Epimetheus, the god of afterthought, is a sad sort of fellow, as gods go. I’m not aware of him appearing in any myth other than the first creation of Humanity, where he gets cast as the clown, the thoughtless one who bungles the making of animal life, using up all the powerful defensive and offensive traits on other species and having none left for the humans. His brother Prometheus (Forethought) had to fix his blunder by stealing a part of the power of the gods to give to the poor furless, clawless, slow-running humans.
Wow, it only just occurred to me: as the god of forethought, Promethus must have known exactly what he was getting himself into. He really was selfless, accepting his fate of being chained to that rock for thousands of years. Stuck there with only that hungry bird for company, cut off from the friendship of gods or humans until Heracles came along, someone who was both human and god, to free him. And he knew at least in outline what was going to happen to him.
I’ll admit, I prefer the story of Hanuman, the Monkey King, who sacrificed his tail to set a string of fires to accomplish his mission, assigned to hiim as penance for invading Heaven, and when he asked for his tail to be restored, Brahma said, “No, your destiny is to never have a tail again. Instead, you shall become the father of a race of tailless monkeys who will rule the world.”
Hanuman - although I actually prefer his Chinese name, Sun Wu Kong, because then he’s King Kong - clearly was lacking in forethought, or he wouldn’t have tried to challenge the Supreme Being. I wonder what his afterthought was, as he nursed the cauterized spot on his behind and contemplated his descendants, tailless and hairless and walking in such a ridiculous fashion, torso parallel to legs, that their footprints would always be unmistakable in their weirdness. Did he wonder if we were a fair trade for his lovely tail?
But what about poor Epimetheus? Aside from mourning his own failure and his brother’s suffering, what did he do with his afterthoughtful life? Did he visit humans who had behaved foolishly and torment them with all the things they should have done? Did he invent the mirror, so people could reflect? Did he lurk on staircases to taunt people with l'esprit de l'escalier?
Or was he something kinder: offering people a chance to turn the past over in order to become better? After all, the past can’t be changed even by the gods, but we can at least reflect on it to improve our future.
[Afterthought: Oh, right, he was also the husband of Pandora, and was equally ineffectual at saving her from that nasty trick the gods played on her.]
https://comraderadmila.com/2020/01/23/phase-one/
The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Think."
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