What is PANDORA's BOX?

Question

what is it or what does it mean?

Answer 1

In Greek mythology, Pandora ("all gifted") was the first woman, fashioned by Zeus as part of the punishment of mankind for Prometheus' theft of the secret of fire. The myth of Pandora is very old, appears in several distinct versions, and has been interpreted in many ways. In all versions, however, the myth is a kind of theodicy, addressing the question of why there is evil in the world.

Hesiod, in his Works and Days, ca. 700 BC, has a very early version of the Pandora story

The legend
The titan Epimetheus ("hindsight") was responsible for giving a positive trait to each and every animal. However, when it was time to give man a positive trait, there was nothing left. Prometheus ("foresight"), his brother, felt that because man was superior to all other animals, man should have a gift no other animal possessed. So Prometheus set forth to steal fire from Zeus and handed it over to man.

Zeus was enraged and decided to punish Prometheus and his creation: mankind. To punish Prometheus, Zeus chained him in unbreakable fetters and set an eagle over him to eat his liver each day, as the eagle is Zeus' sacred animal. Prometheus was an immortal, so the liver grew back every day, but he was still tormented daily from the pain, until he was freed by Heracles during The Twelve Labours.

To punish mankind, Zeus ordered the other gods to make Pandora as a poisoned gift for man. Pandora was given several traits from the different gods: Hephaestus molded her out of clay and gave her form; Athena clothed her and adorned her with necklaces made by Hephaestus as well as taught her manual dexterity and how to spin; Aphrodite gave her beauty; Apollo gave her musical talent and a gift for healing; Demeter taught her to tend a garden; Poseidon gave her a pearl necklace and the ability to never drown; Zeus made her idle, mischievous, and foolish; Hera gave her curiosity; Hermes gave her cunning, boldness and charm. The name Pandora, thus, derives from the fact she's received gifts from all deities: "all gifts".


Pandora by John William Waterhouse, 1896The most significant of these gifts, however, was a jar, (later mis-translated as "box"), given to Pandora either by Hermes or Zeus. Before he was chained to the rock, Prometheus had warned Epimetheus not to take any gifts from the gods. Epimetheus did not listen to his brother, however, and when Pandora arrived, he fell in love with her. Hermes told him that Pandora was a gift to the titan from Zeus, and he warned Epimetheus to not open the jar, which was Pandora's dowry.

Until then, mankind had lived a life in a paradise without worry. Epimetheus told Pandora never to open the jar she had received from Zeus. However, Pandora's curiosity got the better of her and she opened it, releasing all the misfortunes of mankind (plague, sorrow, poverty, crime, despair, greed, etc.). Once opened, she shut it in time to keep one thing in the jar: hope 1. The world remained extremely bleak for an unspecified interval, until Pandora "chanced" to revisit the box again, at which point Hope fluttered out. Thus, mankind always has hope in times of evil.

In another version of the myth, hope is considered the worst of the potential evils, because it is equated with terrifying foreknowledge. By preventing hope from escaping the jar, Pandora in a sense saves the world from the worst damage.

The daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora was Pyrrha, who married Deucalion and was one of the two who survived the deluge.

The story of Pandora's Box can be interpreted in more than one way, but is often thought to be a version of "curiosity killed the cat".

Most scholars 2 contend that Pandora's "box" is a mistranslation, and her "box" may have been a large jar or vase, forged from the earth, perhaps because of similarities in shape between a jar and a woman's uterus 4. There is also evidence 3 to suggest that Pandora herself was the "jar".

The mistranslation is usually attributed to the 16th Century Humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam when he translated Hesiod's tale of Pandora. Hesiod uses the word "pithos" which refers to a jar used to store grain. It is possible that Erasmus confused "pithos" with "pyxis" which means box. The scholar M.L. West, has written that Erasmus may have mixed up the story of Pandora with the story found elsewhere of a box which was opened by Psyche 5.

The original Greek text from 700 BC of Hesiod's Works and Days, whence we get the earliest extant story of Pandora and the jar, does not specify exactly what was in the box Pandora opened. 7

The scholar M.L. West has written that the story of Pandora and her jar is derived from a pre-Hesiodic story or legend and this is what causes the confusion and problems with Hesiod's version and its inconclusiveness. He writes that in earlier legends, Pandora was married to Prometheus, and cites the ancient Catalogue of Women as preserving this older tradition, and that the jar may have at one point contained only good things for mankind. He also writes that it may have been that Epimetheus and Pandora and their roles were transposed in the pre-Hesiodic stories and legends. He remarks that there is a curious correlation between Pandora being made out of earth in Hesiod's story, to what is in Apollodorus that Prometheus created man from water and earth. (Apollodorus, Library and Epitome, ed. Sir James George Frazer.[2] ) 8

Martin P. Nilsson writes that the part about Hope being left in the box was likely added later: a sequel to the original legend. 9

The tale of Pandora's Box also shows how Early Greeks imagined woman to be created by the Gods as evil on the inside and beautiful on the outside in order to make men miserable. Various feminist scholars believe that in an earlier set of myths, Pandora was the Great Goddess, provider of the gifts that made life and culture possible, and that Hesiod's tale can be seen as part of a propaganda campaign to demote her from her previously revered status. For an alternate view of Pandora, see Charlene Spretnak's Lost Goddesses of Early Greece; A Collection of Pre-Hellenic Mythology, 1978. For an alternate view of goddesses in general, and stories such as those of Eve and Pandora regarding women and evil, see Merlin Stone's When God Was a Woman.

The presence of Hope in a jar full of evils for mankind raises questions about whether Hope is a comfort for the evil mankind experiences, or whether the hope for something better must be interpreted as the damnation of mankind. According to Hesiod hope implies the control of the future, and since no one can control the future, to have hope is to be deluded 6. Others think that Hope being left in the box symbolizes Hope as often being humanity's only comfort.

Answer 2

A story from Greek Mythology - when Pandora opens the box it introduces evil into the world. It is now a metaphor for taking an irreversible step that appears to be progress, but that you can never return from and that will ultimately make the world worse.

Nearly all religions have similar stories - for example Eve taking the apple in the Bible is quite similar.

In the modern world, the developments of nuclear fission and genetic engineering are seen by some as a type of Pandora's box.

Answer 3

In Greek mythology, Pandora was the first woman on earth. Zeus ordered Hephaestus, the god of craftsmanship, to create her and he did, using water and earth. The gods endowed her with many talents; Aphrodite gave her beauty, Apollo music, Hermes persuasion, and so forth. Hence her name: Pandora, "all-gifted".
When Prometheus stole fire from heaven, Zeus took vengeance by presenting Pandora to Epimetheus, Prometheus' brother. With her, Pandora had a box which she was not to open under any circumstance. Impelled by her natural curiosity, Pandora opened the box, and all evil contained escaped and spread over the earth. She hastened to close the lid, but the whole contents of the box had escaped, except for one thing which lay at the bottom, and that was Hope.

Answer 4

In about 1920, during the roaring twenties, a man and his wife, named Fred and Alice Box named there new daughter Pandora Box. Well the kids in the neighborhood were kind of strange and started calling poor Pandora Box, Pandora's Box out every time they saw her, and then one day this little snot nosed kid yelled out, "I see Pandora's Box". Well, you can kind of guess what happened after that and, the Parents took pity on their daughter and changed he first name to Judy, but the expression stuck in the American vocabulary anyway. So Pandora's Box is still being called out by little snot nosed kids.
That is the story the way my Father told it. Believe it or not!

Answer 5

Mind not the poster above me.

According to Edith Hamilton in Mythology the source of all misfortune was Pandora's curiosity. "The gods presented her with a box into which each had put something harmful, and forbade her ever to open it. Then they sent her to Epimetheus, who took her gladly although Prometheus had warned him never to accept anything from Zeus. He took her, and afterward when that dangerous thing, a woman, was his, he understood how good his brother's advice had been. For Pandora, like all women, was possessed of a lively curiosity. She had to know what was in the box. One day she lifted the lid­and out flew plagues innumerable, sorrow and mischief for mankind. In terror Pandora clapped the lid down, but too late. One good thing, however, was there­Hope. It was the only good the casket had held among the many evils, and it remains to this day mankind's sole comfort in misfortune."

Answer 6

Jupiter had malignantly crammed into this box all the diseases, sorrows, vices, and crimes that afflict poor humanity; and the box was no sooner opened, than all these ills flew out, in the guise of horrid little brown-winged creatures, closely resembling moths. These little insects fluttered about, alighting, some upon Epimetheus, who had just entered, and some upon Pandora, pricking and stinging them most unmercifully. They then flew out through the open door and windows, and fastened upon the merrymakers without, whose shouts of joy were soon changed into wails of pain and anguish


it symbolizes all the diseases, sorrows, vices, and crimes that afflict poor humanity

Answer 7

The titan Epimetheus ("hindsight") was responsible for giving a positive trait to each and every animal. However, when it was time to give man a positive trait, there was nothing left. Prometheus ("foresight"), his brother, felt that because man was superior to all other animals, man should have a gift no other animal possessed. So Prometheus set forth to steal fire from Zeus and handed it over to man.

Zeus was enraged and decided to punish Prometheus and his creation: mankind. To punish Prometheus, Zeus chained him in unbreakable fetters and set an eagle over him to eat his liver each day, as the eagle is Zeus' sacred animal. Prometheus was an immortal, so the liver grew back every day, but he was still tormented daily from the pain, until he was freed by Heracles during The Twelve Labours.

To punish mankind, Zeus ordered the other gods to make Pandora as a poisoned gift for man. Pandora was given several traits from the different gods: Hephaestus molded her out of clay and gave her form; Athena clothed her and adorned her with necklaces made by Hephaestus as well as taught her manual dexterity and how to spin; Aphrodite gave her beauty; Apollo gave her musical talent and a gift for healing; Demeter taught her to tend a garden; Poseidon gave her a pearl necklace and the ability to never drown; Zeus made her idle, mischievous, and foolish; Hera gave her curiosity; Hermes gave her cunning, boldness and charm. The name Pandora, thus, derives from the fact she's received gifts from all deities: "all gifts".
Pandora by John William Waterhouse, 1896
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Pandora by John William Waterhouse, 1896

The most significant of these gifts, however, was a jar, (later mis-translated as "box"), given to Pandora either by Hermes or Zeus. Before he was chained to the rock, Prometheus had warned Epimetheus not to take any gifts from the gods. Epimetheus did not listen to his brother, however, and when Pandora arrived, he fell in love with her. Hermes told him that Pandora was a gift to the titan from Zeus, and he warned Epimetheus to not open the jar, which was Pandora's dowry.

Until then, mankind had lived a life in a paradise without worry. Epimetheus told Pandora never to open the jar she had received from Zeus. However, Pandora's curiosity got the better of her and she opened it, releasing all the misfortunes of mankind (plague, sorrow, poverty, crime, despair, greed, etc.). Once opened, she shut it in time to keep one thing in the jar: hope 1. The world remained extremely bleak for an unspecified interval, until Pandora "chanced" to revisit the box again, at which point Hope fluttered out. Thus, mankind always has hope in times of evil.

In another version of the myth, hope is considered the worst of the potential evils, because it is equated with terrifying foreknowledge. By preventing hope from escaping the jar, Pandora in a sense saves the world from the worst damage.

The daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora was Pyrrha, who married Deucalion and was one of the two who survived the deluge.

Answer 8

well theres alotta myths but one story is that there was a beautiful box made from a god or watever trying to seduce men... when a army commander opened it... well his whole army died of plague... opening pandoras box means opening something that u cant control or wont grasp...

Answer 9

Pandora has it between her legs.

Answer 10

it is a box where it is forbidden to open because all the evil will come out of it and the bottom of it is hope.

Answer 11

well i suppose its a story about a girl and all her troubles that she taught she would face after opening a box that she had.