Homer’s Litai: Figurative or Literal? Heraclitus the Allegorist and Clement of Alexandria

The purpose of the present paper is to examine two diametrically opposed interpretations of the Homeric Prayers that were put forward by Heraclitus the Allegorist and Clement of Alexandria. This article shows that these divergent (figurative vs. literal) interpretations reflect not only the conflicting interests of their authors (the glorification of Homer vs. the glorification of Christianity) but also a significant difference between a pagan (polytheistic) and a Christian (monotheistic) attitude to the literal-figurative dimension of personifications.