Thoughts on Numbers

These past two weeks I have begun to make the transition over from Homer's Iliad to the Odyssey. Wonderful works to be read. But as I'm transitioning, I begin to wonder if both works were really told by the same storyteller. Straight away, the Iliad teems with strong emotions...mostly rage as everyone does kill one another. But The Odyssey begins very calm and serene-like. And as I'm reading, I feel as though I'm on a cruise ship -- enjoying the meals, enjoying the entertainment; enjoying the ride. And then something strikes me. Numbers. They're all the same. Patroclus charged the wall three times. Odysseus was stuck on Calypso's island for seven years. The Trojans fought for nine years... Aside from the 40, 50, 90 long black ships, it seems to me that all the numbers in both texts are 3, 7, or 9. Why? Honestly, I have no idea. The number three is interesting because the Christian churches, I believe, use this number the most. The Holy Trinity. Three days and Jesus rose again. Etc. Outside of the church it seems that everything comes in threes for whatever reason. Take this summer for instance. Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett died on the same day. But low and behold, just a few days later, Billy Mays bought the farm. All three big events lighting up the news and our television sets -- three being the prominent number. Perhaps Homer and the Greeks figured this out? Perhaps they recognized that for whatever reason, things (whatever they may be) come in threes. Seven. Okay, seven. Well, there's seven days in a week. That's easy enough. Biblically, seven days to create the universe. Seven is also used a lot in the book of Revelations. Perhaps that was really another thing the Greeks figured out before the Christians harbored it...? I don't know. I'm just told that the number seven represents completeness, which would make sense for Odysseus, seeing how he spends seven years on Ogygia with Calypso before he is released to return back to Ithaca. But why nine? And nine is the real reason this particular blog was spawned. While daydreaming one day, it occured to me, The Trojans fought for nine years before ending the war in the tenth. Okay. It takes Odysseus nine years before coming home in the tenth. (Making it all twenty years for the big guy.) But why nine? It's mentioned a healthy number of times (althought not as many as three or seven). What about the parallel to birth? When a woman conceives, the doctor gives her a due date -- nine months after conception. NINE. And it's funny...people typically believe a woman to be pregnant for nine months when in actuality she gives birth nine months after conception, equaling a grand total of TEN. Perhaps in both texts nine is a significant number because of what ten represents. It is a full circle. An even number. All of our fingers and toes are accounted for. Ten. After nine comes the birth. For the Greeks, it was to win over the Trojans. For Odysseus, it will be his respawning into his native land of Ithaca. As for me, it will take about three months to read The Iliad, The Odyssey, and The Aeneid. Perhaps there is a little something in numbers...