Being close to Halloween, it might be good to consider one of the metaphors assigned to pet animals in history.
Many have heard of the “hounds from hell,” but few know what it means. That’s OK because the image added to people’s brains is frightful enough.
Cerberus, in Greek mythology, is a multiheaded dog that guards the gates of Hades, the underworld, or hell; take your pick. His job is to keep the dead from escaping. Cerberus is but one dog, not “hounds,” plural. The title fits, however, because when he sleeps, one of his heads is always awake and on guard.
The Hades of Greek mythology was just a subterranean dwelling place for the dead unlike the Christian concept of hell which is for unrepentant souls. Hades (same name) was the god who ruled Hades and the dead were his subjects.
Some say he wasn’t evil, like Satan. But he was amoral and an autocrat. He, like the other gods, wasn’t bound by laws. So, the whole party of gods could be frivolous, autocratic, vengeful, unyielding, but also be moved to acts of kindness and compassion.
In Christian hell, there are no dogs mentioned but there are minor-league devils who do the dirty work with pitchforks.
In 1949, Howard Washington Thurman, an African-American theologian, philosopher and leader wrote his seminal text, “Jesus and the Disinherited.” The book developed out of a series of lectures Thurman presented at Samuel Huston College in Austin, Texas, in 1948.
In Thurman’s books he describes the “three hounds of Hell.” He labeled the hounds as fear, hypocrisy and hatred. Thurman believed that these three human failings motivated much of the destructive behavior caused to oneself and others over time.
Thurman also believed that until we can eliminate these three “hounds,” not much change for the better can occur. According to Wikipedia, the book is Thurman’s interpretation of Jesus’ teachings through the experience of the oppressed and it discusses nonviolent responses to oppression.
John Masefield was an English poet and write and was the UK’s Poet Laureate from 1930 until 1967. He wrote a little poem about 1920 entitled, “The Hounds of Hell.” I say “little” in jest. The poem is 3,551 words long and in 12-point type and in stanzas, it eats up 15 pages.
That said, if there ever was one piece of classic poetry to read to kids around Halloween, this might be it. Plan on it taking several nights. Consider:
“What hounds are these that hunt the night?”
The shepherds asked in fear.
“Look, there are calkins clinking bright;
They must be coming here.”
And these, not in order:
They came to where the hounds had fed,
And in that trampled place
They found a pedlar lying dead,
With horror in his face.
“Black” (said the traveler), “black and swift,
Those running devils came;
Scoring to cry with hackles stifft,
And grin-jowls dropping flame.”
Then presently a cry rang out,
And a mort blew for the kill;
A shepherd with his throat torn out
Lay dead upon the hill.
Great stuff. Happy Halloween all.
Powell is the public information officer for the Washington State University College of Veterinary Medicine, which provides this column as a community service. For questions or concerns, email cpowell@vetmed.wsu.edu.
