That's the Power of Pride

Euripides’s Bacchae focuses on Dionysus’s return to Thebes and his quest for recognition and revenge. As the Bacchae demonstrates, “a god’s / fist comes down on men…who hold back what is due to gods,” a sentiment which is especially magnified by Dionysus’s pride (883-884, 886). Because of the Theban people’s lack of acknowledgement and worship for Dionysus, the Chorus warns the people that a time will come when they will pay attention to the god (537-538). They understand that Dionysus will stop at nothing to collect the recognition and praise he thinks he deserves. Dionysus’s pride is the primary driving force behind his motives and desire for honor, acknowledgement, and worship from King Pentheus and the Theban people.

Because Dionysus is prideful, he craves honor and retaliates whenever a character, namely Pentheus, disgraces him. Soon after Dionysus arrives in Thebes, he intoxicates the women with his power and leads them to Mt. Kithairon. Pentheus is outraged because the focus has shifted from him and his subjects engage in a practice he sees as immoral. In an attempt to end the madness and corruption in Thebes, Pentheus arrests a foreigner, who is Dionysus in disguise, because he “carried this new disease / to [their] women (353-354).  While Dionysus allows the guards to capture him, he fully intends to punish and humiliate Pentheus for “the painful mistake he had made” (634). After he escapes his bonds, Dionysus takes advantage of Pentheus in his unsound state of mind and his desire to see the Maenads. He explains that the women will “kill [him] if they see him as a man” and persuades Pentheus to “change rank” and dress like a girl (822-823). The king’s humiliation is not enough to compensate for the enormous blow to Dionysus’s pride, though. Because Pentheus repeatedly dishonors Dionysus, the god seeks revenge which only comes through Pentheus’s death.

Along with honor, Dionysus constantly seeks recognition and worship for his godliness. From the time Dionysus is born, the city of Thebes strongly disbelieves that he is the son of Zeus, and they continue to question Dionysus’s deity. Instead, they claim that Sémelê, Dionysus’s mother, has been “seduced by some man or other and put the blame on Zeus” (29).  To Dionysus’s disgust, the city’s king, Pentheus, also fails to acknowledge him through libations or prayers (46-47). After traveling for several years, Dionysus returns home, eager to teach the city a lesson and force both Pentheus and the people he rules to “see [him] clearly as divine” (23). He punishes the city by inflicting the women with madness and leading them to Mt. Kithairon to worship him through dance and rites. Later, Pentheus spies on the Maenad camp where he is discovered by the women and dies brutally at the hands of his mother, Agavê (1114). Similar to Pentheus’s failure to acknowledge Dionysus’s deity is Agavê’s lack of recognition of him as she “tears him limb from limb” (1210).  A messenger delivers news of Pentheus’s death to the city and points out that reverence for the gods is “the most wise / of all pursuits a human being can follow” (1151-1152). Because of their king’s death, the city learns their lesson, and Dionysus’s prideful desire to be recognized as “truly god” is fulfilled (48).

Soon after Pentheus’s murder, Dionysus makes an appearance high above the royal house and triumphantly proclaims to the city that he was “born of no mortal father, / for [he] is the son of Zeus” (1341). His physical status, which is superior to everyone, and the declaration of his godliness point out his pride once more. Though Dionysus achieves his goal of recognition and honor, he cannot help but bask in the glory of his newfound status. Dionysus proceeds to issue unpleasant fates of characters who “committed an outrage against [him],” and uses them as an example (1347). These characters serve as undeniable proof of the consequences that follow when the Theban people fail to acknowledge and honor their god.