The Myth of Sisyphus

Sisyphus is a sinner who was condemned by Zeus in Tartarus to an eternity of rolling a boulder up a mountain until it nearly reaches the top, then watching it roll back down again. Sisyphus was founder and king of Corinth, or Ephyra as it was called in then. He was notorious as the most cunning dishonest knave on earth. His greatest triumph came at the end of his life, when the god Hades came to claim him personally for the kingdom of the dead.

Hades had brought along a pair of handcuffs, a comparative novelty, and Sisyphus expressed such an interest that Hades was persuaded to demonstrate their use – on himself. And so it came about that the high lord of the Underworld was kept locked up in a closet at Sisyphus’s house for many a day, a circumstance which put the great chain of being seriously out of whack. Nobody could die. A soldier might be chopped to bits in battle and still show up at camp for dinner.

Finally Hades was released and Sisyphus was ordered summarily to report to the Underworld for his eternal assignment. But the wily one had another trick up his sleeve. He simply told his wife not to bury him and then complained to Persephone, Queen of the Dead, that he had not been accorded the proper funeral honors. What’s more, as an unburied corpse he had no business on the far side of the river Styx at all – his wife hadn’t placed a coin under his tongue to secure passage with Charon the ferryman. Surely her highness could see that Sisyphus must be given leave to journey back topside and put things right.

Kindly Persephone assented, and Sisyphus made his way back to the sunshine, where he promptly forgot all about funerals and such drab affairs and lived on in dissipation for another good stretch of time. But even this paramount trickster could only postpone the inevitable. Eventually he was hauled down to Hades, where his indiscretions caught up with him. For a crime against the Gods – the specifics of which are variously reported – Sisyphus was condemned to an eternity of hard, frustrating and fruitless labor.

His assignment was to roll a great boulder to the top of a great mountain. However, each and every time Sisyphus, by the greatest of exertion and toil, nearly attained the summit of this mountain, the enchanted boulder rolled all the way back down the slope again.

This is simply the story of our lives. The God’s have specific punishments for specific crimes. The punishment for dishonesty is toil, endless fruitless toil. This is also a metaphor for the exact same punishment bestowed upon Adam and Eve, for their treachery in the garden. Nearly everyone here is experiencing this in some form. This is an analogy for lower forms of consciousness. Virtue is rewarded with heightened consciousness.