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Attributed to Orpheus

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns

Name: The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns
Author: Attributed to Orpheus

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The HymnsLXII. To Dike · Lines 1–11

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LXII. To Dike · Lines 1–11

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Ancient Greek

p. 206

LXII. ΔΙΚΗΣ

θυμίαμα λίβανον

Ὄμμα Δίκης μέλπω πανδερκέος, ἀγλαομόρφου,

ἣ καὶ Ζηνὸς ἄνακτος ἐπὶ θρόνον ἱερὸν ἵζει

οὐρανόθεν καθορῶσα βίον θνητῶν πολυφύλων,

τοῖς ἀδίκοις τιμωρὸς ἐπιβρίθουσα δικαίη,

ἐξ ἰσότητος ἀληθείῃ συνάγουσ’ ἀνόμοια·

πάντα γάρ, ὅσσα κακαῖς γνώμαις θνητοῖσιν ὀχεῖται,

δύσκριτα, βουλομένοις τὸ πλέον βουλαῖς ἀδίκοισι,

μούνη ἐπεμβαίνουσα δίκην ἀδίκοις ἐπεγείρεις·

ἐχθρὴ τῶν ἀδίκων, εὔφρων δὲ σύνεσσι δικαίοις.

ἀλλά, θεά, μόλ’ ἔπι γνώμαις ἐσθλῇσι δικαίη,

ὡς ἂν ἀεὶ βιοτῆς τὸ πεπρωμένον ἦμαρ ἐπέλθῃ.

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns: LXII. To Dike

p. 207

LXII. To Dike

fumigation from frankincense

I sing the eye of Dike, all-seeing, splendid of form,

who also sits upon the sacred throne of Zeus the lord

and looks down from heaven on the life of mortals of many tribes,

bearing down upon the unjust, an avenger, and righteous,

on equal terms drawing unlike things together by truth;

for all that is borne for mortals by evil purposes,

hard to judge, for those who crave the larger share by unjust counsels —

you alone come down upon them and rouse justice against the unjust;

an enemy of the unjust, but kindly to the just who keep your company.

But come, goddess, righteous, upon good purposes,

that life's fated day may ever come to pass.

1.The hymn's addressee is an eye. Ὄμμα Δίκης is what line 1 says it sings; by line 8 the address has become second person and the eye has become the goddess, and the figure is not resumed. Dike's silent knowledge is old — Solon fr. 4.14–15 West has her σιγῶσα σύνοιδε, silently aware of what is and what has been — but that is cognisance, not an organ of sight, and the proverbial ὀφθαλμὸς Δίκης belongs to a different strand. The hymn's opening is its own.

2–3.ἐπὶ θρόνον ἱερὸν ἵζει — with the accusative, she sits on the holy throne of Zeus, not beside it. Hesiod has her seated beside her father when she is wronged and telling him of unjust men (Works and Days 259–260, in the passage 256–262); this hymn seats her on the throne itself and gives her the looking down rather than the reporting up, and line 8 has her act on what she sees without referring it to anyone. Sophocles puts a Dike of the opposite address at Antigone 451, ἡ ξύνοικος τῶν κάτω θεῶν Δίκη, dwelling with the gods below — a contrast to this hymn's placing, not a support for it.

5.ἐξ ἰσότητος ἀληθείῃ συνάγουσ’ ἀνόμοια — on a footing of equality she draws unlike things together by truth. ἐκ with the genitive gives the basis she works from, not a result she produces. The case-endings are editors' work: ἀληθείῃ is Hermann's for the codices' ἀληθείας, and ἀνόμοια Abel's for ἀνομοῖα. So equality is a procedure and not a verdict, which is the hymn's answer to line 7's men who want τὸ πλέον, the larger share.

Placement.LXI, LXII and LXIII are three consecutive hymns on the same subject: Nemesis, Dike, and Dikaiosyne, whose heading stands on the same page as the end of LXII. The collection has already named Dike once, at XLIII.2, as the middle of the three Horai beside Eunomia and Eirene. Here she is given a hymn of her own — and Eunomia's name is the reading the editors removed from LX.2, two hymns back.

About This Reading Edition

The eighty-eight Orphic Hymns and the Prayer to Musaeus, in Ancient Greek and English, with the supplied critical apparatus, explanatory notes, introduction, glossary and editorial matter.

Historical Text and Translation

Orphic Hymns, attributed to Orpheus. Greek text after Eugenius Abel, Orphica (Leipzig and Prague, 1885), pages 57–102.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

The ancient Greek source and the 1885 Abel edition are public-domain material. The supplied new English translation and editorial matter are published with the site owner’s authorization. Both supplied original files remain unchanged.