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Concept
Themis
Summary
In Greek mythology and religion, Themis (ˈθiːmᵻs; Themis) is the goddess and personification of justice, divine order, law, and custom. She is one of the twelve Titan children of Gaia and Uranus, and the second wife of Zeus. She is associated with oracles and prophecies, including the Oracle of Delphi. Her symbol is the Scales of Justice.
Themis means "divine law" rather than human ordinance, literally "that which is put in place", from the Greek verb títhēmi (τίθημι), meaning "to put."
To the ancient Greeks she was originally the organizer of the "communal affairs of humans, particularly assemblies." Moses Finley remarked of themis, as the word was used by Homer in the 8th century BCE, to evoke the social order of the 10th- and 9th-century Greek Dark Ages:
Themis is untranslatable. A gift of the gods and a mark of civilized existence, sometimes it means right custom, proper procedure, social order, and sometimes merely the will of the gods (as revealed by an omen, for example) with little of the idea of right.
Finley adds, "There was themis—custom, tradition, folk-ways, mores, whatever we may call it, the enormous power of 'it is (or is not) done.'"
In the Hymn to Apollo, Themis is referred to as "Ichnaea", meaning "Tracker".
Some classical descriptions of Themis describe a sober-looking woman holding scales. Themis is an earth goddess much like her mother, Gaia, and in some stories it is hard to tell the two apart. Some classical depictions of Themis show her holding a sword.
When Themis is disregarded, Nemesis brings just and wrathful retribution; thus Themis shared the small temple at Rhamnous with Nemesis. Themis is not wrathful; when a distraught Hera returned to Olympus after quarrelling with Zeus, Themis, "of the lovely cheeks," was the first to offer her a cup.
Themis presided over the proper relation between man and woman, the basis of the rightly ordered family (the family was seen as the pillar of the deme). Judges were often referred to as themistopóloi (the servants of Themis).
Official source
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