Heaven and earth are created, the sea fluctuates, fish swim in the sea, birds fly and sing in the air, and the ground is crowded with all kinds of animals, but there is no creation that has a soul in it and can rule the world. At this time, Prometheus set foot on the earth. He was a descendant of the older generation of gods deposed by Zeus, and the son of Iapetus, born to Mother Earth and Uranos. He clearly knew that the seeds of heaven were dormant in the soil, so he dug some soil, wetted it with river water, and kneaded it into a human body according to the image of the world's dominant god. In order to give life to the human body made of mud, he took the characteristics of good and evil from the hearts of various animals, and then sealed them in people's chests. He has a friend among the gods, and this is Athena, the goddess of wisdom. Athena appreciated the creation of the son of Titan, and blew the soul, the breath of the gods, into the clay figurine with only half life.
In this way, the first people were born, and soon they multiplied everywhere and filled the earth. But for a long time, they didn't know how to use their noble limbs and God-given spirit. They turn a blind eye, listen but don't hear, and run around like human figures in dreams, and don't know how to use everything in the world. They can't cut stones, burn bricks with clay, make beams and rafters out of wood cut in the forest, and use these materials to build houses. They live underground like ants who are busy all day, living in underground caves where there is no sunshine, and can't distinguish winter, spring with flowers and summer with harvest in sight according to reliable signs. Everything they do is chaotic and unplanned.
So Prometheus came to take care of them: he taught them to observe the rise and fall of stars; He invented the method of calculation and created pinyin characters; He taught them to put the animals on the yoke so that they could bear a share of human labor; He made horses get into the habit of pulling carts; He invented ships and sails suitable for sea navigation. He also paid attention to human life: once upon a time, when a person was sick, he was helpless, didn't know what to eat and drink for his health, didn't know how to take medicine to relieve his pain, and died miserably without medicine. Now, Prometheus told them how to prepare drugs to drive away all kinds of diseases. He also taught them the skills of prophecy, explained omens and dreams, and explained the display of birds' flight and sacrifice; He guided them to explore the underground and found underground minerals, iron, silver and gold. In a word, he introduced them to all the skills needed for life and all the tools to alleviate their hardships.
Not long ago, Zeus seized his father's throne and deposed the old gods. Now he and his sons rule the kingdom of heaven. Prometheus, on the other hand, is a descendant of the old gods, so the new gods noticed the newly born human beings and asked them to worship them in exchange for the protection they were willing to provide to mankind. In Mercone, Greece, man and God held a party, and the rights and obligations of human beings were determined together. Prometheus attended the meeting as the protector of human beings, and he suggested that the gods should not make human beings bear excessive obligations because they have the responsibility to protect.
Prometheus was clever and determined to fool the gods. He slaughtered a big bull in the name of his creation and asked the gods to choose the part they liked. He cut the slaughtered cow into two piles: meat, internal organs and a lot of fat were piled under the cowhide, and the latter pile was bigger, but inside it was bare bones cleverly wrapped in beef tallow.
Zeus, the father of the gods, saw through his deception at a glance and said, "Son of Iapetus, noble prince, my good friend, how unfair your distribution is!" Prometheus thought he could fool Zeus, so he smiled to himself and said, "Noble Zeus, the greatest of the eternal gods, please choose a pile you like!" Zeus flew into a rage, so he deliberately grabbed the white suet with both hands, peeled it off and saw the bare bones, but he pretended that he had just found himself cheated and said angrily, "I can see clearly that you haven't lost your cheating trick."
Zeus decided to retaliate against Prometheus' deception and refused to give the last gift that mankind urgently needed to realize civilization: fire. But the clever son of Iapetus found a way to remedy it: he took a flammable anise branch and went to the sky to get close to the solar car. Then he put the branch into the flashing flame and got the fire. He brought the fire to the earth, and the burning flames of the woodpile went straight into the sky.
When Zeus saw that there was such a brilliant fire rising on earth, his soul felt a piercing pain. Since human beings have used fire, he can't take it away from them, but he immediately thought of a new disaster instead of prohibiting human beings from using fire: he asked the fire god Hephaestus, who is famous for his superb skills, to create an image of a beautiful girl for him.
Athena, jealous of Prometheus, had no affection for him, so she came to help Zeus, put a shiny white coat on the girl's image, and let the girl hold the veil on her face with her hands, wearing a corolla decorated with flowers and a golden ribbon on her head. Hermes, the angel of God, gave this charming girl the ability to speak, while Aphrodite, the god of love, gave her all charming and lovely gestures. Zeus created an excellent pest in this way. He named her Pandora, which means "a woman who got everything from heaven", because every god gave her a gift that made mankind suffer.
Later, Zeus took the girl to the land where man and God walked happily together. People are full of praise for this incomparable woman. And she went to Prometheus' naive brother Epimetheus and gave him Zeus' gift.
Prometheus once warned his brother not to accept gifts from Zeus on Mount Olympus, lest mankind suffer disaster. But this warning didn't work. Epimetheus accepted the beautiful girl Pandora without even thinking about it. The girl came to Epimetheus with a big box with a lid in her hands, and immediately lifted the lid. A large group of disasters immediately flew out of the box and spread to the earth like lightning. The only one of these gifts that is beneficial to mankind, that is, hope, was locked in a box by Pandora according to the will of the father of the gods.
Before that, human life has never been disturbed by disasters, heavy labor or diseases that afflict people. But since Pandora opened the box, disasters have filled the earth, sky and ocean in various forms; Diseases scurried around in the crowd, day and night without sound, and all kinds of fever besieged the earth; The god of death, who used to sneak in humans slowly, is now running as fast as flying.
After that, Zeus immediately took revenge on Prometheus. He handed the sinner over to Hephaestus and two servants-Kratos and Biya, who were called coercive and violent. They were ordered to drag Prometheus to the wilderness of Scutia, and chained him to the dazzling cliffs of the Caucasus Mountain high above the abyss with endless chains. Hephaestus was reluctant to complete the task entrusted by his father, because he admired the son of Titan, and he knew that Prometheus was the descendant of his great-grandfather Uranos and the descendant of the same god as him. To this end, he said a few words of infinite sympathy, only to be condemned by rude servants. Out of helplessness, he had to let his servants complete this cruel task.
In this way, Prometheus was sadly hung on the cliff, propped up, unable to sleep and never bent his tired knees. "How many sorrows and lamentations you will make in vain," Hephaestus told him. "Zeus's will is unchangeable, and the new gods who won the kingdom of heaven not long ago are cold."
The prisoner's pain will really be permanent, or it will last for 30 thousand years. Although he lamented loudly, he called on the wind, the rivers, the waves of the sea, the earth, the mother of all things, and the sun, which has insight into everything, to testify about his suffering, but his will remained firm: "As long as a person realizes the inevitable irresistible power," he said, "he will certainly endure everything that is destined to happen." He predicted that the new marriage would corrupt and destroy the masters of the gods. But no matter how Zeus threatened him, he refused to elaborate on this seemingly bright and dark prophecy.
Zeus is uncompromising. He sent an eagle to peck at the prisoner's liver every day, and the liver grew back as much as it was eaten. This kind of pain will not stop until no one comes out to die voluntarily and suffer for him.
The day when the unfortunate man was rescued finally came. Hundreds of years after Prometheus was hanged from a cliff and endured terrible pain, Hercules happened to pass by here in search of golden apples. When he was hoping to ask Prometheus for advice, he felt pity for the fate of the prisoner, because he saw a fierce eagle standing on the prisoner's knee and pecking at the liver of the unfortunate man. So he left the stick and the lion's skin behind him, bent his bow and took an arrow, and with one arrow, he shot the fierce eagle down from the liver of the victim. Then he untied the chain and took Prometheus away. But in order to meet Zeus' requirements, he made Chiron, a centaur who voluntarily gave up eternal life to die, the body double of Prometheus. However, in order to maintain Zeus' judgment that Prometheus would be hanged on the cliff forever, Prometheus must be made to wear an iron ring forever, and a small piece of stone from the Caucasus cliff is tied to the other end of the iron ring. In this way, Zeus can proudly say that his enemies have been locked in the Caucasus Mountains.