The Ethics of Afterlife in Classical Greek Thought

The Greeks imagined the afterlife in a variety of ways, from a shadowy continuation of existence in the Homeric Hades to a dramatic compensation for one’s actions in life, either horrific torments in the underworld or blissful feasts and celebrations in paradise. Whether the afterlife was thought of as a continuation or a compensation, however, the same ethical standards govern existence in the afterlife as in life itself; virtues and vices deserve the same kind of recompense, and the overall happiness of the individual is reckoned in the same ways, even though the individual ceases to be an ethical actor after death. As “The Ethics of Afterlife in Classical Greek Thought” argues, the afterlife is always good to think with, and the Greek ideas of afterlife differ not so much from place to place or from time to time, but rather from text to text, as particular authors make use of different elements of the tradition to express their ideas.