone clearly representing the rights of the family and the gods
vs. the civic as in the I.A. represents more a
rights represented by Creon. Agamemnon
person corrupted by leadership and a lust for power vs. Clytemnestra whose own perso
nal honor involves the survival of her daughter and subsequent marriage at all costs. As
so often in Euripides, the issues are clearly not abstract.
evil to do it", as urged

than in the Republic 13.Hence the benefactor
loves the one who benefits more than vice versa (1167b): in fact one's
acts become one's raison d'etre (1168a). One can easily see the Homeric
parallel which has a hero defining himself through his noble acts.
How does this then apply to Iphigenia? In the Iphigenia at Aulis she
is the only character who is loyal to her friends and relatives (besides
meaning both friend and relative, in Homer the word for philos also
means "one's own"), and actively pratices virtue. Helen violated philia
(I.A. 69, and 265-272). Agamemnon is accused of being disloyal to his
friends (334 ff.) and his relatives (e.g. 932) and oiphilotimia, a devotion
to power (342) which has become a vice in its excess (one might wonder
ifAchilles would purchase his honor with his child's life).
Agamemnon in turn accuses his brother Menelaus of being a slave
to a woman (378 ff.), thus philogynaios, or as the play says philogamos
(392). Agamemnon has betrayed the relation o? philos, by pledging his
"best beloved" to Hades instead of a bridegroon (458, 463-464, 630,
648) 14.Iphigenia is on the other hand true to her beloved father (philon
630), and in fact is called philopator (638), one who, of all the children,
loved him most (cf. her use of phil-words in 652, 1222, 1229, 1238, and
1247). She rejects the baser form of philia, namely to philopsychein
n See Ronald A.
Sharp, Friendship and Literature: Spirit and Form, Durham 1986,
p. 88. Vlastos showed the altruistic component o? philia as depicted inAristotle in his
article 'The Individual as anObject of Love inPlato', inPlatonic Studies, Princeton 1973.
He quotes Aristotle in the Rhetoric (1380B35-1381A1): "Let philein be defined as
- own
wishing for someone what you believe to be good things wishing this not for your
- so far as you can to bring
sake but for his and acting them about", p. 3. One might also
question Iphigenia's doing what she did in a relation of philia for her father whom she
said betrayed her (I.A. 1314). First of all, she allows herself to be educated by him, she
believes him and later says to her mother that Agamemnon was
unwilling to sacrifice her,
but was doing it on account of Greece
(I.A. 1456). Secondly, the relationship o? philia
continues with one's relatives in spite of one's feelings: John M. Cooper cites Euripides
Phoenissae 1446, saying "unlike the other types of case, family -philia existed even despite
the absence of goodwill", 'Aristotle on Friendship', in Essays on Aristotle's Ethics, ed. A.

O. Rorty, Berkeley 1980, p. 334 n. 2.
14Simon Goldhill noted this
betrayal of the philia relationship in his treatment of
the Oresteia and the o? philos/echthrosy\ "Such a problematis is recalled
"problematic
also in the reference to Iphigenia, the daughter of Agamemnon (phile), who was sacrifi
ced neleos, 'pitilessly', overlooking the bonds o? philia (cf.Aga. 245-247) patros philou
etima), to aid the revenge of Menelaus on Paris (echthros) who seduced
...philos (philos)
Helen (phile/echthra?Y, Language, Sexuality, Narrative: the Oresteia, Cambridge 1984,
p. 133.
76 M. McDonald
(1385) and thereby becomes megalopsychos. Shewill not cling to life, but
offer it for her country (1380f?), Achilles (1390ff.) 15and Artemis
(1395ff.). I claim, hower, that she ismainly loyal to her father, and even
begs her mother not to hate him (1454).
One notes that philia as the abstract does not occur in this play, and
in fact is infrequently used by Euripides, but the verb, adjectives and
compounds occur
frequently. I would like to think that this suggests
contingency and action orientation, paralleling the fact that Iphigenia is
not sacrificing herself primarily for an ideal, but rather as an act contin
gent on her philial relation with her father.
Agamemnon loves his child (I.A. 1256), but this is not sufficient
cause for him to give up his leadership of the expedition against Troy.
He uses Iphigenia as a commodity, and purchases leadership with the
coin of her body. She is an alienable extension of himself, following what
Aristotle claimed is the relation of a parent to child. The child owes its
life to the parent, and in fact, Iphigenia returns her life to Agamemnon
(cf. N.E. 1165a: "it is nobler to support those responsible for one's exi
stence than to preserve one's own life"). Iphigenia also believes her fa
ther when he tells her that he is sacrificing her for the benefit of Greece.
Thus she obtains immortal fame and honor through her practice of phi
lia.
How then could Iphigenia change her mind and choose to become
a heroine after she has said a bad life is better than a glorious death
(1252, being more faithful to Archilochus than to Homer, and inconsi
stent according to Aristotle)? She, in fact, was teachable. Nancy Sher
man says, "In philia, children follow the example and precepts of
parents because of antecedent love and trust of them" 16.
In her plea for her life (1211 ff.), Iphigenia speaks of the loving con
versations she had with her father. She says that she was the first to call
him father and he the first to call her child (1220-1221). As she sat on his
15Smith sees
Iphigenia as doing what she did out of love for Achilles, "Asmy title
suggests, Iphigenia has an irrational motive well known in Greek Literature, well prepa
red by the play, thoroughly intelligible, but little appreciated in this instance as far as I
can see: she is in love, and chooses to sacrifice herself for her intended husband", 'Iphi
genia in Love', in Arktouros, ed. G.W. Bowersock-W. Burkert-M.CJ. Putnam, New
York 1979, p. 174.
Xii
Aristotle's Theory of Moral Education, Diss. Harvard Univ. 1982, p. 176. For vir
tue to be we must see it as a teachable science, cf. Georgios On
taught, Anagnostopoulos,
theGoals and Exactness of Aristotle s Ethics, to be published.
lap, he would talk of her future happiness in her husband's home (1223
1225), and she in turn would say she would receive him lovingly in her
house repaynig all his painstaking upbringing (1229-1230). And that is
in fact the return in a ritual marriage with death (1342, 1355
she makes,
1356, 1399). She repays her father and she repays Greece (cf. her calling
Greece mother 1498, cf. also apodidousa 1230 and didomi 1397). Iphige
nia says explicitly that Agamemnon is forced to do what he does and he
is sacrificing her because of Greece (1456). Thus she believes what he
says in 1255 ff., claiming that he loves her (1256), but Greece is forcing
him (1271), and that Greece needs her sacrifice for freedom and ven
geance for the barbarian rape (1273-1275). Iphigenia echoes his words
saying that she will die to free Greece and so that barbarians won't rape
Greek women (1380-1384). Iphigenia iswell instructed by a father she
loves, and she makes his goal her goal.
Others in the play also change their minds and have not been called
inconsistent. Agamemnon changes his mind, first agrees to Iphigenia's
sacrifice, then sends a letter telling her not to come to Aulis, but finally
he is convinced by Menelaus to consent to the sacrifice (44Iff.). Mene
laus also changes his mind and says that he now has pity for Iphigenia,
and she should not lose her life forHelen (47 Iff.). It is ironic to have the
two brothers arguing a standpoint
from opposite to the position they
took earlier. They change their minds quickly out of weakness; Iphige
nia's change seems, instead, to come out of heroic philia.
Change also is common feature of the psychology of Euripides'
characters, what Michelini saw as "the great emotional lability of most of
the characters: violent shifts of mood and intent are brought about by
changes in human relations (Kreousa in Ion), by the inner moods of the
character (Medeia), or by bizarre coincidence (Hekabe)" 17.
We can also
remember Orestes' changing moods, and Electra's comment in Or. 234,
of everything is sweet", metahole panton glykon. This was a fea
"Change
ture of the Euripidean art, as if the dissoi logoi of the sophists were inhe
rent in human character, in some cases even plots (cf. Heracles and
Hecuba, both of which have been criticised for seeming to be two badly
characters, for the most part, are admirable
merged plays). Sophoclean
17
Ann Norris Michelini, Euripides and the Tragic Tradition, Madison 1987, p. 113.
I would a term other than "emotional lability", particularly inMedea's case, if it
prefer
implies weakness or inconsistency. If itmeans "susceptibility to change", I accept itwho
leheartedly.
78 M. McDonald
for their consistency and dogged pursuit of their goals, but the Euripi
dean character has many turns as his/her varying and unreliable circum
stance.
One more explanation for Iphigenia's change of mind, might be

that Euripides was reworking Aeschylus who depicted Iphigenia as an
unwilling victim, even hoisted a

in ritualistic way before she was sacrifi
ced, a hand clamped over her mouth to avoid ill-omened struggles or
curses (Ag. 228-237). This resistance might be what Euripides is allu
ding to by having Iphigenia first object to being sacrificed. Then he goes
one better, as in fact Euripides
Aeschylus does in his Electra, referring to
the implausible Aeschylean ploy of locks of hair or footprints as ameans
for recognition, and suggesting something more plausible, such as a scar
recognized by the tutor. Euripides cares enough about Aeschylus to

have Electra say that locks of hair and footprints are hardly adequate for
identification since they differ in the case of a man and woman. So also
the Euripidean may first allude to her weaker
Iphigenia Aeschylean
counterpart by refusing to be sacrificed, and then act all the more nobly
when she has weighed the data and come to amore informed decision.
us at
Also, Euripides has look real human beings, and the most nor
mal reaction for Iphigenia when she hears that she is to be sacrificed is to
object; as she says, "the person who prays for death ismad" (I.A. 1251
1252).
Let us look at some of Iphigenia's parallels. Menoeceus in the Phoe
nissae says that he will give his life to free his city (991-1057), after he has
assured his father that he will escape rather than be sacrificed. This
movement is the opposite of the movement in the Iphigenia. Creon urges
Menoeceus' escape, whereas Agamemnon demands the sacrifice. Both
Menoeceus and Iphigenia take verbal positions the opposite of what
they eventually do. The only difference is that Menoeceus deceives his
father, whereas Iphigenia changes her mind and obeys her father. It is
this latter that Aristotle seems to call inconsistent, the verbal
although
positions and action are the same for both Menoeceus and Iphigenia. It
is not Iphigenia's character that has changed, but her circumstances and
her reaction to them, based on her new perception of the situation pre
sented by her father and Achilles.
Makaria says, that by not being philopsychousa, so
"life-loving", she
has discovered the fairest thing, to leave life nobly (eukleos lipein bion
533-534), using words similar to Ajax's "it is proper that the noble man
either lives well or dies well" (Aj. 479-480). Iphigenia also has Ajax's
nobility but she differs from in that her "Homeric" heroism, far from
being obsolete in the new bourgeois world, is used to serve the public
cause, through subservience to her father. She, as Ajax, is destroyed, but
Aiax dies through opposition, Iphigenia through acquiescence.
above maxim
The is echoed by the daughter of Praxithea in the
Erechtheus, who is sacrificed for the sake of Athens on the advice of an
oracle from Delphi. She says, "honourable death is a truer life than igno
ble life", 52 Austin 18.Praxithea says, "on account of this we bear our
children: to save the altars of the gods and our native land" 50, 14-15
Austin. We see the obvious contrast with Iphigenia's sacrifice, as Cly
temnestra herself noted in the Electra (1024ff.), saying, "It would have
been forgivable if he had sacrificed one formany, to prevent the taking
of the city, or to benefit his home for the sake of the other children".
In the Hecuba, Polyxena says that she is not a woman who is philo
psychos, "life-loving", (348) using the same word Makaria did and Iphi
genia does when finally deciding to offer her life freely and heroically.
Polyxena also says she would rather die honorably than live dishonora
as a slave, she who was born a princess {Hec. 342-378). Here the
bly,
definition of living well clearly includes not just the moral goods, but the
materialistic goods described by Adkins as aristocratic.
power-oriented
Polyxena attains her own freedom by dying {Hec. 549-550), whereas
Makaria, Menoeceus, Praxithea's daughter, and Iphigenia die to benefit
others.
Iphigenia first makes her unheroic claim, but then comes to share
Makaria's and Polyxena's views. The only difference is that Iphigenia
learns from her father and from the example of those about her, namely
from Achilles' bravery and willingness to die for her. It is very possible
that Aristotle said she was inconsistent
because he would not allow for
the fact that this female child (an inferior to the male adult, on both
counts, as female and a child, see Politics 1252b, also N.E. 1158b) was
capable of an heroic choice (children are compared to animals in not
being blameworthy since they act in ignorance N.E. lilla, but Aristotle
18"Honourable death is a truer life than

ignoble life" (52Austin) was quoted in
T.B.L. Webster's The
Tragedies of Euripides, London 1967, p. 128. He suggests that ear
lier Erechtheus' "does not accept self-sacrifice as as her mother
daughter cheerfully
offers" on the basis of a fragment of Ennius (60 J.): "Many are stony-hearted and pity
But she finally agrees, so on might see this as a precedent for Iphigenia's
nobody".
"change". (TheErechtheus was produced in 422 and Iphigenia inAulis in 406).
80 M. McDonald
admits they are capable of learning how to make an informed choice,

namely proairesis, E.E. 1240b). Aristotle was know for undervaluing
females; after all he blamed Euripides because he made Melanippe too
intelligent for a woman, and this was a flaw, in characterization (Poetics

1454a), comparable to Iphigenia's inconsistency 19.
Rosenmeyer sees Iphigenia's choice typical of the heroic nature

since it does not involve complicated self-reflection or an ostensible
decision process, but merely reveals a drive for fame ("das Verlangen
nach Ruhm")20. In Iphigenia's "choosing" fame one might think this
corroborates Snell's assessment of Iphigenia devoting herself to an
abstract, but I would claim more that she seeks this fame in response to
her father's instructionconcerning why this fame would be merited. As
Theseus changes his mind and follows the heroic path advocated by his
mother in the Suppliants, so Iphigenia heeds her father's advice 21.
Rosenmeyer has also refined Snell's theories of decision making in

Greek tragedy by showing the great role that necessity plays in Greek
tragedy in contrast to the epic, so that there ismore evidence of free and
considered choice in the epic 22.The role of necessity ismore than evi
dent in the Iphigenia at Aulis in both the pressures on Agamemnon and
19
Lefkowitz says, "It was not...accidental that itwas
in the polis that the concept of
the "natural" difference and inferiority of women was
theorized, and that Aristotle, iden
tifying women with "matter" (as opposed to "spirit" and "form"), and consequently
excluding them from the logos, the domain of "reason", furnished the theoretical justifi
cation for public life and private law", introduction to Maureen B. Fant's translation of
L'ambiguo malanno by Eva Cantarella (1981), Pandora's Daughters, Baltimore 1987, pp.
1-2. Aristotle says that woman, indeed, has the deliberative faculty (bouleutikon) but it is
weak (akuron) 1260a, 6-7 Politics. So also Dover says "Xen.Oec. 3, 11 has reservations
about their [women's] as moral and "Woman's nature is just as
responsibility agents"
as man's, it is deficient in mind and Xen. 2,9,
good though (gnome) strength", Sym.
Greek Popular Morality in the Time of Plato and Aristotle, Oxford 1974, pp. 96 and 99.
Page duBois speaks of women being deprived of a share in public logos: "Women and
slaves were in principle excluded from discourse, silenced", Centaurs & Amazons, Ann
Arbor 1982. We can add vis ? vis Iphigenia, "or sacrificed".
20
"Der Stimmungsumschlag erfolgt v?llig unvermittelt, und das entspricht offen
sichtlich der heroischen Natur, die wohl klagen und sich f?rchten mag, sich aber nicht
auf eine Selbst befragung einlassen darf", 'Wahlakt', p. 14.
21
See'Wahlakt', p. 21 n. 41.
22
"Um der Grosse des Helden und des Glanzes und der Schwerelosigkeit seiner
poetischen Welt willen legt das Epos kein besonderes Gewicht auf die Zw?nge die sich
mit einem Entscheidungsprozess verbinden, w?hrend diese in der Trag?die stark her
vortreten", 'Wahlakt', p. 10.
on Iphigenia 23. Iphigenia explores the limits of freedom in her new nar
rowed context, and this exploration is indicative of the new view of
heroism.
It should be obvious by now that Iphigenia contrasts with all the
others in this play. There have been various assessments of Agamemnon,
from those who see him as a good father who must sacrifice his daughter
for the good of his country, to those that represent him as totally black 24.
So also some see Clytemnestra as a mother altruistically concerned for
her child, or instead as a selfish woman concerned for Iphigenia only as
she represents her own honor or time. Achilles also can be seen as a
noble hero, or a boastful prig, again concerned more about his reputa
tion than Iphigenia's good.
I tend to follow the "black" assessments of Agamemnon, Menelaus
and Achilles, although the situation is complex; I see Clytemnestra as
"more sinned against than sinning" to quote Wassermann25. This
"black" background I think puts Iphigenia's "white" into relief. I see
her as a genuine heroine, to be contrasted with the "Homeric" heroes in
Euripides who have become corruptly bourgeois. I also see her as exhi
biting a philia, which Aristotle called an arete, a virtue, when he said that
no one would choose to live without friends although possessing all the
other goods (N.E. 1155a). By sacrificing her life for her friends and the
good, Iphigenia exhibits the characteristics of the friendship that Aristo
tle says is based on the good. She "thinks herself worthy of great things
and is so in fact", and so satisfies Aristotle's definition of the megalopsy
chos.
She exhibits
aidos, respects her father's lesson, and achieves kleos
ageraton, the ageless fame praised by the chorus I.A. 568 (cf. Achilles'
kleos aphthiton). She exhibits nobility, as both Achilles and the chorus
note (1402 and 1421-1422).
23 von
"Auch in der Euripideischen Variante des Themas der Entscheindung Aga
memnons, der Iphigenie in Aulis (V. 303-542), steht der Zwang (anagke) ganz in Vorder
grund", 'Wahlakt', p. 10.

24 see Herbert
For a summary of the various theories about Agamemnon's motives
in Euripides' at Aulis", Hermes 109, 3, 1981, pp. 257
Siegel's 'Agamemnon 'Iphigenia
265, particularly the first three notes. Rosenmeyer also speaks of Agamemnon's agoni
zing choice: "Ebenso wie in Agamemnon des Aischylos besteht ein Konflikt zwischen
der v?terlichen Liebe und dem Ehrgeiz des Feldherrn. Ebenso wie inAgamemnon des
Aischylos wird die Wahl besonders qualvoll durch das Zusammenspiel der Kr?fte des
Zwanges", 'Wahlakt', p. 10.
25
'Agamemnon in the Iphigenia at Aulis: A Man in an Age of Crisis', Trans. Am.
Philoi. Ass. 58, 1949, p. 184.
82 M. McDonald
I think philia is also a key to understanding Euripides 26.He antici

pates Aristotle by having Herakles say, "Whoever would prefer wealth
or power over loyal friends thinks wrongly" {H.F. 1425-1426). Again
and again in Euripides' plays, friendship shows man's superiority to the
gods and the way that he can survive in a hostile universe.

It does not matter that some of the reasons that Iphigenia gives for
her noble sacrifice are ironic on close inspection. After all Artemis seems
rather arbitrary in demanding this child's life. So also, when Iphigenia
says thatAchilles should not give his life for her, isHelen then somuch
better? And then we look at the freedom of Greece, which seems ironic
as amotive since its leaders are slaves to their passions, e.g. Agamemnon
envies the freedom of his slave (16 ff.), and claims that he himself is a
slave to the mob (450, Menelaus and Clytemnestra corroborate this
assessment 517, 1357)27. And should one free Greece from the barba
rians, since the barbarians should be ruled by Greeks not vice versa {I.A.
1400-1401)? Are theGreeks not acting like barbarians by demanding a
human sacrifice? Indeed, the reasons that Iphigenia gives for her noble
act do seem misguided, but they are also the reasons that Agamemnon
has just given {I.A. 1255 ff.). She listens well, and is a dutiful daughter.
One can assess Iphigenia from many standpoints 28.1 have concen
trated on the philosophical motivation for Iphigenia, contra Snell,
26
Schein, Scully and Tyler have also noted this (see n. 10). Scully puts itwell, "Yet,
in the midst of desolation, suffering, and even death, human fellowship and love are the
only consolations, however temporary and tenuous, which man possesses in an inhuman
universe", p. 462. So also C. Segal of Agave and Cadmus, at the end of the Bacchae,
seeing parallels in the endings of the Hippolytus and the Herakles, "The indifferent
justice of the gods elicits and highlights by contrast the love, devotion and protectiveness
of these two people to one another", Dionysiac Poetics and Euripides' Bacchae, Princeton
1982, p.324.
27
Many see Iphigenia's motivations as complex, e.g. Kamerbeek as and tra
quoted
slated by E.A.M.E. O'Connor-Visser in Aspects of Human Sacrifice in the Tragedies of
Euripides, Amsterdam 1987: "Iphigenia's love for her father, the impression made on her
by Achilles' behaviour and the illusion that she can save Hellas through her sacrifice
make her
change psychologically understandable", p. 144.1 do not deny this complexity,
but merely concentrate on what I think Euripides considered the inter
primary, namely
personal relationships.
28
Snell refers to the passage where Agamemnon envies the freedom of his slave as
"one of the most impressive scenes of ancient
tragedy, but also one of the most horrible,
though it contains nothing of the bloodshed and terror to which other tragedies have
accustomed us. Here we are concerned with the inner destruction of a man", and
Poetry
Society: The Role of Poetry in Ancient Greece, rpt. Freeport 1961; New York 1971, p. 89.
As Agamemnon is destroyed by his life, Iphigenia lives through her death, and by her
death she gains her freedom illustrating Erechtheus' daughter's claim that "honourable
death is a truer life than ignoble life".
seeing what she does as Aristotelian rather than Platonic, Heideggerian

rather than Hegelian. In this way also she is the sole repository of aristo
cratic heroism, now reborn in a bourgeois context.
Iphigenia saysAchilles should not give his life for her: itwould be a
waste, because "one man's life is worth more than 10.000 women's"
1394. One cannot imagine Achilles saying the reverse, although, indeed,
he says that he is willing to defend Iphigenia to the death. But we know
that this defense is because of his own honor rather than concern for her
as a person, since he earlier claimed that he would have gone along with
Agamemnon's ruse if only he had been consulted first (961-967).
Iphigenia pursues honor like Alcestis, but a woman's honor that
proceeds from philia towards Achilles and her father, what Lefkowitz
calls a "passive heroism" 29.
We see again Iphigenia operating heroically,
but she is caught in a bourgeois net. She gives her life indeed for kleos
aphthiton, "immortal fame", but her context strangles her, forcing her to
follow what her father says: the bourgeois ideal. Her kleos is that of an
Alcestis, not an Achilles. It is not bourgeois to die for oneself and one's
honor, but it is to die on behalf of friends and country. In the Politics
Aristotle makes the family a model for the city, with the father as the
head, and devotion owed to him, the devotion Iphigenia practices
through philia. Chalk made the significant observation that philia has
replaced arete and bia, the Homeric ideals, in Euripides' Heracles 30.
Iphigenia's comment on women's value vis ? vis men is an ironic

reversal of the heroic situation in Homer where in fact 10.000 men die
for one woman ("the face that launch'd a thousand ships", as Marlowe
said). However, they die for their own honor, or Troy's gold and women
as a symbol of that honor, not altruistically for Helen's or Menelaus'
well-being. So what Iphigenia says reflects the reality of Greek thought

about women in her time, which led to Aristotle's undervaluing her
29
"...women's passive heroism sets the model for a man", Heroines and Hysterics,
London 1981, p. 11. Cf. also Michelini, "The continual prominence given to female figu
res is a necessary correlative to the revision of heroic standards in Euripidean drama. By
their very presence and their into the plays of concerns labeled as
through injection
female, Euripidean women disrupt the rhythms of Hellenic culture continually compro
mising the standards of male heroism and leaving their male counterparts diminished",
Euripides and the Tragic Tradition, p. 247.
}0
'Arete and Bia in Euripides' Heracles', Journ. Hell. Stud. 82, 1962, pp. 7-18:
human teaches Heracles the of traditional arete based on violence,
philia inadequancy
and finallyHeracles is led "through a fully human relationship contrasted with the amo
to comprehend the tragic nature of action", 18.
rality of the gods, p.
84 M. McDonald
capacity for moral decision and thus calling her inconsistent, whereas
what Marlowe said reflected thoughts about women in his own time.
Action now takes precedence over intellectual apprehension or ver
bal protestation. Iphigenia chooses to sacrifice herself out o? philia for
her father, Achilles and her country. Rather than a hope for something
permanent which is apprehended intellectually, this is more a creative
act in response to emotional ties, with the heart guiding the head, as it so
often does in Euripides. Iphigenia is not so much devoting herself to an
as to the emotional
intellectual universal particular; she is not dying so
much for an idea, but rather those she loves, and in this is indicative of a
new type of heroism validating a cooperative relationship as an element
of stability in an unstable universe 31.
University of California, Irvine
31 n. 10. Schein to philia

See asks, does Iphigenia's devotion "necessarily imply a
contrast of emotion to reason?". It does not in this particular case. But if one were to ask
whether emotion or reason were primary, I think one would to the for
give preference
mer. Euripides constantly shows the irrational the rational. Medea (Med. 1078
defeating
1080) and Phaedra (Hipp. 273 ff.) both say they know what they should do rationally, but
they choose the opposite, and follow their emotions. Medea opposes her of the
logic
heart to Jason's logic of the mind: He speaks logically, but unjustly (Med. 580-581). In
the Bacchae we have a chorus which says, to sophon d'ou sophia (395). Dodds in his edi
tion (Oxford 1944) cites Murray "the world's wise are not wise", p. 121. What Euripides
teaches is the logic of heart. In the I.A. Euripides says to te gar aideisthai (563):
sophia
Wisdom is knowing aidos, respect, and proper limitation. Iphigenia knows this and
displays aidos to her father, and this is her wisdom. It is the wisdom of the heart, and
springs from philia. Snell showed how antisocratic Euripides could be in the chapters on
Tassion and Reason', in Scenes from Greek Drama, Berkeley 1967, pp. 23-69. It is rather
surprising that he chose later to show Iphigenia following a Platonic ideal (see n. 4). Pro
fessor Rosenmeyer suggests Snell "was caught in his Hegelian past". My own reasons for
differing with Snell should be clear by now. My thanks to Seth Schein, Thomas Mac
Cary, David Konstan, Thomas Rosenmeyer, Georgios Anagnostopoulos, Gerasimos
Santas and George Huxley for the help they have given me with this paper.

Macdonnald Marianne Philia Euripides Ifigenia in Aulis

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Iphigenia's "Philia": Motivation in Euripides "Iphigenia at Aulis"

representing something positive and acting in a way consistent with her

father's pretenses of patriotism, 'Aristoteles zu Euripides' in Aulis', Hermes

I see Iphigenia instead practicing the Aristotelian virtue of megalo

any society, communication operates on three different levels: communication of

women, communication of goods and service, communication of messages", Structural

ca', inMondo classico: percorsipossibili, Ravenna 1985, p. 49.

malevolent, hope man's

Schimidt-Berger, Philia. Typologie der Freundschaft und Verwandtschaft bei Euripides,

heroism, new in that it now is to be found inwomen, children and slaves

rally, and this action is not simply based on an intellectual apprehension.

Diss. Eberhard-Karls-Universit?t T?bigen 1973, James Tyler, cited in n. 5, and Samuel

Philia can be a source of heroics. There are three main categories of

something one wishes

evil to do it", as urged

the absence of goodwill", 'Aristotle on Friendship', in Essays on Aristotle's Ethics, ed. A.

One more explanation for Iphigenia's change of mind, might be

unwilling victim, even hoisted a

recognized by the tutor. Euripides cares enough about Aeschylus to

18"Honourable death is a truer life than

admits they are capable of learning how to make an informed choice,

intelligent for a woman, and this was a flaw, in characterization (Poetics

Rosenmeyer sees Iphigenia's choice typical of the heroic nature

Rosenmeyer has also refined Snell's theories of decision making in

grund", 'Wahlakt', p. 10.

I think philia is also a key to understanding Euripides 26.He antici

gods and the way that he can survive in a hostile universe.

seeing what she does as Aristotelian rather than Platonic, Heideggerian

Iphigenia's comment on women's value vis ? vis men is an ironic

well-being. So what Iphigenia says reflects the reality of Greek thought

University of California, Irvine

31 n. 10. Schein to philia

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