Father Sun Gods
Many of the world’s religions worship Father Sun Gods. There’s the Egyptian god Ra who ruled the sky, earth, and underworld. After creating life, he spread warmth and light everywhere and helped things grow. Surya, the Hindu sun god, provided healing and comfort to his people. The Aztecs, however, had Tonatiuh, a cruel god who demanded sacrifices.
These gods represent different kinds of fatherhood, whether neutral, cruel, or kind. Apollo, the Greek sun god, revealed yet another type of father, for he was absent.
Apollo fathered a child with the nymph Clymene, then he returned to his palace and focused on his work. His son, Phaeton, knew him only through the stories his mother told. Ridiculed by other children for claiming to be the son of a god, he still believed his mother. So one day he set off to find his celestial father. [1]
In Search of Father
Many of us search for fathers we never knew, for ones we wished we’d known. If we’re lucky, we eventually learn to father ourselves. Phaeton would not be so fortunate.
After a long journey, the boy reached “the land of the rising sun.” [2] There he made his way through the sun god’s palace to the throne room and stopped, amazed. An incredible glowing being sat in a golden chair. Could this be his father? How big, and strong, and wonderful he was.
As soon as Apollo saw the boy, he realized who he was. Dimming his light so as not to overwhelm the mortal child, Apollo beckoned for Phaeton to come forward. Eagerly, the boy ran up to stand beside his father, and his father smiled down at him with pride. Phaeton felt warm and happy.
Phaeton Makes His Request
Yet he still needed to show the truth to those other boys. “If you are my father,” he said to Apollo, “give me proof.”
“All right,” said Apollo. “You can have anything you want.”
“Anything?” asked Phaeton.
“Of course. You are my son.”
“Then let me drive your chariot in the morning,” Phaeton said.
Wanting to Be Important
Some of us long to be like our fathers, to fill their shoes, to do their work, to be men, to be women, to be recognized as important and competent and worthy. Phaeton longed for all of this. His father’s work seemed glorious, and Phaeton wanted to it, too.
Yet sometimes, this is not a good idea. Perhaps we are too young, or maybe we’re not like our fathers, and their work is not for us. We all have our personalities, our strengths and weaknesses. When fathers demand that their sons become like them, they often ignore the child’s own soul and purpose. Fathers who understand their sons, and their daughters, they encourage them to become who they are meant to be.
Apollo may have enjoyed seeing how much his son be like him. After all, this kind of flattery feels good. Yet the god knew that since his son was mortal, he would probably never grow strong enough or divine enough to pull the sun across the sky. It can’t be easy to have a god for a father.
On the other hand, if some day Phaeton could control the god’s chariot, Apollo knew he wasn’t ready to do so now. So Apollo tried to talk the boy out of this wish. Phaeton would not be dissuaded.
Parenting Styles
In the 1970s, Diana Baumrind identified three types of parenting: authoritarian, authoritative, and permissive. Thirteen years later, Eleanor Maccoby and John Martin adapted her work, dividing the permissive parenting style into two categories: indulgent and neglectful.
In their research study on the adjustment patterns of adolescents, Susie D. Lamborn and Nina S. Mounts measured the impact of Maccoby and Martin’s four parenting styles on 4,100 teenagers from various cultural and ethnic backgrounds. They found that regardless of the youth’s ethnicity or culture, those raised with authoritative parenting had the highest levels of competence and the best psycho-social adjustment of the study’s participants. Authoritative parenting combines closeness with healthy consistency, expectations, and limits. [3]
As we might expect, the poorest outcomes were found among teenagers from neglectful homes, ones in which parents showed little emotional care or support for their children, and where they provided few expectations or limits on behavior. These teens’ self-confidence was low, they tended to use drugs and get into trouble, and most of them did poorly in school.
In between these two groups were the youth raised in authoritarian or indulgent homes. Those with authoritarian parents, who were expected to adhere to strict rules, but who didn’t receive the attention or tenderness of authoritatively-raised children, generally did well in school, behaving themselves and abstaining from drugs, yet they had just as many problems with self-esteem and confidence as those from neglectful homes. Indulgently-raised youth, on the other hand, who had few limits, yet lots of love, got into trouble and used drugs, but felt better about themselves, got along with their peers, and were more self-reliant.
Phaeton’s Parents
Of course, no matter what we do, we can’t guarantee our children will grow up content, confident, law-abiding, and successful, for youngsters are influenced by many things. School supports, for instance, can make a big difference, as can mentors and grandparents. Peer interactions are also important.
Yet given what Lambourn and Mounts discovered, I think we can trace Greek tragedies to neglectful, indulgent, or authoritarian parenting. Let’s see how that might fit in Phaeton’s case.
Like most Greek gods, Apollo was an absent father, leaving Clymene to parent by herself. Apollo might not have been neglectful, exactly. Perhaps he supported Clymene in some way, giving her food or clothing or even money. Yet he wasn’t there for Phaeton, and the boy felt the lack keenly. Not only did his heart ache, but he felt rejected and abused by the neighborhood children.
If Clymene had been stronger, perhaps Apollo’s defection wouldn’t have mattered so much. She was, however, a nymph. Nymphs may be sweet and kind, but they are inconsistent and indulgent. Although his mother surely loved him, I suspect Phaeton had few rules to follow and received few consequences if he broke those rules. Apparently, he got whatever he wanted most of the time. Could Clymene have been trying to make up for the lack of a father in the boy’s home?
Regardless, Phaeton was used to getting his way. Apollo had little practice setting limits or saying no. Perhaps he felt guilty for abandoning the boy. So when Phaeton insisted that the only thing he wanted was to drive his father’s chariot and pull the sun across the heavens, Apollo gave in. His heart heavy, he set the boy into the seat and gave him the reins of his wild, unruly horses.
Tragedy Strikes
It was a disaster. Feeling the light touch of Phaeton’s hands on the reins, the horses sped across the heavens, galloping high and low, careening off the trail, and stampeding so close to earth that the snow melted from the Alps, the grasses burned to their roots, and the seas boiled away.
Mother Earth cried out to Zeus for relief, so the king of the Gods struck the sun’s chariot with a thunderbolt, causing Phaeton to tumble headlong into the River Eridanus. To quench the fires the sun had started, Zeus caused a torrential rain to fall. Earth was saved, but Phaeton died.
Perhaps the tragedy could have been averted had the boy’s parents done a better job raising him. But perhaps not. Besides, we can only do our best based on who we are and what we know at the time. If we could see the future, we would doubtless change it by choosing a different path, yet who knows if the new outcome would be better or worse?
Disasters happen. That’s the way of life. Authoritarian parenting tempts us because we think that if we provide enough limits, we can keep our children safe. However, survival is not guaranteed, no matter how strict we are. Nor how benevolent and wise. Most children live to adulthood, even though life is dangerous. Even when children make mistakes, lose control, and take on more than they can handle, even when we leave them to cope on their own, somehow most of them make it through.
Phaeton Dies
Unfortunately, some of them children don’t. Phaeton had no business trying to drive his father’s chariot, yet Apollo felt helpless to stop him. Bound by his rash promise, the god allowed his son to make a very sad choice. Out of control, with no parental figure to help him, Phaeton fell, and in his falling, he died.
Fathers grieve their children. The other day, I sat with a family whose matriarch was dying. One of the sons couldn’t stop crying. Two of his own sons had died when they were young men, and the loss of his mother reminded him of his earlier losses, making her passing unbearable. Love is a wonderful thing, and it breaks our heart.
I imagine Apollo felt sick for a very long time. Clymene may have been furious. The myth tells us that Phaeton’s sisters stood by the river and mourned until they turned into poplar trees, where they stand to this day, crying for their brother.
Father Greg Boyle Fathers Gang Members
Although we can’t save everyone, sometimes we have the opportunity to guide or teach or comfort a youngster whose father wasn’t there, or whose family was too chaotic to be authoritative, or who had the best upbringing, and still got into trouble beyond their ability to cope.
Father Greg Boyle has spent thirty years among gang members in East Los Angeles. He’s written books and articles and given talks about the young people he’s known and loved and, yes, parented. One such boy was Louie. One day, Louie asked Father Boyle for a blessing. As Boyle prepared to bless him, he remembered it had been the young man’s birthday just a few days ago. Tenderly, Boyle told Louie how happy he was to know him and to have him in his life. “I’m proud to call you my son,” Boyle said. [4]
Foster Parenting Changes Lives
We don’t have to be biological fathers to make a difference. We can be mentors, teachers, and foster parents. Morrison Child and Family Services, for example, runs a foster parent program for boys who have gotten into legal trouble.
These boys need re-parenting from people who care about them, provide safety, healthy boundaries, and who compassionately and respectfully hold them accountable. The boys need fathers. They need stable, caring homes with adults who will give them appropriate affection and set healthy boundaries. The Morrison Services’ Breakthrough Program invites adults, especially ones who themselves struggled when they were younger, to offer these boys a second chance.
Re-Parenting Ourselves and Others
We can help society in many ways. One way is to be a foster parent. Another is to focus on ending racism, transforming the prison system, promoting restorative justice in our schools. Perhaps we have our own young children to raise. Others of us have enough to do just keeping ourselves whole and healthy.
For millennia, humans around the world have celebrated a Father Sun God. Like real fathers, these deities can be kind, absent, and even violent. Though not a panacea, it does make a difference how we raise our children. Love, attention, and limits seem to be best for young people. If we didn’t get that authoritative parenting, perhaps we can re-parent ourselves, for we all need love, attention, and limits.
In faith and fondness,
Barbara
Credits
- Story of “Phaeton and the Chariot of the Sun” adapted from Price, Margaret Evans, A Child’s Book of Myths, New York: Rand McNally, 1929, pp. 75-83.
- Ibid 77.
- Lamborn, Susie D. and Nina S. Mounts, “Patterns of Competence and Adjustment among Adolescents from Authoritative, Authoritarian, Indulgent, and Neglectful Families,” Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin, 1990. For more information see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting_styles.
- “The Calling of Delight: Gangs, Service, and Kinship,” an interview by Krista Tippet on On Being, April 2, 2015, https://onbeing.org/programs/greg-boyle-the-calling-of-delight-gangs-service-and-kinship/.
Photo by Jeremy Bishop.