John Esposito // 4/30/08 // Greek Philosophical Writers: paper

What’s wrong with Agamemnon’s offer (Iliad 9)

Christopher Gill presents Achilles as defending a reciprocity-based ethic, a

specific instantiation of the ‘objective-participant’ type, by justifying his response to an

offense against heroic reciprocity. Gill’s Achilles crucially, and in contradistinction to

other commentators’ versions, presents Agamemnon’s personal offense against Achilles

as a particular case of a generalized violation of the ‘heroic code’, whose offensiveness

lies precisely in its failure to qualify as charis: the theft of booty justifies Achilles’

response, and dejustifies Agamemnon’s attempt to reconcile with Achilles in book 9,

precisely because charis, not wealth, is the medium of exchange. Briseis-apportioned is

charis, but not Briseis-simpliciter: charis, according to Gill, is a property attached to

things non-rigidly by a particular heroic-social event (the apportioning of spoils

following military victory). Briseis-returned (in book 9) no longer bears the charis-

property precisely because she is not being granted to Achilles freely, out of the bounty

won; therefore she does not qualify as charis, and therefore cannot function as exchange-

medium in the heroic reciprocity ethic. If Achilles had accepted Agamemnon’s offer,

then the offer-acceptance conjunction would have been an exchange; but since the things-

offered were not charis-bearers, therefore the exchange would not have been a charis-

exchange, hence not a heroic-reciprocity exchange; but since Achilles’ objection to

Agamemnon’s treatment consisted precisely in Agamemnon’s failure to recognize

Achilles as an equal (within the group of warrior-peers), this kind of non-charis/heroic-

exchange would not have addressed Agamemnon’s offense.

 This account is incomplete, as I hope to show below; more problematically, it

grants Agamemnon exactly the premise that Achilles, in rejecting the offer, denies. For

Odysseus’ and Phoenix’ arguments both address Achilles as Agamemnon’s offer treats

Achilles – that is, as a non-warrior-peer (in particular, as a child: in the case of the offer,

this becomes quite explicit when Agamemnon offers to make Achilles his son-in-law

(gambros, 9.142, 283): Achilles rejects O/P’s arguments identically to his rejection of the

gifts, but accepts Ajax’s argument as kata thumon (645) – that is, as addressing Achilles’

response to the offense (since that is what Achilles’ relevant thumos is), and hence also

addressing the offense (which subsists in the Achilles-Agamemnon warrior-relation, so

that ‘addressing Achilles’ response’ is just ‘addressing the offense of the Achilles-

Agamemnon relation’). But Ajax’s argument does not resolve the offense because his

argument – that the offense consists in just one girl, and girls are not very important (632-

9) – rests on a quantitative analysis (balancing ‘one-girl-loss’ against ‘comrade-betrayal’;

the argument actually becomes arithmetic when Ajax balances ‘one-girl-loss’ against

‘seven-girl-gain’ (638)) which Achilles rejects. Ajax’s argument is somehow the right

kind of argument – it ‘pushes the right buttons’, for it does touch Achilles’ thumos – but

the pro-fighting quantitative balance is either simply wrong or irrelevant. It would be

‘simply wrong’ if Ajax got the quantitative balance wrong – in this case Achilles would

(mentally) respond, ‘in fact losing one girl is more important to me than seven girls, or

fighting for my comrades’– or ‘irrelevant’ if the offense had nothing to do with balanced

quantities (this would deny the relevance of the Donlan-type ‘generalized reciprocity’

model).
 But charis-exchanges do have nothing to do with balanced quantities: they aren’t

‘quid pro quo’, or even ‘quodlibet pro quolibet’ (as the ‘generalized reciprocity’ model

would argue). If this claim is true, then the whole ‘generalized reciprocity’ model doesn’t

work for charis-exchanges; and in order to show this I would have to engage more

directly with the generalized-reciprocity scholarship; but this will wait for another paper.

Here I will present only the portions of the general argument necessary to discuss the

specific case of Achilles’ rejection of Agamemnon’s offer, using the relevant distinctions

to explain (a) most basically why Achilles cannot accept Agamemnon’s offer, and (b)

how Gill’s explanation agrees with Agamemnon in its most fundamental ontological

claim.

First, one of the key features of charis-exchanges is that they are free. This

(supposedly) says no more than that non-charis-exchanges are non-free because, in such

exchanges, goods are offered in expectation of some definite ‘reward’ – which is just a

restatement of the ‘mutual-benefit-maximizer’ analysis of any exchange, particularized to

the particular exchange – whereas charis-exchanges are free because they are not offered

in expectation of any definite reward. Reciprocity is not altruism because the reciprocal-

giver gives expecting that participating in a reciprocity-system will produce some self-

benefits that (because the benefit consists in ‘participation’) aren’t separable from other-

benefits, while the altruistic-giver gives expecting no self-benefit whatever (and, in fact,

insofar as the altruistic-giver expects any self-benefit, the gift is not altruistic – even if

this self-benefit consists in the gift itself (‘the joy of giving’), the other-benefit generated

by the gift (‘a mother’s love’), or any other-benefit inseparable from the self-benefit).

The reciprocity-gift cannot be called formally ‘self-interested’ because it does not

through itself entail some self-benefit (hence it does not entail some ‘definite’ self-

benefit; and its self-benefitting is not separate from its other-benefitting), but neither can

it be called ‘altruistic’: so ‘reciprocity culture’ is normally analyzed as a kind of mean

between the two, with ‘reciprocity’ (Donlan/Gill-types would argue) preferable to

‘altruism’ because (among other reasons) altruism does not maximize mutual benefit,

while reciprocity does. So no reciprocity-type exchange is supposed to be mutual-benefit-

maximizing through itself, but every reciprocity-type exchange is mutual-benefit-

maximizing through generating the reciprocators’ participation in a generalized-

reciprocity-system.

The problem with this model is that any mutual-benefit-maximizer depends on

relative valuation of the things-exchanged: this obtains indifferently to the ‘definiteness’

or ‘indefiniteness’ of the return expected, for both ‘definite’ and ‘indefinite’ returns are

(on this reciprocity-model) mutual-benefit-maximizers. Then all reciprocity-type

exchanges modeled by the previous paragraph (which I believe approximates the

standard Donlan/Gill/etc. model) necessarily entail that things-exchanged be relatively

valued (for only relative-valuation of the things-exchanged generates mutual-benefit-

maximization in exchanges). These relative-valuations normally obtain (on the part of the

things-valued) because of scarcity (on any equilibrium-based microeconomic model) –

but this is precisely what spoils destroy: spoils are distinguished from non-spoils just by

spoils’ externality (spoils are other people’s things) contradistinguished to non-spoils’

internality (non-spoils are our things). As long as this externality is maintained, the spoils

do not enter into the scarcity-calculus, and hence are not relative-valuation-susceptible

(and hence cannot be the things-exchanged in a scarcity-based exchange); if the

externality is not maintained, then they become internal, and hence enter the scarcity-

calculus. But if they do become internal, then they are no longer spoils, and as such have

nothing formally to do with whatever formally has to do with spoils. But warrior-culture

does formally have to do with spoils; in fact, warrior-peerhood is formally generated by

spoils-distribution, and is exactly the locus of the Achilles-Agamemnon quarrel in book

1.1 Agamemnon’s Briseis-theft is an offense formally against warrior-culture, hence

Briseis is the offense-matter precisely as spoils; hence Agamemnon’s offense, which

treats Briseis not as spoils but rather as relatively-valued thing-exchanged, is not against

the ‘indefinite-expectation’-type reciprocity-ethic (since this reciprocity-ethic’s

exchanges mutually maximize benefit on a scarcity-based relative-valuation), does not

treat spoils), but rather against this the warrior-ethic whose exchanges are charis-

exchanges of a non-scarcity-based/relative-valuation kind.

It follows from the principles just outlined that nothing within a scarcity-based

exchange-system can accept the charis-property, because in order for exchanges to occur
1
The genesis of the quarrel runs as follows: Calchas claims that Chryseis is not legitimate spoils (or at
least, that the god does not permit her to be so) (1.92-100); Agamemnon, infuriated, responds first that he
does not wish (ouk ethelon, 112) to accept the ransom-gifts (explaining this wish by Chryseis’ preferability
to Clytemnestra), then justifies his wish by the claim that it would not be fitting (oude eoike, 119) for
Agamemnon to be geras-less (agerastos, 119). This is Agamemnon’s first mistake: he first considers his
own preferences, and considers the spoils-distribution only afterwards, in rhetorical justification for his
wish. In reply Achilles notes the impossibility of a re-distribution, since no common store remains (123-4),
but does attempt to assuage Agamemnon’s wish by compensating him for his loss – in particular, by
promised future spoils-distribution (125-9), not by any offer of non-spoils (as Agamemnon will make to
Achilles in book 9, attempting to compensate for the stolen spoils). For Achilles, then, that which
constitutes the warriors in their warrior-peer-relationship (a point I will argue below) needs to be that in
which Agamemnon’s grievances are addressed (the future spoils-distribution). Agamemnon cannot even
understand the priority of something other than one’s own preferences: he accuses Achilles of deceptive
intent (klepte noo, 132), couches Achilles’ suggestion in terms of Achilles’ wish (etheleis, 133), and
threatens to take away someone else’s geras (135-9) (continuing his programme of treating warrior-peers
as individuals with conflicting preferences, whose disputes are to be resolved by force). Achilles’ reply to
Agamemnon’s threat explicitly describes the geras as something ‘the sons of the Achaeans gave me’
(dosan de moi huies Akhaion), thus re-emphasizing Agamemnon’s lack of special authority in the spoils-
distribution by appealing to the whole group’s authority. Achilles presents himself as geras-worthy insofar
as contributing to the warrior-group’s goal (163-71), while in the next speech Agamemnon openly denies
him credit for these contributions (178), encourages Achilles’ departure from the warrior-group (173-4),
boasts that he is better (pherteros) than Achilles (185), and entirely and explicitly rejects warrior-peerdom
when he presents his Briseis-theft as proof in others’ eyes that no-one is equal (ison) to him (185-6).
for mutual benefit within a scarcity-based system, the things-exchanged need to have

different relative values. But these relative values are determined by (a) the things’

relation to the exchange-parties (x wants j more than he wants k, and y wants k more than

he wants j, so x gives k to y and y gives j to x) and (b) the things’ (scarcity-relevant)

relation to each other: (a) generates the relative-valuation, and (b) constitutes it. (Another

way of putting this is that the exchangers’ relative-valuation of the things is the efficient

cause of the relative-valuation, while the things’ relation to each other is the relative-

valuation’s formal cause.) In book 9 of the Iliad, ‘Achilles’ fighting’ is more valuable to

Agamemnon than everything he offers. (This is true because of the conjunction of

Agamemnon’s martial ambitions and Achilles’ unique prowess: Agamemnon

needs/wants Achilles to fight because Achilles is the best fighter. Achilles himself is

working with this conjunction when he requests Thetis to persuade Zeus to let the Trojans

win for awhile, so that Agamemnon can suffer the effects of his offense.) But then the

Agamemnon-type exchange maximizes benefit on the scarcity-model, not the charis-

model: for Agamemnon is willing to offer all this wealth for Achilles only because there

is no-one like Achilles among the rest of the Achaeans. But note the description under

which Agamemnon is seeking Achilles’ return, viz., ‘the one having uniquely great

prowess’ (‘the best of the Achaeans’): Agamemnon is not seeking precisely Achilles, but

rather the Achilles-function: Agamemnon wants someone to ‘Achilleize’, i.e., slaughter

Trojans like no-one else can2, but it just so happens that the supply of Achilleizers is

limited to one. Hence Agamemnon seeks the exchange; this is the only reason

Agamemnon seeks the exchange. But this is a scarcity-based exchange, and hence not

2
This is clear from the exchanges at the council opening book 9, especially Nestor’s speech (96-113) and
Agamemnon’s reply (esp. 116-8); and also from Odysseus’ words at 305-6, to which Achilles immediately
responds.
charis-based; hence the things-exchanged are not being treated as ‘things charis’, but

rather as ‘things scarce’. Even Ajax’s book 9 argument depends on this factual claim –

viz., that ‘there is no-one like Achilles among the rest of the Achaeans’; so even Ajax

would have Achilles respond to the offer, not as Achilles, but as ‘the one uniquely suited

to protecting his comrades’ (i.e., ‘the Achilleizer’; the fact that Ajax has no interest in

‘the Achilleizer’ as victory-producing distinguishes him from Agamemnon, but does not

change the offer from seeking ‘the Achilleizer’). Agamemnon’s offer, if accepted, would

have Achilles giving fighting-like-the-best-warrior in return for Agamemnon’s gifts-

including-Briseis: but ‘fighting-like-the-best-warrior’ is conceptually indifferent to

Achilles or non-Achilles: Achilles is aristos only because he happens to be so, so his

best-ness is incidental to the offense, so his individual ‘Achilles-ness’ is incidental to the

offer.

But just this ‘individual Achilles-ness’ is not incidental to the offense, and hence,

if the offer is to address the offense, cannot be incidental to the offer. For if warrior-

culture is generated/maintained not by scarcity-based exchanges (which it can’t be,

because it’s generated by spoils, which exclude any scarcity-calculus insofar as spoils are

external) but rather by non-scarcity-based exchanges (that is, charis-exchanges of the

non-generalized-reciprocity kind), then ‘relation to spoils as such’ excludes ‘inclusion in

scarcity-calculus’: for spoils as such are non-internal, hence not included in the relative-

value-generating scarcity-calculus; and therefore, considering relations as founded in the

terms’ attributes and considering attributes as subject-parasitic (a position that admittedly

might be questioned for metaphysical reasons, but which can, I think, be invincibly

defended), things related to spoils as such, in respect of that relation, are not included in
the scarcity-calculus. Achilles, then, in respect of his relation to Briseis-as-spoils, is not

included in the scarcity-calculus; but Agamemnon’s offer, since it is a scarcity-type offer,

does include Achilles-as-superwarrior in the scarcity-calculus; therefore it does not treat

Achilles in respect of his relation to Briseis-as-spoils. But whatever is included in the

scarcity-calculus, is included as multipliable – which is just what it means to be a

‘scarcity-calculus’, i.e., ‘treatment of objects according to extensional quantity’. So

Agamemnon’s offer, because it treats Achilles as ‘superwarrior’ (for that is exactly what

Agamemnon wants in return for his gifts), treats him as ‘a superwarrior whose singularity

is guaranteed only by a contingent fact of the army’s make-up’: it does not formally treat

him as non-multipliable: but Achilles is essentially non-multipliable insofar and only

insofar as he is Achilles and not Ajax or Odysseus or some other possible ‘best of the

Achaeans’.

Moreover, precisely in treating Achilles as multipliable, Agamemnon’s offer

treats him as non-related to Briseis-as-spoils: for (a) Agamemnon’s offer’s failure to treat

Achilles in respect of his relation to Briseis-as-spoils and (b) Agamemnon’s offer’s

treatment of Achilles as multipliable (i.e., non-individual) are both generated by its

treatment of Achilles-as-superwarrior within the scarcity-calculus. But multipliables are

just non-individuals, and non-individuals are just properties (this is the (rather confusing)

modern formulation of Aristotle’s ‘non-substances are just accidents’ in its logical

equivalent ‘only first substances are non-predicable’; an adequate demonstration of what

I mean, which requires elucidation of Aristotle’s first/second substance distinction, would

require a full solution to the problem of universals): so Achilles-as-superwarrior is not

Achilles-as-individual/substance, but Achilles-as-bearer-of-the-superwarrior-property.

But property-bearing is individual-indifferent (i.e., properties are the kind of things that

can multiple individuals can ‘have’), so the material fact that Achilles is the only

superwarrior adequate to Agamemnon’s wish (viz., ‘to have the best of the Achaeans

fighting for me’; for Achilles is in fact the best of the Achaeans) does not formally

individualize the superwarrior-property to Achilles; and since exchange-terms are

exchange-terms only formally in respect of the exchange, Agamemnon’s offer’s

treatment of Achilles as superwarrior treats him as a non-individual (i.e., as bearer of the

‘superwarrior’ property). Moreover, this is true because every scarcity-based (hence

every relative-valuation-dependent, hence every mutual-benefit-maximizing) exchange

treats its terms formally as property-bearers, (since ‘scarcity’ entails ‘multipliability’,

which is just ‘non-individuality’).

But the relation between ‘non-treatment of Achilles-as-related-to-Briseis-as-

spoils’ and ‘treatment of Achilles as non-individual’ is closer than has been made explicit

to this point. For everything internal to the system described by a scarcity-calculus is

susceptible to treatment as multipliable=property-bearer (since system-inclusion entails

scarcity-calculability, which entails multipliability); therefore only system-external

things, or things as system-external, cannot be treated as property-bearers. This is exactly

what spoils are: but warrior-peers are formally constituted as warrior-peers precisely in

their relation to the spoils (that is, in the moira): therefore as warrior-peers, Achilles and

Agamemnon are system-external, and hence (in this relation) not treatable as property-

bearers. (This is why Nestor’s argument, which relates Achilles and Agamemnon as

system-internal, and describes both as (different-)property-bearers, does not address

either Agamemnon’s or Achilles’ anger, even though everything he says is perfectly true:
for although true, still only relevant within the system.) Therefore any warrior’s treatment

of any other warrior as (nothing but) property-bearer, is a failure to treat that warrior as a

warrior-peer; but this is exactly what Agamemnon does in his offer (in treating Achilles

as ‘superwarrior’), exactly what Odysseus and Phoenix do in their arguments (in treating

Achilles as ‘child’ (of Peleus (252-9), Phoenix (485), or Agamemnon (142, 283)), or

‘Meleager-like’ (529-601, esp. 600)), and at least epistemically-potentially what Ajax

does in his argument. But Ajax makes no claim about the offer’s supposed warrior-

peerhood-restorative power (though he does mention the Achaeans’ desire (memamen) to

be friends to Achilles again), and instead treats the offer as of the same sort as a blood-

price (632-6) (only much more extravagant, in return for far less harm done); and

Achilles, as blood-price-acceptor, is (epistemically-potentially) system-external (since

blood-price does not essentially import spoils, since blood is indifferent to spoils-ness or

non-spoils-ness). What makes Achilles reject Ajax’s offer is his recollection (mnhsomai)

of the actual offense (646-8), which, not being spoils-indifferent, necessarily treats

Achilles as system-internal; so that, even though Ajax was correct (kata thumon) in not

claiming that the offer might restore Achilles’ warrior-peerhood with Agamemnon

(which the offense, insofar as still obtaining, destroys), he simply left out the particular

character of the offense itself (which, once recalled, is exactly what prevents Achilles

from accepting the offer).

If this analysis is correct, then the requirements of a true charis-exchange-based

ethic are extremely robust: for such an ethic essentially has no rules, because rules are

syllogistic and hence (in order to maintain syllogistic validity) universal; if universal,

than formally relating properties (and so materially relating property-bearers); and then
not relating individuals as such. But charis-exchanges necessarily relate individuals as

such. (This ‘essential rulelessness’ is a kind of radicalized anti-Kantianism; it is (I think)

logically identical to Aristotle’s political notion of laws as necessary generalizing

approximations useless toward treating individuals as such, without ‘wise judges’ to

examine each case casuistically.) This charis-exchange model provides no answer to the

question, ‘what gift from Agamemnon would be acceptable to Achilles?’, because any

answer justifiable by (syllogistic) argument would not treat Achilles as individual: nor

could any offer be made by anyone not participating with Achilles in the spoils-

apportioning (and being formally constituted by this as warrior-peer with Achilles) treat

Achilles as precisely an individual; nor could any warrior-peer other than Agamemnon

make an offer particularly to redress Agamemnon’s offense, since both terms of the

extra-systemic charis-exchange are individuals. So only Agamemnon can redress the

wrong. But an even stronger claim can be made if we import some Aristotelian

distinctions, namely: no-one but Agamemnon could even come up with a way for

Agamemnon to redress it. For the offense whose matter is Briseis-as-spoils is formally a

violation of the Agamemnon-Achilles warrior-peer-relation; but since this relation

obtains between rational individuals (because these warriors are human), even the

reason(=logistikon) of these individuals is part of the term of the charis-exchange-

relation (for ‘Agamemnon’s reason(=logistikon)’ isn’t something really distinct from

Agamemnon (this again might be attacked on metaphysical grounds, but again, I think,

can be defended)). But since the offense-redresser must be reason(=logistikon)-principled

(since this is just what ‘come up with’ means), and hence its charis-relevant logos

reason-constituted, this ‘reason’ also must be Agamemnon’s (or else the offense-
redresser would be constituted partly of non-Agamemnon). In other words (and contra

the Adkinsian ‘results-culture’ model), since the warrior-peers are related as warrior-

peers precisely as individuals, the thought counts too, insofar as it informs the charis-

exchange: where ‘the thought’ doesn’t mean ‘the stuff somehow floating around inside

Agamemnon’s consciousness’ but rather ‘the logos characterizing the particular charis-

exchange as such’. In the Agamemnon-Achilles case, this is why ‘Briseis-returned’ is not

‘Briseis-as-spoils’: because Agamemnon is not offering her as ‘Briseis-as-spoils’ (and

hence extra-systemically), but rather as ‘Briseis-as-relatively-valued’ (and hence intra-

systemically): but this ‘offering’ is made to have this character (logos) by Agamemnon

(as a rational individual, which is to say, also in his logistikon).3 (Incidentally, this

logistikon/individual real-identity also accounts for the necessity of Achilles’ self-

explanation (contra Whitman, Parry) to his warrior-peers: for Agamemnon’s offense

might have altered their logistika toward affirming Achilles only as intra-systemic non-

individual (as seems in fact to have happened to Nestor, Odysseus, Phoenix, and at least

possibly to Ajax as well): but in relating to warrior-peers as individuals, Achilles relates

to them also in their logistika; therefore if their logistika affirm him only as property-

bearer, they themselves are not in warrior-peer relation to him. Only when their logistika

have been suitably altered (here, by Achilles’ rational persuasion), such that they

rationally accept Achilles as individual warrior-peer, will the relationship (of rational

individuals to rational individuals) be restored.)

So much for this sketch of ‘true charis-exchanges’. Briefly, then, let’s look at how

Gill’s presentation of Achilles’ rejection not only fails to offer a full account of the

rejection, but actually makes the same mistake as Agamemnon. The short form of the
3
Gill 1996 gestures in this direction at 146n181.
argument is this: Gill thinks that Agamemnon has ‘offended warrior-reciprocity’,

therefore Achilles is ‘a participant in warrior-reciprocity who has suffered, and perceives

himself to have suffered, some offense against this warrior-reciprocity’; therefore

Achilles must reflectively re-apply the warrior-reciprocity ethic to Agamemnon’s

offense, generating the ‘exemplary gesture’ that embodies this warrior-reciprocity-

accepting judgment of Agamemnon’s warrior-reciprocity-violating action. The

‘exemplary gesture’, however, is simply the embodiment of ‘an offense against warrior-

reciprocity’: it responds to (and embodies) only ‘warrior-reciprocity violated’, without

any reference to the particular character of the particular violation. Gill’s Achilles’ re-

application of the warrior-ethic – his projected departure from Troy as a ‘performance’ –

has nothing to do with Briseis, let alone Briseis-as-spoils contradistinguished to Briseis-

returned: it responds merely to ‘an [which is to say, any] offense against warrior-

reciprocity’. But then, since Achilles is offended precisely as extra-systematic individual

related to Briseis-as-spoils, Gill’s Achilles’ projected departure has nothing to do with

Achilles as offended. For Gill, Achilles’ offense-response must be unspecified to the

particular content of the offense, because it is primarily constituted by its communicative

exemplarity: Achilles’ ‘performance’ is the best response to Agamemnon’s offense

precisely insofar as it is the best way to communicate the offense to his fellow warrior-

peers.4 So Achilles’ response (for Gill) is warrior-ethic-relevant just insofar as it is

communicative, and communicative insofar as his situation might be common to all

warrior-peers: but since (for Gill) all community-members are related as fellow and

mutual reflective deliberators, Achilles can re-join his peers only by re-establishing this

communicative relation with them. But since the act of ‘communicative-relation-re-

4
Gill 1996, 143.
establishing’ is an example – that is, Achilles presenting himself as exemplary to others

like him – it does not treat Achilles as an individual, nor does it address the particular

offense Agamemnon has actually committed, but rather treats Achilles only insofar as he

has something (namely, warrior-society-membership) in common with the other warrior-

peers, and therefore formally in respect of a universal (the property ‘warrior-society-

membership’; again in Aristotle’s terms, only substances are incommunicable). Gill’s

philosophical problem is that all exempla are exempla precisely as universal, but the

terms of the warrior-peer-relation are individuals precisely as such.

Work Cited

Gill, C. 1996. Personality in Greek Epic, Tragedy, and Philosophy: the Self in Dialogue.
Oxford.